Is this a flow on result of no missiles.
http://www.news.com.au/world/nato-ships-and-aircraft-believed-to-be-hunting-russian-carrierkilling-submarines-off-syria/news-story/fa4589195aac8e7fc13e8b331fffcf91
Cause for concern and makes sad reading.
Harpoon missiles are no use against submarines...... So having the missiles or not wont make a difference in this case.
Yes it doesn't make good reading but clear perspective needs to apply.
The Russians will want all the Intel they can get on NATO ships as we do on their ships and the easiest way to do this is by trailing them, if you use a submarine then nobody knows about it.... Hopefully.
Where the UK has left its self open for criticism is the fact we got rid of our maritime patrol aircraft who flew 24/7 searching and tracking movements from the Baltic without a replacement and turned the airbase that housed them over to the army because we don't need them...... Fast forward a few years and we find we do need the aircraft and the big thing they told the army, DON'T DAMAGE THE BRAND NEW SHINY RUNWAY..... They didn't damage it they only dug sections of it up to practice putting down temporary runways...So we now need to find space at another airbase for these aircraft....
We are also seeing more of the ASW frigates being used all over the world or tied up so the submarines are not being tracked with uk surface ships as much as people would like. That's not to say they are being tracked by other means.
There does seem to be increased actions from Russia but they are only really reported when
1) someone or some media outlet wants to make a statement on the condition of the armed forces
2) when they have nothing better to report and they need pages filled.
One last thing.. The cynic in me with these submarine reported stories..... How do you know it's actually there, if the crew are doing their job nobody should know they are there!