I have a feeling that those 10 men were a skeleton crew. The article says they were towing the thing to a scrapyard. K-19 was the first Russian nuclear ballistic missile sub, I'd bet K-159 was another one much later down the line, though whether it was a fast attack or boomer, I don't have a clue.

Oh, I need to RTFA... it was an attack submarine, decommed in 1989. It lost it's "floating hulls" (pontoons?) in a storm and that's why it went down.

I had seen reports of the decay that the Russians had fallen too, but this is pretty bad. Pontoons? It wasn't still sea worthy?

God help the common seamen in Russia.

It was out of service, sitting in its homeport for 14 years. I would bet it got close to zero maintenance in that time... not too surprising it wasn't seaworthy.

Just for FYI:

Though I'm not a Navy guy, I take an interest in their stuff the same as anyone who's interested in military history. I'm almost positive that there has been no conventional subs in our Navy for at least 35 years.

I remember reading the book that Lloyd (?) Bucher wrote (he was the skipper of the USS Pueblo, the electronic surveillance ship that was captured by North Korean patrol boats in 1968). I'm pretty sure I remember him saying that he had been in conventional subs (diesel) until they were all retired. He didn't have the academics to be nuclear qualified so he had to continue his service in surface vessels.

(Now I'm not trying to get you guys steamed about the Pueblo --Lord knows I get steamed enough myself thinking about it. I'm just citing this as evidence for my assertion).

This lack of any sort of modern conventional power subs has come to be seen as a weakness in our Navy by some, for various reasons; I think I've seen various proposals recently to bring back modern conventional subs. Whether the regular establishment Navy supports this idea I don't know (though I doubt they do).

Suggest you keep an eye out for this if you're interested, and include it as a blog item.

I'd better qualify my remark. I meant to say no more conventional powered "combat-capable" submarines. I don't know about research, but I would think any research sub would be a special design, whether it's nuclear or conventional powered. I don't think we've kept any combat capable diesel boats in service for any reason, to include research. But I defer to any Navy guy who knows for sure otherwise.

Wasn't there some stupid comedy movie put out about 5 or 10 years ago, about a bunch of misfits manning an old diesel conventional sub? I think the Frazier guy was in it? I didn't see it, but if a lot of people did, maybe that gave folks the idea that conventional U.S. Navy subs are still around.

Note I said U.S. Navy. I'm sure that the Dutch and Germans, among others, are still building modern conventional subs. Not sure of how they are powered. There's some way to do it using hydrogen peroxide as well as diesel -- that may be what they're using.

For all we know, the ole' Russkies built their reactor vessels out of carbon steel. And the older the sub, the less containment they had. We build all our stuff out of Inconel, which in Nuclear World as glorious as Titanium is in flyboy land. But an older sub, with a small depleted core leaking slowly will cause no real rise in radiation levels in the ocean. Remember, Dilution is the Solution to Pollution.

Oh, the American diesels are all gone. They have no use in our Navy. There are some hulks laying about, but not in any shape to move. Plus an entire crew would have to be trained specifically to run one. Nuke boats are quite the different animal from a diesel. There are "Special" boats out their for "Special" work, but they are one-off production models (USS Narwhal) or converted ex-boomers.

The US has no non-nuclear subs left. When Taiwan wanted them, we arranged for a sale from another country, somewhere up in the Scandanavia's I think.

I've posted a few articles on US Sub names and some general info. Stop by for a visit.

I know that Norway and several other countries maintain modern diesel attack subs. I think the UK might as well, but I'm not sure about that.

Just read soemwhere that the core had already been pulled.

Oh I knew conventional Attack subs were long gone. I was thinking of the USS Narwhal, but I couldn't remember if she was a nuclear boat or not. Plus the DSRV, a quick check and,

https://www.chinfo.navy.mil/navpalib/factfile/ships/ship-dsrv.html

Also doesn't the Navy operate some tint subs of the Alvin type?

https://www.ocean.udel.edu/deepsea/level-2/mission/alvin.html

Okey-dokey, some more research and I find that I wasn't wrong. The active combat subs are all nuclear. The research ones including the Alvin, which is Navy funded, are all conventional, except for the NR-1. One interesting note. The couple of conventional EX attack subs I found.

https://www.hazegray.org/worldnav/usa/images/agss555.jpg

https://www.hazegray.org/worldnav/usa/images/trout.jpg

info on both found here.

https://www.hazegray.org/worldnav/usa/submar.htm

I don't know a huge amount about the Navy, but I rarely forget something I've read totally. I was the annoying guy in high school that never took a book home, read it once, that was enough. I never studied for exams.

Thanks for the link to "hazegray". The jpegs didn't work but the info site did. Fascinating (as Mr. spock says) about the Trout class conventional sub to be used as an unmanned sonar target. I think now I did read something about this but had completely forgotten.

