The Benjamin Franklin-class submarine was a group of US ballistic missile submarines that were in Navy service from the 1960s–2000s. The class was an evolutionary development from the earlier James Madison class of fleet ballistic missile submarine. Having quieter machinery and other improvements, it is considered a separate class. A subset of this class is the re-engineered 640 class starting with USS George C. Marshall. The primary difference was that they were built under the new SUBSAFE rules after the loss of USS Thresher, earlier boats of the class had to be retrofitted to meet SUBSAFE requirements. The Benjamin Franklin class, together with the George Washington, Ethan Allen, Lafayette, and James Madison classes, comprised the "41 for Freedom" that was the Navy's primary contribution to the nuclear deterrent force through the late 1980s. This class and the James Madison class are combined with the Lafayettes in some references.
The Sturgeon class was a class of nuclear-powered fast attack submarines (SSN) in service with the United States Navy from the 1960s until 2004. They were the "workhorses" of the Navy's attack submarine fleet throughout much of the Cold War. The boats were phased out in the 1990s and early 21st century, as their successors, the Los Angeles, followed by the Seawolf and Virginia-class boats, entered service.
Project 651, known in the West by its NATO reporting name Juliett class, was a class of Soviet diesel-electric submarines armed with cruise missiles. They were designed in the late 1950s to provide the Soviet Navy with a nuclear strike capability against targets along the east coast of the United States and enemy combatants. The head of the design team was Abram Samuilovich Kassatsier. They carried four nuclear-capable cruise missiles with a range of approximately 300 nautical miles (560 km), which could be launched while the submarine was surfaced and moving less than four knots (7.4 km/h). Once surfaced, the first missile could be launched in about five minutes; subsequent missiles would follow within about ten seconds each. Initially, the missiles were the inertially-guided P-5. When submarine-launched ballistic missiles rendered the P-5s obsolescent, they were replaced with the P-6 designed to attack aircraft carriers. A special 10 m2 target guidance radar was built into the forward edge of the sail structure, which opened by rotating. One boat was eventually fitted with the Kasatka satellite downlink for targeting information to support P-500 4K-80 "Bazalt" anti-ship cruise missiles. The Juliett class had a low magnetic signature austenitic steel double hull, covered by two inches (51 mm) thick black tiles made of sound-absorbing hard rubber.
K-222 was the first and only Project 661 nuclear-powered cruise-missile submarine built for the Soviet Navy during the Cold War. Although the Soviets saw K-222 as an unsuccessful design, upon completion it was the world's fastest submarine and the first to be built with a titanium hull.
A ballistic missile submarine is a submarine capable of deploying submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs) with nuclear warheads. These submarines became a major weapon system in the Cold War because of their nuclear deterrence capability. They can fire missiles thousands of kilometers from their targets, and acoustic quieting makes them difficult to detect, thus making them a survivable deterrent in the event of a first strike and a key element of the mutual assured destruction policy of nuclear deterrence.
An attack submarine or hunter-killer submarine is a submarine specifically designed for the purpose of attacking and sinking other submarines, surface combatants and merchant vessels. In the Soviet and Russian navies they were and are called "multi-purpose submarines". They are also used to protect friendly surface combatants and missile submarines. Some attack subs are also armed with cruise missiles, increasing the scope of their potential missions to include land targets.
The George Washington class was a class of nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines deployed by the United States Navy. George Washington, along with the later Ethan Allen, Lafayette, James Madison, and Benjamin Franklin classes, comprised the "41 for Freedom" group of submarines that represented the Navy's main contribution to the nuclear deterrent force through the late 1980s.
The Ethan Allen class of fleet ballistic missile submarine was an evolutionary development from the George Washington class. The Ethan Allen, together with the George Washington, Lafayette, James Madison, and Benjamin Franklin classes comprised the "41 for Freedom" that were the Navy's main contribution to the nuclear deterrent force through the late 1980s.
The Lafayette class of submarine was an evolutionary development from the Ethan Allen class of fleet ballistic missile submarine, slightly larger and generally improved. This class, together with the George Washington, Ethan Allen, James Madison, and Benjamin Franklin classes, composed the "41 for Freedom," the Navy's primary contribution to the nuclear deterrent force through the late 1980s. The James Madison and Benjamin Franklin classes are combined with the Lafayettes in some references.
USS Albacore (AGSS-569) is a unique research submarine that pioneered the American version of the teardrop hull form of modern submarines. The revolutionary design was derived from extensive hydrodynamic and wind tunnel testing, with an emphasis on underwater speed and maneuverability. She was the third vessel of the United States Navy to be named for the albacore.
