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useful role by giving North Korea an opportunity to explain that the<br />

trainees were not the vanguard of an invasion force. 271<br />

At the 419th MAC plenary meeting called by the KPA/CPV held<br />

on June 27, 1983, the South claimed that on June 19, South Korean<br />

soldiers on patrol in the vicinity of Munsan had discovered three<br />

armed intruders who, after a gun battle, were all killed, but the North<br />

asserted that the incident was fabricated. At the 421st meeting<br />

requested by the UNC/MAC convened on August 23, the South<br />

claimed that on August 5 outside Wôlsông on the east coast an armed<br />

spy boat had fired at the Republic of Korea navy vessels which fired<br />

back and sank the boat, but the KPA/CPV Senior Member denied the<br />

act. On August 13, an unidentified vessel had approached the South<br />

Korean coast in the vicinity of Ullûng Island. On August 5, international<br />

signals were sent to stop the vessel, but during interrogation<br />

it fired and began to escape. When a navy helicopter chased the vessel,<br />

it was fired on by machine guns, but the helicopter responded by<br />

sinking the vessel. Three men were found dead but the corpses could<br />

not be retrieved and there were no survivors.<br />

The North regarded the incident as fabricated and claimed that<br />

the fish-detector vessel “P’ungsan” was on its way from the East to the<br />

West Sea. After departing from Japan, a South Korean naval destroyer<br />

had bombarded it and an airplane fired at it with missiles. The vessel<br />

had sunk further away from Ullûng Island than the South had<br />

asserted. Five men died. The UNC/MAC Senior Member showed<br />

271_ Downs, ibid., p. 115; Hapch’am chôngbo ponbu, ibid., 1999, pp. 374-6; Kukpang<br />

chôngbo ponbu, op. cit., 1993, pp. 2<strong>09</strong>, 374; Lee, ibid., 2004, pp. 125-6; The<br />

Korea Times, “413th MAC Meet: UNC Charges N. Korea With Dispatching<br />

Agents,” May 29, 1982.<br />

346 Peace-keeping in the Korean Peninsula

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