This brief (48 pages) book takes a look at US nuclear submarines and their development. This marks another Jim Christley effort, following up on his earlier book on the US Fleet submarines. This book only covers "The Fast Attacks" (SSNs), so one hopes there will be a follow on focused on the ballistic missile nuclear submarines (SSBNs).

In his latest effort, Christley tackles an attempt to sketch a thumbnail history of the US nuclear sub program. He starts out with "the propulsion problem", which aptly describes the shortcomings of diesel-electric propulsion, and the need for speed and endurance, and a brief lesson in power requirements vs. speed. He describes the brief investigation of hydrogen peroxide propulsion, and then the decision to "go nuclear". He moves through the Nautilus, describing both her incredible capabilities (in dodging hunters and "destroying" carriers during war games) as well as her shortcomings with respect to noise and hydrodynamics. The smaller Skate class gets a section, with brief mention of their arctic exploits. Skipjacks are next, with a new hull design ("cylinder of revolution") giving these boast unparalleled underwater speed. The reasons for the move to the Thresher/Permit class are next detailed. There is an extended section on the noise problem, and the design features of this class to reduce noise radiated into the sea. Christley mentions he was stationed on both Skipjack and Permit class submarines, and despite their greater length, he found the layout and space utilization of the Skipjacks to be superior in his opinion. He also covers the loss of Thresher, some of the reasons for the loss, and SubSafe improvements introduced as a result.

The Sturgeon class gets a mention, surprisingly brief, given their mainstay role in the Cold War. Chrsitley mentions that they had good crew habitability, and were capable of long deployments. He also mentions that since they used the same SW5 powerplant as the Skipjacks and Permits, and as a result they lost another 3 knots of speed from the Permits, which were in turn slower than the Skipjacks. This trend toward speed loss was viewed as a serious issue, and a new class of submarines with a more powerful reactor (S6G) and additional quieting was designed. These were the Los Angeles class submarines. Christley describes the three main sub-designs within the class, as the vertical launch tubes (for Tomahawk cruise missiles) were installed, and under-ice capabilities added.

Chrsitley closes his review of the evolution with the Seawolf and new Virginia classes. The Seawolf class was in response to the Soviet Union's latest attack boats, but just as the Seawolf program was getting underway, the Soviet Union collapsed. Only three of the 29 planned boats were built, with the last (SSN-23) modified for special operations. A less expensive alternative was sought in the Virginia class. Christley makes a point of the dual role that advanced computer capabilities have made for the Virginias. First, the Virginias were built using advanced CAD/CAM procedures to design and fabricate the submarine hardware without extensive paper blueprints. Secondly, the Virginias incorporate extensive computer control in the submarine, reducing the crew size and integrating control functions.

Following the individual class descriptions, there is a very nice section on submarine sensor systems, and the increasing sophistication of the sonar systems on board each class. The advantages of the switch from analog to digital signal processing are described, along with a description of the different sonar array systems used. A bit of the terminology used to designate the individual systems is also highlighted, along with TMA (Target Motion Analysis) and Doppler shifts as ways to determine dispositions of other ships and submarines. There is also a section on fire control and weapon systems, describing how targets are identified and tracked, as well as a nice chart of submarine weapons systems. The book closes with some brief descriptions of Cold War submarine operations, and a section on disposal of old nuclear submarines.

Throughout the book are sets of charts that describe briefly the characteristics of each class of submarine, and give the names of the ships, hull numbers, launch dates, as well as the commission and decommission dates. Color artwork includes a very nice cutaway diagram of a Los Angeles class submarine, a Sturgeon trailing a Russian submarine, and color side views of all the major nuclear US SSN classes. One minor point is that all of the submarines are drawn with the lower hull red, upper hull black scheme, which is not always the case over the years, and never was for the later Virginia class, which are all black. There are also some nice color photos throughout, including a couple of intriguing ones of the Nautilus in drydock (looks like the recent 2004 drydocking at EB), with lime green antifouling paint.

Overall, this book is well worth the money, and serves as a nice introduction to US attack boats. Not as heavy duty as Polmar & Moore's "Cold War Submarines..." (which is referenced), but certainly a good place to start.

It was very amazing read this book, give you a good knowledge of the evolution of nuclear power and all kind of fast attack US has. For the people interesting in join the submarine fleet I do recomend this book.