From CONOPS to Kill Chains: Building the Architecture of Subsea Dominance
In Ernest Hemingway’s novel The Sun Also Rises, Mike Campbell describes his progression toward bankruptcy as happening “gradually, and then suddenly.”Hemingway may have been portraying financial troubles, but the same might be said for the evolution of undersea warfare. What began years ago as broad, visionary concepts of operation (CONOPS) has given way to a rapid proliferation of increasingly capable autonomous systems. The next phase is now underway: moving from a collection of concepts and technologies toward integrated, distributed kill chains. The following vignettes illustrate how these emerging architectures might come together across five mission sets.ANTI-SUBMARINE WARFARE (ASW)A maritime patrol aircraft (MPA) arrives on station. Scattered throughout the region are littoral battlespace sensing gliders (LBS-Gs) providing updated environmental data to characterize the sound velocity profile and improve acoustic detection and localization. Ten nautical miles away, a high-endurance XL- AUV towing a passive acoustic array patrols a known submarine transit route, while five hundred meters below, a distributed wireless network of seabed acoustic nodes listens in the frigid darkness. A contact is detected and classified. The network transmits data via burst acoustic communications (ACOMMS) disguised as ambient noise, which is received by comms-enabled sonobuoys deployed by the MPA. Rather than break contact and surface or transmit via ACOMMS and risk counter-detection, the XL-AUV releases a small AUV, which reaches the surface and passes a compressed contact report over the horizon. Minutes later, the MPA fuses both reports into a track. The MPA then alters course, preparing sonobuoys to localize the contact and lightweight torpedoes to engage.Persistence is the key to vigilance, and nowhere is this more apparent than ASW. With a range of 5,000 kilometers and a submerged endurance of 45 days, Cellula Robotics’ fuel cell-powered Guardian AUV could provide an underwater “unblinking eye” for persistent ASW surveillance. Passive sensing could be provided by a compact KraitArray from Systems Engineering & Assessment (SEA), a 20mm diameter, low-SWaP towed sonar array compatible with both uncrewed underwater and surface platforms. Environmental sensing could be provided by Slocum Gliders from Teledyne Marine equipped with sensors that measure temperature, pressure, and salinity.Ultra Maritime and Anduril Industries could offer another piece of the distributed acoustic picture. During the U.S. Navy's LANTERNFISH 2026 exercise, Ultra Maritime combined its passive Sea Spear deployable sonar (integrated with Anduril’s Seabed Sentry sensor nodes) with an SSQ-125B active sonobuoy to passively detect and actively localize AUVs. The Navy has also sought ACOMMS-enabled prototype SSQ-125s capable of acting as communications gateways.Micro-AUVs such as the ecoSUBu5 could also act as “data bubbles” to covertly smuggle high-bandwidth data through the air-sea interface. Cellula and ecoSUB demonstrated just such a capability in 2022, using a Cellula Robotics Envoy (previously Solus-LR) as the host vessel.Vice Adm. Rick Seif, Commander, Submarine Force, Atlantic Fleet, receives a brief from defense industry professionals at Joint Expeditionary Base Little Creek - Fort Story as part of Exercise Lanternfish 2026. Exercise Lanternfish is a capability development and demonstration event designed to enhance US Navy, AUKUS, and defense industry interoperability in defensive subsea and seabed warfare (SSW). (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Anderson W. Branch)PORT SECURITYAn intruder detection system senses an anomalous acoustic signature within the channel leading to a heavily trafficked naval harbor. A hydrophone array establishes a track, triggering a non-kinetic counter-UUV system to activate, disabling and defeating the incoming threat. An AUV is dispatched to obtain high resolution imagery of the seabed along the suspected approach route, which operators use to compare against baseline imagery. Something has changed, and an ROV is deployed to investigate.Port security is evolving from discrete surveillance and response systems toward a persistent detect-localize-classify-neutralize architecture.Forcys, now part of Kraken Robotics following its acquisition of Covelya Group, addresses the detection problem with its Sentinel IDS, an intruder detection sonar designed to detect, track and classify divers, swimmer delivery vehicles and AUVs in cluttered harbor environments. ThayerMahan, meanwhile, has developed SeaGuard, a rapidly deployable non-kinetic AUV defeat system intended for ports and CUI defense. SeaGuard can be paired with ShorePicket, the company’s acoustic monitoring system which uses low-profile, linear hydrophone arrays to provide acoustic intelligence and warning in high-traffic, noisy environments.If a threat reaches the seabed, the problem becomes one of change detection, classification, and neutralization. Synthetic-aperture sonar from Kraken Robotics can generate detailed acoustic imagery, while optical systems from Voyis (now part of Kraken Robotics) can create high-resolution three-dimensional models for identification. The threat could then be interrogated and remotely neutralized using a Defender ROV from VideoRay (an AeroVironment Company) to deploy a remotely detonated charge.ThayerMahan’s SeaGuard can be paired with its ShorePicket arrays to provide acoustic intelligence and warning. Credit: ThayerMahan, Inc.EXPEDITIONARY SEA DENIALOn a remote island deep inside an adversary weapons engagement zone (WEZ), a small detachment of Marines rotates a fleet of strike AUVs into a strategic waterway to autonomously engage enemy surface traffic. Some 600 nautical miles away, a low-profile autonomous craft is inbound, loaded down with critical supplies and additional rounds. Meanwhile, hybrid autonomous undersea and surface vehicles (AUSVs) maintain watch offshore, providing additional targeting data to the Marine operators and the mobile mines lurking below.Pods of roaming, armed AUVs may sound futuristic, but platforms such as the VATN Systems' Skelmir S12 – a swarm-enabled medium AUV with a range of between 125 and 200 nautical miles - could enable an austere Marine Corps expeditionary advanced base (EAB) to conduct sea denial operations by establishing a persistent, mobile minefield just offshore.Covertly resupplying the Marines creates another problem. Leidos' Sea Specter offers an intriguing solution: a stealthy, long-range autonomous low-profile vessel (ALPV) inspired by narco submersibles and intended to deliver supplies or firepower into contested areas.Offshore intelligence warning and targeting data could be provided by the SubSeaSail HORUS, a small wind- and solar-powered semi-submersible platform designed for low signature, long endurance ISR missions.SubSeaSail’s HORUS. Credit: SubSeaSailCRITICAL UNDERWATER INFRASTRUCTURE (CUI) DEFENSEA transoceanic cable operator is alerted via distributed acoustic sensing (DAS): contact detected near a section of cable located hundreds of meters below the surface. A resident AUV is dispatched to investigate, processing its survey data onboard to identify the anomaly rather than transmitting terabytes of raw data. A compressed ACOMMS transmission is relayed via a loitering USV providing a communications gateway to operators ashore, who acknowledge the finding and authorize neutralization. The vehicle deploys a small shaped charge from an integrated neutralization module, which is then activated remotely via acoustic signal.The defense of vulnerable subsea infrastructure continues to gain attention, and persistent autonomous operations could transform CUI defense from periodic survey missions to continuous awareness.During LANTERNFISH 2026, Bedrock Ocean, Integer Technologies, and Liquid Robotics demonstrated an architecture linking AUVs, persistent ACOMMS, and shore-based mission awareness to address critical undersea infrastructure protection. All three companies bring an important piece of the kill chain to bear – Bedrock with a fleet of modular AUVs purpose-built for subsea imaging; Integer Technologies, with DIGIT UxV mission assurance software, which fuses real-time operational state with predictive digital twins; and Liquid Robotics with its high-endurance Wave Glider USV, providing a gateway between the surface and undersea domain.Oceaneering brings decades of subsea inspection and intervention experience to this problem set. Its Freedom AUV is a resident-capable vehicle that can dock with Oceaneering’s Liberty resident system to charge its batteries and transfer data without having to surface. And Freedom’s unique tooling interface could conceivably be used to actuate a mine-neutralization module, such as one designed to deploy small, remotely detonated charges.Credit: OceaneeringSUBSEA STRIKEAn XL-AUV approaches a contested maritime chokepoint. On the ocean floor below, an energy depot is powering an enemy passive acoustic sensing array. Waiting inside the XL-AUV’s payload bay is a complement of smaller autonomous vehicles - some configured with advanced imaging sonar and target recognition software, while others carry high-powered warheads. The imaging vehicles are released, capturing high resolution imagery of the seabed that is processed by onboard target recognition software to confirm the depot’s location. Targeting data is transmitted back to the XL-AUV and passed to the strike AUVs, which slip quietly from the payload bay.Seabed warfare is often framed around cables and pipelines, but could increasingly encompass UUV-launched kinetic strikes against other forms of infrastructure: sensors, effectors, and energy outposts. Anduril’s Dive-XL paired with the company’s Copperhead family of AUVs offers one potential architecture. Copperheads can be fitted with side scan sonar for survey missions, or high-powered warheads for strike.Meanwhile, crewed submarines themselves are becoming autonomous system motherships. In March of this year, L3Harris received a DIU contract for its Iver4 900 Torpedo Tube Launch and Recovery (TTLR) system. Such a capability would extend the submarine’s organic sensing capability, but it also would enable precision engagements against seabed targets.The next phase in the evolution of undersea warfare may be less about developing new platforms than connecting those that already exist. AUVs, USVs, distributed sensors, sophisticated payloads, and advanced processing are providing the individual links. The challenge now is integrating them across the air-sea interface and throughout the water column into distributed operational kill chains.