Soviet Foxtrots: Cuban Missile Crisis
Loaded with nuke-tipped torpedos
Introduction to the Foxtrot submarine
NATO designated this type of submarine as “Foxtrot,” while the Soviets called them Project 641 submarines. The first vessel was laid down in 1957 and commissioned in 1958. I've seen figures ranging from 58 to 74 of these submarines built for the Soviet Navy. Huchthausen noted that the Soviets had more than 300 diesel submarines, with half intended for long-range attacks.
The Foxtrot submarines were powered by three Kolomna diesel engines and three electric motors, which drove three propeller shafts. This setup produced a lot of noise, something submarine captains disliked. I’ll go back to the diesel-electric concept in a moment.
The Foxtrot's maximum surface speed was 16 knots, and her maximum submerged speed was 15 knots, making the Foxtrot a relatively fast boat. She could remain submerged for about five days, but her underwater endurance could be extended to 7-10 days if traveling at a very slow speed of 1-2 knots per hour.
The Foxtrot had a long-range capability of up to 2,200 nautical miles. It carried a crew of approximately 78 members and became a successful Soviet global patrol submarine. The submarine was designed to intercept advancing warships and disrupt sea communication lanes.
The Foxtrot had 10 torpedo tubes, with six at the bow and four at the stern. She could carry 22 twenty-one-inch torpedoes or up to 44 AMD-1000 ground mines. Additionally, she was capable of carrying a standard 21-inch nuclear anti-shipping torpedo with a 15-kiloton yield. This weapon would make her effective against hostile carrier battle groups.
I mentioned earlier that the Foxtrot used three diesel engines to power three electric motors, which then drove three propeller shafts. When submerged, she operated on batteries. The batteries provided electricity to the electric motors, allowing them to turn the propeller shafts. Eventually, the batteries would run out of power, requiring a recharge.
At certain points during her voyage, the skipper would surface and start the diesel engines. These engines would recharge the batteries and run the propeller shafts. While on the surface, if the skipper wanted to recharge his batteries faster, he would slow down to let the diesel engines focus more on recharging.
A problem with diesel engines is that they consume a large amount of air to operate and release a similar amount of fumes, making it impossible to use them while fully submerged. They can only obtain that air when surfaced or through a snorkel, which must rise above the water's surface, leaving her vulnerable to detection by surveillance ships and aircraft.
Snorkels were added to enable diesel engines to take in air while at periscope depth and to vent exhaust. This tactic minimized the radar target area to just the periscope, exhaust pipe, and snorkel air intake. As a result, underwater speeds could surpass surface speeds.
To conserve battery power, the diesel engines with the snorkel were used as long as possible for travel and combat. After the attack, they relied solely on battery-powered electric motors to escape quietly and deeply.
There are technical issues with using the snorkel this way, which is why most skippers prefer to surface to run the diesel engines, recharge the batteries, and operate the propellers.
The Foxtrot was a large submarine with three decks. This is why the Soviets labeled their submarines with a “B” prefix. The “B” stands for “Большой,” which translates to Bol’shoy, meaning big or large. The Russian letter “Б” matches the English letter “B.”
Two of those decks housed batteries, specifically the bottom two. These heavy batteries slowed the submarine when submerged. Using two decks for the batteries made the boat feel crowded, leading to poor living conditions onboard these submarines. As will be discussed later, during the Cuban deployment, additional passengers, including special officers, were brought onboard to oversee the nuclear torpedo and conduct signals intelligence (SIGINT) operations against the USN forces attempting to locate them.
During the crisis, the USN assigned "C" prefixes to target submarines. For example, the USN cataloged the Soviet B-59 submarine as C-19. When analyzing Soviet submarine movements during the Cuban crisis, the interchange between "C" and "B" and the use of different designation numbers can become quite confusing.
