naval warfare 3rd WW, battle for the Arctic (Cold war period)

Stuart Galbraith · April 20, 2023

Yeah I thought it sounded a bit sus. Please check out that thread though, lots of interesting documents on it.

Perun · April 21, 2023

Perun · April 21, 2023

From another forum:

hawk66 wrote: Hi,

does anbody know the role of the German and Norway navies during the cold war or any good book/resource about it? Of course the overall role was defense but I would be interested in the operations areas, doctrines and that stuff.

Thanks.

The German Federal Navy (Bundesmarine) was tasked with defending the Baltic approaches, to provide escorts and supply support in the North Sea and to contain the Soviet Baltic Fleet. The Bundesmarine was equipped with small, relatively short range submarines, surface combatants, fleet supply vessels and had its own naval air arm to carry out those missions. Because the U-waffe was not intended for long range operations in the North Atlantic, the submarines were relatively small and short ranged. Their main area of operation in the Baltic approaches was within a day's sailing time of the Tirpitz pier. For many years, the Marine Flieger was equipped with relatively short ranged maritime strike aircraft. (Sea Hawks and later F-104s for attack, Gannets and later Atlantics for ASW and various helicopters for inner ring ASW.) No carriers. The Marine Flieger's fixed wing aircraft were land based. Only the helicopters went to sea. The whole point was to deny the Soviets access to the North Sea.

https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/warships1discussionboards/german-norway-navy-during-cold-war-t26603.html

RETAC21 · April 22, 2023

On 4/21/2023 at 6:59 PM, Perun said:

From another forum:

hawk66 wrote: Hi,

does anbody know the role of the German and Norway navies during the cold war or any good book/resource about it? Of course the overall role was defense but I would be interested in the operations areas, doctrines and that stuff.

Thanks.

The German Federal Navy (Bundesmarine) was tasked with defending the Baltic approaches, to provide escorts and supply support in the North Sea and to contain the Soviet Baltic Fleet. The Bundesmarine was equipped with small, relatively short range submarines, surface combatants, fleet supply vessels and had its own naval air arm to carry out those missions. Because the U-waffe was not intended for long range operations in the North Atlantic, the submarines were relatively small and short ranged. Their main area of operation in the Baltic approaches was within a day's sailing time of the Tirpitz pier. For many years, the Marine Flieger was equipped with relatively short ranged maritime strike aircraft. (Sea Hawks and later F-104s for attack, Gannets and later Atlantics for ASW and various helicopters for inner ring ASW.) No carriers. The Marine Flieger's fixed wing aircraft were land based. Only the helicopters went to sea. The whole point was to deny the Soviets access to the North Sea.

https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/warships1discussionboards/german-norway-navy-during-cold-war-t26603.html

Norway's was coastal defence 100%, their submarines were similar to the Germans and were intended to operate close to the coast, remaining assets were mainly missile boats and minesweeper to operate in the Fjords waterways, though they had 5 frigates and a couple of high seas coast guard escorts which would work for convoy work in the Norwegian sea. Germany had assets (in the 80s) to constitute 3 escort groups to work with the Dutch and the RN for ocean escort work, and 3 destroyers to work in the Baltic together with the Danes. Missile boats and submarines would be able to make the combined Baltic fleet a hefty price to invade Denmark or Germany, but the Kiel canal was an obvious weakpoint

Perun · April 23, 2023

10 hours ago, RETAC21 said:

Norway's was coastal defence 100%, their submarines were similar to the Germans and were intended to operate close to the coast, remaining assets were mainly missile boats and minesweeper to operate in the Fjords waterways, though they had 5 frigates and a couple of high seas coast guard escorts which would work for convoy work in the Norwegian sea. Germany had assets (in the 80s) to constitute 3 escort groups to work with the Dutch and the RN for ocean escort work, and 3 destroyers to work in the Baltic together with the Danes. Missile boats and submarines would be able to make the combined Baltic fleet a hefty price to invade Denmark or Germany, but the Kiel canal was an obvious weakpoint

Do you know of wich ships consisted 3 escort groups of german navy

RETAC21 · April 23, 2023

1 hour ago, Perun said:

Do you know of wich ships consisted 3 escort groups of german navy

They would be adhoc on the basis of the destroyer flotillas:

1 Destroyer Squadron: Type 103 Lütjens class based in Kiel

2 Destroyer Squadron: Type 101 Hamburg class based at Whilhelmshaven, though they were suited for the Baltic mostly

2 Frigate Squadron: Type 122 based at Whilhelmshaven

4 Frigate Squadron: Type 122 based at Whilhelmshaven

LouieD · April 23, 2023

found this today, too bad it is still retained.....

