[Gargamel]

Originally Posted by Molon Labe

Thanks for that!

No prob. I love crunching numbers like this.

I'm a bit concerned about the MF active rule... It doesn't really give you an incentive not to use it a lot... I wonder if that's as intended.

I got thinking about that too. I wondered, like you, how accurate the scoring system is to the intended real world application of ACTUV. Google is my friend, Excerpts from the GAO website:

https://www.fbo.gov/utils/view?id=2c...f8de5a09560d70

The Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) Continuous Trail Unmanned Vessel (ACTUV) program seeks to develop and demonstrate an independently deploying unmanned surface vessel optimized to provide continuous overt trail of threat submarines

Notice the highlighted part. That screams using your active sonar.

Also:

It is not intended as an ASW search capability. ACTUV relies on conventional force structure to provide a target cue, but then prevents those search assets from being tied up in intensive trail operations.

As the missions have been showing, the idea is for conventional assets (SOSUS, SSN, SSBN, ASW, etc) to make contact with the target, and then hand over control to the ACTUV platform. This explains why the active sonar penalty is so small. Since the asset has handed off to ACTUV, there is little threat to the original asset, so letting them know they've been found is of little concern. In the short term at least.

That also probably rules out the anti-narcosub (ANSW? ) theory we had before. Once a primary asset has contact with a narcosub, they are very unlikely to hand off to a drone for contact. Most likely they will either prosecute right then, or hand off to another asset to immediately prosecute. The only scenario I can think of where ACTUV would play a role in ANSW, is where a SSN sits off the the South American Coast, hands off to ACTUV, and let's the drone track the target till they get into waters that fall within US jurisdiction.

• Operations from a shore base
• High system reliability for long duration missions in the harsh maritime environment without opportunity for underway human maintenance or repair

......

• Sufficient range for independent theater or global deployment
• Extended loiter endurance to support forward operational prepositioning
• Speed, maneuverability, and endurance advantage over target set

So this also explains why the fuel penalty is so low. These things are supposed to be designed to have global range. I'm really curious as to the power plant now. Endurance over a SSK after deploying from half a world away? Impressive for a non-nuclear platform.