America Needs More Predator Submarines to Stop China
The Pentagon says budget constraints are forcing it to buy only one Virginia class attack boat per year.
Apex predator surfaces Down Under, August 2023.
Photographer: Tony McDonough /AFP/Getty Images
My first job after graduating from the US Naval Academy in the late 1970s was as the anti-submarine warfare officer on a new Spruance class destroyer. The ship was bristling with equipment to hunt and kill submarines, including an advanced sonar suite to locate the thousands of tons of steel in the hull of a sub.
But here is the truth: A destroyer on the surface is essentially little more than a target for a cutting-edge nuclear-powered attack submarine. Without a great deal of help from carrier-based anti-submarine aircraft or land-based maritime patrol planes like the P-3 Orion, destroyers are going to lose a fight with a sub.