“I’m very confident in our undersea superiority,” Carter said, speaking to sailors at the New London submarine base in the state of Connecticut on May 24. “I’m also confident we’ll retain it, but it’s not a birthright. We have to work at it. We have to spend money on it, which we’re doing and will do. We have to be innovative in technology, and we have to have really good people.”
While the US Navy routinely claims that they are not the anti-submarine warfare technology leader, the country has nonetheless outspent the next six global navies, combined.
“We have always been in that job,” Commander Dan Reiss, who commands USS New Mexico, a Virginia-class attack sub, told Defense One. “I’ve been in for 17 years, and the focus has always been on anti-submarine warfare.”
“Anti-submarine warfare isn’t just about subs” other naval forces are also brought to bear, including maritime patrol aircraft and surface warships, Reiss said. “Some of those areas have become challenged, but as for submarines, we’ve always been focused on it.”
