Norks strategy on the cheap

NY Times:

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the attack was evidence, the officials say, of how North Korea has compensated for the fact that it is so bankrupt that it can no longer train its troops or buy the technology needed to fight a conventional war. So it has instead invested heavily in stealthy, hard-to-detect technologies that can inflict significant damage, even if it could not win a sustained conflict.

Building a small arsenal of nuclear weapons is another big element of the Northern strategy — a double-faceted deterrent allowing it to threaten a nuclear attack or to sell the technology or weapons in order to head off retaliation even for an act of war like sinking South Korean ships.

In an interview last week, Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that the joint training exercise with South Korea planned just off the country’s coast in the next few weeks represented only the “near-term piece” of a larger strategy to prevent a recurrence of the kind of shock the South experienced as it watched one of its ships sunk without warning. But the longer-range effort will be finding ways to detect, track and counter the miniature submarines, which he called “a very difficult technical, tactical problem.”

“Longer term, it is a skill set that we are going to continue to press on,” Admiral Mullen said. “Clearly, we don’t want that to happen again. We don’t want to give that option to North Korea in the future. Period. We want to take it away.”

American and South Korean officials declined to describe details of the coming joint exercises, except to say that they would focus on practicing antisubmarine warfare techniques and the interdiction of cargo vessels carrying prohibited nuclear materials and banned weapons.

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Most anti submarine activity takes place in international waters where planes and choppers can drop devices into the water to help find the subs. What probably happened in this case is the Nork sub was in North Korean waters when it fired the torpedo that sunk the South Korean warship. The difficulty in detecting the sub will depend on the range of the detection equipment. They should have been able to detect the torpedo after it was fired unless the range was so close they would nave no time to react. But, if the sub was that close, they should have spotted it.

Hopefully we can develop the technology to deal with the problem.