The Permit-class submarine was a class of nuclear-powered fast attack submarines in service with the United States Navy from the early 1960s until 1996. They were a significant improvement on the Skipjack class, with greatly improved sonar, diving depth, and silencing. They were the forerunners of all subsequent US Navy SSN designs. They served from the 1960s through to the early 1990s, when they were decommissioned due to age. They were followed by the Sturgeon and Los Angeles classes.
The Skipjack class was a class of United States Navy nuclear submarines (SSNs) that entered service in 1959-61. This class was named after its lead boat, USS Skipjack. The new class introduced the teardrop hull and the S5W reactor to U.S. nuclear submarines. The Skipjacks were the fastest U.S. nuclear submarines until the Los Angeles-class submarines, the first of which entered service in 1974.
Seaview, a fictional nuclear submarine, was the setting for the 1961 motion picture Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, starring Walter Pidgeon, and later for the 1964–1968 ABC television series of the same title. In the film, Seaview fires a ballistic missile with a nuclear warhead to extinguish the Van Allen belt that was set on fire by a space cataclysm.
The Project 670 Skat submarine was a nuclear-powered cruise missile submarine built for the Soviet Navy and later operated by the Russian Navy. All Charlie I/II-class submarines are decommissioned. One Charlie-class submarine was used for testing an Oniks missile. Charlie I and its successor Charlie II-class submarines are designed by the Lazurit Central Design Bureau of Gorky.
A teardrop hull is a submarine hull design which emphasizes submerged performance over surfaced performance. It was somewhat commonly used in the early stages of submarine development, but was gradually abandoned in the early 20th century in favour of designs optimized for high performance on the surface as a result of changes in operational doctrine. Although naval doctrine changed, design practices remained until the later parts of World War II when the German Kriegsmarine suffered ever-growing losses of submarines in the Battle of the Atlantic.
The Sjöormen class was a class of submarines built for the Swedish Navy in the late 1960s. They had a teardrop hull shape and were capable of diving to 150 metres (490 ft). At the time of their deployment they were regarded as one of the most advanced non-nuclear submarine-classes in the world, incorporating many new features including x-rudder and anechoic tiles. Both speed and underwater endurance was at this time very high for a conventional submarine. The submarines were retired by Sweden in the early 1990s. In the late 1990s, four submarines were acquired by the Republic of Singapore Navy (RSN) and relaunched as the Challenger class following modernisation and tropicalisation.
The UGM-89 Perseus was a proposed U.S. Navy submarine-launched anti-ship (AShM) and anti-submarine (ASW) cruise missile that was developed under the Submarine Tactical Missile (STAM) project, which was also referred to as the Submarine Anti-ship Weapon System (STAWS). This missile system was to be the centerpiece for a proposed third-generation nuclear-powered cruise missile submarine championed by then-Vice Admiral Hyman G. Rickover, the influential but controversial head of the Navy's nuclear propulsion program.
Project Nobska was a 1956 summer study on anti-submarine warfare (ASW) for the United States Navy ordered by Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Arleigh Burke. It is also referred to as the Nobska Study, named for its location on Nobska Point near the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. The focus was on the ASW implications of nuclear submarines, particularly on new technologies to defend against them. The study was coordinated by the Committee on Undersea Warfare (CUW) of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS). It was notable for including 73 representatives from numerous organizations involved in submarine design, submarine-related fields, and weapons design, including senior scientists from the Atomic Energy Commission's nuclear weapons laboratories. Among the participants were Nobel laureate Isidor Rabi, Paul Nitze, and Edward Teller. The study's recommendations influenced all subsequent US Navy submarine designs, as well as submarine-launched ASW tactical nuclear weapons until this weapon type was phased out in the late 1980s. New lightweight and heavyweight anti-submarine torpedo programs were approved. Although not on the initial agenda, the Polaris submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) was determined to be capable of implementation at this conference. Within five years Polaris would exponentially improve the US Navy's strategic nuclear deterrent capability.
K-70 was a "Project 651" diesel–electric submarine built for the Soviet Navy during the 1960s. Commissioned in 1965, the boat was armed with long-range cruise missiles to carry out its mission of destroying American aircraft carriers and bases. The missiles could be fitted with either conventional or nuclear warheads. K-70 was initially assigned to the Northern Fleet, but was transferred to the Pacific Fleet a few months later. The submarine was decommissioned in 1989 and subsequently scrapped.
K-68 was a "Project 651" diesel–electric submarine built for the Soviet Navy during the 1960s. Commissioned in 1965, the boat was armed with long-range cruise missiles to carry out its mission of destroying American aircraft carriers and bases. The missiles could be fitted with either conventional or nuclear warheads. While much of the submarine's activities during the Cold War are unknown, she did make at least one patrol in the Mediterranean Sea before serving as the test bed for an auxiliary nuclear reactor from 1976 to 1991. K-68 was decommissioned in 1992 and subsequently scrapped.
