Global Courant
There will be a Vanguard class on September 11th ballistic missile The submarine glided back to port at Naval Base Clyde in a zombie-like state: the sound-deadening, anechoic tiles on the hull had been bleached pale white by barnacles, where they had not been stained a sickly green by algae. It was the image of tired.
That feral sentiment was likely shared by the submarine’s approximately 130-man crew, and for good reason. It is believed that the vessel and its crew did so Spent 195 days on patrol, the vast majority of them submerged. Many claim this sets a record for the longest known patrol by a Royal Navy submarine.
According to Navy Lookout websiteHowever, its sister ship Victorious may have lasted a few weeks longer, completing a 207-day patrol in 2021. The website claims that Vanguard class patrols last an average of 163 days (5.5 months), an increase from the average of the previous three months.
The Royal Navy refuses to confirm the duration of deployment, per official policy. While the identity of the returning submarine is not mentioned in the reports, only the Vigilant and Vanguard are reportedly operationally available in 2023.
While the submarine crew can rightly be proud of completing this enormously long mission, the fact that this was deemed necessary is not a good thing. Regular nuclear deterrent patrol by the US Navy Ohio-class SSBNs The last two or three months, while their record for the longest ever SSBN patrol – set by the Gold crew of the USS Pennsylvania in 2014 – was just over four and a half months.
HMS Vengeance en route to Devonport for a refit in February 2012.Handout – Getty Images
The Royal Navy’s four Vanguard-class submarines are nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines (or SSBN) – often called ‘boomers’ or ‘bombers’ in US and Royal Navy parlance. While attack submarines prowl the ocean looking for trouble, a boomer just wants to sneak around quietly and be left alone – waiting in case the call ever comes to end the world as we know it by launching a strategic nuclear missile strike. Hopefully that never happens.
London is no longer concerned with nuclear weapons on land or in the air, such as its own long-retired ‘V-bombers.’ Nuclear weapons at sea are expensive, but difficult to attack preventively. When submerged, they effectively guarantee an apocalyptic retaliation even if an opponent makes a successful first strike. For more than half a century, the Royal Navy has always had at least one SSBN patrolling the sea, armed with nuclear missiles 365 days a year. The mission is known as Continuous At-Sea Deterrence (CASD).
The main culprit for the extra-long patrols is the lead ship of the class, HMS Vanguard. In 2012, the Royal Navy discovered that the Vanguard’s reactor was leaking radiation into cooling water. This development was revealed to the public in 2014.
So Vanguard spent seven years refueling and overhauling everything to the limit amount of £500 million. These renovations included repairs related to the hair-raising situation clash with the French SSBN Le Triomphant in February 2009, and replacing much of the seaplane tail section and bearings. Vanguard finally left the Devonport shipyard in May 2023.
HMS Vanguard arriving at Clyde Naval Base in Faslane in November 2010.CPOA(Phot) Tam McDonald – Wikimedia Commons
During those years, three submarines were forced to take on the constant patrols, even though they too inevitably needed time for maintenance and repairs. The same month Vanguard returned to sea, Victorious arrived in Devonport to begin a major refit, following a fire on board in September 2022.
These problems arise from the risks of operating such a small SSBN force with little redundancy. Maintaining the continued deployment of SSBNs, with their nuclear reactors and missiles, is so expensive that only four other countries currently do so: France, Russia, the US and now China. And although China has twenty times the population of Britain, it only has that number six Type 094 Jin-class SSBNs.
The psychological toll of underwater boredom
The Royal Navy insists it has compensated the crew with ‘additional pay after an extended period at sea’. But many experienced submariners agree that it takes six months Underwater- is longer than people should spend in an isolated and confined environment – especially with virtually no communication with the outside world.
2022 commentary on two Vanguards who carried out 157-day patrols: former Royal Navy SSBN commander Rob Forsyth-noted in a blog post that the “great danger is that this unchanging routine, week after week, leads to boredom, complacency and an inevitable decline in standards (…) personal relationships are tested to the limit.”
