{"id":67089,"date":"2024-05-09T09:45:00","date_gmt":"2024-05-09T09:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/uncategorized\/2024\/05\/09\/us-navys-submarine-fleet-is-too-small-heres-how-selling-some-may-help\/"},"modified":"2026-08-18T20:53:26","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T20:53:26","slug":"us-navys-submarine-fleet-is-too-small-heres-how-selling-some-may-help","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/naval\/2024\/05\/09\/us-navys-submarine-fleet-is-too-small-heres-how-selling-some-may-help\/","title":{"rendered":"US Navy\u2019s submarine fleet is too small. Here\u2019s how selling some may help."},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This is the first story of a two-part series on how the U.S. submarine force is participating in the trilateral AUKUS alliance. <\/i>Click here<\/i><\/a> to read the second story.<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n\n

ABOARD THE SUBMARINE DELAWARE OFF FLORIDA\u2019S COAST \u2014 The attack submarine Delaware<\/a> silently pulled away from the pier at Port Everglades, past the pleasure craft and the cargo ships, and then sank beneath the waves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The U.S. Navy\u2019s Virginia-class submarine was showing off for VIPs on board, performing \u201cangles and dangles\u201d \u2014 diving sharply and listening for anything not safely stowed to go tumbling \u2014 piping simulated targets into its combat system, and taking simulated torpedo shots at the imaginary surface ships.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Though the April 4 demonstration is a far cry from the complex training Delaware\u2019s crew will conduct later this year ahead of the boat\u2019s deployment to U.S. European Command\u2019s theater, leaders said any at-sea opportunity benefits the crew.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the need for at-sea time butts up against a problematic reality for the Navy: It has 49 attack submarines, despite a formal requirement for 66.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The fleet size has remained stagnant for at least a decade, even as demand for these stealthy forces increased. Attack submarines would be pivotal in a conflict against China. They\u2019re also in high demand within the European theater in order to counter Russia\u2019s sophisticated submarine fleet. And they\u2019ve even made history in the Middle East, with the Virginia-class sub John Warner becoming the first in its class to fire Tomahawk missiles in combat during a 2018 strike on Syrian chemical weapons facilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The situation will worsen before it improves, according to the Navy\u2019s long-range shipbuilding and fleet inventory plan, which shows the force dipping to 47 later this decade before hovering in the mid-50s for many years. The fleet isn\u2019t projected to hit 66 until 2054, well beyond the \u201cdecade of concern\u201d \u2014 when military officials say the threat of conflict with China will peak.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Furthermore, the U.S. Navy intends to sell at least three, and as many as five, of these attack submarines to Australia as part of the trilateral AUKUS pact<\/a> that also involves the U.K.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
From left, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, U.S. President Joe Biden and British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak hold a news conference during the AUKUS summit on March 13, 2023, at Naval Base Point Loma in San Diego Calif. (Jim Watson\/AFP via Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Still, Vice Adm. Rob Gaucher said that, perhaps counterintuitively, selling the submarines to Australia will help the strapped undersea fleet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By delivering the boats to an ally who will operate them in coordination with American boats, \u201cwe get more submarines far forward. We get a port that gives us access\u201d to the Indo-Pacific region, the commander of naval submarine forces said during a panel at the Sea-Air-Space conference in April.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe get the opportunity to leverage an ally who can help us with manning and operating. We get surge capacity because now I have another area [where] I can do maintenance.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Crewing and maintenance woes<\/h1>\n\n\n\n

Gaucher told Defense News the submarine fleet faces two vexing problems today and into the coming years: crewing and maintenance<\/a>. But bringing Australia into the fold could help with both.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the COVID-19 pandemic<\/a>, the submarine force stepped back from recruiting<\/a>. More broadly, as the Navy\u2019s overall crewing levels have been tight, the force opted to focus on operations at sea rather than recruiting ashore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve put a focus back on that,\u201d Gaucher said, though he declined to discuss the size of the submarine force and to quantify its shortfall. But already \u201cwe feel the impact of that recruiting shortfall.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Offsetting that will be Australia\u2019s growing nuclear-trained submarine force, as the nation builds a cadre of sailors and officers who will crew its Virginia-class submarines in the 2030s and its SSN-AUKUS boats in the 2040s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The U.S. has already graduated the first Australian naval officers from nuclear power school. Gaucher said during the panel discussion that, by the end of this year, the Navy would graduate about 50 nuclear-trained operators and another 50 submarine combat operators. Those numbers are expected to grow in the coming years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gaucher told Defense News these sailors will train on American submarines for the rest of this decade, increasing the number of individuals qualified to stand watch on American boats, which in turn produces some flexibility in crewing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
The U.S. Virginia-class submarine Delaware arrives in T\u00f3rshavn on June 26, 2023, for a scheduled port visit, marking the first time a U.S. nuclear-powered submarine has moored in the Faroe Islands. (Cmdr. Michael N. Mowry\/U.S. Navy)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Similarly, the submarine force is strapped for maintenance capacity. Getting boats out of maintenance on time<\/a> is Gaucher\u2019s top focus, but it\u2019s an issue across the Navy and won\u2019t be fully achieved until perhaps 2027 or 2028<\/a>, service officials have said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, around 2027 the Navy will begin operating as many as four Virginia-class subs out of the HMAS Stirling submarine base in Western Australia, with local personnel conducting routine maintenance on the boats as they grow their repair capacity. That will reduce pressure on the maintenance system back at home, Gaucher said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bryan Clark, director of the Hudson Institute think tank\u2019s Center for Defense Concepts and Technology, told Defense News that offloading four subs\u2019 worth of routine maintenance to HMAS Stirling will ease the pressure on the Navy\u2019s Puget Sound Naval Shipyard and Intermediate Maintenance Facility in Washington state, allowing the workforce there to more quickly get other subs through refits and overhauls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While there are typically concerns about sending surface ship repair work overseas<\/a>, Clark said the Navy and its industry partners, General Dynamics\u2019 Electric Boat and HII\u2019s Newport News Shipbuilding<\/a>, simply do not have enough capacity for all the needed submarine repairs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A 50-sub force in a 66-sub world<\/h1>\n\n\n\n

