Quote:
Originally Posted by Randomizer
With all respect I don't think that is entirely accurate since as I understand it, American pre-war submarine doctrine included provisions for submerged detection, approach and attack by passive sonar alone with active sonar just used for getting the final bearing and firing range.
The problem was that without the computer support for solving the target motion analysis problems that were developed post-war, the technique was theoretically sound but practically useless. As far as I know not one submerged sonar attack was successful, at least in the Pacific.
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Ah yeah, fair enough, I had heard of that, although this is why I also point out "successful german tactics" in the same paragraph later. I'm definitely talking about practice more than theory - a tactic in the books doesn't mean a successful tactic. I don't doubt that theories about making submerged-only approaches have been floating around since sonar was first invented, and might have even been in doctrine and on the books. However like you say, without more sophisticated TMA among other things, these were not a practical success.
I'm sure many a useful contact was picked up by hydrophone first, too. But all in all, I think all successful uses of WWII-era large submarines capitalized on them being able to survey the surface by eyeball or radar. As soon as they were unable to do that (like u-boats were unable to do once the Allied radar got sophisticated and widespread enough), these submarines became instantly obsolete along with their whole doctrine. Attempts to work around that with things like snorkels were marginally successful at best.