09-151.pdf

On September 19, the UNC/MAC Senior Member protested the
incident, but North Korea refused to receive the message. After having
learnt some details about the botched infiltration mission from South
Korean news accounts, the KPA requested a MAC secretary meeting to
be held on September 26; in spite of its policy to dismantle it, North
Korea returned to the MAC when needed. At the seven secretary
meetings held between September 26 and December 17, all but the
last of them called by the KPA, North Korean officers demanded the
return of the submarine and the crew and threatened to retaliate “a
hundredfold or a thousandfold” for the deaths of the commandos, but
the UNC/MAC consistently insisted that the incident should be
handled by the South Korean government.
On September 26, the North claimed that the crew was not
properly equipped with weapons for self-protection, but when they
were encircled by personnel from the South they just coped with the
situation. Since the submarine had stranded due to engine trouble, the
incident was not an armistice violation. Consequently, the submarine
and the crew should be returned as soon as possible. The UNC/MAC
responded that, after its investigation, its special investigation team
had concluded that it was a deliberate armed intrusion and a serious
armistice violation and protested severely. At the NNSC meeting held
on September 24, the Swedish and Swiss members made similar
statements to those on April 9. The intrusion was regarded as a
“planned infiltration attempt that failed” and as “one of the gravest
incidents between North and South Korea in recent years.” Such an
ibid., 1997, p. 160; Lee, op. cit., 2004, p. 126; Oberdorfer, op. cit., pp. 387-9.
Original quotation marks.
North Korea Incapacitates the MAC and the NNSC in the 1990s
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