About subs, military/naval, missiles, nuclear weapons & politics. New Aussie subs have been just talk since 2009. Collins LOTE 2028-2040? of partial help. UUVs help more. POTUS may cancel AUKUS Virginias in 2031 as the USN needs all SSNs to the 2040s. Australian Gov ignores US higher priority to Columbia SSBNs (one/year being commissioned 2029-2041). Meaning minimal Virginia production until 2043. Shawn C and Gessler are excellent authors.
Hi all,
Pete has emailed me that he's in Canberra for a week and will be slow to respond to his email notifications on comments on SubMatts.
In the meantime, my recommended submarine movies and a TV documentary to watch:
Hunt for Red October 1990
UK TV documentary series shot during HMS Turbulent's last patrol in 2010.
4 comments:
Crimson Tide ?
I'm sure there will be plenty to talk about when he comes back.
Someone Is Showing a Lot of Underwater Interest in Indonesia’s Straits:
https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2026/07/20/someone_is_showing_a_lot_of_underwater_interest_in_indonesias_straits_1195453.html
Hi Anonymous at 7/21/2026 2:56am
Yes, the Lombok and Makassar straits are deep, and a submarine could traverse them submerged - note that both these crucial shipping corridors are absolutely within Indonesian territorial waters, so any submarine using them has to travel on the surface and fly their national flag.
Indonesia shoul have the naval resources to detect intruders in the Lombok Strait, but Makassar is another matter, which is why the head of the Indonesian navy has called for the establishment of a SOSUS system https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2025/04/indonesian-navy-seeks-sosus-like-systems-to-detect-foreign-submarines/
Thanks Shawn and Anonymouses
Das Boot and Red October remain my and most of the RAN Submarine Service's favourites :)
I'm back from Canberra. There, there was less discussion on regional small to middle power submarine forces and more on the uses/potential of SSNs in the hands of Australia.
I voiced my accustomed arguments that only SSNs can make an impact on Chinese, Russian and NK (one day) SSNs and SSBNs (aka "nukes"). Speed and no time on noisy diesels.
What WASN'T discussed was a group of expert scholars around the late Professor Desmond Ball https://gentleseas.blogspot.com/search?q=desmond (who I used to talk to at ANU) publicised the existence of the "fishhook" SOSUS array - extending all the way from SK, southern Japan, Phils, Indonesian Archipelago (eg. straits & Java) to the Andaman-Nicobar islands - connecting to India's own SOSUS.
See https://gentleseas.blogspot.com/2016/08/chinas-currest-ssbns-too-limited-to-be.html and https://gentleseas.blogspot.com/2021/08/india-and-other-quads-tracking-chinese.html
While most complete access to the Fishhook would likely go to the Five Eyes, SK, Japan, Singapore? and India if Chinese nukes and SSKs crossed Southeast Asian straits/narrows some helpful SOSUS info might be supplied to ASEAN allies sufficient to advise them what was coming and going. ASEAN allies could place themselves in straits/narrows sufficient to track even fast moving nukes.
Cheers Pete
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