Underwater warfare

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Virginia-class submarine

Underwater warfare is one of the three operational areas of naval warfare, the others being surface warfare and aerial warfare. It refers to combat conducted underwater such as:

• Actions by submarines actions, and anti-submarine warfare, i.e. warfare between submarines, other submarines and surface ships; combat airplanes and helicopters may also be engaged when launching special dive-bombs and torpedo-missiles against submarines;
• Underwater special operations, considering:
  • Military diving sabotage against ships and ports.
  • Anti-frogman techniques.
  • Reconnaissance tasks.

Name[]

Underwater warfare may also be referred to as undersea warfare^[1] or subsurface warfare.^[2]

History[]

In the 20th century underwater warfare was dominated by the submarine. In the 21st century unmanned underwater vehicles are coming to play a significant part in underwater warfare.^[3]

Seabed warfare[]

Seabed warfare is defined as “operations to, from and across the ocean floor.”^[4] In general the target of seabed warfare is infrastructure in place on the seabed such as power cables, telecom cables, or natural resource extraction systems.^[5][6]

See also[]

• Commando
• Frogman
• List of military special forces units
• Naval tactics
• Spetsnaz

References[]