A 2016 Navy force structure assessment called for 66 attack submarines. That requirement has remained steady since \u2014 and the fleet size has also remained steady around 50, despite a number of efforts meant to help grow it, including extending the lives of older Los Angeles-class attack subs and pouring billions of dollars into the submarine-building industry to increase output.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With 50 boats, \u201cwe\u2019re able to realistically meet what we\u2019ve traditionally met in our global force management,\u201d Gaucher said. But \u201cif you ask me if I want more submarines, of course. And there\u2019s never going to be enough.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, it takes everything going right \u2014 a submarine coming out of maintenance on time and not unexpectedly having to surge forward for an overseas mission \u2014 for a submarine crew to get the desired number of training days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But, Gaucher said, \u201cif you throw a perturbation into that \u2026 that\u2019s where you have to make those trades.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Currently, some submarines are on routine deployments for which they fully planned, trained and certified.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other boats are considered \u201ccombat surge ready\u201d and are eligible to scramble into theater if needed. These boats are trained and certified to a smaller number of core missions, but may not qualify for the full range of tasks a routine deployment could require.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
The Los Angeles-class submarine Topeka undocks on schedule at Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard and Intermediate Maintenance Facility in Hawaii. (Dave Amodo\/U.S. Navy)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A larger fleet would mean more boats on routine deployments and fewer scrambling to surge. It would mean satisfying more requests by combatant commanders and having more boats already forward in theater \u2014 rather than the surge boats at home taking perhaps a week to prepare for deployment before traveling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It would also allow the boats at home to further develop tactics as well as train alongside surface, aviation and special operations forces, rather than potentially surging forward for an overseas mission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere\u2019s just really countless things you can do if you have more,\u201d Gaucher said. \u201cBut we can still get the core things done. … So we pick the best things for those submarines to do that best satisfy what the combatant commanders need us to do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Clark, however, said his team at Hudson is wrapping up a 2045 fleet design study for the Navy that will call for 54 attack submarines. The study will contend the service needs a larger fleet of attack submarines to address the most vexing operational problem: a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But increased development of unmanned systems, including the Replicator initiative at the Pentagon and the Hellscape effort through U.S. Pacific Fleet, could help deter or stop an attack, as well as reduce the need for crewed attack submarines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf you\u2019re aiming for [54] submarines in 2045, then you can get away with selling three to Australia, and the net benefit is positive because you\u2019re bolstering the alliance,\u201d Clark said. \u201cThree submarines, now somebody else is paying for the maintenance, manning them, sustaining them, and the U.S. benefits from them being out there as part of the alliance force.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Continuously ready\u2019<\/h1>\n\n\n\n

The top officer on the attack sub Delaware, Cmdr. Rob Low, said having an in-demand asset<\/a> as part of an insufficiently sized fleet weighs on him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Speaking to Defense News during the April embark, Low said the deployment rotation is the same today as it was when he was a junior officer, but that submarines are more often called to surge. As a result, there\u2019s now a greater need to be \u201ca lot more focused on making sure we\u2019re continuously ready.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Sailors and Marines of the Bataan Amphibious Ready Group return home following an extended deployment in the Middle East. (MC2 Anderson W. Branch\/U.S. Navy)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe all know that there\u2019s not a lot of backup if we have a problem. So we really pride ourselves on making sure we\u2019re material-ready to be in mission at any moment,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd the second we have something that\u2019s minor break on board, we immediately go into repair mode to make sure that the second we pull [into port in Groton, Connecticut], it\u2019s not going to impact us in our ability to get deployed if we needed to at any moment.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This hyperfocus on readiness<\/a> extends to the crew. Low said crew members have been receptive to cross-training, even teaching the nuclear-trained operators to stand watch at the sonar or fire control console in the control room \u201cso that if I end up having a shortage in one rate, I can move people around and continue to operate without any problems.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Low said he has trained his junior sailors to the maximum qualification point allowed, with junior sailors sometimes standing watches that are normally reserved for chief petty officers. This allows the chiefs to focus on mentoring and developing junior sailors, even as the watch bills are still filled with fully qualified personnel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Low also noted he empowered his senior enlisted sailors to have \u201cownership of material\u201d and run the sub\u2019s machinery with little oversight from officers. This frees up his officers to focus on tactics, which Low said is vital given the strategic competition the U.S. Navy is in with Russia and China.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the immediate term, Low is focused on getting his boat ready for deployment: He and the crew will continue training at sea, come in for two remaining maintenance periods, go through full training and qualifications, and then head to <\/b>European waters later this year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the operating environment and the risk of a surge deployment remain on his mind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe have to be ready,\u201d he said. \u201cThree weeks from now, we can be sent to someplace, and we have to be completely ready.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is the first story of a two-part series on how the U.S. submarine force is participating in the trilateral AUKUS alliance. <\/i>Click here<\/i><\/a> to read the second story.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The U.S. Navy\u2019s fleet includes 49 attack submarines, despite a formal requirement for 66. 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