- 6 months ago
These young men are beginning an intensive 6-week course at the end of it if they pass the weekly test they could find themselves at the controls.
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Short filmTranscript
00:00You have to be really mature to be able to survive, and in the submarine fleet, it's
00:18really an elite force, and I felt like I wanted to be a part of that.
00:29Man Battle Stations
00:59Hundreds of feet below the eastern Pacific, the crew of the USS Topeka is being called
01:06away to battle stations after picking up a contact on their sonar.
01:10They will maneuver into position to fire a torpedo.
01:15Submariners always operate as though they're actually at war.
01:19From Commander Jablonski to the most junior enlisted man, they are here by choice.
01:25Their training is as rigorous as any in the armed forces.
01:29It begins right after boot camp.
01:35Come on, gentlemen.
01:36Rise and shine.
01:37Let's go.
01:38Roll out.
01:405.30 in the morning.
01:41Let's go.
01:42Wake Sleeping Beauty up down there.
01:44Everybody awake?
01:45Let's go.
01:46Wake your shipmates up.
01:47Aged between 17 and 25, these young men are beginning an intensive six-week course. At the end of it, if they pass the
02:06weekly test, they could find themselves at the controls of a billion-dollar nuclear submarine.
02:13Look, Mom, no hands.
02:16Look, Mom, no brains.
02:17Across the world, another submarine goes to action stations.
02:22A Russian typhoon is preparing to dive.
02:32Taking the world's largest submarine beneath the water requires immense precision and teamwork.
02:38Twenty years ago, Captain Zhiguliev started his training at the Zherzinski College of Naval Engineering.
02:54In Russia, two years' military training is still compulsory, but you can select the service in which you'll train.
03:01Many choose submarines from a sense of family tradition.
03:05But some of the 2,000 trainees here will join the surface fleet.
03:09You will be building in Perinor.
03:19Russia has a proud naval tradition dating from the time of Peter the Great, who commissioned an experimental submarine in 1719.
03:28Here in St. Petersburg, he laid the foundation for what was to become the largest submarine force in the world.
03:41The school in which these cadets train is located in the old Admiralty, built by Peter nearly 300 years ago.
03:49In the course of the Cold War, nuclear submarines became one of the principal pillars of Soviet strategic doctrine.
04:00But the diesel electrics which fought their campaigns in both world wars still form a major part of their fleet.
04:08These museum pieces are not far removed from submarines on which some of these trainees will serve.
04:14While the U.S. force is religiously nuclear, its submarines designed to hunt for or hide from the Russians, Soviet interests have included confined waterways more suited to the capabilities of diesel boats like this Foxtrot.
04:33At 10 submarine academies across the former Soviet Union, courses are conducted in both technologies.
04:44They are hard to get into, easy to fail, and the demands are intense.
04:50As well as becoming familiar with reactor rooms, control rooms, and communication centers, the trainee will have his nerve tested in simulators.
04:59These students are practicing how to plunge their boat into a crash dive.
05:14It may look antiquated, but the trainees' response to such an emergency must become second nature for the day when they face the real thing.
05:22For the trainee, the principles of submerging and surfacing apply as much to the Foxtrot as to the 24,000-ton typhoon.
05:40For the trainee, the principles of submerging and surfacing apply as much to the Foxtrot as to the 24,000-ton typhoon, but there the similarity ends.
05:53SIREN
05:59SIREN
06:03SIREN
06:06SIREN
06:09Learning to drive this submersible mountain
06:38is only part of the story.
06:40When your boat contains unimaginable explosive power
06:43as well as a couple of nuclear reactors the size of a bus,
06:48safety is everything.
06:55The most dangerous thing is unprofessionalism
06:58and a lack of expertise among the crew.
07:01It only takes one person, one person on a boat who's an amateur
07:05and the situation's fraught with dire consequences.
07:09A submarine is not simply a hollow cylinder.
07:13It is divided into various compartments
07:16like the engineering and propulsion plant,
07:19weapons spaces, the control centre and living quarters.
07:23Each must be capable of being sealed off
07:26because each is vulnerable to two major threats.
07:31The two great fears of submariners are, of course, fire and flood.
07:35Fire, because you're in an enclosed space and even a smouldering rag
07:39can fill a compartment with smoke within a matter of moments.