Perun · April 23, 2023

2 hours ago, LouieD said:

found this today, too bad it is still retained.....

That would be wery interesting

Perun · April 23, 2023

SOVIET NAVAL BLAST CALLED CRIPPLING

An authoritative British military publication said today that an explosion at a Soviet naval base in May crippled the fighting capacity of the Northern Fleet, the strongest of the Soviet Navy's four high-sea fleets.

First reports of the blast came last month from United States intelligence officials, who said that it occurred May 13 in an ammunition depot at Severomorsk, northeast of Murmansk, on the Kola Peninsula. Severomorsk, a city of 55,000 people, serves as the base of the Northern Fleet.

The officials said the explosion had been the result of carelessness and had killed 200 to 300 people. It was so powerful that it was thought at first to have been a nuclear accident.

The latest information on the blast was reported today by Jane's Defense Weekly. Jane's spokesman, Richard Coltart, said the information had come from Western naval sources with access to intelligence material. 'Greatest Disaster Since War'

''The destruction represents the greatest disaster to occur in the Soviet Navy since World War II,'' said Jane's. ''It is conservatively estimated that it will be two years before the facility is fully operational again.''

The weekly said the Northern Fleet would not be ''a viable force for the next six months'' because it lost two- thirds of its surface-to-air and ship-to- ship missiles in the explosion. NATO naval sources said the report was ''substantially correct.'' But some defense specialists and United States intelligence sources disagreed.

At the time of the explosion, United States officials said they doubted that the explosion would have a long-term effect on Soviet naval readiness. They suggested then that it would cramp the navy only briefly.

The Russians have said nothing about the explosions, which were recorded by United States reconnaissance satellites and seismological facilities. Rapid Replacement Expected

Maj. Bob Elliott of the International Institute of Strategic Studies here said:

''Since it is the Northern Fleet involved, we have no doubt that every available piece of ordnance has been combed out of the system and has already been used to make up the losses.

''An operational fleet of that nature would be given top priority. The losses were a setback, but it would have been more important if the Northern Fleet spent a lot of time at sea in confrontation with NATO.''

The largest and most important of the Soviet Navy's four operational fleets, the Northern Fleet has its theater of operations mainly in the Arctic and in the Atlantic Ocean. The three other fleets, each associated with one of the seas bordering the Soviet Union, are the Baltic Fleet, the Black Sea Fleet and the Pacific Fleet.

The Northern Fleet is believed to have an aircraft carrier, 148 cruisers, destroyers and other warships with 190 of the navy's 371 submarines.

Jane's said the blast destroyed about 580 of the Northern Fleet's 900 SA-N-1 and SA-N-3 surface-to-air missiles and nearly 320 of the 400 SS-N-3 and SS-N-12 ship-to-ship missiles. The SS-N-12's are supersonic cruise missiles able to carry nuclear warheads. Jane's said the entire stock of about 80 SS-N-22 missiles, also capable of carrying nuclear warheads, and an indeterminate number of SS-N-19 antiship missiles were destroyed.

Some SA-N-6 and SA-N-7 surface-to- air missiles were damaged, it said, as were large quantities of spare parts.

Jane's said ballistic missiles used by the fleet's submarines, which patrol the eastern seaboard of the United States, escaped damage.

Although some military sources said they felt the missiles could be replaced without much trouble, Jane's said the SA-N-3's, used for air defense, could not be ''fully replenished from stores as the production line for these missiles was shut down in the late 1970's.''

