by:
Kyle Mizokam
In March 2010 the corvette ROKS Cheonan, operating in the Yellow Sea near the Northern Limit Line, was struck in the stern by an undetected torpedo. The 1,500-ton Cheonan, a Pohang-class general-purpose corvette, broke into two halves and sank. Forty-six South Korean sailors were killed and fifty-six were wounded. An international commision set up to investigate the incident pinned the blame on North Korea, in large part due to the remains of a North Korean CHT-02D heavyweight acoustic wake-homing torpedo found at the location of the sinking. The submarine responsible is thought to have been a Yono-class midget sub.
North Korea should by all rights be a naval power. A country sitting on a peninsula, Korea has a long naval tradition, despite being a “shrimp” between the two “whales” of China and Japan. However, the partitioning of Korea into two countries in 1945 and the stated goal of unification —by force if necessary—lent the country to building up a large army, and reserving the navy for interdiction and special operations roles. Now, in the twenty-first century, the country’s navy is set to be the sea arm of a substantial nuclear deterrent.
more
http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/could-north-koreas-submarines-sink-the-us-navy-war-22309