07:44And, of course, you can't get rid of that smoke.
07:46You can contain it, but you can't get rid of it
07:48unless you get up to the surface and ventilate the compartment out.
07:52So fire is the rel, is the really serious threat.
07:57Flooding, well, the noise of running water,
07:59one of the first things you're trained on training classes,
08:01you always run towards the sound of running water.
08:03Each time they perform this basic drill,
08:10the water will get deeper and colder
08:12until finally they can stop the leak even in the dark.
08:16But at operating depths,
08:18the ocean would enter with the force of a steel rod
08:21smashing anything in its path.
08:23You can become concerned over a long submarine career,
08:27and I think most people do at some stage
08:30as you settle into your bed at night,
08:33nestling alongside the pressure hull,
08:35and one inch away from you, of course,
08:37is a thousand feet pressure of water.
08:40Well, I think they need to set tougher conditions
08:52because the exercise is simple to perform.
08:55It's relevant only to shallow depths.
08:56You couldn't do this to save your ship at great depths.
08:59But the exercise is good for getting over that psychological barrier.
09:02It is mental training.
09:03These cadets are about to face a simulated engine room fire.
09:14They must isolate and control it as quickly as possible,
09:18for even a short delay could jeopardize lives
09:21and possibly the ship.
09:33It's a straightforward, almost routine exercise,
09:48but it holds particular relevance for the Russians.
09:52They have lost sailors and nuclear submarines to fires,
09:56some very recently.
09:58The Russian submarine, the Mike class, the Consomolets,
10:02which sunk in the Norwegian Sea a couple of years ago,
10:05was destroyed by fire.
10:08And the Yankee-class strategic submarine
10:10that sank off Bermuda, almost certainly,
10:12again, it was fire that got out of control.
10:15Norwegian defence forces were tracking and photographing
10:18the Soviet submarine before the fire and before it went down.
10:23So I think there is a question mark
10:25over the Soviet firefighting capability
10:27as it has been demonstrated in the last five years.
10:32We believe, based on the Soviet Mike's submarine sinking,
10:38part of their problem was the fact
10:41that the crew got exhausted
10:43before they could solve the damage control problems
10:45they were faced with,
10:47and they ultimately lost the ship.
10:49Aware of the potentially catastrophic results
10:52of such emergencies,
10:54all nuclear navies reject criticism
10:57of their safety standards.
10:58The Titanic was the unsinkable ship,
11:01but it sunk.
11:02Things do go wrong.
11:03Accidents have happened.
11:04The Americans have lost
11:05two nuclear-powered submarines at sea.
11:08The Soviets have lost possibly
11:09up to seven nuclear-powered submarines at sea.
11:11The last one being a couple of years ago
11:13in the Mike class off of Norway.
11:16These fifth-year cadets face the immediate prospect
11:19of service in a military
11:21with a poor record of nuclear safety.
11:24Though information has been scarce,
11:26senior officers admit that there are problems.
11:33It is not surprising that accidents occur
11:37on board American ships and on board Soviet ships,
11:40and they are related in the first instance
11:41to the fact that the level of training
11:43lags behind the adaptation to new technology.
11:46Nuclear accidents on board submarines,
11:53like the one described in this film,
11:55are bad enough.
11:56But 40 years of nuclear power
11:59have produced a deadly legacy.
12:01So what's happening in the Soviet Union
12:06is that these submarines
12:07are just stockpiling up.
12:09When you go to the big ports
12:11like Seredinsk, Seremorsk,
12:13you find that there are defunct submarines
12:16just laying there.
12:17No-one knows what to do with them.
12:20With more to decommission than anyone else,
12:23the Russians have the biggest problem.
12:26But they're not alone.
12:27None of the nuclear navies knows how to dispose
12:31of a worn-out nuclear submarine.
12:35The sensible, rational, scientific solution
12:38would be to take it out into deep water and sink it.
12:41It would then give off less radiation
12:44than the average granite outcrop
12:46in places, for instance, like Aberdeen in Scotland.
12:50What you put in the ocean today stays there.
12:53You can't take a vacuum cleaner to the ocean
12:55and clean up the mess in 10 years' time
12:57because you found out new information
12:59about the radiation dose effects.
13:02These recruits follow in the footsteps
13:04of 6,000 submarine engineers
13:07who've trained here in Pushkin.