The weekly said the missiles could be replaced by drawing from the arsenals of the Baltic Fleet. But it said this would ''leave the supply line vulnerable to attack,'' adding that the destruction at Severomorsk meant the Northern Fleet has only limited storage and testing facilities.

oll of the Soviet Munitions Blast 580 of 900 SA-N-1 and SA-N-3 surface-to-air missiles. SA-N-1's are the principal surface-to-air missile of the Soviet Navy. It has a estimated range of 9 miles and carries a warhead of 155 pounds. The SA-N-3 entered service in 1967; its warhead is believed to weigh between 90 and 440 pounds. About 320 of 400 SS-N-3 and SS-N-12 long-range ship-to-ship weapons.

https://www.nytimes.com/1984/07/11/world/soviet-naval-blast-called-crippling.html

Edited April 24, 2023 by Perun

Perun · April 23, 2023

A SILENT BATTLE SURFACES

UNDER THE four oceans and the seven seas, American and Soviet submarines fight a near-war every day of the year. Relentlessly, they search for one another, trailing an adversary when they can and trying to evade one when detected. They make every move of a real war, except shoot.

The submarines operate in what Adm. James D. Watkins, the former Chief of Naval Operations, has called an ''era of violent peace.'' It is an era marked by sharpening debate among naval officers and strategists about the relative importance to the Navy of submarines, surface vessels and air power in a war at sea. Consensus is slowly building among the experts that, against the Soviet Union, the submarine would be the vanguard. At the same time, fueled by political and budgetary concerns, the debate is gaining a wider audience and promises to be a key issue when hearings over the military budget resume in Congress in February.

Should a shooting war erupt, many experts argue, submarines would be the capital ships of the American and Soviet fleets. The battleship dominated naval operations in World War I, and the aircraft carrier brought victory at sea in World War II, but the nuclear-powered submarine would provide the edge in a future conflict.

Neither carriers nor battleships have become obsolete, by any means. Carriers are often the first thing a President asks for when he wants a show of force; they provided air cover for the invasion of Grenada and bases for bombing Lebanon and Libya. The battleships the Navy is bringing out of mothballs can also project power from sea to shore.

But during a war at sea between the United States and the Soviet Union, submarines would provide the most mobility, the greatest stealth and some of the heaviest firepower, conventional or nuclear. Soviet submarines armed with cruise missiles would seek to destroy American warships and fire at the United States itself. Attack submarines carrying torpedoes would go after American warships and cargo vessels. Soviet ballistic missile submarines would provide a strategic nuclear reserve.

American attack submarines, which are armed with both torpedoes and cruise missiles, would seek to destroy Soviet submarines as well as targets in the Soviet Union. The United States would rely even more on ballistic missile submarines as a strategic nuclear reserve.

Intelligence reported that the Soviet Union was building better submarines at a rate faster than expected. The Soviets built the Typhoon, at 25,000 tons the world's largest submarine, to operate in the Arctic. Then came Delta IV, another ballistic missile submarine built for Arctic operations. American intelligence determined that Soviet missiles, fired from waters just north of the Soviet Union, could hit most targets 5,000 miles away in the United States.

At the same time, new submarines armed with cruise missiles enlarged the Soviet fleet. Three new classes of attack submarine, each quieter, faster and better armed than those before, were produced, as were new diesel-electric submarines.

To assess those developments, Admiral Watkins in 1984 ordered a thorough review of the balance of submarine power. The conclusions were ''somewhat of a surprise,'' said his successor, Adm. Carlisle A. H. Trost. ''We were surprised to this extent, that they had advanced more rapidly in their qualitative improvements and in their numbers of platforms than we might have anticipated in, say, 1979.''

Rear Adm. John L. Butts, then director of Naval Intelligence, began in early 1985 to brief Congress behind closed doors about advances in Soviet submarines. The Navy had found that the Barents and Kara Seas had become havens for new Soviet ballistic missile submarines. That formidable bastion is bounded by the Kola Peninsula, the Norwegian Svalbard Islands and the Soviet islands of Franz Josef Land and Severnaya Zemlya. The floor of those shallow waters is strewn with listening devices, and the surface is patrolled by Soviet antisubmarine ships. Overhead are antisubmarine warplanes. In a crisis, mines could be laid quickly - and there is no weapon an intruding submariner fears more, because they are so hard to detect. In front of the bastion, moreover, are deployed more attack submarines in the Norwegian and Greenland Seas to form a defense in depth.

