Turkey’s first commercial-built special operations submarine passes pressure hull test

A Turkish commercial organisation has built and tested the pressure hull for a special operations and attack submarine for the first time. STM engineers began designing the pressure hull of the STM500 in June 2022 and the hull completed its quality testing processes in 2023.

The pressure hull of the STM500 was showcased for the first time at the Saha Expo in Istanbul which has been taking place this week.

The milestone is as much economic and commercial as it is one of manufacturing expertise. The use of national resources by a commercial company to create a national defence asset has not previously been attempted in Turkey.

Özgür Güleryüz, general manager of STM, claimed the company was able to complete the work because it had experience on previous construction and modernisation projects for the navies of Turkey and Pakistan.

He added that the achievement of building the pressure hull (the outer shell of the submarine) demonstrated the ability of the Turkish defence sector to indigenously develop such sections for a naval submarine in future.

Such a capability could prove crucial to Turkey’s defence export dreams.

“Representatives of the navies of various countries, particularly those with geographically shallow waters, are closely following the development of the STM500”, said Güleryüz. “The STM500 has a lower price tag with respect to conventional naval submarines, and it can be deployed for special forces operations through its swimmer delivery vehicle. Our aim is to equip the STM500 with the national combat systems technologies being produced by Turkish defence companies, thus demonstrating the power of Turkish naval engineering”.

The timing of the development could take advantage of a growth in the global submarine market, which is forecast to grow from its current US$30 billion value to $45 billion by 2033, according to GlobalData.