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| China-Japan-Koreas |
| Chinese produce new type of sub |
| 2004-07-16 |
| via Wash Times - EFL Ooooh! All sources unnamed and anonymous. Big surprise. By Bill Gertz - July 16, 2004 China's naval buildup has produced a new type of attack submarine that U.S. intelligence did not know was under construction, according to U.S. defense and intelligence officials. The submarine was spotted several weeks ago for the first time and has been designated by the Pentagon as the first Yuan-class of submarine. A photograph of the completed submarine in the water at China's Wuhan shipyard was posted on a Chinese Internet site this week and confirmed by a defense official as the new submarine. Wuhan is located inland, some 420 miles west of Shanghai. One official said the new submarine was a "technical surprise" to U.S. intelligence, which was unaware that Beijing was building a new non-nuclear powered attack submarine. U.S. intelligence agencies have few details about the new submarine but believe it is diesel-powered rather than nuclear-powered, said officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity. ...more... Anonymous. Of course. Seems the Straits will be crowded. Wonder if Hong Kong can spare some of those nifty natty traffic cops... Meanwhile, IIRC, there was some asshat who sold non-cavitating propeller design secrets to China about a decade ago... |
| Posted by:.com |
| #9 Yo Sam. Were you a skimmer, airedale or bubblehead? What hull numbers? |
| Posted by: Zpaz 2004-07-16 10:48:28 PM |
| #8 Chinese PLA Submarine Database Search on 'AIP'. I count 6 in 2004 and more coming. |
| Posted by: ed 2004-07-16 12:57:56 PM |
| #7 ...Mr. Gertz is, shall we say, a bit credulous when it comes to The Threat. A year or so back, he made a big deal about him and his photographer being the first Americans ever aboard a Russian Sovremenny class destroyer. For some reason he never responded to my email where I offered to send him the pics I have of myself aboard a Sovremenny in Norfolk , May 89. (FULL DISCLOSURE: The Sovs sent the Sovremenny and a Slava class cruiser on a port call to Norfolk; I was one of several thousand people who got aboard. I had a better time than most, my tour guide was the chief engineer aboard the attack sub USS Norfolk . ) Mike |
| Posted by: Mike Kozlowski 2004-07-16 12:50:49 PM |
| #6 I'll bet the Russ are happpy to find the wiley Chinee can make Kilo knock offs. I'll bet it's not an AIP boat. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2004-07-16 12:45:47 PM |
| #5 It's a submarine made out of bamboo. Tends to get waterlogged rather quickly tho.... |
| Posted by: Bomb-a-rama 2004-07-16 12:02:52 PM |
| #4 From experience I found diesel boats harder to find then nukes in brown water. A couple really obvious reasons are they make almost no noise when running on batteries and most diesels can bottom and shoot from the bottom (which really sucks for surface ships). Most of it boiled down to how much the crew trained. We found nukes with crappy crews and didn't find diesels with good crews. Training is a huge chunk of it when it comes to sub hunting. |
| Posted by: Yosemite Sam 2004-07-16 10:26:20 AM |
| #3 Diesel-electric boats are great for coastal defense. Very quiet at slow speeds. You still have to keep up your maintenance, which has always been the big problem with socialist states. Have to keep an eye on this. |
| Posted by: Steve 2004-07-16 8:58:45 AM |
| #2 Actually, new Air Independent Propulsion subs can stay underwater for several weeks and can be made quieter than nuc subs since they don't have to use reactor coolant pumps. They are a big threat. |
| Posted by: ed 2004-07-16 8:26:48 AM |
| #1 oohhhh. A DIESEL SUB! Tech break through! PRC woke up to the fact that they can't get to Taiwan in sunk ships. This is, I'm sure, a capable boat, but not enuf...they'll try and build a bunch in their usual "numbers overcome tech superiority" doctrine |
| Posted by: Frank G 2004-07-16 8:19:54 AM |