Replacing the Subs

[KevinB]

They very much are, the difference is that they are designed to operate in the warmer period of the year where there is actual traffic within the Arctic. This discussion was had in the infancy of the AOPS program, it makes little sense to go send heavy icebreakers to go patrol the Arctic during a time where effectively nobody else is present.

Except folks under the ice…

 

[YZT580]

Except folks under the ice…

so we fire on sound from a stone frigate.

 

[KevinB]

so we fire on sound from a stone frigate.

I keep pointing out Possession is 9/10th the law.

Don’t occupy it year round and someone else will.

 

[YZT580]

I keep pointing out Possession is 9/10th the law.

Don’t occupy it year round and someone else will.

You can't possess it from 250 meters below sea level. And if the automated system does its job, you will never surface to claim the land. Our maintaining possession does not require the U.S.S. New Jersey. It requires roads, railroads, runways and financial reasons for those to be built.

 

[KevinB]

You can't possess it from 250 meters below sea level. And if the automated system does its job, you will never surface to claim the land. Our maintaining possession does not require the U.S.S. New Jersey. It requires roads, railroads, runways and financial reasons for those to be built.

It isn’t an either or.

Yes to need to significantly expand and develop the northern lands.

I was pretty sure we just debunked the automated defense systems above. The ice pack needs year round patrolling or you will end up with squatters.

 

[Underway]

Those automated mines can be air dropped. So IF you needed to do some mining that's the way you would do it. Probably a just push them out the back of a herc or something at this point. You wouldn't have a permanent presence of mines.

Persistent sensors or attritable sensors that are UUV's, seafloor sensors, floating sensors or whatever, that can highlight issues/contacts, that's the way to go.

Its ok for a submarine to sail through Canadian water, innocent passage and all that... (lol), but it's not ok for us to not know about it. And of course if you choke point the access to the Canadian arctic with our own submarines as well, you have a pretty good setup.

 

[KevinB]

Those automated mines can be air dropped. So IF you needed to do some mining that's the way you would do it. Probably a just push them out the back of a herc or something at this point. You wouldn't have a permanent presence of mines.

Not through multi year pack ice.

Persistent sensors or attritable sensors that are UUV's, seafloor sensors, floating sensors or whatever, that can highlight issues/contacts, that's the way to go.

Detection doesn’t necessarily equal deterrence.

Its ok for a submarine to sail through Canadian water, innocent passage and all that... (lol), but it's not ok for us to not know about it. And of course if you choke point the access to the Canadian arctic with our own submarines as well, you have a pretty good setup.

What Submarines

IMHO you need Heavy Icebreakers something like the old Polar10 Nuclear that can operate year round in the Arctic Circle.
I’d like for Canada to have SSN’s as well, but that is secondary to having a surface presence.

 

[Underway]

Not through multi year pack ice.

No one is going under multi year ice in the Canadian NWP. Perhaps north of Elsmere. I think you underestimate the challenges of ice even for submarines. Particularly when the ice dams can reach all the way to the bottom of the ocean, and the iceburgs regularly scrap along.

Perhaps there is some bunker busting ordinance that can penetrate through ice and release a torp. That would be interesting... Maybe something for BOREALIS to work on! lol

Detection doesn’t necessarily equal deterrence.

Its the first step, and letting them do stuff without knowing that we know they are there, isn't the worst idea.

IMHO you need Heavy Icebreakers something like the old Polar10 Nuclear that can operate year round in the Arctic Circle.
I’d like for Canada to have SSN’s as well, but that is secondary to having a surface presence.

No need for the nuclear ship, but the Polar class' being built at Davie and Seaspan will be enough for now. Not that they are going to be able to see subsea either. You can't do that with an iicebreaker overly well. Maybe release some things via the moonpool (UUV's).

 

[Stoker]

No one is going under multi year ice in the Canadian NWP. Perhaps north of Elsmere. I think you underestimate the challenges of ice even for submarines. Particularly when the ice dams can reach all the way to the bottom of the ocean, and the iceburgs regularly scrap along.