I'm glad the Iranians didn't get her -- she deserves better. Scrapping would be a better fate than having a bunch of Islamic fanatics peering thru her telescope and lining up a U.S Navy ship for a shot--or being used for a suicide mission (same thing I suppose).

I speculate that knowledge of the existence of this boat is what gave some writer or producer the idea for the aforementioned movie.

Hey Ted I don't think any sale to Taiwan has ever gone thru. I specifically remember reading somewhere, fairly recently, that the Dutch or Germans who still make these subs are too scared of offending Red China. I'm guessing the same considerations scare all of our other NATO "allies" about a possible transfer to Taiwan of existing boats already in their fleets.

Be interested in any links anyone might have about these German or Dutch designs.

This was a big topic of interest after the forcedown of our reconnaissance plane early in the current administration but it has now disappeared completely. Suggest you guys blog on it if interested cause I'll bet you dollars to donuts it'll be back someday.

I suspect the awarding of the 2008 Olympic games to the Reds (oops, I mean the PRC) has take the pressure off Taiwan for now but it'll be back in our lifetimes, when things get bad on the mainland and the Chinese Communists need a "Falklands-style" foreign adventure to distract the unruly masses.

We may be sorry that we didn't follow through and force the transfer of some subs to Taiwan when we had a chance, if we are eventually faced with the decision of whether or not to commit US Navy assets to defend the Taiwan straits against an all out Communist attack designed to force Taiwan's surrender. Be interesting to see what happens then (from a distance I mean -- God help the Taiwanese). The honest thing to do would be to quietly admit to Taiwan that we're not willing to risk war on their behalf and help them to negotiate the best deal they can get now.

Do you guys really think any administration will risk war and the massive disruption to our China trade and economy that would be involved? We'd have to strike the mainland if the Chinese salvoed dozens of these sea-skimmer missiles at our ships from their soil, to defend such an invasion effort. Even if we sent in only nuclear attack subs and just sank their invasion ships, I don't think any Chicom leadership would hope to survive such a blow to their pride without retaliating, possibly with nuclear attacks against a static Pacific base somewhere (Guam, Okinawa). And if the mainland ever gets as desperate as the Norks are now (how I love that acronym--learned it from these blogs) they may well try it.

Anyway, this is the main reason I wish we had retained some conventional sub capability in the U.S. Navy, with some sort of domestic production. But I guess all our knowledgeable Navy guys (a la CPT Morpholine's post) are dismissive of the capabilities of even modernized conventional submarines as far as our own Navy goes.

Seems like it would be worthwhile to buy some for ourselves, develop doctrine, train up the crews, and then train up some Taiwanese crews and quietly let the Chicoms know about it, keeping them handy for quick transfer to Taiwan if needed. Might be a cheap way to help defer a war scenario such as described above. But such an idea would never survive the Congressional appropriations process without Navy support.

Do I believe any American president would risk all out war with China over Taiwan? No, this president in particular, yes I believe he would risk much. The words freedom and commitment aren't throw away lines for him. Now would it be wise to threaten or even entervene if necessary is another issue. I believe we would largely have little choice. To pull back and shake our head would be to tell Japan, you're on your own. Korea would still be a problem and every single nation in the pacific that depends on the power of the US Navy would try and cut a private deal with China, our dominance in the Pacicfic would be at extreme risk.

Welcome to Cold War II, no, We have little choice but to make the Chinese really believe we'd go to the mat for Taiwan, no matter the risk. If they truely believe it, then the risk assesment is theirs. How much pain can they endure to capture Taiwan, and the odds are against them. Invasion vessels, madness, how many divisions can they afford to have drowned? By air, equally suicide, with Taiwanese F-16's and the CAP from the Pacific Fleet. A sneak attack couldn't put enough men on the ground to win, any larger numbers would get them discovered too soon.

All they can do is bombard with artillery and missiles. Hell on Taiwan, but enough to make them surrender? Only they will know if the time comes.

The key is making them KNOW we will bend them over and pump them hard if they try. If they threaten nuclear attack on American bases and cities in California, they know we can still vaporise every single population center in China. They would have to be insane to risk that, even for Chinese pride. If they still attack and hope to defy the odds and win anyway, then the outcome could be as bloody as any in WWII. We can't help that, if they're nuts, we're all screwed. Just like against the Russians.

I wonder if Taiwan's best shot at getting additional subs wouldn't be Isreal? Don't they build their own conventionals? IIRC, Taiwan has a small fleet of older subs already, but I could be wrong.

As for China and Taiwan, you're right about it being Cold War II. I don't think that in any real sense it's that important to the US, except for psychological purposes. Well, maybe it would allow China to extend it's military power further out into the pacific. I feel that this is one of those that neither side can win, and the best we can hope for is to play it to another draw. or change the fundamental situation like happened with the former Soviet Union.