By way of comparison, Forsyth states that his Cold WarPatrols of the era lasted only 50–75 days (an average of two months) and were conducted in reportedly less cramped conditions than those of the Vanguard. Even then, he wrote that “great efforts were still needed to keep the crew stimulated and alert and not allow them to withdraw into themselves (…).” Forsyth noted that he himself had adopted quirky habits, such as tying his scrub brush to a leash and taking it for a walk once a week.
Of a 111-day patrol of the Warspite from 1982 to 1983, he wrote that he “was told that operating errors, flare-ups among crew members, and disciplinary issues began to become a problem halfway through, about fifty days. He adds that long patrols led to loss of vision, weight, general fitness and spatial awareness, and that the lack of sunlight lead to vitamin D deficiencies.
Cookies and tea for Prime Minister Cameron and the crew of the Vanguard-class submarine HMS Victorious while at sea off the coast of Scotland on April 4, 2013.AFP-Getty Images
The Telegraph interviewed Ryan Ramsey, a former attack submarine commander, who said he would be “surprised if there were no mental health issues after this because it is extreme. The reality is they shouldn’t. Those boats are designed for three-month patrols.”
Deficiencies in discipline among Royal Navy submarines have received regular media attention in recent years, whether related to intimidation and forbidden sexual relations, their abuse hard drugs And alcoholor raucous partying. At one point in 2017, such scandals culminated in 10% of the Vigiliant’s crew being fired, investigated or forced to resign – including the captain and first officer.
The Department of Defense’s reluctance to discuss the duration of nuclear patrols based on operational security has angered critics who argue that the strain on crews resulting from prolonged patrols increases the risk of an accident involving the UK’s nuclear delivery systems.
London’s nuclear vanguard
A Vanguard-class submarine departs Faslane in September 2009.JEFF J MITCHELL – Getty Images
The Royal Navy’s four Vanguard-class submarines – Vanguard, Victorious, Vigilant and Vengeance – were commissioned between 1993 and 1999 at a cost of £3.75 billion per hull. They are each 150 meters long (one and a half football fields) and displace 17,500 tons underwater. Originally built for a 25 year lifespan, they have been given a life extension to operate for 35-40 years instead. Their Rolls-Royce PWR2 pressurized water reactors generate air and maintain propulsion in such a way that the submarine can remain submerged virtually indefinitely – at least as long as there is food for the crew.
Although Vanguards have four torpedo tubes for self-defense, their primary weapons are stored in their sixteen missile tubes. These Trident II D5 ballistic missiles – the the same type used by US Navy boomers– are each capable of releasing multiple independent warheads. In practice, the submarines have been going to sea since 2010 loaded with just eight missiles, filled with no more than forty nuclear warheads between them. However, London’s overall stock is in flux. In the 2010s the number was reduced to approximately 160 warheads, of which no more than 120 were operationally available. In 2021, the government announced plans to reduce the stockpile to 260 nuclear weapons.
The cost and purpose of the British nuclear deterrent force are criticized in left-wing circles of British politics. One complication is all that Royal Navy submarines are based at Faslane, Scotland. Should Scotland vote for independence in a referendum, SSBNs could be denied use of Faslane as Scottish independence parties oppose the use of the nuclear deterrent base.
Nicola Sturgeon, former leader of the Scottish National Party and First Minister of Scotland, attends an anti-nuclear protest in London on February 27, 2016 (Trident is the name of the missile on the Vanguard-class submarine).Mike Kemp – Getty Images
Political risks aside, the Vanguards should (in theory) be replaced by the next generation of Dreadnaught SSBNs by 2030 – with a planned lifespan of fifty years. Initial construction phases for the first three Dreadnaughts began in 2016 at BAE Systems’ Barrows-in-Furness shipyard. The Dreadnaughts will be slightly longer than the Vanguards and considerably larger, with a height of 153.6 meters and a displacement of almost 19,000 tons underwater.
Many of the Dreadnaught’s reported innovations appear to focus on improving the quality of life for the crew. That includes separate quarters and bathrooms for male and female crew members, new dedicated sports facilities and a sickbay, and a lighting system designed to simulate an artificial day/night cycle. That could make a six-month patrol more bearable, although it’s still not recommended.
Infographic on the features of the SSBN’s successor, posted by the Royal Navy in 2016, the year the first steel for the lead ship HMS Dreadnaught was cut.BAe Systems PLC – Wikimedia Commons
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