A former partner in a top-10 global management consulting firm, Joe Buff is a seasoned risk analyst and professional writer on national security and defense preparedness. Two of his non-fiction articles received annual literary awards from the Naval Submarine League. He is also a national bestselling author of tales of near-future warfare featuring nuclear submariners and special operations forces in action at their bravest and best. Joe holds a master's degree in math from MIT, earned under a National Science Foundation Fellowship. He worked as an intern at the Argonne National Laboratory. Previously a qualified actuary for twenty years, with extensive experience at interpreting policy implications of dire "what if" scenarios, he is now a member of the Society for Risk Analysis, a non-partisan international scholarly body headquartered in McLean, VA.
Joe's father was an enlisted man in the Navy (Seabees in the Pacific Theater) from 1946 through 1951, and his uncle was a merchant mariner on the North Atlantic convoys late in World War II, before being drafted into the U.S. Army to serve in the Occupation of Nazi Germany. Joe is a Life Member of the following Navy-related organizations: U.S. Naval Institute, the Navy League of the United States, the Fellows of the Naval War College, CEC/Seabees Historical Foundation, and the Naval Submarine League. During 2004, after having been a guest luncheon speaker at their Annual National Convention, Joe became a sponsored Life Associate Member of the U.S. Submarine Veterans, Inc. He was recently made an Honorary Life Associate Member of the Navy Seabee Veterans of America, partly in recognition of his pro bono work for Operation Seabees Knowledge.
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May 25, 2005
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at the Frontlines.]
Submarines rank as true capital ships of the 21st century. They stand in the front line of American sea power, and will do so for decades to come. Whether in a peacekeeping or warfighting mode, they can take care of themselves and take on anything an enemy throws their way. They've evolved tremendously, with unique mission capabilities, since the first submersible warship was commissioned into the U.S. Navy over one hundred years ago. That pace of submarine technical and tactical innovation is, if anything, more fast-paced now than ever before in military history. And as tools for preserving our national security, we just can't live without them in robust numbers. (I'll come back to these central themes after a recap of the bigger picture.)
Eternal controversy, perpetual success: Naval submarines and their crews have always co-existed with a climate of nationwide controversy and debate as to their proper roles and even their relevance. But whenever the clarion call to arms was sounded, in a too-often complacent and unprepared America, talented improvisation by our submariners helped save the day. Repeatedly, during conflict after conflict, the new things that old subs could do held delightful surprises, and the infinite versatility of these platforms impressed all those in the know. Their lineage and utilization follow a twisted trail over the years, which itself forms interesting reading -- required reading to make informed decisions about acquisition planning today.
Walk along this trail with me and you'll see what I mean. A side lesson we'll learn is that trends in global warfare can't be managed like they're a business, and main events or changes -- discontinuities -- can't be predicted by spreadsheeting.
As commerce raiders in World War I, some people considered submariners too ungentlemanly, even calling them modern pirates. Yet in that very same role in World War II, sinking enemy merchant ships, American submarines gallantly led the charge to retake the western Pacific from Imperial Japan -- when our battleships still sat crippled or sunk in Pearl Harbor, and our aircraft carriers were initially badly overstretched.
For a while between the world wars, subs were thought of as surface-fleet escorts and scouts, or as harbor-defense vessels, depending on the at-sea endurance of the particular submarine class. Neither role really panned out at the time, yet nowadays no carrier strike group's commander would even think of steaming near a global conflict zone without one or several nuclear subs on his team. In the context of homeland security, when a terrorist or rogue sub might sneak near our shores by a shrewd exploitation of oceanographic conditions, severe weather, and other tricks, harbor defense isn't trivial. Funny how concepts that once seemed quaint can take on so much immediacy, isn't it?
American submarines in W.W.II were also desperately pressed into service as forward-deployed radar pickets, giving early warning of approaching enemy planes -- especially the dreaded kamikazes. (Subs were a lot more survivable at this than destroyers, since they could dive after radioing an alarm; all the destroyers could do was get sunk.) Other subs covertly emplaced, supplied, and extracted what we'd now call special operations forces, in all theaters. This ranged from supporting coast watchers in the Pacific, to the Brits towing X-Craft and other minisubs in the battle again Nazi Germany. Subs sank enemy warships aplenty, too, including aircraft carriers and even surfaced submarines. Whenever requested, they saved downed aviators -- each man a priceless asset -- from Japanese-occupied islands or the cruel sea. George H. W. Bush probably owes his life to U.S. Navy submariners -- and indirectly so does his son, our current commander in chief. Dubya ought to reflect on that.
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When World War II ended and led straight to the Cold War, submarine mission roles changed again, in ways undreamed of before, but they remained as necessary as ever to freedom and peace: At first the Silent Service soldiered on with diesel boats, either leftovers from the big shooting war, or "improved" derivative classes. Sonar science, and the importance of quieting, advanced in leaps and bounds. Nuclear weapons began to proliferate from the moment of their birth, and practical nuclear propulsion for submarines followed a decade thereafter. Nuclear-powered fast attacks (SSNs) revolutionized submarine ops, becoming the first-ever genuine "submarines" (as opposed to "submersibles") -- able to stay deeply submerged for prolonged periods. No more that risky daily snorkeling or surfacing to run the noisy diesel engines and recharge the flammable batteries! Genuine ongoing stealth had at last arrived. HOO-YAH.
When subs and early cruise missiles were wedded, new types of warship emerged, the SSG and SSGN. When nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles joined the show, the strategic deterrent strength of SSBNs came to the fore. Concurrently, homing torpedoes able to attack a submerged and evading target grew ever more effective and reliable. The best sub-hunters, instead of surface ships or aircraft, became other subs. That antisubmarine job took on huge urgency when a single enemy SSBN could (and still can) potentially wipe out a dozen -- later, with MIRVs, two hundred -- friendly cities and bases. Spying against the other side acquired new significance, and undersea superiority against our opponent's nuclear submarines became one key to democracy's and civilization's survival. The Cold War's psy-ops arena was one where the Silent Service played an absolutely indispensable part: Successful American crews messed with the minds of the Russkie submariners they trailed, and through them messed with the minds in the Kremlin. By amazing but classified feats of eavesdropping, they read those Kremlin minds as if they had ESP.
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