Will Strategic Submarines be Vulnerable?

Abstract

in view of the increasing emphasis placed upon strategic submarines under the Reagan strategic program announced October 2, 1981, it is of interest to review the prospects for survivability of such submarines in the foreseeable future. This is particularly timely because the Scowcroft Commission has confirmed the U.S. inability to identify a survivable land-basing posture for the MX missile and because the Soviet Union will presumably soon be faced with the vulnerability of its own silo-based ICBM force, whether by reentry vehicles on U.S. ICBMs or from U.S. SLBMs. Antisubmarine warfare (ASW) techniques and capabilities important for strategic purposes are quite different from those which can be employed in tactical antisubmarine operations. Strategic offensive submarines are able to carry out their mission-delivering nuclear weapons against the homeland of an opponent-while, at the same time, limiting their own vulnerability by utilizing evasive modes of deployment and operation. Tactical, or attack, submarines, on the other hand, must approach their target-warships, merchant ships, a chokepoint to be mined, or the like-to be successful; this limits their flexibility in operational decisions. Furthermore, the contest between tactical submarines and ASW forces may take place over months or years, involves no trailing of submarines but the kill of submarines essentially on sight, and could be modulated by either side to its own advantage. In a long war of attrition, for example, the naval forces of one side may be kept at home or in sanctuaries, so that the enemy's attack submarines would have no targets. The attack submarines themselves may be kept at home or out of danger if using them were deemed too hazardous because of their vulnerability. In contrast, to be effective and worth contemplating, ASW against strategic submarines would have to threaten to destroy almost all offensive submarines within a few days at most. Otherwise, ASW would be superfluous, since both U.S. and Soviet forces would be vulnerable over a period of months to repeated attacks on their accustomed ports.1