13:09And in Groton, 50 new recruits
13:11start training every week.
13:13Here we go again!
13:15Here we go again!
13:17Same old song again!
13:21Marching down the avenue!
13:26Few more weeks and we'll be through!
13:30I won't have to look at you!
13:34Am I right, am I right, am I right or wrong?
13:39First thing I want to do is welcome you
13:41to the submarine force.
13:42If you're wondering and asking yourself,
13:44am I where I belong, the answer is yes.
13:46You're going to get the best training
13:48the Navy has to offer in the submarine force.
13:50No B.S.
13:52They say you're going to have four eggs.
13:54Well, I don't know.
13:58This base is called the heart
14:00of the submarine force and it is.
14:01I know that might sound a little corny, but it is.
14:04I mean, every submariner starts here
14:06and he will at some time be back here.
14:09Submariners have been training at Groton since 1916.
14:17The most complex, the most compact,
14:19the most deadly ship of war, ton for ton,
14:23ever conceived by man as the submarine.
14:25No training is more rigid, no training more intense
14:29than that of the submariner who must fight his battles
14:31imprisoned in a carcass of steel sailing in the deeps
14:34of the world's water basins.
14:39The purpose of this school is to screen you guys.
14:41We're going to do that several ways.
14:43We're going to look at you academically,
14:45we're going to look at you environmentally,
14:47and we're going to look at you militarily.
14:51I've been telling you this since last week.
14:53I'm not listening to it anymore.
14:54I'm not going to listen to myself talk.
14:56If somebody's got a stencil kit here, share it, use it.
15:03We want them to start taking responsibility for themselves
15:06because a lot of them, it's their first time away from home.
15:09Mama's not here to lay out their clothes for them
15:11in the morning and stuff anymore.
15:13You look good.
15:15Thank you, Chief.
15:17The classes load them with information,
15:20all of which they must retain to graduate.
15:23It's a crash course, and only the motivated survive.
15:27We've got this thing called a cord.
15:30It's a muffler.
15:31Being able to pack all this information,
15:33they throw a lot of stuff at us in this short period of time,
15:35and they make us learn it all.
15:37All right, how many people in here want to go to an SSBN?
15:40That is your first choice of duty, SSBN.
15:42Put your hands up.
15:43But they can choose what kind of submarine they want to serve on.
15:48Some choose an SSN, the fast attack or hunter-killer submarine.
15:57Its varied missions, including stalking other submarines
16:01and covert operations, seem to promise adventure.
16:05Others prefer the SSBN, the strategic ballistic missile submarine.
16:20The floating hotel with its regular routine of deterrent patrols.
16:24This class of submarine is almost constantly at sea,
16:28manned by alternating crews.
16:30Whichever submarine they choose, the trainees must learn to drive it,
16:37to turn thousands of tons around within four times its length,
16:42and to ascend and descend at a rate of several hundred feet per minute.
16:46They learn on a simulator they call dive and drive.
16:51I'm really nervous about this now.
16:56I've never done this before.
16:57I did it once, but...
16:59In real life, you watch out,
17:00because sometimes you lose the indications.
17:02Sometimes you may only lose one of the indications.
17:04Make sure you call what it is.
17:06You need to let us know that there's a problem first.
17:08Yeah, talk. Let people know.
17:10Get the word out, right?
17:11In every casualty, get the word out.
17:12Every casualty.
17:13If the stern planes are stuck or jammed on full dive,
17:16or 25 dive, okay?
17:18What are you going to say?
17:19Serious planes jammed at 15-degree dive.
17:22Now, do you think they heard you back there?
17:23Did you guys hear that?
17:24No.
17:25What did he say?
17:26You didn't hear that.
17:27Serious planes jammed at 15-degree dive.
17:29Okay, that's a little better.
17:30Manly and commanding.
17:31That's the key here.
17:32Your first couple times, you're very nervous,
17:34especially if you're the man in charge and stuff,
17:36but after a while, you get used to it.
17:38And that's how you survive, though.
17:40If you have a casualty, you need to be ready to handle it,
17:43and you're going to fight a casualty the way you train to fight a casualty.
17:48You're not going to do it correctly if you've never practiced.
17:51So, submarining is stressful.
