[What About This Book] Nuclear Power Below the Sea, Resolve Above the Desk

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It is not only submarines that descend beneath the sea. Some nations push both fear and determination below the surface. After reading "Korean Nuclear-Powered Submarine," what lingers is not the image of a steel hull, but the expression of a nation determined to see such a vessel built to completion. While the book describes submarines, it ultimately illuminates something much larger than the vessel itself-things like the Blue House and the Ministry of National Defense, shipyards and nuclear reactors, the Korea-U.S. Nuclear Agreement and the IAEA, budgets and organizational charts. Although this is a book about underwater weapons, the scenery atop a desk keeps surfacing alongside.

The book’s first steps are directed underwater, but its gaze soon rises above the surface. The short breath of diesel submarines, the ambiguous improvements of AIP, and the extended endurance of nuclear-powered submarines-these are only the beginning. The surrounding waters, entangled with China, Russia, Japan, and North Korea, come next, followed by terms like maritime transportation routes and strategic autonomy. North Korea’s SLBM threats, the need to protect sea lines of communication, and the pursuit of strategic autonomy-these concerns linger longer than the descriptions of hulls and reactors. In this book, submarines are not merely a matter of performance, but of time, of will, and ultimately, of how long a nation can maintain its focus in one direction.

The argument unfolds almost without pause. These direct sentences can sometimes feel rough, but that very roughness reveals just how long the author, Moon Geunsik, has kept this issue close to his heart. Rather than a feigned posture of balance, the book carries the density of someone finally speaking after a long period of endurance. This force does not arise solely from the author’s background. Throughout the book, there is a sense only possible from someone deeply familiar with submarines. Experiences such as the acquisition process of the Jangbogo, serving as captain of the Nadeyong, and working in Project 362 are not just listed in the author’s biography at the end-they serve as the invisible foundation beneath nearly every sentence. Most books on security let words like deterrence, response, autonomy, and balance inflate until they become intangible. Here, however, such terms remain grounded, supported by the weight of the hull, the duration of operations, the depth of waters, and the friction of international norms.

A conceptual diagram of the Korean nuclear-powered submarine based on the existing KSS-III design. The book contemplates the nation's resolve to make this possible for longer than the hull itself. Photo by H.I. Sutton X.

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What is fascinating is that, even while the book discusses the merits of submarines, it continually makes the stories outside the submarine appear larger. In the beginning, it outlines the history of submarines, principles of propulsion, differences between diesel and nuclear-powered vessels, and the changing operational environment. However, the book truly gains momentum after this point. How should Korea’s indigenous project be propelled? Is independent construction possible? Why did past efforts fail? How can the hurdles of the Korea-U.S. Nuclear Agreement and international regulations be overcome? Why is a presidential-level PMO necessary? At this stage, the submarine ceases to be merely a weapon beneath the sea, and instead becomes a question that tests the national system: how long can a country sustain a long-term project, align ministries, technology, and diplomacy in a single direction, and ensure the project survives even as administrations change? The book repeatedly turns its gaze toward these issues.

Thus, rather than a weapons manual, this book is closer to a document seeking to persuade the nation. Blueprints, policy memos, retrospectives, and proposals overlap within its pages. In particular, the vision for a presidential-level, pan-government integrated project team is the book’s most explicit statement along this line. This proposal is not simply about adding another organizational chart. The Ministry of National Defense and the Navy alone are not enough; diplomacy, defense, nuclear energy, industry, budget, and international trust must all be managed together. In discussing hulls below the sea, the book is actually inquiring more into the structure of administration and the continuity of politics on land. Given how often major projects in Korean society have been shaken not by technical shortcomings but by failures in coordination, the book’s perspective feels more like seasoned realism than exaggeration. This is also why, more often than not, the real challenge is not the performance of a single submarine, but the nation’s capacity to see such a project through to the end.

The discussions of cost, regional tensions, diplomatic backlash, and alternative options are brief. Yet even the absence of these topics reinforces the book’s single-minded focus. The time that has repeatedly folded and unfolded over the past half-century cannot remain landlocked yet again. That is why, more than the darkness beneath the sea, it is the texts of agreements, organizational charts, budget tables, and conference rooms that come to mind first. The hull may not yet be in the water, but the book is already measuring the time beyond it.

Korean Nuclear-Powered Submarine | Written by Moon Geunsik | Planet Media | 352 pages

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