I'm kind of surprised that your dad has gone into specifics... submariners tend to be anally retentive about getting into specifics. as for diesels, speed is not a critical part of their skillset as their mission profile usually requires more of a lurking role, "sprint" and drift etc.... . speed and range is a fundamental argument between nukes and conventionals. eg the RN got a nuke on station in less than a quarter of the time that it took for their conventionals to arrive (during the falklands) The Collins are "abnormal"examples for a conventional as they were designed for different missions. eg USN fleet support, long range and the atypical ISR role. They're designed for 70+ day missions in a wartime footing. The smaller the sub, typically the shorter the time off station. (AIP issues aside) the mission profile more or less determines the platform requirement.

Well, the reason he doesn't mind talking about information like this, is that it in many cases is already public record. The other aspect is that a subs top speed isn't so important to how effective it is in combat(although it does make them about 10x more flexible since they can be rapidly deployed anywhere). The bigger issue is stealth and my dad has no knowledge of that stuff anyway. It's really interesting when you hear about some of the stuff that went on that no one really talks about. For example there have been a few collisions underwater between US and Russian boats. Usually it was simply said that they "hit a whale". Other stories were just wierd like how one time they ran out of salt(because of a clerical error) and ended up scraping salt off of the de-salination machines that make the fresh water for the boat. Of course the drawback was it had all sorts of little critters that they ended up having to eat. Check out bergall.org and you can read about some of the goofy crap that used to happen, like "santa nuke".

Well, every information related to the limits (min and max) of any military asset is classified. For obvious reasons. After that, the specs defined by end user give the envelop.

I get the impression that The Cold War was only ever fought between the US and the USSR. When the records get declassified (if ever) then quite a few people will sit up and suddenly remember the Brits were doing their fair share as well. I mean it's easy peasy doing an underwater look on a Typhoon when he's on trials and work up - the hard part comes in detecting and staying with him when he's ice picked on QRA. But the Brits never did anything like that surely - of course not.....'cos Tom Clancy - that imaginative writer of FICTION - never got wind of it.

Is that the same Tom Clancy who had an Air National Guard A10 attack a Soviet fleet in the Atlantic, drop some red flares and then fly home safe and sound? Is he still even writing books? You know, maybe the next potus runner should change his name to "Jack Ryan". I bet you he would make a good show of it.

>>>Is that the same Tom Clancy who had an Air National Guard A10 attack a Soviet fleet in the Atlantic, drop some red flares and then fly home safe and sound?<<< Which book was that in? It sounds like some good comic relief.

The closest to that which I read from Tom Clancy was when two Republic of China F16's sank a Chinese Sovremeny class destroyer by dropping a 500 pound bomb on it, with both aircraft getting away just fine. No mention of the SA-17's, nor of the four 5.1 inch guns, nor of the four 30mm CIWS's.....

Pretty sure it was "Hunt for Red October" the A10 dropping flares on the soviet fleet.

"... Pretty sure it was "Hunt for Red October" the A10 dropping flares on the soviet fleet. .." bingo, that was the name of it.... I was in an airport lounge reading it between flights and nearly vomited several times reading that book... but i made it through.. its similar to the "ice berge right ahead" scene in "Titanic" where they order hard a port and the helmsman promptly goes hard a starboard...

Another bit in that book which I thought was farcical was where he describes a two seat Harrier being used for Sub Hunting!!!!!!