Perhaps there is some bunker busting ordinance that can penetrate through ice and release a torp. That would be interesting... Maybe something for BOREALIS to work on! lol

Its the first step, and letting them do stuff without knowing that we know they are there, isn't the worst idea.

No need for the nuclear ship, but the Polar class' being built at Davie and Seaspan will be enough for now. Not that they are going to be able to see subsea either. You can't do that with an iicebreaker overly well. Maybe release some things via the moonpool (UUV's).

I would say throw some of that 5% into a SOSUS type listening post at the narrow parts of the passage.

 

[Kirkhill]

IIRC, when we were discussing the AOPS and seasonality, one of the problems that kept being raised was scouring. There were parts of the southern channels of the NWP that were so shallow, and those parts shifted with the tides and the seasons, that bergy bits moving through the channels regularly scoured the bottoms. This was seen as a threat to cables and minefields. It is the reason I suggested that any enduring fields would have to be resown seasonally. It is also the reason I proposed the stone frigate notion of launching torpedoes from dry land through tubes. I figured that the tubes could be engineered to be berg/scour proof.

As to the sensors. The old sensors were permanently installed cables with microphones. The new sensors can be microphones on UUVs attached to the forts by fibres. They can manoeuvre around obstructions, or get out of the channel, or just be replaced by another one if it gets dammaged.
If those chunks of ice are in the channel and scouring the bottoms I doubt it any CO is going to risk his command in those waters.

...

PS

It occurs to me that a stone frigate is not restricted to passive sensors. Ships are careful with active sensors because they give away their position. The position of a stone frigate is known. There is nothing to give away. It can ping freely.

In fact, it seems to me that its pinging, and reflections, could by picked up by third party sensors and used to image a field.

 

[Stoker]

IIRC, when we were discussing the AOPS and seasonality, one of the problems that kept being raised was scouring. There were parts of the southern channels of the NWP that were so shallow, and those parts shifted with the tides and the seasons, that bergy bits moving through the channels regularly scoured the bottoms. This was seen as a threat to cables and minefields. It is the reason I suggested that any enduring fields would have to be resown seasonally. It is also the reason I proposed the stone frigate notion of launching torpedoes from dry land through tubes. I figured that the tubes could be engineered to be berg/scour proof.

As to the sensors. The old sensors were permanently installed cables with microphones. The new sensors can be microphones on UUVs attached to the forts by fibres. They can manoeuvre around obstructions, or get out of the channel, or just be replaced by another one if it gets dammaged.
If those chunks of ice are in the channel and scouring the bottoms I doubt it any CO is going to risk his command in those waters.

...

PS

It occurs to me that a stone frigate is not restricted to passive sensors. Ships are careful with active sensors because they give away their position. The position of a stone frigate is known. There is nothing to give away. It can ping freely.

In fact, it seems to me that its pinging, and reflections, could by picked up by third party sensors and used to image a field.

DRDC had been conducting some research for the Canadian Arctic Underwater Sentinel Experiment at the research center at Gascoyne Inlet on Devon Island. It was a network of ice resistant sensors, with UAV's and AI to analyse sounds from Lancaster Sound. The site during the cold war used to listen from submarines apparently. I was up in 2017 doing some things with HMCS Shawinigan in support of that.

What I would suggest is stationing a ice resistant fixed offshore platform and station it right in the middle of the chokepoint with personnel. Not too far from Resolute for helo transfers. You could station all manner of weapon systems on the platform or ashore that could make it a bad day for any submarine. The platform could also double as a SAR platform.

 

[Kirkhill]

DRDC had been conducting some research for the Canadian Arctic Underwater Sentinel Experiment at the research center at Gascoyne Inlet on Devon Island. It was a network of ice resistant sensors, with UAV's and AI to analyse sounds from Lancaster Sound. The site during the cold war used to listen from submarines apparently. I was up in 2017 doing some things with HMCS Shawinigan in support of that.

What I would suggest is stationing a ice resistant fixed offshore platform and station it right in the middle of the chokepoint with personnel. Not too far from Resolute for helo transfers. You could station all manner of weapon systems on the platform or ashore that could make it a bad day for any submarine. The platform could also double as a SAR platform.

