The Seawolf Mystery

"Anyhow, whatever the Connecticut hit will be investigated. Sailors were injured, but none killed (thank God). It is heading back to port on its own power, and will be repaired. Does China have some kind of underwater stealthy drone that we don't yet know about? Don't know."

Interesting things going on over by China right now. The Dogs of War might be howling a bit. First off, China has been violating Taiwan's airspace, with abandon as of late. So much so, the President of Taiwan has told China that should Taiwan be invaded by China, Taiwan would fight "to the end". Then it was disclosed that the United States has had some of our elite forces over in Taiwan, training their military. The amount of troops we have had there has been less than a hundred, but still...

But the strangest thing was yet to come. One of our most sophisticated submarines, a Seawolf class sub named the USS Connecticut (SSN-22), had an "incident" in the South China Sea. It hit "something" while on duty, submerged. Hit a what? Another sub? An undersea mountain (that has happened before)? An alien USO? What then?

The Seawolf is still considered a highly classified weapon in the Navy's inventory. A bit of disclosure - while employed at one of my former companies, that company was awarded a contract to make the propeller for the Seawolf. Special accommodations were made at the plant to ensure there was an adequate security firewall to protect the unique nature of the highly classified nature of the propeller. 

At one time, the Navy was going to build 29 Seawolf subs. We needed them to match the Soviet's best attack subs. But then the Soviet Union went away, so we cut down our need to 12 Seawolf subs. Then we found out how expensive they were to build. So we now only have three. We are building the must less expensive Virginia class attack subs instead.

Anyhow, whatever the Connecticut hit will be investigated. Sailors were injured, but none killed (thank God). It is heading back to port on its own power, and will be repaired. Does China have some kind of underwater stealthy drone that we don't yet know about? Don't know. But whatever this sub hit, without any detection, is a concern. It happened once, it may be able to happen again.