17:53Do you understand the bubble?
17:55What is it showing you right now?
17:57This?
17:58What angle is the ship at?
17:59It's not a perfect trim.
18:01Oh, you got that right.
18:02What's the number?
18:03What degrees of dive do we have on right now, bubble on the ship?
18:05Five.
18:06No.
18:07The first time I was doing it, I was trying to concentrate so much on
18:10actually maintaining control and things like that.
18:12And then, midway through the training simulation, I just said,
18:15hey, might as well enjoy it now.
18:18This is the best it's going to get.
18:24Diving officer, submerge the ship to 150B.
18:26Dive! Dive!
18:28Dive! Dive! Dive!
18:36Dive! Dive!
18:37It's been said that American submarines are overmanned and under-automated.
18:42In theory, that may be true, until something goes wrong under 50 feet of Arctic ice.
18:47You're here, that are stressful.
18:48We got a building that simulates part of the engine room.
18:53We're going to set it on fire.
18:55And you guys put it out.
18:57You guys!
18:58Not John Wayne, not Chuck Norris.
19:01You guys.
19:02Make it over here, put it out of control!
19:08Make sure you don't get perpendicular to the hose.
19:12Put your hand around, down and under.
19:14Put it on the outside of your shoulder, there you go.
19:16There you go.
19:21When something goes wrong, you need people
19:24who can figure it out very quickly,
19:26take the appropriate action, and maybe combat the casualty
19:29for long periods of time.
19:43Also on week five, we're going to send you
19:45what we call the wet trainer.
19:47Its technical name is the damage control trainer.
19:50We just call it the wet trainer
19:51because you're going to get wet.
19:54It simulates part of the engine room on a submarine,
19:56lower level this time, not upper level.
19:59It's facing forward.
20:00It's full of pipes, valves, pumps, motors.
20:04The instructor, he has it nice.
20:05He sits in a little glass booth.
20:07He stays nice and dry.
20:09He flips switches, and all the water in the world
20:11starts coming into that trainer.
20:13You all heard the horror stories about the flange.
20:16It's located.
20:17It's got a three-quarter inch gap in between the two faces.
20:19It's a metal to metal surface.
20:22Your job is to actually tighten up the bolts,
20:26bringing the two surfaces together.
20:28If you were on a submarine, and there's no switch thrown then,
20:31but the water starts coming in,
20:32it is all the water in the world.
20:34It's the ocean.
20:351,200 gallons per minute.
20:36It's the largest leak that you'll be facing in here.
20:39You guys don't stop it.
20:41It gets deep.
20:44If you're a short guy, you're going to be real interested
20:46in getting it stopped quicker than the tall guys will.
20:57Fighting a casualty is no place for individual heroics.
21:01Teamwork is the key.
21:02The instructor monitors the exercise,
21:05communicating with the team leader through an air phone.
21:10How many personnel are in the space?
21:13Say again.
21:13How many personnel are in engine room lower level?
21:18Weight 1.
21:19Weight I?
21:20Get out of the ball.
21:22Number 2.
21:24Get out of the ball.
21:26Where are you going?
21:27Get out of there.
21:28There's one guy up there on this side, standing in the whole room.
21:30Right.
21:31You.
21:31That's what he's there.
21:33These men might be enjoying this spectacle now,
21:37but it's their turn next.
21:39Oh, my God.
21:41The pressure is relentlessly increased.
21:43Go ahead and give me the ASW discharge flange.
21:45.
21:50ASW, we're flying.
21:53What's the doctor's test on?
21:55.
21:57We want to see if they're physically and mentally capable of handling a stressful situation that we
22:26put them in, which is the water spraying around everywhere, and see if they can actually
22:31handle it, be able to work in that kind of environment.
22:33If they have a problem working in the water, well, then we need to know about it, because
22:38if they go onto a submarine and they get faced with this situation, it could be detrimental
22:44to themselves and personnel around them.
22:47These exercises test psychological suitability more than practical skills.
22:52They will come later.
22:54.
22:55.
22:59The real training starts for them when they get on their boat.
23:01The guy's really going to learn the nuts and bolts of the system, be able to touch the
23:05valves, trace the pipe, look at the breakers, see his gear, work on his gear when he gets
23:10to the submarine.
23:11.
23:12.
23:13.
