Canada and nuclear SSN

[UglyMowgli]

One's name was Rubis, her rival's Trafalgar. The first was a French submarine, the second British. Neither sub class now guards Canada's Far North sovereignty. Yet some 18 years ago, Ottawa almost decided to buy up to a dozen such nuclear-powered U-boats to defend its long-contested claim over the water and seabed of those vast polar territories in red on your map.
Now Europeans gape as five nations press claims to "our" energy-and-minerals-rich Arctic seabed. They chuckle as a metre-high titanium Russian flag planted on the ocean floor panics our current prime minister into going north as our sovereignty goes south. They marvel at his surface-only Canadian response: a few, years-late coastal patrol ships, modest military and naval bases, and an amateur militia of Inuit "Rangers."
Again Canada defends its North with bombast, symbols and long-to-happen half-reforms. It abandons effective presence on "its" Arctic seabed where the riches lie. Only under-ice nuclear subs can patrol there: this summer, HMCS Corner Brook, a second-hand diesel-electric submarine, travelled north, but couldn't go far under the ice.........

More :

http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=06b557bc-bbc0-4543-90e3-4da70001bef6

[DAB]

I remember reading an American article from the time, but that one suggested that the Trafalgar option was the one preferred by the Canadian Government...

...I've also never heard the suggestion that the PWR1 reactor was leased by the UK for use in Submarines. Its an American design, but I was always under the impression that the British Government had brought the plans and built a reactor to them?

Of course, I could have been running under a false impression these past 15 years!

[fatty]

Yes, it's true; the DND white paper from 1987 advised the procurement of 10-12 nuclear attack submarines. I'm not certain about where the subs would come from - in one book I read that the government was even in talks to purchase retired American SSNs, who knows.

Anyway I don't believe we are totally sunk without SSNs to patrol under ice. Other states have been patrolling under ice for decades and they are not really much closer to claiming the region. It took that Russian breaker expedition before some heads were seriously turned. The present plan of reservist-crewed patrol boats is at least a good step towards having a continuous presence and especially a visible one - something a submarine is not very good at.

I guess we'll see.

[Kapitan]

Why doesnt canada go for the easier option and buy 2 or 4 type 212 / 214 SSK's with AIP?

[fatty]

Why doesnt canada go for the easier option and buy 2 or 4 type 212 / 214 SSK's with AIP?

Because we already have four new SSKs. It would be cheaper just to upgrade them to AIP.

[DAB]

I wouldn't imagine that the 212, 214 or Victoria SSK's would have the strengthened hull and sail required for under ice operations.