Russia's Titanium Sierra-Class Submarines: A Nightmare for the U.S. Navy

Russia's Sierra-Class Submarines were built to sink the U.S. Navy in a war - Soviet submarine designers subverted expectations when they began building hulls from titanium instead of default steel. The titanium hulls had benefits – and also drawbacks, which is why the Americans never followed with a titanium-hulled submarine of their own.

And the Soviets, despite the novel incorporation of titanium, never relied on the metal for the backbone of their submarine fleet; only a handful of...