Tim Mahon
Both Russia and China are making measurable advances in acoustical signature management for their submarines and present a real and growing danger for NATO on both sides of the Atlantic, and for NATO and ASEAN nations in the Indo-Pacific. Russia’s newest boats – especially the Borei, Borei-A and Yasen-M classes – are sufficiently stealthy to strain NATO’s ASW capabilities.
The Boreis use pump-jet propulsion, which Russian sources claim gives it an acoustic signature roughly one-fifth that of older Soviet-era designs such as the Typhoon and Delta-IV classes. The Yasen-M class is intended to completely replace Russia’s older attack submarines entirely, armed with Kalibr cruise missiles and, in some configurations, Zircon hypersonic anti-ship missiles. Press reports suggest that Russian submarines are probing the North Atlantic and undersea cable routes with a tempo not seen since the Cold War. However, Russia’s force also shows serious stress: shipyards building roughly one boat a year, a submarine lost in drydock, another towed home on the surface, and a shrinking overall fleet despite quality improvements in newer classes.
China’s submarine fleet has historically been noisier and easier to detect, but that is now changing, which in turn alters the strategic perspective in NATO capitals. Chinese engineers, it was reported last year, have developed a hybrid active-passive engine vibration isolation system that could reduce engine noise by up to 26 dB: that translates to more than halving the range at which a submarine can be detected by sonar. More striking is the recent spotting of a sail-less submarine design at the Jiangnan Shipyard in Shanghai. Removing the sail dramatically reduces hydrodynamic noise and frees space for other systems, though it complicates periscope and sensor arrangements. This design may be related to the anticipated Type 095 attack submarine, which military analysts expect will set a new standard for Chinese undersea warfare. Chinese military journals acknowledge the PLAN cannot currently guarantee submarine stealth, which suggests these developments may be aimed at closing that gap.
On the Atlantic’s eastern approaches, Russian submarines operating from the Arctic and North Atlantic threaten NATO’s reinforcement lines, undersea communications cables, and European ports. On the Pacific side, China’s quieter submarines challenge the US and its allies in the Indo-Pacific, with potential spillover into the Atlantic if Chinese submarine operations expand globally – a development some analysts consider plausible within the next decade. There are also quiet protests in government circles in Washington that, unless something is done, the existence of these fleets could have a detrimental effect on exploitation of the emerging economic opportunities in both the North-West and Northern Passages.
NATO and its allies, acutely aware of the developments but not yet entirely agreed on a plan to mitigate and counter the potential threat(s), have a number of countermeasures at their disposal. Frankly, we expect to see considerable investment of human capital, technological resources and plain hard cash in some or all of the following technologies in the next several years.
- Next-generation underwater sensors: a combination of advanced sonar, quantum sensors, magnetic anomaly detection and AI-enabled analytics to lower the detection threshold compared with legacy systems – of particular relevance in shallow waters and choke points around China and in the Greenland-Iceland-UK (GIUK) Gap;
- Use of autonomous swarming UUVs to create persistent, distributed sensor networks across wide remote areas – especially useful as the number of manned platforms available for routine patrol and surveillance missions reduces every year;
- Better protection of undersea cables and energy infrastructure against threats from, for example, Russia’s Belgorod and Khabarovsk boats;
- Advanced processing, AI and machine learning have a role to play in enabling detection at greater ranges than conventional sonar processing currently allows;
- New submarine programmes, such as the US Columbia class, UK Dreadnought class and the AUKUS programme, will help to maintain underwater superiority even as Russian and Chinese threats grow. Adjunct programmes such as the Virginia Payload Module and AUKUS Pillar Two will bring advanced capabilities, to include quantum technologies, enhanced AI and hypersonic weapons, specifically aimed at countering China’s submarine expansion.
The bottom line
Russian submarines constitute NATO’s primary Atlantic naval threat but, despite qualitative improvements, its fleet is declining and shows operational strain. China is improving but is some distance from being able to claim parity. Should China’s quieter boats begin regular Atlantic deployments, or should Russian quality gains outpace NATO sensor and processing upgrades, the game could change dramatically – and astoundingly quickly.
Headline image shows an impression of the proposed AUKUS submarine – a boat that seems to offer a robust counter to forecast developments from Moscow and Beijing. (UK government image)
