The sinking of South Korean Corvette Cheonan

Asymptote

Asymptote

Banned Idiot
I have a theory.

The South korean navy sank their own boat. I know this sounds shocking, but let me explain.



1. Both US and South Korean investigators had stated officially, that the torpedoes that sank the South Korean corvette was made in GERMANY.

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2. South Korea bought numerous german subs (Type 209 for example). The most recent one is Type 214 submarine with 3 commissioned to date. The most recent one SS-075 "An Jung-geun" was commissioned on December 1st, 2009. A mere three months before the incident.

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And ofcourse, German submarines fires german torpedoes.


3. North Korea is a country under the most intense international embargoes on earth. Even civilian equipments remotely sounds like it can do anything to make weapon is banned. So for a TORPEDO (which is not your common black market weapon like AKs) - a highly specialized weapon that's under EU's Arms Control Regime (that's tighter than a nun's ass), it is impossible for North Korea (who has no diplomatic relation with Germany) to acquire such weapon. Torpedo is not something you can just steal or smuggle at a tradeshow or carry on a camel's back.


Applying occam's razor - simplest explaination is usually the correct one.


So, for North Korea to .....


A. Con/steal/buy the torpedoes UNDETECTED, then smuggle the german torpedoes across the world UNDETECTED, only to sink a South Korean Corvette....

or

B. South Korean Navy after acquiring the brand spanking new Type 214 submarines, while still unfamiliar with the operations of the submarine goes on excercise, made a huge mishap and fired the torpedoes by mistake, and sunk one of its own ship. Then while fearing embarrassment, blamed North Korea for it.


Which one sounds more plausible?
 
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siegecrossbow

siegecrossbow

General
Staff member
Super Moderator
Asymptote said:
I have a theory.

The South korean navy sank their own boat. I know this sounds shocking, but let me explain.



1. Both US and South Korean investigators had stated officially, that the torpedoes that sank the South Korean corvette was made in GERMANY.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!




2. South Korea bought numerous german subs (Type 209 for example). The most recent one is Type 214 submarine with 3 commissioned to date. The most recent one SS-075 "An Jung-geun" was commissioned on December 1st, 2009. A mere three months before the incident.

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And ofcourse, German submarines fires german torpedoes.


3. North Korea is a country under the most intense international embargoes on earth. Even civilian equipments remotely sounds like it can do anything to make weapon is banned. So for a TORPEDO (which is not your common black market weapon like AKs) - a highly specialized weapon that's under EU's Arms Control Regime (that's tighter than a nun's ass), it is impossible for North Korea (who has no diplomatic relation with Germany) to acquire such weapon. Torpedo is not something you can just steal or smuggle at a tradeshow or carry on a camel's back.


Applying occam's razor - simplest explaination is usually the correct one.


So, for North Korea to .....


A. Con/steal/buy the torpedoes UNDETECTED, then smuggle the german torpedoes across the world UNDETECTED, only to sink a South Korean Corvette....

or

B. South Korean Navy after acquiring the brand spanking new Type 214 submarines, while still unfamiliar with the operations of the submarine goes on excercise, made a huge mishap and fired the torpedoes by mistake, and sunk one of its own ship. Then while fearing embarrassment, blamed North Korea for it.


Which one sounds more plausible?
Click to expand...

As ridiculous as it may seem to other people I am inclined to believe the second choice. If the North Koreans could in fact "fake" the torpedo so well as to make it indistinguishable from the Germans their weapons technology is probably on par with the Chinese, which we clearly know isn't the truth. The South Korean government is taking a huge risk if they are doing a coverup since it has led to tremendous tension in an already sensitive area.
 
solarz

solarz

Brigadier
siegecrossbow said:
As ridiculous as it may seem to other people I am inclined to believe the second choice. If the North Koreans could in fact "fake" the torpedo so well as to make it indistinguishable from the Germans their weapons technology is probably on par with the Chinese, which we clearly know isn't the truth. The South Korean government is taking a huge risk if they are doing a coverup since it has led to tremendous tension in an already sensitive area.
Click to expand...