View attachment 94348View attachment 94349View attachment 94350

It strikes me that to man 12 subs you need 600 people willing to
deploy for months on end, in tight quarters, deprived of fresh air, sunlight and the sky, and in constant awareness of crush depth.

Life on a rig like you describe would seem to require fewer people and better terms of service. Easier to recruit and sustain?

 

[Kirkhill]

Build a couple more off Tuk, Churchill/Nelson, Moosonee and Chisasibi as transfer points for deep sea ships. Pipelines, lighters and helos to the shore.

 

[Stoker]

Build a couple more off Tuk, Churchill/Nelson, Moosonee and Chisasibi as transfer points for deep sea ships. Pipelines, lighters and helos to the shore.

You could do all sorts of stuff. Make it a platform for AI controlled AUV's or whatever. Probably a spot to tender submarines.

 

[Dana381]

What I would suggest is stationing a ice resistant fixed offshore platform and station it right in the middle of the chokepoint with personnel. Not too far from Resolute for helo transfers. You could station all manner of weapon systems on the platform or ashore that could make it a bad day for any submarine. The platform could also double as a SAR platform.

If you attack a sub or ship in a choke point do you not then make that point unnavigable?

 

[Oldgateboatdriver]

Depends on the choke point and where you carry out the attack, Dana.

For instance, on the West Coast, a strait like Juan de Fuca can be considered a choke point, but it is between 15 and 20 Km wide, so sinking a ship there is no big deal as far as navigation is concerned. On the same coast, you also have Porlier pass, a narrow passage of only a few hundred meters. A sinking there is problematic. Both types of such choke points exist in the North West Passage, so it becomes a matter of choosing the right one to set up defenses.

Moreover, the value of maritime choke points is that they funnel vessels from the open ocean into a more restricted area, the approaches, when they need to get through the choke point. The killing can also be done, then, in these approaches, which is not a problem for navigation either.

 

[Oldgateboatdriver]

Its ok for a submarine to sail through Canadian water, innocent passage and all that...

Actually, Underway, there is no such right of innocent passage in the NWP according to Canada's official position.

Canada drew straight lines across all the outside edges of the Arctic archipelago and claims the waters so enclosed as internal waters of Canada. There is no right of innocent passage in internal waters. In international law, the state has absolute and unrestricted power over such waters. This position is based on what is, IMHO, a fallacy, that the ice in those passages is used by the Inuit as if it was land to hunt, fish and travel.

I say it is a fallacy because, obviously, it only applies when there is solid ice across the whole area, i.e. in winter. In summer, when the waters are open, the Inuit use boats like everyone else. In winter, there is just no ship traffic up there, other than icebreakers on extremely rare occasions (last time CCGS Amundsen overwintered there, it did so stopped, as a floating base rather than icebreaking), and the ice reforms quickly behind them.

The US position is that the 12 NM waters from each island in the archipelago are properly territorial waters of Canada, and up to 200 NM, are Canada's EEZ, but the NWP itself is an international strait. In such waters, international law provides for the right of innocent passage, and in international strait, there are even more restrictions on what the nation whose waters it is can impose. The US position, BTW (12NM territorial, and 200 NM EEZ), mean that the NWP cannot be transited without, at some points (in fact multiple and over quite a wide area), being forced to enter Canadian territorial waters, and that the whole of the archipelago is unambiguously Canadian EEZ.

I also believe that the US position is wrong. The US position on the 12 NM territorial waters and 200 NM EEZ is the correct starting point, but there are still numerous bays and fiords in the Archipelago that meet the criteria of international law for enclosure with strait base lines to become internal waters, and these would have to be promulgated by Canada everywhere they are applicable, IMO, and then the 12/200 NM calculated therefrom. Also, I don't believe that the NWP meets the criteria for designation as an international strait because it simply has never been used for international navigation. There have been very very limited attempts, such as the SS Manhattan, of exploring such possibility, but it came to no fruition, and "adventurers" transiting for the sake of the adventure, but it is not and has never been used for "international navigation" as this term is employed in International law of the sea.

Personally, however, I think that the actual properly applicable regime should be adopted sooner rather than later by Canada and Canadian legal framework that would be workable when the waters become more accessible should be put in place as early as possible.

