A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to RN's Sub Base

Background 

From HMS Astute's unfortunate series of casualty prone sea trials M.E. had offered this  Interview with grounded sub's CIVILIAN fathometer operator from October 24, 2010. The
interviewee selected the disguise shown below.

Update: January 25, 2017

HM Naval Base Clyde will become the UK’s single integrated submarine base after 2020, with all operational UK’s subs based out of Scotland.  As currently planned, Astute-class attack boats will be based there in the mid-2020s and the new Dreadnought class of deterrent subs from the early 2030s.   

The Royal Navy’s Submarine Service unveiled its new official tartan yesterday.  The tartan was commissioned to celebrate more than a century of links between the submarine service and Scotland, ahead of HM Naval Base Clyde becoming the UK’s only submarine operating base.  The official submariner tartan, is available to all qualified submariners (RN dolphins required) past and present.  Below it is modeled by a submariner.

Submarines are always silent and strange.

Life on a Small North Korean Submarine

Background

Living in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) is strictly regulated under a legal system based on the Prussian Legal System the Best (according to 19th c. Japan) and Communist legal theory. Credible facts about everyday life in North Korean have not flowed as freely as cheerful claims by its leaders.  Credible facts about the DPRK's military have been even more cloistered.  According to the CIA's The World Factbook [color emphasis mine], 18 is presumed to be the legal minimum age for compulsory military service; 16-17 is the presumed legal minimum age for voluntary service (2012).

We wonder what crewing may be like for North Korea's submarine sailors.  Intriguing clues are available from public sources outside of the DPRK in two rare cases that came to the attention of external authorities and news media.

Example One:  Penalty for participation in spy sub's failure

JUNE 27, 1998   9 North Koreans Dead in Submarine

SEOUL— The bodies of nine North Korean sailors and agents were discovered Friday inside a captured North Korean midget submarine, shot and killed in what South Korean officials called an apparent murder-suicide.

Officials said there were signs of a struggle inside the submarine, as four North Korean agents apparently shot themselves to death after first killing five sailors.

South Korean authorities also said there were indications that the vessel, which was captured after becoming entangled in a fisherman's net off the South Korean coast Monday, had been on a spy mission, leaving them divided about how much of an issue to make of this latest North Korean incursion. 

North Korea's Version of Events
The submarine sank as it was being towed into port, it was unclear if this was as a result of damage or a deliberate scuttling by the crew.^[3] On 23 June the Korean Central News Agency admitted that a submarine had been lost in a training accident.

Later, 
On 25 June the submarine was salvaged [not by North Korea] from a depth of approximately 100 feet (30 m) and the bodies of 9 crewmen were recovered, 5 sailors had apparently been murdered while 4 agents had apparently committed suicide.^[5] The presence of South Korean drinks suggested that the crew had completed an espionage mission.^[6] Log books found in the submarine showed that it had infiltrated South Korean waters on a number of previous occasions.^[7]  The bodies of the members of submarine crew were subsequently buried in the Cemetery for North Korean and Chinese Soldiers.^[8]
 

Example Two:  Death benefit to families of submariners 

March 11, 2016 - USNI NEWS |  U.S. Official: North Korean Submarine is Missing, Presumed Sunk

Subsequently, a South Korean news outlet has claimed the sub was sunk and "improved housing" awarded to the families of the sailors lost. (This news has subsequently been removed from the internet). Draw your own conclusions.

Submarines are always silent and strange.

U.S. Navy's Advanced Tactics: Autonomous Swarming & Spoofing

Yesteryear

Molten Eagle first heralded the swarming concept in September of 2005.  Eleven years later the U.S. is closer to fleet deployment at will.  By 2013, ME had also realized and predicted that one of the best uses of AUVs was going to be spoofing enemy surface and submarine warships.

Although the U.S. Navy has yet to admit spoofing acoustic signals to mimic subs of foreign nations, this has been a useful practice for half a century.  The possibilities to decoy and to deceive (false flag) are practically endless. No navy wants to boast about such capabilities, however.

So as seas fill with costly subs from more nations than ever, operated by seamen (and women) with less experience than ever, and needing more refueling and in-port maintenance than U.S. nuclear subs do, advantage beneath the seas is assured in peacetime.  

But as foreign sailors eventually learn to operate their subs as quietly and safely as designed, the noises of age will begin plaguing their vaunted and costly vessels whether AIPs or nucs.  Overdue maintenance prematurely ruins missions with embarrassing tows back to port. Have you noticed how often tugs have accompanied foreign (even Chinese and Russian) subs far from their homeports?

The Future...

In wartime advantage will be leveraged by the abilities of U.S. surface vessels, aircraft and subs to launch specialized AUVs in overwhelming numbers.  Spoofing? Of course! But for now, read on to see only what IS admittedly available (video, also).

Submarines are always silent and strange.

 

Financing ISIS Below the Rio Grande

August 3, 2016 ...   RED FLAG [WARNING]

"Worse Than Ransom: $400 Million in Cash from U.S. to top state TERROR sponsor"

• Cash makes tracing proceeds to end receivers extremely difficult.  

• "What will IRAN do with $400 Millions in euros, Swiss francs and other currencies flown to Tehran on a cargo plane?"  ANS: Whatever Iran wishes.
  

• P.O.T.U.S. and his State Department will have plausible deniability if some portion of it is sent to Venezuela under the guise of sorely needed "food assistance", then funneled off to support Latin American versions of ISIS.

 December 28, 2016 ... 

"Spanish Military Report: Islamic Terrorists Operate, Raise Cash in Latin America to Attack U.S."

• "Venezuela, Mexico, Peru and Chile also have large and rapidly growing Muslim populations. Trinidad and Tobago, Caribbean islands on the northern edge of Latin America, are identified as “especially worrisome” because local authorities reported that 70 of their citizens traveled to Syria and Iraq to join ISIS."

• The report cites a 2012 article in a military publication from Trinidad that compares the growth of radical Islam in the country to a group of violent Muslims that tried to overthrow the government in 1990. 
  

•  "The top Al Qaeda leader in Mexico was identified in the State Department records, via a September 2004 cable from the American consulate in Ciudad Juárez, as Adnan G. El Shurkrjumah. ...  [B]efore he died Shukrijumah helped plan several U.S. attacks, including plots to bomb Oprah Winfrey’s studio and detonate nuclear devices in multiple American cities."

Submarines are always silent and strange. 

Definition: "The Crisis for ISIS"

Related information can be found in our earlier posting.  Please accept our apology for being a day later than promised in the earlier post. Adverse Weather interfered with a return schedule. 

NOTE:  Baghdad Sacked by the Mongol Army's seige that ended February 10th 1258.
 
Submarines are always silent and strange.