North Korea Building a Submarine Capable of Launching Short-Range Nuclear Missiles

[TreeBeard]

Don't worry America. Trump has assured us that he is in love with Kim and Kim is in love with Trump. They are two love birds with visions of A-Bombs exploding in their heads.

[Mircea]

Originally Posted by thrillobyte

Satellite photos show North Korea working on a submarine capable of launching short-range missiles. Now it all makes sense why Kim has been test firing all these short range missiles over the last few months. My guess is he's planning to put nuclear warheads on them and then get close to the US. What's next is anybody's guess.

I'm not sure how you drew that conclusion.

NBC is the least credible news source.

I couldn't read the entire article because of the pay-wall, but it said absolutely nothing about short-range missiles.

Other sources are more credible, but notice the use of weasel words:

New photos taken of a North Korean shipyard suggest the country could be building a submarine that could potentially be capable of launching a nuclear missile, a report early Tuesday said.

Originally Posted by Ralph_Kirk

SOSUS still works for the US.

Not on diesel/electric, which is what North Korea, China, Russia, Iran and many other countries use.

Lest you forget, a Chinese diesel/electric defeated US airborne ASW platforms then defeated surface ASW platforms (fast frigates and destroyers) and sailed right up to a US carrier and surfaced.

Originally Posted by lilyflower3191981

Nobody knows for sure how much plutonium the North has made, or where it all is.

That's not entirely true.

Pu-239 only exists naturally in trace amounts. If you strip-mined the entire Earth, and that means draining the oceans, you might get enough for a 1 kt device.

Pu-239 is made in a reactor bombarding U-238 with slow and medium speed neutrons:

U-238 + n --> Np-239 - e = Pu-239

Pu-239 also undergoes neutron capture and converts to Pu-240, but that's not a big deal.

Pu-240 also captures and if you run the reactor sloppily, you get Pu-241 and Pu-242 which you definitely don't want. Both produce a lot of heat. A lot of heat. They'll crystallize plastic explosives, melt solder connections, crack printed wire boards and damage cryotons so the weapon doesn't work.

We know which reactors the Koreans used --because Clinton gave them the reactors -- so we know the burn-up time.

Based on that, the Koreans probably have about 60 kg.

They used 4.5-5.0 kg for their 1 kt test-shot to see if their fission design works, then 8 kg for their 20 kt test-shot, then probably another 8 kg to test a fission-fusion design which everyone says failed but which I say was a success, because the Koreans were more interested in knowing if their fission-fusion design works and not in producing a big bang.

That would leave them with about 35-39 kg which is enough for about eight 1 kt devices.

[Sydney123]

Originally Posted by thrillobyte

Satellite photos show North Korea working on a submarine capable of launching short-range missiles. Now it all makes sense why Kim has been test firing all these short range missiles over the last few months. My guess is he's planning to put nuclear warheads on them and then get close to the US. What's next is anybody's guess.


https://www.nbcnews.com/news/all/pho...ching-n1047066

Do you think Kim is planning on....Taking us down? That would be a pretty lofty goal.

[Ralph_Kirk]

Originally Posted by Mircea

Not on diesel/electric, which is what North Korea, China, Russia, Iran and many other countries use.

Lest you forget, a Chinese diesel/electric defeated US airborne ASW platforms then defeated surface ASW platforms (fast frigates and destroyers) and sailed right up to a US carrier and surfaced.

SOSUS does work on diesel/electric. It just doesn't work as well on the most effectively designed diesel/electric.

And diesel/electric subs don't get across the Pacific very easily--there is a reason the US and the USSR didn't use them against each other during the Cold War. As I said, North Korean subs are a threat to South Korea and Japan.

[Mircea]

Originally Posted by msgsing

Remember the Cuban missile crisis under President Kennedy when the Russians placed short range nuclear weapons 90 miles from the US?

Yeah, I remember Eisencoward telling Kennejerk twice during the transition meetings not to deploy the Jupiter IRBMs to Italy and Turkey until the situation in Cuba had been handled.

I remember Eisencoward calling and writing letters to Kennejerk begging him not to deploy the Jupiter IRBMs until the situation in Cuba had been handled.

I remember Kennejerk totally screwing up the Bay of Pigs.

I remember Kennejerk totally ignoring Eisencoward's pleas and deploying the Jupiter IRBMs in Italy and Turkey, anyway, because, you know, Kennejerk went to Barfard so that makes him smarter than Eisencoward.

I remember Kennejerk telling the world after securing the POWs from the Bay of Pigs that Kennejerk totally screwed up that the US would not invade Cuba.

I remember the Russians warming up to Castro after that, and I remember the Russians putting SS-4 and SS-5 IRBMs in Cuba.

