Three of the first four of the Navy's new Virginia-class attack submarines — including the USS Hawaii — will be homeported at Pearl Harbor beginning with the USS Texas in 2009, U.S. Sen. Daniel K. Inouye confirmed yesterday.

The basing reflects the increasing importance of the Pacific as other nations build up their navies, and signals a new direction for Pearl Harbor, which will have the largest concentration of the Navy's first major combat ship designed for a post-Cold War environment.

"The homeporting of these state-of-the-art submarines recognizes the strategic importance of Pearl Harbor and the Pacific Ocean," said Inouye, D-Hawai'i. "Furthermore, the men and women of the Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard who will be maintaining these submarines look forward, as always, to providing the best services and support that our nation expects for our personnel serving in the Pacific."

Pearl Harbor already has 16 Los Angeles-class attack submarines, a design that was first deployed in 1976 and continues to be decommissioned as the vessels age while a few others have been refueled with new reactor cores.

The $2.4 billion to $2.7 billion Virginia-class subs are designed to operate in both the open ocean and nearshore shallows, and have improved stealth, sophisticated surveillance capabilities and special warfare enhancements.

SHIFT TO PACIFIC

The Pearl Harbor basing announcement comes as the Pentagon begins to shift more submarines to the Pacific to meet a goal of having 60 percent of its force in the Pacific and 40 percent in the Atlantic by 2011.

The Navy recently said dozens of countries, including North Korea and Iran, have diesel subs, and more than 180 foreign submarines operate in the Pacific within reach of critical chokepoints and navigational sea-lanes.

According to the Heritage Foundation, China has made naval modernization its top priority and since 1995 has built a modern fleet of 29 advanced diesel-electric submarines, with 10 more being built.

Last October, a Chinese Song-class diesel-powered attack submarine surfaced within sight of the Kitty Hawk aircraft carrier strike group in the East China Sea near Okinawa.

The USS Hawaii, which in May became an active weapon system when it was commissioned at the U.S. Naval Submarine Base in Groton, Conn., follows the lead ship in the class, Virginia, and the second sub to be built, Texas.

The 7,800-ton Hawaii is expected to arrive at Pearl Harbor in 2009 sometime after the Texas.

The Hawaii, Virginia and Texas are assigned to the U.S. Atlantic Fleet's Submarine Squadron Four in Groton for continued testing and evaluations, including what are known as post-shakedown availabilities to retrofit systems.

The North Carolina, the fourth submarine in the class, is expected to be commissioned next spring.

No permanent basing announcements had been made until yesterday.

Cmdr. Mike Brown, a spokes-man with the U.S. Pacific Fleet submarine force at Pearl Harbor, said the USS Virginia is permanently assigned to Groton and "it isn't going anywhere."

Brown said he had not seen anything "officially initiated" within the Navy that talks about the relocations to Pearl Harbor, but the secretary of the Navy and other officials previously confirmed that the USS Hawaii would be based in its namesake state.

Naval analyst and author Norman Polmar said such a concentration at Pearl Harbor makes sense.

"You really don't want to base (a new class of submarine) at 10 different ports because of the costs of people trained to support and maintain specific submarine systems — reactors and certain other gear," Polmar said, "It's much more efficient to put everything in one port."

The Navy earlier this year said after commissioning and acous-tics and other testing, the Hawaii might get a several-month mission — like the first in the class, the USS Virginia, which spent nearly three months off the coast of South America.

But the Hawaii will have to return to the Groton shipyard next spring for up to a year of improvements and fine-tuning.

MANY CHANGES

The Navy expects to pay for two Virginia-class subs per year starting in 2012 at the latest, which is double the current rate, and is trying to get the price down to $2 billion a sub in 2005 dollars.

The submarines have four 21-inch torpedo tubes and 12 vertical launch tubes with Tomahawk missiles.

Gone is the hull-penetrating periscope, which has been replaced by cameras and sensors mounted on masts, allowing command and control to be moved to larger quarters on the second deck level.

Modularity and a change in the way 4,000-pound torpedoes are carried mean that more room can be created.

That space can be filled with torpedoes, for a maximum of 24, or berthing can be created for 30 SEAL commandos. At 377 feet, the Virginia-class subs are 17 feet longer than their Los Angeles-class counterparts.

A topside lockout can accommodate nine SEALs, instead of two on Los Angeles-class submarines, meaning quicker deployments.

The Navy is placing more emphasis on the nearshore shallows where ships and commerce are concentrated, and the Virginia-class subs have six side-mounted sonar arrays, plus arrays in the bow, sail and nose, improving capabilities for eavesdropping and mapping the ocean floor and minefields.

The Virginia-class is a replacement for the deeper-diving but more expensive Seawolf class. Three of the subs were built.

It's still too early to determine the net economic effect of the submarine-basing plan for Hawai'i with plans for Los Angeles-class retirements or relocations to Hawai'i from other bases still largely unannounced.

Polmar, the naval analyst, believes that more than 60 percent of the Navy's approximately 53 submarines eventually will be moved to the Pacific. That shift already has begun, and the USS Jacksonville is expected to arrive at Pearl Harbor from Norfolk, Va., in 2008.

The USS Connecticut, USS Seawolf and USS Hampton have recently shifted to West Coast homeports in line with the submarine distribution recommended in the 2006 Quadrennial Defense Review, a planning roadmap put out by the Pentagon.

WORK FOR SHIPYARD

The USS Minneapolis-St. Paul, a Los-Angeles-class sub, recently arrived at Pearl Harbor from Norfolk for inactivation, a process that includes draining and removing hydraulic systems and tanks and preparing it to be towed to Puget Sound in Washington state where the nuclear reactor will be removed.

Three Los Angeles-class subs were inactivated at Pearl Harbor between 1996 and 1999, and a reactor refueling on a sub is being completed, but coming emphasis will be on Virginia-class subs.

Bob Dewitz, president of the Ship Repair Association of Hawai'i and CEO of HSI Electric, a marine electric firm, said the replacement of older Los Angeles-class subs with the Virginia class will ensure continuity of workload for shipyard workers.

Kerry Gershaneck, a spokes-man for the Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard and Intermediate Maintenance Facility, said a "phenomenal amount of work" lies ahead to prepare for the arrival of the Virginia-class subs.

"We're looking at facility infrastructure, we're looking at training, equipment, tools, spare parts — all the variables associated with a new class of submarine," he said. "The shipyard's strategic focus is preparing for the Virginia-class submarines. That is our future."

Reach William Cole at wcole@honoluluadvertiser.com.