Australia has just signed a $50 billion contract with France to build its new generation of submarines.
The United states appears to be going in a very different direction. “Mainstreaming Unmanned Undersea Vehicles into Future U.S. Naval Operations” has just been published by National Acadamies Press (free PDF download) outlining some of the strategy. The main report will not be openly published.
I suspect the future of submarines will include a large numbers of very smart drones and the focus will be on communicating with them whilst submerged, support and maintenance. Potentially a lot cheaper and none of the constraints of supporting submariners. I would not be suprised to see the project a white elephant by the time they are built.
