Zvi and the Cato institute both have lengthy pieces about why the Jones act is bad [1] [2], and whether or not you believe that has entrenched our shipbuilders, the US essentially manufactures no ships compared to South Korea and China.
This naval news post says there are $5 billion in modernization costs for the shipyard needed for this project so it seems like we're still years away from a started (much less completed) project.
[1] Nov 2024 https://thezvi.substack.com/p/repeal-the-jones-act-of-1920
[2] June 2018 https://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/jones-act-...
One issue is that Naval ships are very different from commercial vessels, and at least in the USA, almost no shipyards have shared facilities and staff between the two products since WWII. Interestingly, most other countries do not build most of their naval tonnage (destroyers and frigates) to the same standards that the USA does (European countries are notable for using commercial hulls standards for these ships).
On a related note, the Odd Lots podcast had a (relatively) recent Jones Act debate episode, which is worth a listen if you're interested in the subject.
Do other countries do it differently?
From the same source as this article, American HHI working with Korean HD HHI. No real action yet but both companies want to be working together. https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2025/10/hii-hosts-hd-hh...
Just long overdue: South Korea is one of the last, staunch US allies that can build large ships at scale.
But will bringing manufacturing to Philadelphia be a mistake? Will they run into the generations-steeped shipyard workers and steelworkers?
Will American steelworkers try put one over to make themselves an expense, or a legit partnership to help each other?
I can see this going either way; and I hope this partnership transcends the usual, petty partisanship.
We should get every country to do this.
Build your nuclear subs here, in the US shipyards. We'll help you!
We can massively expand our capacity, which will be important for self defense in the coming decades.
If they aren’t, you can’t neutralize the enemies supplies. If they are, those third countries are effectively part of the conflict.
The US had to take the latter stance because it didn’t have a strong industry to product its own weapons. If it supported nations from buying from non-warring parties, it would be shit out of luck if it had its own wars. So it received a lot of investment from European powers, generating jobs, economic growth, and the funding to expand its domestic production without having to take on debt or wait for a war to break out.
Come its entry into WWI and then WWII, the US had a strong home base of industrial capacity for arms manufacturing.
Trust lost is trust that either never comes back or it takes tremendous, long term continuous effort. Not holding my breath.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_E-6_Mercury
Tl;dr attenuation of signals in water is frequency dependent, just like in air or walls, etc.
So the plane has a 5 mile long antenna
“We can’t. The updates are still updating”
https://bulgarianmilitary.com/amp/2025/03/09/russian-media-c...
Technically, yes. Politically, no.
“To produce fuel for the submarines’ naval propulsion, the ability to enrich uranium was required. However, this plan probably served two goals, since a country with enrichment capability can also enrich uranium to weapons-grade levels without significant difficulty. The fact that [former President Roh Moo-hyun] launched this plan less than five months after North Korea’s [2003] withdrawal from the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) supports the possibility that his ulterior motive was to acquire uranium enrichment capability in part to enable the future development of nuclear weapons. Ultimately, Roh had to abandon this plan in 2004 amid rising suspicion of South Korea’s nuclear ambitions after the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) discovered that South Korean scientists had previously conducted an unauthorized enrichment experiment” [1].
[1] https://www.csis.org/analysis/will-south-koreas-nuclear-ambi...
Wikipedia says U235 is ~0.7% of earth deposits, and as little as 7kg may be required for a minimal nuclear device. Processing, 700kg of uranium does not sound insurmountable, even with a terribly slow and inefficient process. Just grinding it up and using some kind of mass spectrometer could trivially separate a 3Dalton mass difference.
It’s not a casual undertaking and other nations will know you’re doing it. The major global powers are not interested in more nuclear weapons, not only to maintain their hegemony but also to limit the number of parties that could cause massive issues. Not to mention the likelihood that a national or political shift could mean nukes in the hands of those less…restrained.
Plus it raises the surface area of others gaining access to the material or capabilities. Proliferation is bad for the world, generally.
The challenges are primarily geopolitical. There are uranium enrichment operations in a number of countries around the world. Weapons grade enrichment is a lot harder, but nothing that a sufficiently funded and motivated nation state couldn’t achieve if they wanted to and, most importantly, didn’t have any other countries discover it.
> Processing, 700kg of uranium does not sound insurmountable, even with a terribly slow and inefficient process.
You have to get enough uranium ore, process that down, then enrich it on a large scale. Uranium ore deposits aren’t very uranium dense except for a few known mines, so pulling rocks out of the ground in another country may produce extremely low yields.
Enrichment is a very slow process requiring a lot of stages because U235 and U238 are barely different, so they don’t separate much in each stage. Everything has to work together and work well. Like you said it’s not insurmountable, but by the time a country has spent years mining low-yield ore and building complicated many stage centrifuges they’re likely to make a mistake that leads to an intelligence agency catching on.
