잠수함산업은 잠수함 설계와 건조 등 생산적 활동 전반을 지칭하며 잠수함을 건조하는 기업, 정부, 제도 및 정책 등을 포함하는 개념으로 정의할 수 있다. 잠수함산업이 국가경제에 순기능으로 작용케 하기 위해 관련 제도나 정책이 잘 정비되어 있어야 하는데 이러한 제도나 정책에 영향을 미칠 수 있는 요인들을 도출하여 잠수함산업 기반을 강화하고자 하는 것이 본 논문의 핵심이라 할 수 있다.
한국 잠수함산업 기반 강화를 위해 돌고래급, 209급, 214급, 장보고-Ⅲ급 잠수함 사업 추진현황 연구를 실시한 결과, 각 사업 추진과정에서 사업간 연계성이 부족하고 건조공백 현상이 지속적으로 발생했던 문제점을 확인하였다.이러한 건조공백 현상은 업체의 잠수함 설계능력 약화 등에 따른 산업 기반 약화 현상을 초래할 뿐만 아니라 국가적인 측면에서도 방위산업 기반이 약화되어 국가 경쟁력 손실로 이어질 우려가 있다.
최근 잠수함을 건조한 경험이 많은 미국, 영국, 호주 등도 잠수함 사업 추진간에 정책의 혼선과 기술적 오류 등으로 인해 사업추진에 많은 어려움을 겪고 있다. 그들이 겪었던 문제점들은 한국 잠수함 사업 추진 간에도 이미 발생하였거나 앞으로 발생이 예상되는 것들로 사전 철저한 대비가 필요하다. 따라서 체계적이고 전략적인 잠수함 사업 추진은 국가 경제력 제고와 안정적인 잠수함 전력 확보에 매우 필요한 사항임을 알 수 있다. 2014년 현재 214급 잠수함 사업과 장보고-Ⅲ급 잠수함 사업이 진행되고 있다. 특히, 장보고-Ⅲ급 잠수함 사업비용은 척당 많은 비용이 소요되는 국책사업이기 때문에 각 사업을 전체적인 시각으로 조명하고 체계적으로 분석할 필요가 있다. 장보고-Ⅲ급 잠수함의 독자적인 국내연구개발 건조를 성공적으로 수행하기 위해서는 한국보다 잠수함 운용 경험이 많은 외국 잠수함 사업 경험을 바탕으로 교훈을 도출하여 한국의 잠수함 사업 경험을 정밀 진단하고 후속사업에 반영하는 것이 시급한 과제일 것이다.
본 논문에서는 외국 잠수함 선진국에서 발생하고 있는 잠수함산업 기반 유지현황 사례 분석을 통해 산업 기반에 영향을 미치는 요인 총 15개를 도출하여 잠수함산업 분야에 근무경험이 있는 관계관들에게 설문조사를 통해 중요도를 계층적 분석방법으로 평가해 보았다. 평가결과, 가장 중요한 영향요인 7개 즉, 작전운용성능, 핵심장비/기술개발,건조공백방지, 위협환경/예산, 시험평가, 품질관리, 파트너십획득체계 순으로 중요 영향요인을 식별하였다. 따라서 식별된 중요 영향요인 7개를 현재 진행하고 있는 장보고-Ⅲ 사업에 환류 반영함으로써 사업의 성공에 기여토록 해야 할 것이다.
정책적 조언으로는 첫째, 현재 214급 잠수함과 장보고-Ⅲ급 잠수함 사업이 동시에 진행되고 있어 사업 종결과 함께 건조공백 현상이 발생할 우려가 매우 크다는 문제점을 식별하였다. 현재 계획대로라면 2020년대 초반 잠수함 설계 및 건조가 중단되므로 잠수함 건조공백을 방지하기 위해 후속 잠수함 사업이 가급적 빨리 시작되어야 함을 제시하였다. 둘째, 장보고-Ⅲ급 후속함의 톤수 크기를 약 4,000톤급으로 키워서 유사시에 재래식잠수함 추진의 한계점을 극복할 수 있는 소형원자로를 탑재할 수 있도록 사업을 추진해야 할 필요성을 제시하였다. 셋째, 잠수함산업 기반 활성화를 위해 209급 잠수함 방산수출을 확대할 필요성을 제시하였으며 정부와 방위산업체가 함께 노력하는 맞춤형 방산수출 전략을 추진해야 할 필요성을 제시하였다. 넷째, 잠수함 산업기반 활성화를 위해 관련 기관이 적극적으로 참여하는 협업체계를 구축하여 발생하는 문제점에 대해 관련 기관이 공동으로 대응하는 파트너십 획득체계 구성 필요성을 제시하였다. 또한, 잠수함 건조 조선소뿐만 아니라 잠수함 탑재장비와 부속을 제공하는 협력업체들을 중적으로 관리해 나감으로써 탑재장비의 성능 부족의 문제점을 사전에 예방하기 위한 노력이 중요함을 강조 하였다.