23:14.
23:15.
23:16.
23:17.
23:18.
23:28All of these men have achieved the award about to be presented to their shipmates.
23:32They're dolphins.
23:33Silver for the enlisted men and gold for the officers.
23:37They're like a pilot's wings and just as hard to earn.
23:41To qualify, the raw submariner must learn every major system on board, be able to describe how
23:48it works, draw it, and recite its specifications.
23:52All this on a boat with seven million parts.
23:56It marks the coming of age of a submariner and the end of a tough first year on board.
24:03In all submarine fleets, junior officers aspire to one thing above all others.
24:25To captain their own submarine, it remains one of the most challenging of commands.
24:31If there's one thing that we've learned, and I think that the United States Navy has learned
24:38as well, a submarine commanding officer cannot have a rule book.
24:42Okay, sure, there are some things which he can't do and some things which he must do,
24:46but he can't have a rule book.
24:48There is no set tactic or set thing to do in such and such a circumstance.
24:52He must use his own initiative and adapt, and adapt very quickly, in split seconds, to
24:56what's happening.
24:58At first, the Royal Navy did not believe it necessary to train its submarine captains.
25:04A good eye for shooting partridge was considered qualification enough.
25:09This is the submarine commanding trainer, where basically the submarine officers come in here
25:24to learn the basic skills of being a submarine officer.
25:28Operators collect information from many sensors, keeping the captain informed.
25:33Piecing the picture together enables him to make the tactical decisions in fighting the submarine.
25:39Very similar to a medieval knight on the hill.
25:43The captain can sit there, he can look over the top of these young men,
25:47and they will get all that information and, like a jigsaw, put all the bits in.
25:52But for a true sense of the pressure involved, there's nothing like the real thing.
25:58Thirty miles outside Glasgow, a Royal Naval frigate is charging straight towards a Royal Naval submarine.
26:04This man wants to captain a submarine.
26:14This man wants to captain a submarine.
26:19This man must decide whether he's capable of doing so.
26:33Look at the ball for two minutes.
26:35A British commanding officer is trained in what's known as the perisher course.
26:39A perisher derives from an old expression, periscope school.
26:43But as a matter of fact, it's not sort of bad expression,
26:45because a lot of people perish along the way.
26:48Oh, get me up! Down!
26:50Come on, engineer, need some speed!
26:52It's an utterly ruthless preparation for command.
26:56Totally ruthless.
26:58And being British, we're more used to people being rude to us, very rude to us,
27:03than I think people are in the United States Navy as a whole.
27:06Come on, engineer!
27:10Engineer, you're gonna go and put up your arse if you don't get this boat on depth!
27:14It's very, very brutal.
27:16A lot of people fail.
27:18But at the end of it, you come out tough and able to face any tactical situation on your own,
27:25without support, and take full responsibility for it.
27:28I'm not saying that's not true of United States Naval officers as well.
27:38But it's my opinion that they were more inclined, certainly in the early days of nuclear power,
27:43to look back after that big kettle boiling up back there,
27:47than they were to look forward to their torpedo tubes and the enemy ahead.
27:51Submarine captains can polish their skills in the calmer atmosphere of the attack teacher.
28:00Computer scenarios simulate potential do-or-die situations.
28:05Ausatak, take her deep.
28:06Canuck Balfour, clear to the right.
28:08Come on, head two-thirds.
28:10Head two-thirds, on mine.
28:11Sounding, one-five-zero fathoms below the keel.
28:13Check the charge.
28:14Right, ten degrees runner.
28:15Listen up in the fire control party.
28:17Just received flash traffic due to the deteriorating political situation in the Orange Republic,
28:24and their perception of our disarmament.
28:27The Orange Republic has launched attack against the United States.
28:31A hot war exists.
28:32We're open ocean.
28:34Received traffic indicating an orange submarine is entering our area from the west.
28:40We've received orders to prosecute and attack any enemy forces in our area.
28:47Any questions?
28:48Carry on.
28:51The Navy has this idea and policy and tradition of true accountability,
28:57100 percent accountability to the captain of a ship.
29:01He is responsible for the way the garbage is dumped all the way up to the way the torpedo is shot or the guns are shot.
29:07Annapolis is the premier officer training academy for the U.S. Navy.
