The New Frontier for Drone Warfare Is Deep Underwater
New larger autonomous vessels, with evocative names like Ghost Shark and Manta Ray, are aimed at gathering intelligence and countering new threats at sea
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The new underwater drones, with names such as Ghost Shark, Herne and Manta Ray, can typically dive thousands of feet below the surface and operate largely without human interaction for days on end. That ability makes them ideally suited to gather intelligence, protect undersea infrastructure and counter potential threats in the Pacific, advocates say…
Adm. Lisa Franchetti, chief of naval operations, has said developing robotic and autonomous systems is one of the U.S. Navy’s top priorities in preparing for a possible war with China.… China has built the world’s largest surface naval fleet and its own large autonomous underwater vehicles. … [end quote]
There are many technical challenges, including the harsh undersea environment, communications through deep water and the fact that no human is aboard to fix problems. But technology developed for space exploration will probably come in handy.
Similar to aerial drones, relatively inexpensive aquatic drones can threaten massively expensive conventional weapons (e.g. aircraft carriers, nuclear submarines). I assume that strategists are working on future warfare scenarios with defense as well as offense in mind.
Wendy
That seems unlikely. Under seas infrastructure is mostly either cables, which are a foot wide and a thousand miles long, oil pipelines which are 2 yards wide and a hundred miles long, or oil rigs sitting atop a million pounds of concrete.
An underwater drone is ideal for underwater sabotage, spying, but protection? I don’t think so.
No question but drones of all sorts will radically transform smart weaponry from the simplest to the most complex, on land or in air, water, or space.
However, the different possible micro-tactics will all depend on evolving (mostly stupidly and corruptly or cleverly and so costly as to be statements of possible intent rather than real), while large scale strategies to direct weapon development will be based on early to the game hunches, seat of the pants memories of sci-fi, and inherently baffled by too many choices.
No one knows what is coming nor in what order with what costs, and the label for that is usually CHAOS.
I expect seabed cables and pipes will start to have packs of super cheap super energy efficient eyes, ears, noses watching over them, with fast moving pit bull drones ready to take out approaching threats…? And after a while the placement and design of cables and pipes and the like will be greatly altered to make protection much easier.
The world runs far more efficiently when violence and destruction are considered punishably bad form.
I’m reminded of the Rhoomba sweepers that take off from the dock on schedule and return to the dock for charging.
Submarine drones are not likely to be diesel. Nuclear power might be iffy. So recharging batteries has to be a major feature. Otherwise travel distance will be limited. Would you believe a mother ship to maintain them between missions?
I can see AI torpedoes seeking out enemy vessels. Or monitoring critical undersea assets like fiber cables or pipelines for predators seeking to damage them. Perhaps they can collect info on who was there and track them down after the fact.
Following the “dark fleet” of oil tankers that carry Russian oil would be an interesting mission. Can they be identified? Attacked? Or merely tracked down to clearly identify illegal purchasers of Russian oil.
Color me skeptical. An underwater drone has to be powered - somehow. Diesel, gas, or nuclear seem unlikely choices, which leaves electricity. Yes, it would be possible to recharge them without direct connection, although I’m not sure if the principle of induction charging works underwater - but even if it does, you’re talking abojut thousands of miles of cabling, and functions that require a crapton of electrons to move about.
You might make a go of it for “security theater”, I suppose, but it would be vastly expensive and practicably impossible to remotely monitor pinpoint threats along 800,000 miles (I looked it up) of undersea cabling, much less to do anything about it.
Unlike air transport, where there are central nodes you can monitor with some expense (airports), cables are more analogous to rail transport: thousands of miles of infrastructure with only limited opportunity for security (depots) - the rest vulnerable to whatever the human mind might conjure.
The coming tariffs will rob China of the trade balance surplus the country has. Then what? China’s economic problems are horrifyingly bad. Most of the Chinese never made a dime to begin with.
I agree that “protecting” all those cables is a bit much. But a lot of “protection” comes from just having the ability to listen to activities near cables. Listening gives you the audio signature of who was there, for how long and maybe what they were doing. And then you can phone HQ and have them send help.
We have had massive arrays of undersea microphones for many decades (since the 1960s) but the problem with them is that they are fixed in location and take a long time to update or repair. A fleet of strategically moveable microphones to fill in the gaps or deploy for special missions is not a bad idea.
I’m not saying it’s a bad idea. I am saying I don’t think it will work (perfectly, or even particularly well), but that is a different thing.
Look, we can’t even protect giant oil tankers in the Red Sea, a tiny speck of water compared to the cables we’re talking about across the Atlantic, Pacific, Indian, and every other ocean and body of water across the globe. No, I don’t think we should do nothing. No, I don’t think we can protect such a vulnerable asset if somebody really wants to mess with it.
I would say that submarine drones are probably a good offensive weapon, and a terrible defensive one. Somebody trying to use a Howitzer as a shield against incoming artillery is going to find out that it doesn’t work, either. That doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be Howitzers, just that they’re not suited for a defensive role.
In my post upthread I mentioned ears, eyes, nose. Ears gives you the longest distance signal that something is up. Nose (chemical detection) gives you exhaust, if any, of trace elements of non-oceanic stuff, also detection of inevitable thermal plumes, and a likely basis of an identity signature. And when you get close you take photos….
Drones can be extremely tiny, quiter and stealthier than anything capable of sabotage, and very very efficient.
Finland says vessel suspected of cutting cable may be part of Russia’s ‘Shadow Fleet’ https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/26/world/europe/finland-estonia-cables-russia.html The authorities said on Thursday that they believe the anchor of the Eagle S, a tanker registered with the Cook Islands, may have damaged the Estlink 2 cable, which became disconnected on Wednesday. The vessel is thought to be part of Russia’s “shadow fleet”, which is made up of ships that carry embargoed Russian oil products…
Estonia’s Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna said on Thursday that damage to critical submarine infrastructure has become “so frequent” that it casts doubt on the idea this damage could be considered “accidental” or “merely poor seamanship”.
“We must understand that damage to submarine infrastructure has become more systematic and thus must be regarded as attacks against our vital structures,” Tsahkna said in a press release.
Nato now surrounds the Baltic except for Russia. Could Nato regulate access to the Baltic to protect undersea infrastructure like cables and pipelines?
Probably not. Poot-Poot would do damage to whatever he could. Blocking access to Russia with sunken ships might work–especially using Russian ships… Depends how deep the water is (don’t know).
The passages between Denmark and Sweden could be used to inspect entering ships and either require prior registration or take on an experienced pilot. This is routinely required on canals. Why not on the Baltic?
The Panama Canal is 500 feet wide. The Suez Canal is 675 feet wide. The Baltic Sea is 120 miles wide.
I thought the same sort of thing about why it’s so hard to keep rebels from attacking oil tankers in the Red Sea. Then I did a bit of reading and realized that the Red Sea is 170,000 square miles. Too big to patrol effectively except at extraordinary cost. But I still wonder why they don’t convoy them with armed escorts, as happened during World War II after the losses mounted.
The Baltic may be 120 miles wide in the middle but is much narrower on the western end near Denmark.
The British blockaded the Baltic in both World Wars. Germany had battleships but lost them due to problems with the Baltic. They had to rely on submarines. War supplies to the Soviet Union went to Murmansk because Baltic was occupied.
This is somewhat untrue. There is a way to set up buoys to monitor the Red Sea and use missiles to shoot at anything. It does not take more of a direct presence.