Lurkers in the deep: How Canada's new submarines will be used in peace and potential war
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submarines → use → peace
German-built 212CD submarines won't just patrol Canada's coasts, but will travel the world's oceans in stealth
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submarines → build → stealth
"Canada's next submarine fleet will secure our coastlines and waters," Prime Minister Mark Carney said early last month in announcing the choice of Germany's ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems as the preferred bidder for the country's new underwater fleet.
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Carney → secure → fleet
Patrolling Canada's three coasts will be part of the job for the fleet of up to a dozen state-of-the-art diesel-electric 212CD submarines, says retired vice-admiral Darren Hawco, who commanded Canada's Atlantic Fleet and served as the nation's military representative to NATO until 2020.
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who → patrol → 2020
"With three oceans, the Arctic responsibilities, they're one of those strategic assets that we want to have."
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we → want → that
But Hawco says the subs — which are intended to replace the navy's aging Victoria Class fleet and could be ready by 2034 — will also travel the world.
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which → say → world
He expects to see them used in global hot spots from the Taiwan Strait and the nine-dash line in the South China Sea to the Mediterranean and the Baltic.
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them → expect → Mediterranean
Protecting the seabed and everything on it
Nearer to home, the subs' job will include protecting underwater infrastructure and resources that many Canadians are only dimly aware of, like the fibre-optic cables that carry trans-oceanic communications.
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that → protect → communications
"Most people do not appreciate that 90 per cent of global telecommunications actually runs across the seabed," said retired vice-admiral Mark Norman, former commander of the navy.
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Norman → appreciate → navy
"Everybody thinks it's satellite based."
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it → think → ?
"In the early days of the [current] Ukrainian conflict, we saw the vulnerability of underwater infrastructure.
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we → see → infrastructure
"
Even for these more domestic tasks, the submarines' range of 7,000 nautical miles (13,000 kilometres) will be needed "because the distances are so vast," said Norman.
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Norman → need → miles
The new subs "have lots of endurance.
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subs → have → endurance
They are not designed to go anywhere particularly quickly, but they are designed to stay at sea for relatively long periods of time, get into a patrol area, and basically stay there."
Their air-independent propulsion lets them remain submerged for about three weeks, allowing them to operate invisibly in areas such as the eastern and western approaches to Canada's Arctic coast and archipelago.
Riches
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them → design → coast
Hawco says the immediate threat in the North is the fact that Canada and Russia have overlapping undersea claims.
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Canada → say → claims
There would be little return for Russia to invade Canada's Arctic archipelago, much less its mainland, he said.
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he → invade → archipelago
"I think the return for them is to say, 'I own the entire Lomonosov Ridge and all the resources that are there, and there's nothing you can do,'" he said, referring to the 1,800-kilometre-long ridge under the Arctic Ocean that's the subject of a territorial dispute.
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that → think → dispute
The answer to that kind of threat, Hawco said, is "having a submarine that can operate at that kind of distance, that's covert, super-quiet and can sink anything that comes close."
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that → say → anything
As undersea mining becomes more important, said Hawco, the subs will be called on to make sure resources on Canada's continental shelf aren't pilfered.
He cites reports on the amount of rare earth minerals Japan has found by surfacing mud offshore.
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Japan → become → mud
"That's just an indication of how much unexplored, unidentified and arguably unexploited critical minerals there are in seabeds," he said.
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he → be → seabeds
Protecting those resources in the future will involve submarines and a major investment in undersea technology, including "a whole bunch of sensors, whether sitting on the bottom or mobile," Norman said.
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Norman → protect → bottom
A needle in a haystack
A major role for the submarines in NATO's new Cold War with Russia and other adversaries will be intelligence-gathering and surveillance, including the covert insertion of special forces troops.
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role → include → troops
"They could be trailing other platforms, be they surface ships or submarines.
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they → trail → platforms
They could just be doing general surveillance, including surveillance of land-based targets," said Norman.
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Norman → do → targets
Norman says he sees the subs working in concert with a fleet of underwater drones, and doesn't believe drones will render the submarines obsolete.
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submarines → say → drones
Instead, their stealth will keep them relevant.
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stealth → keep → them
"Technology is not going to solve this problem in our lifetimes.
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Technology → go → lifetimes
It still will continue to be like finding a needle in a haystack, and nobody's figured out how to do that yet," Norman said.
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Norman → continue → that
Fear of what lurks in the deep
That stealth is the key difference between the new submarines and the current Canadian fleet.
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stealth → lurk → submarines
"It's hard to hide on this globe today with space surveillance being what it is," said Hawco.
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Hawco → hide → globe
But the new submarines "are able to operate in a very dead zone of water where sound doesn't propagate well.
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sound → operate → water
"
The goal is to create a mystery about where they're deployed.
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they → create → mystery
"One of the greatest challenges in naval operations for an adversary is the knowledge that a submarine is out there somewhere, but you don't know where," said Norman.
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Norman → know → adversary
When a Canadian frigate begins a deployment, there is typically a sendoff with fanfare.
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frigate → begin → fanfare
Pictures of the mission are posted to a Facebook page or the DND website and the frigate can be followed through online ship trackers.
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frigate → post → trackers
A submarine "could be just sitting on the seabed off its own home port," said Norman, "
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Norman → sit → port
but it doesn't matter because it's the fact that it's at sea," and therefore invisible.
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it → matter → sea
"It becomes an asymmetric consumer of resources to try to find a submarine.
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It → become → submarine
When you have a larger fleet, which we're hoping to get, it has a multiplication effect on an adversary.
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it → have → adversary
If they know that Canada has six submarines deployed at a particular moment, in a crisis, then where the hell are the submarines?"
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submarines → know → crisis
…and 68 more, not listed.