29:17The courses are heavy in nuclear science, but some say too light in humanities and the art of war.
29:24Next, you see the 41st and last of the Polaris submarines.
29:35I'm a little bit biased toward this submarine myself, because frankly I was the first skipper of it.
29:41In their final year, the midshipmen are addressed by senior officers.
29:45It's a recruitment exercise.
29:47Their example might inspire the fledgling officers to share their passion.
29:52Following that, in the motif of any place, any time, here's a U.S.S. archer fish.
30:00Given some qualities that I would look for, is first you've got to know your job.
30:04You've got to know your stuff.
30:05You've got to know your weapons.
30:07You've got to know your ship.
30:09We have a very small bearing rate indicating that the contact is either distant
30:14or that we're on a lead possible over lead line of sight.
30:18Range 10 to 12,000 yards. Carry on.
30:22Standby to mark minute. 3-2.
30:24The good skippers I had when I was young allowed me to make torpedo approaches,
30:30to make landings when only skippers were making landings.
30:34And when you're going in with a current either against you or with you,
30:38and you've got to kind of shoot the thing on the fly.
30:40Well, sometimes you hit the pier pretty hard.
30:43Sometimes the pier almost goes over.
30:45Some people have hit their own automobile at the head of the pier.
30:48But these are things that really give you great confidence when you're the person doing it.
30:56Under the captain's eye, the team maneuvers into the best position to fire.
31:17There are certain things that you have to be vitally interested in and involved in,
31:22and one of them is safe navigation of the ship.
31:27You must not run aground.
31:29The other one is safe navigation that pertains to hitting another ship.
31:34You will not have a collision.
31:36Either one of those can ruin your whole day, not to mention a career.
31:41As well as technical training, there are other vital qualities,
31:45less tangible but still essential for successful command.
31:50The attributes of leadership that I think are essential combine management competence
31:56with enough charisma that one can inspire people to follow.
32:03The responsibility of commanding a submarine is rather unique.
32:07Best described in short terms as run silent, run deep.
32:11One is totally alone, far less subject to the kind of minute-by-minute guidance
32:18that a surface commander is likely to be in a task force,
32:22particularly when one commands a ballistic missile submarine
32:27with the awesome responsibility of not only ensuring that there is never an accident,
32:33or never an accidental launch, but that the machine is in instant readiness to fire when directed requires a tremendous attention to detail,
32:45a tremendous sense of teamsmanship.
32:47Get on my back.
32:51Lie flat on me.
32:53Put your feet on my feet.
32:56Don't kiss me on the ear.
32:59Even at 70 years of age, you can still have the right stuff.
33:03All right, you ready?
33:04Yes, sir.
33:10Okay?
33:11There are some old adages that some people print up and put around, like,
33:16know your stuff, be a man, take care of your men.
33:20And that's not too bad.
33:22I mean, you've got to take care of your crew, you've got to know your crew,
33:25you've got to be human, and you've got to be able to laugh at your mistakes,
33:29because you're going to make them.
33:31All your people are going to make them,
33:33and you may make the most colossal ones.
33:35So if you've been smiling at them,
33:37maybe you can laugh at yourself a little bit.
33:51Well, that gives you something to work on.
33:56Okay.
33:59So you've got a firing solution?
34:03We have a firing solution.
34:04Very well.
34:05Firing point procedures.
34:07Sierra 2, tube 3, single-fire ad cap.
34:14The climax of the hunt, but the atmosphere in the control center
34:17remains low-key and disciplined.
34:22Solution ready.
34:23Solution ready.
34:24Shoot on generated bearing.
34:25Set.
34:26Stand by.
34:27Fire.
34:28Torpedo course.
34:29One, three, two.
34:30Runs enabled.
34:316,000 yards.
34:36Very well.
34:37Running normally.
34:38Shot looks good.
34:402,000 yards.
34:41Torpedo enabled.
34:42Good.
34:43Bragging 1, 2, 5.
34:44Range 900 yards.
34:45Target is going 1, 1, 0.
34:46Speed 10 knots.
34:471, 2, 5, 1.
34:48Terminal homing.
34:49Cloud explosion on the bearing of Sierra 1.
34:50Got our quarry.
34:51We'll open down and look out for any companions.
34:54Well, this was a very successful attack.
34:55We acquired the contact.