Claiming that SK sank their own ship and then covered it up, simply based on the fact that the torpedo was German, is not really applying Occam's razor.

However, has there been an official explanation of how NK might've acquired a German torpedo?
 
siegecrossbow

siegecrossbow

General
Staff member
Super Moderator
solarz said:
Claiming that SK sank their own ship and then covered it up, simply based on the fact that the torpedo was German, is not really applying Occam's razor.

However, has there been an official explanation of how NK might've acquired a German torpedo?
Click to expand...

Well I am not too much of an Occam's razor to start with, considering that I am inclined to believe the more "ridiculous" and conspiratorial story instead of the official one.

The official explanation of how NK ended up with a German torpedo pretty much goes along the lines of North Koreans faking German torpedos or smuggling them since they tried to "disguise their involvement by avoiding arms made China and Russia". Talk about cock and bull stories...
 
Quickie

Quickie

Colonel
Asymptote said:
I have a theory.

The South korean navy sank their own boat. I know this sounds shocking, but let me explain.



1. Both US and South Korean investigators had stated officially, that the torpedoes that sank the South Korean corvette was made in GERMANY.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!




2. South Korea bought numerous german subs (Type 209 for example). The most recent one is Type 214 submarine with 3 commissioned to date. The most recent one SS-075 "An Jung-geun" was commissioned on December 1st, 2009. A mere three months before the incident.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!


And ofcourse, German submarines fires german torpedoes.


3. North Korea is a country under the most intense international embargoes on earth. Even civilian equipments remotely sounds like it can do anything to make weapon is banned. So for a TORPEDO (which is not your common black market weapon like AKs) - a highly specialized weapon that's under EU's Arms Control Regime (that's tighter than a nun's ass), it is impossible for North Korea (who has no diplomatic relation with Germany) to acquire such weapon. Torpedo is not something you can just steal or smuggle at a tradeshow or carry on a camel's back.


Applying occam's razor - simplest explaination is usually the correct one.


So, for North Korea to .....


A. Con/steal/buy the torpedoes UNDETECTED, then smuggle the german torpedoes across the world UNDETECTED, only to sink a South Korean Corvette....

or

B. South Korean Navy after acquiring the brand spanking new Type 214 submarines, while still unfamiliar with the operations of the submarine goes on excercise, made a huge mishap and fired the torpedoes by mistake, and sunk one of its own ship. Then while fearing embarrassment, blamed North Korea for it.


Which one sounds more plausible?
Click to expand...

How about this. The involvement of a party that is other than the usual players in the area. A party that you would least expect to be in the area, and that views these usual players as common enemies. It's easy for us to dismiss this as being likely if, let's say, the area is far away from their usual area of operation. But then again we know that, if I'm not mistaken, there are fishing boats in the area, and masquerading as one of the fishermens in the area, and getting a torpedo, or some other weapons, onboard a boat together with the required sensors, would not be entirely impossible.

The motives for such an action would be to start a war between them. The problem is who would view the usual players in the area as common enemies?
 
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Asymptote

Asymptote

Banned Idiot
solarz said:
Claiming that SK sank their own ship and then covered it up, simply based on the fact that the torpedo was German, is not really applying Occam's razor.

However, has there been an official explanation of how NK might've acquired a German torpedo?
Click to expand...


We are not just talking about the German torpedoes here, but the complete system - There are safe guards on the torpedoes that prevents it from launching - let's say from a FISHING BOAT (which is ridicules).
Modern Torpedoes don't just fire off like its a firecracker as if you just light it and it will home-in to target by itself. It has to be PAIRED with the LAUNCHING SYSTEM and SENSOR SUITES - very much like the air launched missiles. Once the torpedo launched it is still ATTACHED TO THE SUBMARINE BY WIRE and it is GUIDED TO THE TARGET BY THE SUBMARINE'S ONBOARD SYSTEM. So, unless the North Koreans also manage to smuggled a Type 214 (Oh yeh! SURE!! That's piece of cake!) to its own water, I very much doubt even with the torpedoes they can manage to launch it, let alone guiding it to target.
 
