A sea serpent. The most dangerous weapon North Korea

"Flame"

Tension in East Asia is growing every year. Here and relations of South Korea with North Korea, and claims of Koreans to the Japanese associated with the Second world. And Vice versa. And, of course, the geopolitical struggle between China and the States. Earlier, by the way, experts estimate that now through the South China sea is approximately 25% of all world trade. So many specialists consider it as the key to world domination, albeit with some "but".



North Korea, in contrast to , any world domination does not claim, and, despite the aggressive rhetoric towards its neighbors is mainly aimed at the defense of their borders. However, the forces of the DPRK is impressive for its size. Military command North Korea has at its disposal two fleets: the East and West. First, according to open sources, includes 470 ships, while the Western has 300 ships and vessels of different classes. The total number of employees in the ranks of the Navy of the DPRK in about 50-60 thousand people. For comparison: the number of the Russian Navy as of 2018 150 thousand people. The total population of Russia is 146 million, North Korea — 25 million.

Entertaining arithmetic, of course, not surprising at all. North Korea is a unique living organism, militarized to the extreme. The term of service for conscripts in the Navy of the DPRK, for example, 5-10 years. In the army — 5-12 years. In a word, "fun."

Quantity instead of quality

With all this there is no doubt about the plight of the country and its armed forces, forced into poverty and international isolation to operate literally everything that can still move on the road, to go by sea or to fly.
Now the North Korean submarine force are among the most numerous. The number of non-nuclear submarines of the DPRK is in the top leading countries: it is estimated that the country has between 70 and 80 submarines. The basis of the submarine fleet is a relatively large diesel submarine, which is a modification of a Soviet submarine of project 633. Just as experts believe, of such boats in North Korea for about 20. At first they imported from China and then North Korea was able to produce ships of this type.
The length of the submarine of project 633 reaches of 76.6 meters and width of 6.7 meters. Underwater displacement — 1712 tons. The crew — 52 people. The submarine has eight 533-mm torpedo tubes.


According to experts, the remaining submarines of the DPRK — small and midget submarines, by default, have limited capacity. However, even North Korea can surprise the sudden achievements (of course, you need to realistically understand the potential and real possibility). In July of this year, the North Korean Agency KCNA reported on the emergence of the DPRK's new submarines. "The new submarine, built with careful guidance and special attention of the esteemed Supreme leader intended to perform tasks in the operational area of the East sea and is in anticipation of emergency housing," — said the Agency.

Experts more drew pictures of boats, which were photographed himself, Kim Jong-UN. At the same time their own conclusions on this score was presented by the famous portal Covert Shores devoted to naval matters. "Footage shown on KCNA, show only the lower hull of the submarine near the stern and near the nose. This is enough to confidently say that before us is a modified submarine of the Romeo class," — says the expert. All this confirms the thesis about the existence of North Korea's large submarine with ballistic missiles, which was previously seen on satellite images at the time of its construction.


Here it is necessary to clarify an important detail: Romeo is nothing like the NATO classification of the above mentioned project 633. Of course, to place on Board the old diesel-electric submarines of ballistic missiles, is not a trivial task. According to earlier information, this project 633 is substantially extended, however, as noted Covert Shores, it is not necessarily so. Most likely, missile containers placed in the compartment aft of the battery right in front of the engine room. The superstructure was lengthened, and the creators had to sacrifice a part of the internal space of the boat. As for the number of missiles, their number varies from two to three: portal Covert Shores on the chart depicts the three rocket mines.


It is Important to clarify one detail, in order to avoid confusion. Earlier, North Korea had already built and put into operation, at least one submarine type Gorae, known in the West as Sinpo. This is a lesser warship, able, probably, to carry one ballistic missile "Puchiko-1".

Last argument

Thus, the DPRK received a strategic submarine whose power may exceed the capacity of the submarine type Gorae. But what exactly is armed with a new boat? In the beginning of the month it became known that on 2 October 2019 in the DPRK produced the first flight test of new ballistic missile submarines "Puchiko-3": a missile launched from a submerged position with the submerged submarine near Wonsan into the sea of Japan. The first launch took place at a distance of 450 kilometers and a maximum altitude at the highest point 910 kilometers. The North Koreans announced a successful start.
— reads the statement of the KCNA.


Apparently, the test missiles used submarine type Sinpo, while the standard bearer "Puchiko-3" should be just modernized missile Romeo. According to experts, solid-fuel rocket and two-stage, and its range could in theory be about 4000 kilometers. But it is in theory.
In any case, the obvious progress of the DPRK both in the creation of strategic submarines and SLBM development: just compare the appearance archaic "Pukulan-1" and shape "Pukulan-3", which is similar to the "true" ballistic missile for submarines. However, to exaggerate the achievements of the regime, of course, not worth it. Moreover, it is almost safe to say that in this direction North Korea will never catch up with either Russia or China. About the United States even to speak of.