Submarine with cruise missiles

First launch of a cruise missile (here an SSM-N-8A Regulus ) from the USS Tunny (SS-282) (1956)

Older Soviet SSG of the Juliett class with an elaborate starting device

As submarines with cruise missiles are submarines referred whose primary armament of cruise missiles or anti-ship missiles is. In the US, they are called Ship Submersible Guided Missile Nuclear ( SSGN ) if they are nuclear powered and Ship Submersible Guided Missile ( SSG ) if they are conventionally powered. In Russia, the name is Podwodnaja Lodka Atomnaja s Raketami Krilatimi ( PLARK, Подводная Лодка Атомная с Ракетами Крылатыми, ПЛАРК ), translated as "nuclear submarine with cruise missiles".

For the first time, unguided rockets were stationed on board submarines by Germany during World War II. The United States Navy first used such missiles in the Pacific War . With the beginning of the Cold War , both the US Navy and the Soviet Navy developed cruise missiles for submarine use. These first boats mainly specialized in land attacks. In the 1960s, both superpowers shifted their land attack capabilities away from cruise missiles. The US Navy put all SSG (N) out of service, while the Soviet Navy began to station anti-ship missiles on their boats.

In 2009, both the USA and Russia each operate four dedicated SSGNs, but submarines from many countries can fire cruise missiles and / or anti-ship missiles from their torpedo tubes as a secondary operational feature.

history

prehistory

During the Second World War , Germany was the first country to experiment with the underwater launch of unguided rockets. From May 1942 the U 511 launched short-range missiles from six launch devices welded to the fuselage in front of the Peenemünde Army Research Center . From a depth of around 8 meters, there were 24 starts, all of which were successful. The Kriegsmarine refused to use this weapon, which had been developed by the army , and the devices on U 511 were removed again in July 1942. The Navy then began developing an anti-ship missile , but was unable to complete it before the end of the war.

The United States Navy experimented with missiles on submarines from 1945. The USS Barb (SS-220) was equipped with a 5-inch rocket launcher and was the first submarine to fire rockets at a land target, here the Japanese city of Shari .

First years

Launch of a JB-2 Loon from the deck of the USS Cusk

After the war, Secretary of the Navy James Forrestal allowed the US Navy to convert two submarines in order to shoot down the JB-2 Loon guided missile, which had been developed from the German Fieseler Fi 103 ("V1"). These tests were then carried out aboard the USS Carbonero (SS-317) and USS Cusk (SS-348) . In 1947, the Cusk shot down the first steerable missile from aboard a submarine. The US Navy then developed its own cruise missile, which was also adopted into the fleet service, the SSM-N-8A Regulus . In the United States, the USS Tunny (SS / SSG-282) and USS Barbero (SS / SSG-317) were equipped with the new Regulus, the Tunny first launched a missile of the type in 1953.

The Soviet Navy also experimented with the German V1 from 1945, but stopped developing its own cruise missile and submarine for this after 1950. Soon afterwards, however, the Soviet Union made another attempt, from which the missiles SS-N-3 Shaddock and P -10 emerged. In 1955 a Zulu-class submarine was modified for shooting down the P-10, and in 1957 the boat shot down four missiles. Ultimately, however, the SS-N-3 prevailed, which was first tested shortly after the P-10 by a whiskey-class boat , S-146 . From 1960, six more boats of the class were converted to cruise missile carriers. The development of the first nuclear submarines with cruise missiles, which began in 1956, was stopped for the time being in 1960. These first attempts failed mainly because of problems with the cruise missile P-20, which never reached operational readiness. In addition, the Soviet Union shifted its focus to land-based missile systems.

Regular use

A Regulus missile launched from the deck of the USS Halibut

After the successful tests, the American Grayback class was the first class to be specially equipped for launching cruise missiles and received two units from 1958. In 1960, the US Navy put a nuclear powered submarine with cruise missiles, the USS Halibut (SSGN-587), into service for the first time. In addition, the Navy wanted to build eleven Thresher / Permit class SSGNs from 1958 . As early as the end of 1958, however, the Navy began, under Secretary of the Navy Thomas S. Gates , to stop the development of this type in order to channel funds into the programs for submarines with ballistic missiles and aircraft carriers . However, the five boats produced continued to operate with the Regulus cruise missiles for the time being, the Thresher / Permit boats were completed as hunting submarines.

A Soviet Echo II

The Soviet Navy put six more modified whiskey boats into service from 1963, five nuclear-powered submarines of the Echo -I- class as early as 1961 and then 29 boats of the Echo-II class from 1962 . From 1963, the Soviets also manufactured 16 conventionally powered Juliet-class boats . The Soviet Union also began to reconsider the stationing of land attack weapons on submarines at this time. From 1965, the SSG (N) were equipped with anti-ship missiles. The first echoes were soon converted to purely hunting submarines, as they were unable to shoot down anti-ship missiles. Even so, the Soviet Union had a far larger fleet of cruise missile boats than the United States. In contrast, these began to decommission their Regulus as early as 1964, the five SSG (N) were deactivated accordingly or converted into hunting submarines. As a result, the US Navy stopped using cruise missile submarines.

However, the Navy of the Soviet Union continued to station cruise missiles on submarines, but limited itself to nuclear submarines. From 1967 boats of the Charlie I class , from 1973 those of the Charlie II class , and in 1969 a single SSGN of the Papa class . These were equipped with improved weapons of the types SS-N-7 Starbright and SS-N-9 Siren . In 1980 two more boats of the Oscar I class and from 1986 the Oscar II class came into service, which have the SS-N-19 Shipwreck on board. At the same time, however, the Soviet Union converted some Yankee-class boats that could carry out land attacks again with the SS-N-21 Sampson .