Yes.
But people would notice, and get upset: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calutron#Iraq
We should go and find more customers.
> Subsequently, the construction of Nuclear submarines marks a departure from past efforts, as previous South Korean submarine construction has focused primarily on conventionally powered submarines
The USS Thresher was lost at sea when it sunk below its test depth and imploded. I wonder if there was any damage whatsoever from the fallout. https://youtu.be/g-uJ1do3yV8?si=CLFS80oo564PKouo
Also the USS Scorpion if I remember correctly.
If the environmental effects don’t matter, then I’m surprised it’s ever been a big deal in the first place. Also slightly surprising that we don’t have nuclear sub-sized power plants powering neighborhoods or cities.
I guess one big difference is that any nuclear sub accident would be located far from populated areas. But has there been any studies of how bad the fallout from one of these smaller reactors could be? If it’s 1/100th the size of Chernobyl, it seems like the maximum damage could be 1/100th of Chernobyl, which may or may not be a sufficient buffer.
Someone downthread joked about using nuclear powered submarines to transmit electricity back to the mainland, but it seems plausible to build a nuclear sub sized reactor offshore (just the reactor, no sub) while enjoying the safety benefits that this class of nuclear reactor apparently has.
Seems like the record is 111 days submerged.
Nuclear Subs are typically pretty big so they can probably bring enough food to last for the entire time without resupply.
Edit: Your downvotes only make me more powerful.
The transmission from sub / ship to shore is not great I think, though. They're used for power during disaster recovery?
Imagine if the title was : "China Gives South Korea Green Light to Build Nuclear Submarines".
What would the comments here be like. No doubt a lot of nonsense about "the ccp" this and "the ccp" that.
Like obviously no matter the country, if you want to build weapons offshore in their territory you probably need permission.
That's the point. South korea is not allowed to build nuclear submarines in their own territory. They lack the sovereignty to do it. The US won't give them permission to build one on their own.
But you probably knew this and your comment is meant to distract.
And the US has an agreement with South Korea that limits domestic production of fissile material for military uses but it's a mutual agreement that we have with a bunch of countries (including China) and is essentially always renegotiable as situations change. Essentially it's just an explicit agreement of how much material a given country intends on producing for the purposes of requiring public political discussions domestically before ramping up production.
That is all very much a flexible situation and the US doesn't have any actual power to legitimately stop South Korea from manufacturing domestic nuclear reactors for military purposes.
Are you being intentionally dense? Why wouldn't they be building it in their own territory if nobody was stopping them?
Besides, I already replied to your other comment that South korea is not allowed to enrich uranium by the US.
They actually could. This has been an ongoing discussion in South Korean politics for years. Nuclear Submarine shipbuilding is a large undertaking and it requires a lot of security to prevent sabotage in ways that other types of shipbuilding just don't have to put up with. So it is in many ways cheaper and more secure to just rely on the US for nuclear shipbuilding as we already have the infrastructure and we are on the opposite side of the world from any adversaries who would have interest in sabotage.
> Besides, I already replied to your other comment that South korea is not allowed to enrich uranium by the US.
This is not true. There are mutual agreements that set the limits on enriched uranium for military purposes but they are flexible agreements that can be renegotiated or broken off as needed. The US has them with everyone including our allies and our adversaries. It's essentially just a tool to say "hey you need to discuss this publicly within your country first before you can change it". Nothing more or less.
Yes you are. An easy tell is "citation needed".
> there is no law
Another tell.
> If RoK wanted to spend a percentage of their GDP on enrichment facilities they could
And they have in the past. Guess who shut that down?
> They don't have an urgent reason to.
South korea is surrounded by 3 nuclear powers ( north korea, china, russia ) and militarily occupied by another nuclear power and yet, they have no urgent reason to? Good one.
> Why would RoK want their own enrichment facilities?
This is just absurd. Your questions answer themselves. And it's obvious you already know the answers but just are trying to distract.
You keep googling and I'll look for the citations. Okay buddy?
Because they don't have the facilities to build a nuclear sub, and America does, since America has built over 200+ nuclear submarines in the past?
Building a nuclear sub, and fueling it, are two separate things.
Korea is an American suzerainty. Not vassal. Similar to North Korea:China. One of the strategic considerations in countering China in Taiwan is whether Japan and Korea would refused their territory from getting involved. That's a veto a vassal doesn't get.
Iran under the Shah was a U.S. vassal. Same for Ghani's Afghanistan. (Belarus: Russia.)