A submarine industry implies the overall production activities such as designing and building submarines and it can be defined by the concept of companies that build the same submarine and the fields in competition. In order for the submarine industry to operate in a proper function for the national economy there requires systems and policies of good order, and the core of this thesis is to deduce the factors that influence these kind of systems and policies to strengthen the bases of the submarine industry. Generally, it requires 3 different types of bases in the industry bases designing and building submarines: design base, construction base and supporting base. The design base includes the technical manpower and design tools (database and design models) necessary for the submarine design, and Ministry of National Defense polices to prevent construction gap of submarines. For construction base, it includes shipyard’s shipbuilding facilities and technical manpower, and the technology to produce, test and assess the core equipments, whereas supporting base includes auxiliary and maintenance facilities required in operating submarines, and the project management sector that can efficiently carry out the submarine project. Advanced nations operating submarines put in generous political support so that they can secure national competitiveness by sustaining the forementioned 3 bases, and sustainment of design base in particular. In recent foreign submarine industrial base research reports, there have been case studies published where positive and negative effects to the industrial bases in the process of going ahead with the submarine project. Especially, in the US and UK submarine projects, there have been reports where severe design and construction gaps occurred and affected negatively to the project. In the case of the US General Dynamics Electric Boat, as there were a long-term construction gap expected by building the Virginia-class submarine, so they prevented the construction gap by promoting the building of the 3rd Seawolf-class submarine where only two of her class were planned to be built. In the UK, it has been reported that since the completion of the Vanguard-class submarines, approximately a decade of construction gap occurred and which led to delay in progress of 3 years and $2 billion worth of additional cost while promoting the new Astute-class submarine project. Furthermore, in the progress of the US, UK and Australian submarine projects, lessons learnt have been deduced that required operational performances exceeding the technically accomplishable limit increases the project cost and the risk of prolongment of the project. And reports have been made where the US and Japan have applied combined shipbuilding and reciprocal shipbuilding methods and it has been shown that the governments are being considerate to strengthen the bases of the submarine industries. In the Australian submarine project, a suggestion to include the submarine crew in the entire submarine project was made so that they can appropriately participate in the decision making process, and to prepare reserve budgets to reduce the risk of project. The bases of the submarine industry in the Republic of Korea are made up of a weak industrial base relative to the foreign advanced nations. Thus, it is very urgent and significant to strengthen the Korean submarine industrial base and provide a proper political advice by deducing the important factors deduced from the foreign submarine industrial base reports and assess the submarine industrial base of Korea. Korea’s submarine industrial base has begun the acquisition project of three 150 ton midget submarines by Korea Tacoma Shipyard in Masan in the 1970s and have progressed into the initial phase of the submarine industrial base by Daewoo Heavy Industries’ acquisition of nine 1,200 ton Type 209 submarines with the German Howaldtswerke-Deutsche Werft (HDW) in the early 1990s. The current maturity of the submarine industrial base was achieved by promoting the acquisition of a much more superior 1,800 ton Type 214 submarines with the joint technical cooperation between Hyundai Heavy Industries and Germany’s HDW. As for Korea’s submarine designing and building history, it has been approximately 40 years since designing the Dolgorae-class midget submarine and approximately 30 years for Type 209 submarine. However, despite the substantial history of submarine design and building, currently, Korea does not have sufficient technology to independently design and manufacture equipments operated and embarked on submarines so it is the case that foreign technology are used or purchased for some equipments. Since the initial Dolgorae-class midget submarine project, Korea has went forth with the Type 209 and Type 214 submarine projects, but due to lack of strategic and systematic project management, Korea Tacoma Shipyard, where Dolgorae-class submarines were designed and built, lost her capability to design and build submarines along with a severe construction gap. Daewoo Heavy Industries where Type 209 submarines were built also had construction gap, resulting in urgent crisis where additional efforts were required to maintain capability to design and build submarines. Therefore a systematic and strategic submarine project has also worked as a positive factor to the national economy. In the current moment, the Type 214 project’s design and building is in progress and the Jangbogo-III project also. In order to successfully conduct the Korea-independent R&D and shipbuilding of the current Jangbogo-III submarine, it will be a pressing task to accurately diagnose Korea’s submarine project experience and closely review experienced foreign submarine projects, then to deduce lessons learnt and apply it in the follow-up project. The Jangbogo-III submarine project is a national policy project that is approximately KRW 1 trillion per ship. Though it is a project consuming a colossal sum of money, there has never been a case where each project was lighted in an overall perspective and analysed systematically. At this point, taking the project’s overlap into consideration, determining the appropriate timing for the follow-up project of the Jangbogo-III project is most important than any other. Through research, the initiation of the next project was confirmed to be in 2014 and this is the analysed result of plotting the employment level considering the actual period of designing/building and 30 year life cycle of a submarine in the process of going forth with the Korean submarine project. In this thesis, I have deduced a total of 15 factors that influences the industrial bases using the analysis of the sustainment of the submarine industrial base in foreign submarine advance nations, and assessed them by using a method of analysis in different classes by importance with questionnaires to relevant personnel with experience in the submarine industry. As a result of assessment, there have been 8 most important factors identified in the order of importance: required operational performance, core equipments/technology development, policy in the Ministry of National Defence, threat environment/budget, test & assessment, quality management, partnership acquirement system and export in defence industry. Therefore the core of this thesis is to contribute in strengthening the submarine industrial bases and furthermore in the national industrial bases by reflecting the 8 important factors influencing the submarine industrial bases to the current Jangbogo-III project in order to contribute in its success, minimise the submarine construction gap and suggest the follow-up project schedule for 2014 to maintain the expertise in submarine building. I have depicted the design and construction results in a graph while analysing the Korean submarine industry for better understanding in the introduction of this thesis, and the method of analysis used is an application of the research method of the LAND report.