34:56Target did not counter-detect us.
34:57We controlled the tactical situation throughout.
34:59We obtained an optimum firing position where we could attack him with impunity.
35:00We were at the perfect weapons range.
35:02Perfect solution.
35:03We probably wasted too much time making the solution too good.
35:04The torpedo, uh, in the right, uh, in the right, uh, in the right.
35:05We were at the perfect weapons range.
35:06Perfect solution.
35:07Uh, we probably wasted too much time making the solution too good.
35:08The, uh, torpedo, uh, in the right, uh, in the left.
35:09We acquired the contact.
35:11The target did not counter-detect us.
35:13We controlled the tactical situation throughout.
35:17We attained an optimum firing position
35:19where we could attack him with impunity.
35:23We were at the perfect weapons range, perfect solution.
35:27We probably wasted too much time making the solution too good.
35:31The torpedo functioned properly, acquired the contact when it should have,
35:37and exploded.
35:40We're just waiting for the breaking up noises.
35:50Torpedoes are not the only weapons a hunter-killer captain trains to fire,
35:55as was demonstrated during Desert Storm.
35:58No U.S. submarine had fired in combat since World War II.
36:03I'm speaking to you next to one of the Tomahawk vertical launch hatches forward on the ship,
36:09out of which came the Tomahawk, which on the 19th of January, 1991,
36:14was fired by this ship to an unidentified Iraqi target.
36:18The use of cruise missiles by the Louisville expanded the submarine's role into the realm of strike warfare.
36:28Its crew received a triumphant homecoming.
36:33And we were greeted by a special edition Louisville Slugger back.
36:39It says, Louisville Slugger, the ship's hull number, SSN 724.
36:44And over here in the periscope crosshairs, kicked Saddam's butt January 19, 1991.
36:51The prime responsibility of command is the nuclear reactor, according to its high priest, Admiral Rickover.
37:02But a submarine's purpose involves more than just intimate knowledge of its propulsion.
37:07Admiral Rickover made a big point of you can't get there if the power plant doesn't get you there, and that's right.
37:13But the name of the game is being able to fight a war, to win a battle.
37:18And you've got to develop your tactics.
37:21We have chosen in the Royal Navy to continue focusing on tactics, what you do with a sharp end,
37:27and to let an extremely well-trained specialist, a technical guy, to look after the kettle back aft.
37:34We run things a bit differently from the British, for example, where the officers in the Royal Navy are engineering specialists,
37:42or operational tactics specialists, and we are trained to be good at both ends.
37:52It doesn't mean to say that our commanding officers know nothing about nuclear power.
37:55They know a very, very great deal about it. Indeed they do.
37:57But they don't feel that they have to be technical to the degree that a United States naval officer feels he has to be.
38:05Indeed has to be under the regime which Admiral Rickover started.
38:11If you're on your way to a nuclear engineering exam, tradition claims this will bring you luck.
38:18Such is the Admiral's legacy.
38:22But whether propulsion or tactics are more important in nuclear submarine warfare has only been tested once.
38:31Having attacked, well, normally in the attack teacher, we'd all stop and have a cup of tea and smoke or something,
38:37but it wasn't quite like that at sea.
38:45The only submarine commander to have sunk a warship with a nuclear submarine is this man.
38:51During the actual attack, it was very much like countless other ones I'd done for practice before,
39:00both at sea on live targets and indeed in our attack teacher.
39:09HMS Conqueror was sent to the Falklands in April 1982.
39:14The British were reacting to an invasion of their territory by Argentina.
39:18In what was to become the most controversial incident of the brief war,
39:26Griefford Brown quickly made sonar contact with a group of Argentinian warships.
39:35I entered my patrol area to the southwest of Falklands on the evening of the 30th of April.
39:40And having settled down to patrol, I quite rapidly gained detection on one of my sonars.
39:46The General Belgrano was an aging cruiser with more than a thousand men aboard.
39:52Much was to be made of her movements immediately prior to the attack.
39:56We spent the whole of that night just following them from deep,
40:00which is not particularly difficult for an SSN,
40:02sending locating reports back, I think, about every six hours or so.
40:07The British had declared a total exclusion zone.
40:11But the Belgrano was outside it and could not be attacked.
40:15So Griefford Brown followed her and waited for instructions.
