Why shouldn't subs be able to rescue?

Perhaps the best thing to emerge from the court of inquiry into the fatal collision of the submarine USS Greeneville and the Japanese fishing vessel Ehime Maru might be an improvement in the search-and-rescue abilities of the American submarine fleet.

Much has been said and written about the seemingly poor response of the Greeneville immediately following the collision. It stood by and called for help as the Japanese vessel sank and its crew took to life rafts. Nine Japanese sailors were lost.

This performance had nothing to do with compassion by the American crew, but everything to do with the weather, the sub’s design and the comforting fact that the Coast Guard was only minutes away.

But what would the sub’s crew have done if the accident occurred 1,000 miles from shore and the Greeneville was the only hope for the Japanese survivors? That’s the question asked from the witness stand Thursday by Rear Adm. Charles Griffiths Jr., the chief investigator of the collision.

Even more compelling, Griffiths wondered what would have happened if the Greeneville had happened on some other marine disaster in the course of its duties. Indeed, it’s hard to imagine that in the millions of miles logged by U.S. submarines plying the seven seas that the opportunity for rescue hasn’t presented itself.

Part of the explanation for the inability of American subs to respond to humanitarian situations is the same as part of the explanation for the collision itself: the Navy’s Cold War mentality. Just as other, more effective equipment exists that would far more reliably have warned the Greeneville of the proximity of the Ehime Maru, American subs could without great difficulty be better outfitted and designed for rescues at sea.

The key to Cold War thinking, however, is that these subs must be unseen, undetected and unsuspected — even, to carry the thinking to absurd lengths, nine miles off Diamond Head.

The Cold War is over. U.S. submarines must still maintain the ability to disappear for weeks at a time, but there may no longer be the need for security so stringent as to necessitate the risk of collision with civilian craft.

Griffiths urged the court to push the Navy to improve its submarines’ search-and-rescue abilities. So do we.

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