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solarz

solarz

Brigadier
Asymptote said:
We are not just talking about the German torpedoes here, but the complete system - There are safe guards on the torpedoes that prevents it from launching - let's say from a FISHING BOAT (which is ridicules).
Modern Torpedoes don't just fire off like its a firecracker as if you just light it and it will home-in to target by itself. It has to be PAIRED with the LAUNCHING SYSTEM and SENSOR SUITES - very much like the air launched missiles. Once the torpedo launched it is still ATTACHED TO THE SUBMARINE BY WIRE and it is GUIDED TO THE TARGET BY THE SUBMARINE'S ONBOARD SYSTEM. So, unless the North Koreans also manage to smuggled a Type 214 (Oh yeh! SURE!! That's piece of cake!) to its own water, I very much doubt even with the torpedoes they can manage to launch it, let alone guiding it to target.
Click to expand...

If what you say is true (I'm no expert on this), why hasn't NK raised a ruckus about the finding?
 
siegecrossbow

siegecrossbow

General
Staff member
Super Moderator
solarz said:
If what you say is true (I'm no expert on this), why hasn't NK raised a ruckus about the finding?
Click to expand...

They are making a huge ruckus about it only that no one believes them or trust them enough to allow them to investigate the sinking.
 
Quickie

Quickie

Colonel
Asymptote said:
We are not just talking about the German torpedoes here, but the complete system - There are safe guards on the torpedoes that prevents it from launching - let's say from a FISHING BOAT (which is ridicules).
Modern Torpedoes don't just fire off like its a firecracker as if you just light it and it will home-in to target by itself. It has to be PAIRED with the LAUNCHING SYSTEM and SENSOR SUITES - very much like the air launched missiles. Once the torpedo launched it is still ATTACHED TO THE SUBMARINE BY WIRE and it is GUIDED TO THE TARGET BY THE SUBMARINE'S ONBOARD SYSTEM.
Click to expand...

I wouldn't be too quick to dismiss it as impossible. It's difficult to pull off, but not impossible. And then there is such a thing as a wake-homing torpedo that can go independent of the launching system.

Another possibility is the torpedo was an already exploded one and was put in place to point fingers to the "responsible" party. The real source of the explosion is another weapon, possibly a sea mine that was anchored at the same location as the exploded torpedo shell - which had been intentionally marked with korean writing to point to the "culprit".

The thing is, under this hypothesis, the usual players in the area don't have a motive to do such a thing. North Korea can't be doing it just to point fingers at themselves. South Korea will definitely not sink its own ship. Who else has the motives to do such a thing?
 
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solarz

solarz

Brigadier
The more I read about this incident, the more questions I get.

1. When the incident first occurred, both US and SK announced that no NK ships or subs were in the area. Now, they are claiming that NK subs left their port a couple of days before the incident and returned a few days after, their whereabouts in between unknown.


Why would the US and SK have announced that no NK ships/subs were in the area, unless they were sure of that? Why then, have they now done an about-face and are implying that NK subs *were* in the area? If they actually got updated intelligence that confirmed NK presence, that would be understandable. However, they have not done that. The whereabouts of NK ships in between the time they left port and returned is *unknown*.

Evidence of a German torpedo was found. According to what I read, the first panel consisting of US, SK, UK, Australia and Sweden. Apparently, Sweden was the only one unwilling to back the "overwhelming conclusion". After that, Sweden was replaced by Canada.

Interestingly enough, the
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makes no mention of a German torpedo. I also don't know how reliable is the information about the investigation panel.
 
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