That's why north korea has nukes? South Korea:US is not analogous to North Korea:China. Neither is Pakistan:China analogous to South Korea:US. If you analogy held, south korea would be a nuclear power.
Stop commenting on things you know nothing about. Honestly, do you think you are an expert in every geopolitical topic?
The treaty restricting Korea is the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons [1]. America is giving Seoul a loophole by offering to do the NPT-governed work.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_on_the_Non-Proliferatio...
> The treaty restricting Korea is the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons [1].
Or maybe Korea could be like India, your native country, and not be part of it.
> America is giving Seoul a loophole by offering to do the NPT-governed work.
Yeah, a loophole seoul doesn't need. You act like america is doing korea a favor. All this does is make korea even more dependent on the US. Even more of a vassal.
No. America is doing itself a favor. Not south korea.
> It could ratchet sanctions (see: Iran) and ravage SK’s position and economic power on the global stage without its sign-off.
So you are saying that korea is not a sovereign state like iran but a vassal to the US. Maybe the US could protect korea (see: Israel) and send billions of taxpayer dollars to korea.
You realise a deal can be both?
> you are saying that korea is not a sovereign state like iran but a vassal
False dichotomy. Korea is not as sovereign as the US, Russia or China because it's not a global nuclear power. Whether Seoul or Tehran are functionally more sovereign is an interesting question that isn't easily answered.
> Maybe the US could protect korea (see: Israel) and send billions of taxpayer dollars to korea
...do you think we don't?
Realize. If you are going to pretend you are american, learn to spell like one.
> False dichotomy.
It's not a false dichotomy. Please take a few courses in philosophy and logic before throwing fancy terms around.
> Korea is not as sovereign as the US, Russia or China because it's not a global nuclear power.
"As sovereign". Sovereignty isn't a matter of degrees. It's more like being pregnant. You are or you are not.
> Whether Seoul or Tehran are functionally more sovereign is an interesting question that isn't easily answered.
It's not interesting at all because tehran isn't militarily occupied by a foreign power.
> ...do you think we don't?
"We" do? Don't think south korea has the lobbying power or influence that israel does. If it did, it'd have the enrichment facilities and nuclear weapons that israel has.
Sure. That comes with costs. Cost that may not make sense for Korea, which is a defense exporter globally and within the American-led Pacific alliance.
(Operating a nuclear shipyard and supply chain is incredibly expensive. It's would also be a high-value target for Pyongynag.)
> your native country
Is this a troll account? (EDIT: 4 months old. Peeked through comment history. All flamebait and racism. Flagged.)
> a loophole seoul doesn't need
You're using the word "need" ambiguously. It's a loophole Seoul benefits from. It gets the benefits of being an NPT signatory and alliance member. And it gets nuclear submarines.
We can debate the costs and benefits. But Seoul wasn't coerced into building a nuclear submarine. Put plainly, it's unclear what security benefits it gets from one given it doesn't project into blue waters.
> You act like america is doing korea a favor
Within narrow confines, it is. Within broader confines, it's acting as the senior security partner. That obviously involves a cession of sovereignty. Same goes for Pakistan vis-a-vis China, or Belarus with Russia.
If you have to ask, no. But then again, since you went through my comment history, you know it's not.
> (EDIT: 4 months old. Peeked through comment history. All flamebait.)
Flamebait? That's rich coming from you.
> Same goes for Pakistan vis-a-vis China,
Are you seriously comparing nuclear armed pakistan/china with south korea/US? You are so unserious that it's hard to take you seriously.
You truly are an expert at everything. Where do you find the time with your nonstop posting here.
I fit it in between investing, skiing and flying. (My cat is already comfortable in helicopters and flying commercial, so I don’t think it will be a big step into a smaller plane.)
Fully agree that reading either for geopolitical opinions is useless.
The US won't allow south korea to enrich uranium on their own. Want to try again?
> I would recommend going beyond simply reading the headline.
Another intentional distracting comment.
190 nations have signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty. This includes China, so the very US vs China premise here is misplaced.
[The US, UK, France, Russia, China and 185 other countries] won't allow south korea to enrich uranium on their own
Who cares?
> This includes China, so the very US vs China premise here is misplaced.
Sure. But it wasn't china that stopped korea's and japan's secret nuclear programs. It was the US.
> [The US, UK, France, Russia, China and 185 other countries] won't allow south korea to enrich uranium on their own
Just like they prevented north korea...
Your response debunks your response. It's quite remarkable actually.
The only country that can prevent another country is the one militarily occupying it. China, France, Russia, UK and the other 185 countries don't militarily occupy south korea. The only reason north korea, israel, india, pakistan, etc were able to go nuclear is because they are not vassal states military occupied by a foreign power.
You don't understand why South Korea might care about nuclear proliferation?