The biggest problem for any modern commerce raider would I'd think be preventing its preys from calling off a distress call. Gone are the days when your preys could only ask for help with a faulty wireless transmitter after tapping out a lengthy morse code message before having their antenna shot off by a well-targeted gunshot. Nowadays a simple handheld device can transmit actual live video of the attack to anywhere in the world instantly.
Which means you have two solutions :
1. You can build something powerful enough in order to be sure you will instantly destroy your target, which means using torpedoes, anti-ship missiles and other noisy devices alongside heavy defensive assets to protect yourself if you fail.
2. You can decide to be stealthy, using a mothership equipped with unmanned diesel electric submarines and underwater drones of various sizes. The idea is that unmanned units should be able to operate as far away as possible from the mothership as an easy solution to conceal the military nature of my Q "brain" ship.
I would personally prefer the second solution. The ROVs and AUVs, deployed from the Q ship would be of various types and sizes. The versatility of these vehicles allows them to perform many missions, while also being more cost effective and preserving military personnel from the Q ship. Medium diesel electric submarine-looking ones could even launch torpedoes, missiles (think of a bigger Chinese Navy HSU-001) or deploy smaller drones,
You could have many types of drones, underwater gliders similar to the Liberdade class and the Slocum class, alongside supercavitating torpedo drones based in the Skhval torpedoes or floating drones. Q ship could also deploy other underwater drones used for intelligence, reconnaissance, mine countermeasures (mine sweeping etc.), mine laying and submarine warfare. Many other types of underwater drones are possible, using biomimetics.
My Q ship will be shadowed with huge underwater drones, similar to the Orca XLUUV, in order to protect my Q ship and to extend the range of my numerous unmanned diesel electric submarines and drones. They could also deploy aerial reconnaissance drones if needed (Blackwing drones). Those nuclear-powered XLUUV can even supply my Q ship with new underwater drones or directly deploy them (first link).
We could even have robotic limpet mines or swarms. A self propelled high explosive magnetic mine looking like a torpedo that explodes or attaches itself to the hull of a target ship and can be detonated hours or even days later by either timer or remote control. These autonomous mines alone or in groups (seeding an enemy harbor) are deployed from hatches located below the waterline of the commerce raider or simply thrown overboard when A ship passes in the vicinity of a target ship (torpedo range). An accompanying XLUUV can also launch them in packs (second link).
I even imagined automated mines and torpedoes set on seabed patiently waiting for an enemy ship and able to thrust at supercavitating speed to their targets or to slowly attach themselves to it, like ambush predators. I am sure they already exist.
I hesitate to add surface vessels (USV) working as surface close range protection units and to protect the mothership from submarines. They could be useful, but it would make the Q ship too noticeable (third link).
- Q Brain ship
- XLUUVs (ROVs and AUVs)
- Unmanned electric diesel submarines (ROVs and AUVs)
- Drones of various types (ROVs and AUVs)
- Robotic limpet mines/swarms (AI controlled only)
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https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-u...-large-unmanned-underwater-vehicle-xluuv.html
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https://www.newscientist.com/article/2166572-watch-a-swarm-of-underwater-drones-hunt-and-surround-a-boat/?utm_source=NSNS&utm_medium=SOC&utm_campaign=hoot&cmpid=SOC|NSNS|2016-GLOBAL-hoot
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http://www.rokem.com/index.php/default/content/57.html