Actually it's another case of lionnoisy making as much noise
over any dirt he can dig up on the Aussies.
What the media says can be true, but it's rarely if ever, the full
story.
What about the other side of the story, from the sailor's side of
it?
In reality, despite all it's teething problems, the Collin's class
sub is one of the deadliest SSKs in the world today. The fact that
it often comes out ahead in exercises againsts the USN, and that
the USN is studying it to learn how to improve it's abilities
against SSK threats is telling on the actual potential of this
system.
Here's a recent article that gives another picture on the Collins,
by the Yanks no less:
Deadliest Diesel Boat in the World Goes to
Sea
April 5, 2007: Australia has completed the refurbishment and
upgrades on the first of its six Collins class subs. The United
States, in a rare move, gave Australia access to American sonar and
underwater warfare systems technology for this. Australia is
spending nearly a hundred million dollars each, to upgrade the
sonar and fire control systems on its six Collins class subs, and
this new deal with the U.S. means that those diesel
electric subs will carry the most advanced electronics in the
world. The Collins class boats, mainly because of the quality of
their crews, have proved to be among the most capable
diesel-electric subs in the world. This
is known because Collins class boats often train with U.S. Navy
ships and aircraft, and usually come out
ahead.
This has made the American admirals more concerned about
the threat from diesel-electric subs. For the moment, however, none
of America's potential naval foes have submarine crews as well
trained as the Australians. The new
electronics will provide the Collins class boats with combat
capabilities similar to the new U.S. Virginian class
SSNs.
The Collins class boats were built in Australia during the 1990s,
and are based on a Swedish design (the Type 471.) At 3,000 tons
displacement, the Collins are half the size of the American Los
Angeles class nuclear attack subs. However, boats that size are
nearly twice the size of subs Europeans are accustomed to designing
and building for their own use. Australia needed larger
boats because of the sheer size of the oceans that surround
Australia. There were a lot of technical problems with the Collins
class boats, which the media jumped all over. The design of these
subs was novel and ambitious, using a lot of automation. This
reduced the crew size to 45.
Australia didn't formally "accept" all the Collins class boats
until three years ago, when everyone agreed that all the major
technical problems were fixed, or at least identified. The current
problem is recruiting a sufficient number of qualified sailors to
keep these subs at sea. Last year, because of personnel
shortages, each available Collins class sub was only able to get to
sea for 88 days. In 2005, each boat averaged 113 days. The
Australian armed forces, in general, are having recruiting
problems, and the government is providing more money (the
traditional, and most effective, cure) to deal with the
problem.
So is it worth it for them to upgrade their subs for such a
cost?
Unless you can find some other way to give any SSK in the world the
abilities of Virginia class SSN, the amount they are spending is
actually a very nice bargain.