At the end of the Cold War, 49 SSGN and 16 SSG were in service in the Soviet Union's fleet.

present

USS Ohio after being converted into a cruise missile carrier

The US Navy reintroduced SSGN around 2005 when the first four Ohio-class missile submarines were converted into cruise missile carriers. As of 2009, these are the only dedicated cruise missile boats in the western world.

The Russian Navy also owns four cruise missile submarines, all of which belong to the Oscar II class . She is the only Marine currently developing new SSGN, the Graney class . Construction began in 1993, but construction was interrupted several times, and the first unit of the class did not go into service until the end of 2013.

technology

A Regulus II in front of the hangar on the USS Grayback

The US used fairly similar technology on all of their Regulus boats. The boats had to emerge to fire the weapon, load each cruise missile individually from a hangar into a horizontal, slightly inclined starter and could therefore only fire the rockets one after the other. The boats carried between two and five Regulus on board. The Soviet boats also had to appear at the launch of the missiles, but these could be fired directly from their hangar, which was also easily elaborated. The Echo II could carry eight anti-ship missiles.

From the Papa and Charlie classes , the Soviet boats could also fire their weapons submerged; vertical launch tubes were used here for the first time . This vertical arrangement of the tubes was previously used in a similar way on rocket submarines and subsequently also became established for submarines with cruise missiles. At the Oscars , 24 missiles were stationed on each boat. The weapons were attached between the pressure hull of the boat and the outer hull.

From the 1970s on, normal hunting submarines were also given the ability to shoot down such weapons. For example, the anti-ship missiles UGM-84 Harpoon and SM-39 Exocet as well as the land attack cruise missile UGM-109 Tomahawk were developed, which can be shot down from torpedo tubes. The second Los Angeles-class construction lot even received twelve dedicated vertical launch tubes for tomahawks. Even so, these boats continued to be referred to as hunting, not cruise missile submarines. The Ohio SSGN were created from the conversion of missile submarines. Here, the 24 former launch shafts for the ballistic missiles were converted, seven Tomahawk can now be fired from one. Since two of the tubes were assigned to a different use, the boats have up to 154 cruise missiles.

Mission profile

A tomahawk shot down from an Ohio-class submarine

The main purpose of the first cruise missile submarines were surprising, tactical attacks on land targets. For example, after the Barb's first attack, the Japanese assumed they had fallen victim to a squadron. In the US Navy's short service life, the SSG (N) were mainly used to contribute to deterrence policies . In 1958, for example, the Tunny drove a deterrent patrol in the Pacific to replace aircraft carriers that had been withdrawn to the Mediterranean due to the Lebanon crisis . Between 1959 and 1964, such patrols in the North Pacific became a standard operation for US boats making 41 such voyages. In addition to the aircraft carriers, the rocket submarines took over this role from the cruise missile boats from 1964.

The Soviet Union shifted its land attack capacity from 1960 largely to land-based missiles, later also to missile submarines. Since the cruise missiles were thus seen as redundant, they were largely superfluous on submarines and largely disappeared from the fleets. However, in order to respond to the increasing threat to its territory from the aircraft carriers, the Soviet Union began to equip submarines with a main armament of anti-ship missiles with which, in the event of war, the aircraft carrier combat groups were to be attacked and intercepted far off the coast. This remained the main purpose of these boats into the 21st century. The anti-ship missiles have ranges of over 400 kilometers and can therefore be fired far outside the anti -submarine canopy that protects each carrier combat group. Since a submarine is not able to determine the position of the combat group independently at this distance, it has to be cleared up, usually by plane, for which the Soviet Union used converted Tupolev Tu-95 bombers .

With the advent of the Tomahawk, US submarines were again increasingly used for land attacks. Massive tactical land attacks were carried out in the Second Gulf War , the Iraq War , the Kosovo War , the War in Afghanistan and the Libyan Civil War .

literature

• Norman Friedman: US Submarines since 1945 . Naval Institute Press, Annapolis 1994, ISBN 978-1-55750-260-5 (English)
• David Miller, John Jordan: Modern Submarines . Stocker Schmid AG, Zurich 1987, 1999 (2nd edition). ISBN 3-7276-7088-6 .
• Norman Polmar, Jurrien Noot: Submarines of the Russian and Soviet Navies, 1718-1990 . Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, 1991. ISBN 0-87021-570-1 (English)
• Norman Polmar, KJ Moore: Cold War Submarines: The Design and Construction of US and Soviet Submarines, 1945-2001 . Potomac Books, Dulles, VA 2003. ISBN 978-1-57488-594-1 (English)
• Bill Gunston: The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Missile Guided Missiles . ISBN 978-3-7784-9732-6

Web links

Commons : Submarines with cruise missiles  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Polmar (2003), p. 85 f.
2. ↑ ^{a b} USS Barb in DANFS (engl.)
3. ↑ Polmar (2003), p. 87
4. ↑ Polmar (2003), p. 91 f.
5. ↑ Miller, Jordan (1999), p. 12
6. ↑ SSGN in the Naval Vessel Register ( memento of the original from October 21, 2004 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (engl.)  
7. ↑ State of the Russian Navy on warfare.ru (Eng.)
8. ↑ Russian fleet takes over first submarine from Jassen project. Retrieved May 4, 2014 . 
9. ↑ Polmar (2003), p. 93
10. ↑ Polmar (2003), p. 97

This version was added to the list of articles worth reading on August 20, 2009 .