From a scaffold stairway that led from the North Dakota’s conning tower, the President stepped heavily onto the concrete floor with a grunt. A large-framed man who hated confined spaces, he was thankful the interior tour was over. At least it had been cooler inside the submarine. With the economy a mess and Congress mired in another deadlock, visiting a shipyard seemed like the last priority on his agenda, but he had promised the Secretary of the Navy he would go boost the morale of the ship workers. As a small entourage flocked to catch up with him, he suppressed his irritation by marveling at the sub’s dimensions.
“An amazing feat of construction.”
“Yes, sir,” said a blond-haired man in a tailored suit who hung at the President’s elbow as if attached by a string. “She’s an impressive feat of technology.” Assistant Chief of Staff Tom Cerny had specialized in defense issues on Capitol Hill before joining the administration.
“She’s slightly longer than the Seawolf class boats, but downright minuscule compared to a Trident,” said the tour guide, a chipper Electric Boat engineering manager. “Most people are used to seeing them in the water, where two-thirds of their bulk is hidden from view.”
The President nodded. As it lay on huge supporting blocks, the three-hundred-and-seventy-seven-foot-long hull towered over them.
“She’ll be a great addition to our arsenal. I thank you for giving me the opportunity to see her up close.”
A granite-faced admiral named Winters stepped forward.
“Mr. President, while we were happy to have you preview the North Dakota, she was not the reason we asked you up here.”
The President took off a white hard hat affixed with the presidential seal, handed it to the admiral, and wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead.
“If a cold drink and a touch more air-conditioning can be worked into the bargain, then lead on.”
He was escorted across the building to a small door guarded by a uniformed security man. The door was unlocked, and the presidential group led in one by one, their faces captured by a video camera above the sill.
The admiral flicked on a bank of overhead lights, illuminating a narrow bay that stretched nearly four hundred feet. The President saw another submarine in a state of near completion, but this vessel was like nothing he had ever seen before.
Roughly half the size of the North Dakota,it sported a radically different design. Its unusually narrow jet-black hull tapered sharply at the bow. A low, egg-shaped conning tower rose just a few feet above its top deck. Two large streamlined pods were affixed close to the stern, almost in the shape of a dolphin’s tail. But the most unusual feature was a pair of retractable stabilizers, shaped like triangular wings, that stretched from either side. A pack of four large tubular canisters clung to their undersides.
The design reminded the President of a giant manta ray he’d seen while fishing off Baja California.
“What on earth is this thing?” he asked. “I wasn’t aware we were building anything other than the Virginia class boats.”
“Sir, this is the Sea Arrow,” the admiral said. “It’s a prototype platform developed under a secret R & D program to test highly advanced technologies.”
Cerny turned on the admiral. “Why wasn’t the President informed of this program? I’d like to know how it was funded.”
The admiral stared at the aide with the warmth of a starving pit bull. “The Sea Arrowwas built with Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and Office of Naval Research funding. The President is presently being informed of its existence.”
The President ignored them and strode along the vessel, peering at the odd appendages along the hull. He studied a concentric circle of small tubes that sprouted off the bow, then made his way aft, noting the sub had no propellers. He gave Winters a questioning look.
“All right, Admiral, you have my curiosity. Tell me about the Sea Arrow.”
“Mr. President, I’ll pass that task to Joe Eberson, who heads up the project. You met Joe earlier. He’s DARPA’s director of Sea Platforms Technology.”
A bearded man with studious eyes worked his way to the front of the group. He spoke in a measured tone with the hint of a Tennessee accent.
“Sir, the Sea Arrowwas, or is, being built as a multigenerational leap in undersea technology. We’re bypassing the traditional development process by integrating a range of cutting-edge technologies and advanced theories directly into the construction. We started with a planned number of technical features that were purely at the conceptual stage. Through the crash efforts of numerous independent engineering teams around the country, I’m happy to report we are very close to fielding the most advanced attack submarine in history.”
The President nodded. “So tell me about all these odd appendages. She looks like some flying creature from the Jurassic age.”
“Let’s start at the stern. You’ll notice she has no propeller.” Eberson pointed at the rounded pods. “That’s what these two external cases are for. The Sea Arrowwill be powered by a shaftless propulsion system. The North Dakota, as you saw, uses a nuclear reactor to power a traditional steam turbine, which in turn drives a shaft-mounted screw. On the Sea Arrow, we’ve gone to an external drive system, which will be powered directly from the reactor. Each of these two flared pods will contain a permanent high-intensity magnetic motor that drives a pump jet propulsion system.” Eberson smiled. “Aside from drastically reducing noise, the design frees up a tremendous amount of interior space, which has allowed us to shrink the vessel’s overall size.”
“What are these permanent magnet motors?”
“They’re an evolutionary, if not revolutionary, advance in the electric motor, made possible by recent breakthroughs in material sciences. A mix of rare mineral elements is synthesized to create extremely powerful magnets, which are then wound into high-performance, direct-current motors. We’ve invested a great deal of research in perfecting these motors—and believe they will revolutionize the way our future warships are powered.”
The President peered through a baffle on one of the pods and saw light shine through from above.
“It looks empty inside.”
“We haven’t actually received and installed the motors yet. The first is due in next week from the Navy’s research lab in Chesapeake, Maryland.”
“You sure they’re going to work?”
“While we haven’t fielded motors of this size, we are confident from our lab tests that they will provide the predicted levels of performance.”
The President ducked beneath one of the extended stabilizers, then glanced up at a pair of barrel-shaped protrusions fore and aft of the conning tower.
Eberson followed in his steps, narrating as he walked.
“The wing-shaped extensions are retractable stabilizers for high-speed operations. They automatically withdraw into the hull when speeds drop below ten knots. The tube-shaped box is a torpedo canister, capable of holding four fish on each stabilizer. The canisters can be reloaded quickly when the stabilizer is retracted into the hull.”
Eberson pointed to the two barrel-shaped objects above them. “Those are subsurface Gatling guns. They’re similar to those used on surface ships, which shoot depleted uranium pellets at rapid fire for last-ditch missile protection. Ours have been developed to fire underwater, using compressed air, for last-ditch torpedo suppression. Of course, we’re banking that most enemy torpedoes will never come near us.”