The Soviet desire to protect that northern bastion may help to explain continued incursions of Soviet submarines into Swedish and Norwegian territorial waters. A Norwegian military analyst, Kirsten Amundsen, has written that the more than 100 Soviet penetrations of the Scandinavian archipelago and fjords reflect Soviet intentions of defending the bastion.

''The Soviet Union will try to obtain control over the Norwegian Sea, the approaches to the Barents Sea and the Baltic,'' Mr. Amundsen wrote. ''It is a foregone conclusion that the Soviet Union will try to make the Baltic Sea a mare nostrum, but in order to control the vital northern waters, the incentive is strong for the Soviet Union to occupy not only the northern half of Norway but also a large part of Sweden.''

On the eastern side of the Soviet Union, another bastion for submarines carrying missiles aimed at the western United States, China and Japan, has been fashioned behind the Kamchatka Peninsula, which separates the Sea of Okhotsk from the Pacific Ocean.

It was over the sensitive Sea of Okhotsk that the Korean Air Lines passenger plane flew just before it was shot down by a Soviet fighter in 1983. Information gleaned from a recent spy case has suggested that the Sea of Okhotsk had been penetrated by American submarines in an intelligence operation.

Were war to break out, American intelligence officers expect the Soviet Union would keep some ballistic missile submarines in the northern bastion but send others into the deep Arctic, where they could hide between keels of ice jutting down from the frozen surface. This would be particularly true on the North American side, where Soviet submarines have been seen and where enormous slabs of older, thicker ice have been tilted by the constant pressure of the moving ice. In those upside-down valleys, a Soviet submarine would be almost beyond detection because sonar cannot distinguish between the quiet, motionless ship and the keels of ice.

Only to launch missiles would the Soviet submarine leave its hiding place and break through to the surface. Missiles cannot be fired through the ice, or even in open water with chunks of ice, without risking damage to the missile's delicate guidance mechanism.

The Navy found in its review that there had been a shift in Soviet shipbuilding priorities to cruise-missile and attack submarines. In addition, Admiral Butts, the intelligence chief, told Congress, ''Progress in Soviet submarine quieting and sonar and signal processing improvements have reduced the acoustic advantage of Western nuclear-powered attack submarines.''

Among the new Soviet submarines is the 14,000-ton Oscar, which can carry 24 cruise missiles and travel at 33 knots. It could stand off, submerged, 300 miles from a target, launch a cruise missile and dive deeper to escape well before the missile hit its target.

Soviet cruise missile and attack submarines roam ever farther afield searching for American submarines. Both types have been seen increasingly in the Mediterranean and in the Caribbean, where they have bases in Cuba. Soviet submarines have patrolled off the coast of South Africa, in the Indian Ocean and the Persian Gulf, and in the South China Sea, where, ironically, they call at the Camranh Bay base built by the United States during the Vietnam War.

T HE DISCOVERY OF Soviet submarine strength in the 1984 review was a ''turning point,'' Vice Adm. James R. Hogg, the director of Naval Warfare, told Congress earlier this year. Consequently, he said, preparing to fight Russian submarines became ''the Navy's number one war-fighting priority, because of the severe national security consequences if we lose that war-fighting edge over the Soviets.''

That change in priority led to two vital Navy programs. The Antisubmarine Master Plan and Investment Strategy is due to be completed by the end of this year. It includes plans to get the Navy's proposed SSN-21 submarine ''off the drawing board and into production,'' said Admiral Trost.

Navy officers say that submarine, to be named Seawolf, will be able to operate in the Arctic, travel at about 50 knots, carry 50 torpedoes (twice as many as the present Los Angeles class), launch Tomahawk cruise missiles and detect hostile submarines at greater distances than any other submarine. The first of the Seawolf class is to be delivered in the early 1990's.

