The sub story no one wants to hear

It’s the sub story no one wants to hear – the coming end of the submarine era. But we must expect it, writes Roger Bradbury, emeritus professor of the Australian National University. There is always an arms race between opposing weapons systems forcing each of them to evolve or die. Sometimes the evolution is gradual, like the replacement of wooden warships with ironclads in response to the growing lethality of naval gunnery in the 19th century. At other times, there is just sudden extinction – the dominance of battleships lasted just a couple of decades, with the last major engagement between battleships being the Battle of Jutland in 1916. The invention of the torpedo made the battleship unviable as a weapon of war.