Murky Waters for the Supersub

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Last year retired British Navy Captain John Moore, editor of Jane's Fighting Ships, declared that the Soviets had taken a dramatic lead in submarine design since the foremost U.S. attack-submarine class, the Los Angeles, was commissioned in 1976. "The Soviet navy has introduced four classes of nuclear attack submarines, all with higher speeds than the Los Angeles'," said Moore, adding that Soviet subs could dive deeper and had more efficient nuclear reactors.

The Soviet improvements are particularly unsettling because they have been made in the most critical life-and-death factor in underseas warfare: noise reduction. Until recently, U.S. submariners joked about the clanging and clanking of Soviet subs, at times picked up quite literally all the way across the Atlantic. In October 1986, however, confidence in the Navy's ability to detect Soviet subs was shaken when the attack submarine U.S.S. Augusta, cruising underwater off Gibraltar, collided with a Soviet submarine it had not heard.

The dramatic turn in Soviet noise reduction has fueled the debate over whether the Seawolf can perform its assigned task. Even with redesigned specifications, the sub cannot dive as deep or sprint as fast as the newest Soviet models. Its computer brain, which with ancillary equipment weighs 32 tons and includes millions of lines of software programming, is still unproved and years behind schedule. Moreover, critics say the Seawolf, costing nearly three times as much as the Los Angeles-class subs, are simply too pricey. "Seawolf is so expensive it will cut our procurement in half at a time when we need more, not fewer, advanced submarines," says Naval Analyst Norman Polmar.

Instead of sinking billions into the Seawolf, some submarine experts suggest prolonging the active life of the Los Angeles subs. But the Navy argues it has literally run out of space for technological improvements in the older model. So tight is space that when the Louisville was commissioned in 1986, crew members were hard pressed to find a place to display a souvenir basketball autographed by members of the namesake Louisville national collegiate basketball champions.

With alternatives limited, most military experts are resigned to proceeding with Seawolf. "Seawolf will be built," says Ronald O'Rourke, a naval analyst at the Congressional Research Service. "But America has got to design a new attack-submarine class, and soon." Congress seems to agree: in approving $467.6 million for Seawolf construction this fiscal year, the legislators also set aside $100 million to begin research on a better sub.