[Eurale]

We should really fear those dreaded diesels! Does he plan to shoot tamale torpedo’s?

[Brilliant]

I would not be too worried about just 4 of them.

[PapaBear3625]

We should really fear those dreaded diesels! Does he plan to shoot tamale torpedo’s?

If we had Chavez's back to the wall, and a cruise ship with a couple of thousand US citizens on it got blown up, would we be able to prove who did it? And would a Dem president be under pressure to avoid having it happen again?

[Kenny Bunk]

We should really fear those dreaded diesels!

Diesel electrics are the quietest, especially when painted with that rubber paint submarine yachtsmen use. They are so quiet that CHICOM diesels have been known to sneak into USN formations before being detected!

But why Venezuela would need subs is beyond me. Their coast is the Caribbean and to leave for the Atlantic or Pacific would require them to get really noticed! They could easily cut off tanker shipments to Aruba and Trinidad, but then that would cost Chavez a lot of money.

Waste of air, that guy. Too bad we can't take him out.

[Polybius]

We should really fear those dreaded diesels! Does he plan to shoot tamale torpedo’s?

Actually, we should dread diesel-electric submarines and we do.

The submarine's greatest asset is stealth and a submarine gets stealth from being quiet. The combustion engine powers a diesel-electric submarine on the surface but, underwater, it is powered by the electric batteries and that propulsion is very quiet.

Therefore, diesel-electric submarines presents a very serious challenge to anti-submarine warfare capabilities.

Hunting for quiet diesel submarines in the shallow waters of the littorals is akin to trying to identify the sound of a single car engine in the din of a major city

****

Navy planners anticipate that adversaries will try to deny U.S. forces access to key strategic coastal areas by deploying quiet diesel-electric submarines. These hard-to-detect boats would make it difficult for U.S. ships to move around freely without exposing themselves to an enemy torpedo shot.