These sensors provide info that can be used for a variety of purposes, but especially for monitoring weather and currents around the oceans so that ships sailing into any given area can know what conditions -- and dangers -- they are likely to encounter. They're not just dual-use technology, but multiple-use. And you can bet that the full range of sensors carried by these devices is not discussed publicly. Before the US gov't would spend million$$$$ on this technology, it would have canvassed every Dept. and Office in the gov't to ask "is there anything you would like to add to these abilities, and how much would it cost ?". Intel services and the Pentagon would have come up with a long list -- hydrophones, seismometers, magnetometers, mass detectors (the latter two items as specifically directional and sensitive as practical), wireless network monitors, etc. Any passing ship, even if observing strict radio silence, could be detected with the right equipment, and results from a network of detectors could effectively follow the ship's progress, to within a certain degree of accuracy depending on the type of detector. You have to wonder -- how many Russian ships pass close enough to this region to be detected ? Did Daddy Vlady tell Trmp he doesn't like the US peeking at his ships ?
As long as it's described as a tool for studying climate change, Trmp will hate it. Let him know the Navy wants it and he'll TACO again. Of course, the inebriated white supremacist and overgrown frat boy currently running our military won't question anything Trmp says or does, so he needs to be court-martialed or just thrown out ASAP.
The currently *acting* SECNAV was appointed by the former SECNAV to oversee unclassified IT systems, among other things, so maybe he has a little better understanding of the need for this technology than his predecessor. And it has to be better than Trmp's.
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