P.S. Little known fact: As the Arctic ice recedes more and more in the summers, there is a lot more first year ice and some multi-year bergs that break and float around, The archipelago, with its configuration and weird currents actually catches more and more of this ice, leading to more frequent, not less frequent, number of events where the NWP gets blocked by ice at various choke points in the summer. That is making navigating the passage more difficult and uncertain for navigation - not the other way around.

 

[Kirkhill]

Actually, Underway, there is no such right of innocent passage in the NWP according to Canada's official position.

Canada drew straight lines across all the outside edges of the Arctic archipelago and claims the waters so enclosed as internal waters of Canada. There is no right of innocent passage in internal waters. In international law, the state has absolute and unrestricted power over such waters. This position is based on what is, IMHO, a fallacy, that the ice in those passages is used by the Inuit as if it was land to hunt, fish and travel.

I say it is a fallacy because, obviously, it only applies when there is solid ice across the whole area, i.e. in winter. In summer, when the waters are open, the Inuit use boats like everyone else. In winter, there is just no ship traffic up there, other than icebreakers on extremely rare occasions (last time CCGS Amundsen overwintered there, it did so stopped, as a floating base rather than icebreaking), and the ice reforms quickly behind them.

The US position is that the 12 NM waters from each island in the archipelago are properly territorial waters of Canada, and up to 200 NM, are Canada's EEZ, but the NWP itself is an international strait. In such waters, international law provides for the right of innocent passage, and in international strait, there are even more restrictions on what the nation whose waters it is can impose. The US position, BTW (12NM territorial, and 200 NM EEZ), mean that the NWP cannot be transited without, at some points (in fact multiple and over quite a wide area), being forced to enter Canadian territorial waters, and that the whole of the archipelago is unambiguously Canadian EEZ.

I also believe that the US position is wrong. The US position on the 12 NM territorial waters and 200 NM EEZ is the correct starting point, but there are still numerous bays and fiords in the Archipelago that meet the criteria of international law for enclosure with strait base lines to become internal waters, and these would have to be promulgated by Canada everywhere they are applicable, IMO, and then the 12/200 NM calculated therefrom. Also, I don't believe that the NWP meets the criteria for designation as an international strait because it simply has never been used for international navigation. There have been very very limited attempts, such as the SS Manhattan, of exploring such possibility, but it came to no fruition, and "adventurers" transiting for the sake of the adventure, but it is not and has never been used for "international navigation" as this term is employed in International law of the sea.

Personally, however, I think that the actual properly applicable regime should be adopted sooner rather than later by Canada and Canadian legal framework that would be workable when the waters become more accessible should be put in place as early as possible.

P.S. Little known fact: As the Arctic ice recedes more and more in the summers, there is a lot more first year ice and some multi-year bergs that break and float around, The archipelago, with its configuration and weird currents actually catches more and more of this ice, leading to more frequent, not less frequent, number of events where the NWP gets blocked by ice at various choke points in the summer. That is making navigating the passage more difficult and uncertain for navigation - not the other way around.

So the bergy bits become nature's own "dragons teeth"? With added advantage that the field is constantly being reset?

It sounds to me as if, even in the summer, subs would move cautiously.

On the other hand I still think an active defence is justified. The more natural obstacles to be exploited then the less effort and money likely to be required.

But we do have to show willing.

 

[Kirkhill]

PS

Upthread somebody expressed dismay about a policy of "shoot on sound".

When dealing with submarines what is the alternative? Even if you are 10 meters from them underwater and in your own sub you can't see them. You can't smell them or taste them. I suppose you could touch them but I am not sure you want to do that. Maybe you can sense their heat or other radiations.

You are pretty much left with your ears and whatever Intelligence can tell you about what you are hearing.

Is that any different for UUVs? For static or dormant UUVs? And where is the dividing line between a UUV and a torpedo or a mine?

 

[Stoker]

I think even if we had something set up in the passage actively looking for submarines, would we try to sink it. I doubt it. Having something there say as as secondary SAR resource would be reason enough for its existence, time of conflict ready to go.

Given the water depth , bad charts etc is there that much submarine traffic?