Comments by "Steve Valley" (@stevevalley7835) on "HMAS Armidale - Persistent Courage" video.

@brendonbewersdorf986 ever read "The Enemy Below"? I did, about fifty years ago. The book was written by Denys Rayner, who spent the war variously commanding a Corvette or a Destroyer, hunting subs, so I suspect some of the details in the book may be accurate. I remember one passage in the book where the CO is frustrated because his Destroyer is so long it can't stay with the U-Boat in a turn. The CO recalls that his old Corvette was so short it could easily stay with a U-Boat in a turn, but the Corvette was so slow, the U-Boat could surface, and run away from the Corvette on it's diesels. With nothing other than that tidbit, and taking U-505's length of 251feet and surfaced speed of 18.2kts, I eliminate the Flower and Castle class Corvettes because they can barely crack 16kts. I eliminate full sized DDs, as too long, Mahan 341' and Fletcher 376', for instance. Best combination of small size and high speed, at least in USN inventory, would probably be a Buckley class DE: 306', 24kts.
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@jamesmasonaltair a friend of mine is retired Canadian military. He spent the 70s and 80s hunting subs as AESOP, one or two tours in Argus patrol bombers and four tours in Seakings embarked on a variety of Canadian ships. He holds that the best surface ship for ASW is the one that gets out of the way and lets the helos handle it. He has offered that, given two helos, a sub is pretty much dead meat.
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@jamesmasonaltair Have you seen the Japanese DDHes that entered service in the last few years? 15-20,000 ton, 30kt helo carriers, loaded with ASW helos.
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