I remember the Russians winning, because:

1) The US and Russia now have parity: If the US attacks the Russians with Jupiter IRBMs, the Russians can respond in-kind with launches of SS-4 and SS-5 IRBMs on American cities; or

2) The Russians force the Allies to quit Berlin and withdraw in exchange for the withdraw of SS-4s and SS-5s; or

3) Parity is achieved when the Russians force the US to withdraw the Jupiters in exchange for the withdraw of SS-4/5s.

The Russians forced Kennejerk to withdraw the Jupiters.

In fact, every Jupiter IRBM was withdrawn from Italy and Turkey before the first Russian missile was ever withdrawn from Cuba and the last missile didn't leave until August 1967 which was almost 4 years after Kennejerk was assassinated.

I know American Exceptionalists like to beat their chests and hail the turning-back of a Russian ship as a Great Victory, but in Reality it was a Non-Event.

I'm guessing there's some part of SS-4 and SS-5 that people don't understand. SS-4s were rail-launched and SS-5s were mobile.

Nuclear weapons are never transported by ship. Nuclear weapons are always transported by air. That ship had nothing more than launchers for the SS-5 which is of no consolation since launchers for at least one battery had already been delivered.

And all that because Kennejerk thought he was smarter than Eisencoward.

The Russians did the right thing and had no choice.

Russian nuclear policy was quid pro quo meaning if the US launches and Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile then the only justifiable response is the launch of an IRBM.

Except, Russian IRBMs cannot hit US targets, so that left the Russians at a serious disadvantage, because the only possible response to the launch of a US IRBM would be to escalate and launch an ICBM, which is unthinkable ---even for Russians.

The Russians also knew the US planned to deploy the Pershing I to Germany in 1964, and the Pershing I was scheduled to replace the Jupiters in Italy and Turkey in 1968.

If you don't understand the implication of that, consider during the Gulf War on flat level terrain the US with all its technology could only find 1 in 10 SCUD missile launchers.

Imagine it's 1971 and Pershing Is are deploying to their primary or alternate firing points up in the foothills of the Turkish mountains.

How many do you think the Russians would find? Probably none.

Originally Posted by my54ford

Not anymore then we spend on ASW now. In case you didn't realize there are active ASW units deployed around the globe at all times. Both Surface and Aviation units keep tabs on potential enemy naval units around the clock and don't forget the fore mentioned SOSUS lines ... Having submarines and having them evade detection are two very different things...

None of that matters when subs are diesel/electric.

[boxus]

Originally Posted by msgsing

Remember the Cuban missile crisis under President Kennedy when the Russians placed short range nuclear weapons 90 miles from the US? We almost went to war. There is no way any US President would allow a North Korean sub to come within striking range of the US or any of our bases overseas.

Well, I do not remember (was not born yet, lol), but the crisis is not comparable, and that even was just a result of a temper tantrum president who still was recovering from a stung ego from the Bay of Pigs.

Fact is the Soviets pressured the US to remove missiles from Turkey, and we ended up doing so in exchange for them not putting them in Cuba.

But reality is NK and anyone has the right of navigation. Only a preemptive strike could be done, but intel probably would need to be pretty solid to decide to attack a ship conducting free navigation.

Originally Posted by Pilot1

I didn't see it in the article as NBC wants to bury the fact, but this is a DIESEL boat. Not a nuke powered boat. These are easily detectable by our methods. This is pure sensationalism to make the threat from North Korea seem worse than it is.

Diesel boats are incredibly quiet, due to the absence of the loud reactor and steam system. However, NK's tech is probably 40 years old, not quite the modern, ASW evading system it would need. Aside from the tech, I doubt they are proficient operators as operations determines a whole lot of the subs stealthiness. Do not forget, the US has boats, semi-submersibles, subs, and planes that get through US defenses to run drugs. The US defense posture is set up for terrorism and to detect a mass attack from a power like Russia.

Essentially the US will do as it usually does, monitor it when the sub deploys, hope to keep track.

Originally Posted by my54ford

Not anymore then we spend on ASW now. In case you didn't realize there are active ASW units deployed around the globe at all times. Both Surface and Aviation units keep tabs on potential enemy naval units around the clock and don't forget the fore mentioned SOSUS lines ... Having submarines and having them evade detection are two very different things...

ASW operations are extremely difficult, it is not like in the movies. The failure for detection and tracking, especially long term, is very high. ASW defense posture and training mostly is centered around battle group protection.

[T-310]

Originally Posted by Hesychios

North Korea Building a Submarine Capable of Launching Short-Range Nuclear Missiles

The prospect of this is truly scary. We will be spending a lot of money in the future tracking these things.


~ Thankfully, Kim writes beautiful letters ...

Not necessarily. NK Navy is not known for its blue water capability. And the old Soviet crap they do use are noisy as hell.