Posted on 02/09/2011 4:00:23 PM PST by ErnstStavroBlofeld
Thanks to the recent announcement that the Pentagon is officially on board for now with the general strategy to buy replacement submarines for the Ohio-class strategic boats, it is time to hunt for the next fleet of boomers.
This is no small Pentagon program by any measure. For fiscal 2012, the Navy estimates it will spend about $1 billion for research and development alone for the replacement program, according to sub-builder General Dynamics Electric Boat Division. It will likely cost up to $40 billion just to buy the subs, and overall program costs could reach $100 billion or more. Even for the Defense Department, that is real money especially in these days of growing financial austerity within the Pentagon and there is certain to be pressure on the Navy to keep a lid on costs for the new boomers.
One of the hints on just how the Navy might do that was dropped in a statement about granting earlier this month of the Pentagons Milestone A authority. The service says, The Ohio replacement will leverage the successful Virginia-class acquisition program. That particular line, analysts surmise, could well mean the Navy would entertain and perhaps even embrace a multiyear submarine construction contract proposal similar to the deal now being used for the Virginia attack boats. Indeed, the Navy and Pentagon might also be open to a teaming agreement similar to the one employed for the Virginia-class subs, where Electric Boat and Northrop Grummans Newport News, Va., shipyards both build and assemble the Virginias.
(Excerpt) Read more at aviationweek.com ...
Good news. I’m not sure how they could make them any more stealthy, short of an active ambient noise generator and AIP. I’m also wondering if they have figured out a way to disguise the subs’ magnetic signature.
That, or a cloaking device.
China will lend to us as long as we control the ME oil fields. They won’t like America when he gets angry. Bruce Banner turns into the Hulk on bad days. If America has too bad a day, someone will pay. That’s a fact. Otherwise, ask yourself, why are the Chinese keeping us going?
That’s the thing about the lending business. As long as you have valuable unsecured collateral, you are in business. Until another army can vanquish our army from the middle east, we have unsecured collateral and lots of it.
Why are we replacing the Ohio subs already?
I remember meeting the first CO of the USS Alaska (SSBN-732), seems like just yesterday.
LOL, when you have several billion uneducated people, that could turn on you and kill you in a heart beat, you try to keep a large portion of them happy and making a living.
we could license build some of those Dolphin class boats
the Germans sold to Israel. Or some of those Swedish Gotland
class with AIP.
Vewy qwiet...
r o g e r t h o s e q u i e t b o a t s
It really doesn’t seem all that long ago does it? I remember watching the Phil Donahue show when he had a special regarding the need for the Ohio Class. My recollection was that he went local to Bangor, Washington to host the special. At the time I didn’t understand why anyone would be opposed to it.
We buy 200 more F-22 Raptors for $30 billion,
200 more C-17 transports for $40 billion,
and 200 more KC-767 air refueling tankers for $30 billion.
Oh, that's Air Force and the Navy wants to spend money. But what of the Marines and Army?
Give the Army and Marines 2,000 A-10 Thunderbolts/Warthogs for about $20 billion. Then give them another $10 billion in ammo and fuel.
Then replace all the barrels on all M16s/M4s and M249s with barrels for necked up 5.56 which is the 6.5 MPC?. Yes, that is all it would take to get a 110 Sierra HP in the same lowers, uppers, mags, belt links, etc. That all would only cost maybe half a billion dollars. Add a half million sets of body armor for another half billion. Another billion dollars for 10 billion rounds of new ammo. All that and we still have tens of billions left for...
7,000 M1114 uparmored HMMWVs for one billion dollars and 1,000 M1117 Guardian Armored Security Vehicle for another billion.
Still a total less than six or seven new subs.
But the Navy...
Okay, how about equipping the Navy's surface ships for the same blue crew and gold crew rotation which the subs use. Get twice the on station time out of the same ships. See the following CBO report
Crew Rotation in the Navy: The Long-Term Effect on Forward Presence
“
This is no small Pentagon program by any measure.
“
If Obama...
and our Chinese lenders...
permit this it will be a major miracle.
Why?
Because all the body armor and F-22s in the world are not the deterrent that keeps the wolves at bay.
But the wolves are not deterred by our nukes because they know we are too chicken to use them.
If that were the case, we’d already be overrun.
Strategic nuclear deterrence is factored in to the procurement decisions made by our primary nuclear adversaries, China and Russia. That being said, our strategic nuclear arsenal was never designed to do anything except: A) retaliate against a nuclear strike, and; B) keep a potential aggressor from making that nuclear strike to begin with. The only exception we have to this doctrine are tactical nukes, and as they aren’t part of the strategic picture to begin with they are the exception that proves the rule.
Any idea that the nuclear sword was meant to deter conventional attack is secondary and even tertiary to its primary mission. Our conventional forces are the prime mover when it comes to conventional deterrence, which is why we planned for conventional engagement in Europe without the use of nukes as a strategic weapon.
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