[Infowarrior] - UK completes Windows for Submarines™ rollout

[Richard Forno]

Royal Navy completes Windows for Submarines™ rollout

By Lewis Page

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/12/16/windows_for_submarines_rollout/

16th December 2008 12:25 GMT

The Royal Navy and BAE Systems plc were pleased as punch yesterday to  
announce that their implementation of Windows for Submarines™ is  
complete ahead of schedule. Windows boxes on Ethernet LANs are now in  
control of the UK's nuclear-propelled and nuclear-armed warship fleet.

The programme is called Submarine Command System Next Generation (SMCS  
NG), and uses varying numbers of standard multifunction consoles with  
two LCD screens, hooked up on an internal Ethernet network installed  
on each sub. Initial reports as the programme developed suggested that  
the OS in question would be Windows 2000, but those who have worked on  
it have since informed the Reg that in fact it is mostly based on XP.

BAE and the Navy say the project has completed early, as many of the  
systems were installed extremely fast. The entire command system of  
HMS Vigilant, a Trident nuclear-missile submarine, was apparently  
replaced with the SMCS-NG Windows LAN in just 18 days, according to  
BAE. The use of commercial-off-the-shelf technology is expected to  
save the taxpayer as much as £22m in support costs over the next ten  
years - a bit more than £2m a year, or about a thousandth off  
Trident's running costs.

“This is a fantastic achievement," said Captain Pat O'Neill. "From  
speaking to operators and maintainers, I know how much they like SMCS  
NG. BAE Systems' work is proof that we can get commercial off the  
shelf technology to sea quickly and support it affordably."

Many in the software community have viewed the Royal Navy's wholesale  
move to Windows-based command systems with concern, feeling that the  
savings are not such as to justify possible losses in security,  
reliability and assurance. In addition to the existing nuclear  
submarine fleet, the RN will use similar equipment to handle its new  
Type 45 destroyers in combat, and versions of SMCS-NG will also lie at  
the core of the upcoming Astute-class subs.

Here on the Reg naval desk, we'd go relatively easy on submarine  
worries - even the Trident boats - as sub command LANs are by their  
nature very isolated and physically secure, and submarines almost  
never need to give their command systems autonomous firing authority.

By contrast, however, an air-defence destroyer like the Type 45 - if  
it is to be much use - will fairly often have to give its collection  
of Windows boxes the ability to loose off a sheaf of Aster missiles  
without human authorisation. Shooting down the possible supersonic sea- 
skimmers of tomorrow will be even more impossible with the delays of  
having humans in the loop.

Just to add to the slight feeling of nerves, a destroyer LAN will need  
to be connected to other networks off the ship as a matter of routine,  
and physical access to a destroyer is hugely easier than to a sub as  
well.

So we aren't really looking at Windows boxes triggering nuclear  
armageddon if something goes wrong here. But we just might, if things  
go wrong, be looking at a computer snag causing another USS Vincennes  
airliner shootdown disaster in coming years. Or, of course, at British  
sailors of the future staring helplessly at what would shortly be  
literally a blue screen of death, as the shipkillers bored in without  
response. ®