Sub Busters: Countering the Submarine Threat

by Hans Halberstadt

The battle between submarine and surface forces goes back to World War I, when German technology first confronted English tactical imagination. Then, and since, there seemed something unfair about the duel. The ocean is huge, a submarine is small and easily hidden, able to strike without warning against seemingly defenseless vessels and crews. The submarine has proved to be, with the aircraft carrier, one of the most effective weapons a nation may use for conflict resolution and crisis management.By World War 2, inventions like sonar/asdic and radar, along with airborne ASW patrols and other techniques and technologies were developed and applied to the Battle of the Atlantic. The German U-boat fleet, initially invulnerable, was ultimately defeated, going to the bottom with nearly all hands.Today, the submarine still prowls the vast oceans. Huge 'boomers' with nuclear power-plants and intercontinental missiles, small attack boats with 'smart' torpedoes cruise beneath the waves awaiting the call to battle stations.Anti-submarine warfare has become a military version of a fine art. The team includes ships like the sleek frigates and destroyers, with racks of homing torpedoes and magazines full of anti-submarine rockets. Here's how they do it.

128 pages, Paperback

First published July 1, 1991

About the author

I trained to be a documentary filmmaker and worked in that industry for about fifteen years before getting involved with book projects. The basic techniques involved in designing a film project apply just as well to non-fiction books so the transition was easy. The books turned out to be more fun, more filled with adventure, and more profitable than the film work so I gradually took on books rather than films.

Although I hear a lot of people complain about the difficulty of getting a book contract, that has never been my experience right from the start. And I never have "writer's block" or any of the other typical complaints of our peculiar breed. Telling stories has always been fun for me and I will explain how and why in a blog on this site.