40:19I had quite a lot of time in my cabin to actually think how I was going to conduct the attack.
40:23I mean, I felt in my own mind that at some stage,
40:27Northwood, our command back here, would actually instruct me to carry out the attack.
40:33And I chose which torpedo I was going to use.
40:36I also, in my own mind, worked out where I was going to position myself.
40:40So there was some mental preparation.
40:46After trailing the Belgrano for more than 25 hours,
40:49the Conqueror received new orders from Whitehall.
40:52Sink it.
40:56I summed seven miles of stern of them.
40:59And it took me about two hours to catch them up and work into an attacking position.
41:04I'd selected the Mark 8 torpedo to fire,
41:07and I planned to fire a salvo of three of those to counteract for any errors
41:11that I made in the fire control solution.
41:15I worked myself into a position of, when we eventually fired,
41:19it was about 1,400 yards on the port bow of the cruiser.
41:24Gave the order to fire.
41:29We heard the torpedoes run on our underwater sonar.
41:32You could hear them quite distinctly running out,
41:34and indeed heard one and then another hit.
41:41I was looking through the periscope at the time
41:43and saw a distinct cloud of smoke and flame from the first one,
41:48and then I think I saw another cloud of smoke from the second.
41:54A cheer went up in the control room, I think,
41:56when we heard the hit, and I looked around
41:59and saw actually there was a lot more people in every corner
42:02than one perhaps anticipated at attack stations.
42:06After that, I went deep and moved away to the east
42:12to just get out of the general area
42:14because I wasn't quite sure what the two destroyers were going to do,
42:17whether they're going to come and take an interest in me
42:19and try and counterattack.
42:23The conqueror returned home to fierce debate
42:26over the decision to sink the Belgrano,
42:29echoing an earlier era when submarines were regarded
42:32as underhand and immoral.
42:34She was a threat to the task force.
42:44She'd been steaming towards them,
42:46and I'd been watching her for a few hours beforehand,
42:49and under direct orders I went in and attacked her.
42:52I think by doing so, although there was obviously loss of life on her,
42:58which I regret, I certainly saved considerable loss of life
43:02from the British task force.
43:04I was obviously aware that I'd actually killed,
43:07I don't know how many, and didn't know for a long time,
43:09but quite a few people,
43:11so there was a certain sense of concern that that had happened.
43:16Nevertheless, as far as I was concerned,
43:18as far as the ship's company was concerned, we were at war.
43:22My immediate reactions after that was...
43:24I think the first one was one of relief
43:26that I'd actually achieved something
43:27that the ship's company and I had been trained to do
43:30over a number of years, all of us,
43:33and a sense of exhilaration that I'd actually achieved it.
43:46Once upon a time, to be in submarines marked you as inferior,
44:10an undersea pirate.
44:12But over a hundred years of submarine warfare
44:15have created a community which now regards itself as an elite.
44:19The recruits in Groton and St. Petersburg
44:22will become part of this tradition.
44:25We inherited from our submariners, specifically our World War II submariners,
44:38a mindset, a way of life, a commitment that is unmatched anywhere in the world.
44:56I mean, you have feelings for these guys.
44:57I mean, it's like your family. I'm not gonna lie.
44:58There's probably a lot of submariners out there that are gonna watch this and say,
45:05that, oh, that's BS, but I mean, it really isn't. I mean, you can ask them.
45:18I wouldn't trade any memories I have on this thing or any of my friends I have on this thing
45:21or anything in the world. They're good. They're good people.
45:25Move the hat!
45:40In an era where the enemy is no longer as clearly defined
45:53and where moves toward disarmament will continue to reduce the submarine's importance,
45:59their prohibitive cost is becoming harder to justify.
46:03In an era where the enemy will be built.
46:22Yet should a new world conflict arise, it will be in the hands of young men like these.
46:29For now, more than ever, such a war is likely to be won and lost under the sea.
46:40Lights out! Lights out!
46:43Everybody hit Iraq!
46:46You're not in Iraq, you are wrong!
46:49Shut up!
46:59Peter Eastern!
47:02I love Yemen!
47:04You're wrong!
47:06I know, I know, I know!
47:07We are blind!
47:08We, too.
47:18Vielleicht else?
47:19When we areнибудь here,
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