The second program, a new master antisubmarine warfare strategy, was incorporated into the ambitious maritime strategy that the Secretary of the Navy, John F. Lehman Jr., made public last winter. Details of the new strategy are secret, but the plan calls for most attack submarines to shift from defense to offense.

In a war, they would seek to destroy Soviet ballistic missile submarines as early as possible, as well as Soviet cruise-missile and attack submarines in the northern waters. A similar assault would be mounted into the eastern bastion.

Before he retired earlier this year, Admiral Watkins told Congress that the Soviet Union was aware of the new strategy. ''They know we are going to the bastions,'' he said. ''They know we can get inside their knickers before they can find us, and they don't like it.''

To enable submarines to operate under the Arctic ice, the Navy has strengthened the sails, or towers, and the diving planes of the 37 submarines in the Sturgeon class. Rotating the diving planes so that they are vertical helps a submarine to cut through the surface ice in an emergency.

In a conflict, the first Soviet ships to become targets would be the older ballistic missile submarines in the Atlantic and Pacific. Today, two or three of those submarines, similar to the one that sank 1,000 miles off the Atlantic coast in October, circle like lazy sharks 500 to 1,000 miles off the East and West coasts of the United States.

Some 10,000 yards behind each Soviet submarine, an American attack submarine prowls with torpedo tubes loaded, just out of Soviet sonar range. The rules of engagement that would govern an American captain's actions are secret, but in a crisis, he would most likely close quietly on the Soviet submarine ahead. Should the Russian captain open missile hatches to fire at the United States, the American submarine would hear it on sonar, and would fire torpedoes with the intention of destroying the Russian ship before the first missile was away. Submarines fire missiles at about one-minute intervals, so the American submarine would almost certainly be able to destroy the Soviet submarine before a second missile was launched.

As for Soviet submarines in the bastions, Admiral Watkins said the maritime strategy called for ''an aggressive campaign.'' By driving into the bastions, he said, American attack submarines would reduce ''the attractiveness of nuclear escalation by changing the nuclear balance in our favor.'' With the Soviet Union placing ''great weight on the nuclear correlation of forces,'' he asserted, American ''maritime forces can influence that correlation'' by sinking Soviet submarines, then deploying carriers closer to the Soviet Union. The new submarine strategy, however, has been questioned on two counts: will it work, and is it wise?

Not all Navy officers think so. During a recent conference at the Naval War College in Newport, R.I., several officers asserted that submarines trying to penetrate the Soviet bastions would be picked off like ducks. Other naval officers have argued that dispatching attack submarines into the northern bastions would leave American carriers exposed to Soviet submarines. They have contended that the attack submarines should be held back to protect the fleet.

Still other Navy critics have pointed to the advantage Soviet electrically powered submarines would have in home waters, where those quiet boats would be hard to detect and sink. A naval officer long experienced in antisubmarine operations was succinct: ''Forget it.''

Outside the Navy, Thomas Stefanick of the Federation of American Scientists has asserted that the submarine strategy might lead to escalation from conventional to nuclear war. ''No other aspect of United States or Soviet military strategy calls for an immediate threat of attack on intercontinental nuclear forces as part of a conventional war plan,'' he said.

Similarly, the Center for Defense Information, run by retired military officers, contended in a recent study: ''The Soviets might respond to United States attacks on the ballistic missile submarines by launching pre-emptive nuclear strikes against the threatening naval forces, thereby triggering a nuclear exchange.''

W HEREAS THE Russians have gathered ballistic missile submarines into bastions, the United States Navy has dispersed its ''boomers,'' as the ballistic missile carriers are known, ever farther afield - and alone. ''We are moving back,'' Admiral Watkins told Congress. ''We are moving our forward-deployed ballistic missile submarines back because we have the longer missile, the C-4 missile.''

The C-4, also known as Trident I, is replacing the Poseidon missile in older submarines and is going into the new Ohio class, of which eight have joined the fleet. The Poseidon has a range of 2,800 miles; the Trident I's range is 4,600 miles.

