PLAN ASW Capability

SamuraiBlue said:

Go ahead believe what you want to believe, it's your life.
Do what you want to do.
Ignorance is bliss ain't it.

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You should know; you start quoting cartoon characters when you lose arguments and accuse other people of technical mumbo jumbo when they go deeper than what you found on Wikipedia (while pretending that the info is from your memory) LOL

A SQUID with a "6 km" detection range is about as useful as a missile with a 6 km flying range. That is to say, useless. Except as a platform for further research, which is exactly what the current SQUID is. A feasibility study for a future prototype for a future deployable system, many years down the road.

As for loitering ASW missiles, it is about as silly an idea as pykrete carriers.... "plausible, but ludicrous". There is no guarantee a loitering ASW missile is anywhere closer to a target than a coastal ASW missile launcher when it is located. And whereas coastal missiles are launch on-demand, a loitering missile is a pre-expended weapon with a low chance of success and a high chance of wastage.

Iron Man said:

A SQUID with a "6 km" detection range is about as useful as a missile with a 6 km flying range. That is to say, useless. Except as a platform for further research, which is exactly what the current SQUID is. A feasibility study for a future prototype for a future deployable system, many years down the road.

As for loitering ASW missiles, it is about as silly an idea as pykrete carriers.... "plausible, but ludicrous". There is no guarantee a loitering ASW missile is anywhere closer to a target than a coastal ASW missile launcher when it is located. And whereas coastal missiles are launch on-demand, a loitering missile is a pre-expended weapon with a low chance of success and a high chance of wastage.

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I agree with the second part of that statement, as there are better ways of delivering an ASW torpedo.
But the first part is just plain wrong.

We've seen the P-3 Orion and the Y-9 MPA aircraft sport short-range MAD detectors. And a SQUID with a 6km detection range is just a longer-ranged version of that MAD detector.

So if an MPA flies at Mach 0.8 during a 8hour patrol, it travels 8000km. With a detection swathe of say 10km, that translates to 80,000 km2 of ocean that is scanned.

SamuraiBlue said:

Go ahead believe what you want to believe, it's your life.
Do what you want to do.
Ignorance is bliss ain't it.

Click to expand...

Here's something to correct your own ignorance.

Earlier this year in 2018, the National Science Foundation reported to Congress that it expects Chinese R&D spending to exceed that of the USA, in the Year 2019

So it is now perfectly plausible to expect China to come up with technological breakthroughs.
And going forward, that should become the default assumption given China's higher R&D spending, which is also growing much faster.

Ignorance is bliss, isn't it?

AndrewS said:

Here's something to correct your own ignorance.

Earlier this year in 2018, the National Science Foundation reported to Congress that it expects Chinese R&D spending to exceed that of the USA, in the Year 2019

So it is now perfectly plausible to expect China to come up with technological breakthroughs.
And going forward, that should become the default assumption given China's higher R&D spending, which is also growing much faster.

Ignorance is bliss, isn't it?

Click to expand...

I would be a bit cautious with such predictions. R&D is much like military spending in that it is largest cumulative.

It can takes years or decades worth of R&D investment to allow the next big breakthrough.

Just because China is projected to spend more on R&D next year does not automatically mean China will suddenly gain the technological upperhand over night.

Also, it is a little simplistic to directly link R&D spending with advancements and breakthroughs. While there is indeed a strong correlation, it’s a hugely variable correlation where investments does not always yield fruits.

Also, in the context of weapons development, it is very rare for a single breakthrough to bring about revolutionary new weapons. Usually you need a vast number of breakthroughs in diverse fields to all be ready before you can bring something to market. One breakthrough may end up waiting ‘on the shelf’ for years or decades before another breakthrough allows it to be used.

This ties back to the earlier point about R&D being cumulative.

AndrewS said:

I agree with the second part of that statement, as there are better ways of delivering an ASW torpedo.
But the first part is just plain wrong.

We've seen the P-3 Orion and the Y-9 MPA aircraft sport short-range MAD detectors. And a SQUID with a 6km detection range is just a longer-ranged version of that MAD detector.

So if an MPA flies at Mach 0.8 during a 8hour patrol, it travels 8000km. With a detection swathe of say 10km, that translates to 80,000 km2 of ocean that is scanned.

Click to expand...

While a SQUID in its current form may be useful in the tail of a maritime ASW aircraft, we have been talking about SQUID in the past on SDF in terms of being deployed undersea as part of a SOSUS-type sensor network. In which case a static non-moving detector with a range of 6km is most definitely not practical.

plawolf said:

I would be a bit cautious with such predictions. R&D is much like military spending in that it is largest cumulative.

It can takes years or decades worth of R&D investment to allow the next big breakthrough.

Just because China is projected to spend more on R&D next year does not automatically mean China will suddenly gain the technological upperhand over night.

Also, it is a little simplistic to directly link R&D spending with advancements and breakthroughs. While there is indeed a strong correlation, it’s a hugely variable correlation where investments does not always yield fruits.

Also, in the context of weapons development, it is very rare for a single breakthrough to bring about revolutionary new weapons. Usually you need a vast number of breakthroughs in diverse fields to all be ready before you can bring something to market. One breakthrough may end up waiting ‘on the shelf’ for years or decades before another breakthrough allows it to be used.

This ties back to the earlier point about R&D being cumulative.

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Yes, R&D is cumulative, but we've seen numerous examples of countries catching up by piggybacking off on existing technology in existence elsewhere.

And in the medium-run over a large and diversified research base (which China has), we will certainly see a very strong correlation between R&D investment and R&D output

Iron Man said:

While a SQUID in its current form may be useful in the tail of a maritime ASW aircraft, we have been talking about SQUID in the past on SDF in terms of being deployed undersea as part of a SOSUS-type sensor network. In which case a static non-moving detector with a range of 6km is most definitely not practical.

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SQUID sensors (if practical) would be small electronic sensors, and should become really cheap to deploy. Then they could be deployed in a static oceanic network.

But in any case, airborne vehicles are better, as it means they can cover a lot of ocean very quickly.

AndrewS said:

SQUID sensors (if practical) would be small electronic sensors, and should become really cheap to deploy. Then they could be deployed in a static oceanic network.

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They would have to improve their detection range by more than a order of magnitude first.

Iron Man said:

They would have to improve their detection range by more than a order of magnitude first.

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I can see numerous civilian applications for SQUIDs which will drive up volumes. So the SQUID electronics could shrink to the size and cost of a smartphone.

Then it would definitely be cheap enough to create a huge array or tripwire of SQUID sensors.