Russians chase of US sub.

[nikimcbee]

I wonder what the score is SSK vs skimmers in the open ocean? No islands to hide by, deep water.
I would guess the subs have the upper hand.

[Oberon]

Hmmm, depends on a few factors tbh, skimmers have the advantage of usually having a helo on hand to dip and drop buoys, if they're lucky they can catch the SSK while it's snorkelling and at its noisest. If not then they just have to hope that they drop a buoy close enough to detect the hull noise, or catch a good return from a ping.

Open and deep waters are not generally the playing grounds of an SSK though, as Stealhead has pointed out, SSKs like to hide in waters which are not much deeper than their max depth, that way they can hide on the bottom, thus screwing with the active returns and if they're smart enough, wait for the ship to come to them rather than expend energy and sound getting to the ship.

Open and deep water is an SSNs playground, they've got the speed and hull strength to go deep and fast, they don't need to worry about air, so they can also play under the ice caps, they are a bit noisier but they can mask this by hiding deeper than an SSK generally can.
That being said, the USN did use to use the Skipjacks and Sturgeons a lot on the old barndoor watching exercises outside Polyarny, and we'd occasionally drop a Swiftsure in the area, but for our close intel runs it was usually an Oberon SSK, because they were quieter and so could get closer without being detected. Not that the Swiftsures and Sturgeons didn't also have their successes, but the SSKs were built for it.

[Skybird]

Like Oberon said, each toy plays in its dedicated playground. As long as that is so, I always put my money on the sub. If both sides are on temporary technology levels, it still will not win always. But most of the time, I assume, and very clearly so. The American concept of carrier battle groups imo only works in small wars against minor, inferior enemies that cannot really bite back. Against an enemy with a decent capacity in waging submarine warfare, this doctrine basing on carrier groups imo is doomed to fail.

Also take into account the Chinese carrier killer missiles. They improve them at frightening pace.

Military thinkers tend to repeat methods by which they won the last war. By that they often miss that time and technology and knowledge have moved on. So it was with battleships in WWII. So I think it will be with carriers in the next possible major conflict (China). Not even mentioning the growing number of increasingly improved Chinese subs.