In the 1990's, the Trident II missile will be able to hit targets 6,000 miles distant and land within 400 feet of them, giving it an accuracy comparable to that of the Air Force's MX missile. When Trident II is deployed, the United States will have nuclear weapons at sea that, for the first time, could destroy any known Soviet target.

Most important, however, is the sea room provided by each advance in missile technology. Dr. Donald C. Daniel, a specialist in naval strategy at the Naval War College, has calculated that submarines armed with Poseidon missiles have only 3 million square miles of ocean under which they can patrol, compared with the 30 million square miles of the Trident I and the 50 million square miles of the Trident II.

American submariners assert that advances in quieting, speed, sonar and deceptive tactics have made it impossible for Soviet submarines to trail a boomer. Vice Adm. Bruce DeMars, who is in charge of submarine operations, told Congress last winter that ''our Trident and Poseidon missile submarines patrol undetected throughout the oceans of the world.'' He added: ''We know of no projected or postulated threat to this survivability we cannot overcome.''

The Central Intelligence Agency, however, has done a study of Soviet antisubmarine efforts in which it identifies 13 Soviet institutes seeking ways to detect American submarines. The agency told Congress that techniques other than sonar, such as synthetic aperture radar, infra-red, magnetic or laser sensors might be able to find a submarine even if deeply submerged, but said they had no proof of a Soviet breakthrough.

When a boomer leaves Bangor, Wash., or Charleston, S.C., its first task is to shake Soviet attack submarines lurking outside those ports. Submariners say that one Soviet submarine is always waiting, and often more.

The boomer slips past the Soviet submarines by having a Navy surface ship jam Soviet sonar, or by having an attack submarine run interference. Sometimes, the boomer launches a device that imitates the submarine's sound and goes northward -while the submarine goes quietly south.

Once in its patrol area, the boomer avoids detection by boring holes in the ocean at three knots, making little noise. If the submarine's powerful sonar hears a Soviet submarine headed its way from a long distance, the boomer fades quietly in another direction.

American submariners have worried that a boomer's ability to remain undetected might be compromised by a weakness in its communications system. Until recently, a submarine rose near the surface to raise an antenna or remained deep but streamed a wire that floated up just under the surface to receive messages. With gains in Soviet technology, submariners feared those receivers could be detected.

But that shortcoming is being overcome with new communications on extremely low frequencies, known as ELF, which became operational several months ago. ELF permits submarines to receive messages at great depths; boomers rarely transmit, so as not to give themselves away.

That one-way communication is vital to deterrence. If communications were not reliable, the President could not be confident that his command to launch nuclear missiles would be received.

As a constant check on security, the Navy loads into each submarine a black box that records every move made during a two-month patrol. After the patrol, the box is taken to specialists at Johns Hopkins University for scrutiny. The researchers look for lapses in operating procedures, study sounds the submarine's sonar has heard and analyze habits into which a captain may have inadvertently fallen, such as spending too much time in a given quadrant of the patrol area.

Once the data are analyzed, the captain is directed to avoid in the future any mistakes he has made. With random operation, the submariners say, comes security.

Meantime, every day, the hunt goes on. Not long ago, two American attack submarines stood guard silently next to a strait in the Mediterranean. When their sonar detected a Soviet cruise missile submarine trying to slip by, one American submarine pulled out to trail it. Shortly afterward, a second Soviet submarine came along behind, whereupon the second American submarine fell into the tail of the parade. The four submarines proceeded through the Mediterranean.

The captain of the second American submarine said later, ''I wondered who was behind me.''

https://www.nytimes.com/1986/12/07/magazine/a-silent-battle-surfaces.html

Edited April 23, 2023 by Perun

RETAC21 · May 3, 2023

I just found this site through the superb https://www.amazon.es/British-Submarines-Cold-War-Era/dp/1526771225

British submarine developments:

http://rnsubs.co.uk/articles/development.html

Perun · May 3, 2023

Interesting site and book, thanks mste

13 hours ago, RETAC21 said:

I just found this site through the superb https://www.amazon.es/British-Submarines-Cold-War-Era/dp/1526771225

British submarine developments:

http://rnsubs.co.uk/articles/development.html

Interesting site and book, thanks mate