The ROKS Cheonan trains with other South Korean warships in the Yellow Sea, Jan. 3, 2024. (South Korean navy)
CAMP HUMPHREYS, South Korea — A survivor of the ROKS Cheonan, a South Korean warship believed sunk by North Korea in 2010 with a loss of 46 sailors, took command of a namesake vessel last month.
Cmdr. Park Yeon-soo took the helm of a Daegu-class corvette, also called the Cheonan, on Jan. 22, promising to remember the “46 warriors” of the original Cheonan “who are looking on from the sky.”
“If the enemy provokes us, we will immediately … punish them and take retribution for our comrades,” he said during his televised assumption-of-command ceremony.
Park was a lieutenant aboard the original Cheonan on March 26, 2010, when the ship was split in half and sunk in the Yellow Sea, south of the disputed maritime border between North and South. It carried a crew of 104.
The Pohang-class vessel was hit by “a strong underwater explosion” caused by a North Korean torpedo, according to a joint investigation by South Korea’s Ministry of National Defense, civilian agencies and 24 experts from the United States, Australia, the United Kingdom and Sweden.
“The evidence points overwhelmingly to the conclusion that the torpedo was fired by a North Korean submarine,” said the September 2020 report. “There is no other plausible explanation.”
Two months after the sinking, the North’s state-run Korean Central News Agency described the report as “sheer fabrication” and said Pyongyang had nothing to do with the incident.
South Korean navy Cmdr. Park Yeon-soo pays his respects at a memorial for the victims of the Cheonan sinking at 2nd Fleet headquarters in South Korea, Jan. 22, 2024. (South Korean navy)
The ship’s stern was raised on April 25, 2010, and recovery efforts, which included help from the USNS Salvor, USS Harpers Ferry and USS Curtis Wilbur, ended four months later, according to a U.S. Forces Korea news release.
Choi Wonil, the Cheonan’s commander during the sinking and now the director of the nonprofit Patriots and Veterans Research Institute based in Daejeon, said he was glad to see Park “overcome difficult times.”
“I also hope this kind of thing happens a lot to the crew members of the Cheonan in the future,” Choi said by phone Tuesday.
Choi said he was “deeply moved” by Park’s promotion and how his former junior officer could “carry out his mission of protecting the [Yellow Sea], which our brothers in arms could not do.”
Park declined to comment for this story, a South Korean navy spokesman told Stars and Stripes by phone Wednesday. South Korean officials customarily speak to the media on condition of anonymity.
Construction of the new Cheonan began in 2020 and the ship was delivered to the navy in May.
The 2,800-ton corvette is equipped with long-range anti-submarine torpedoes and a towed ship array sonar that detects underwater vessels and munitions, which the late Cheonan lacked, according to a Defense Ministry report May 21.
The new Cheonan is assigned to South Korean navy’s 2nd Fleet and primarily operates in the Yellow Sea. It conducted its first sea-based live-fire exercise with other South Korean warships last month, according to a ministry news release.
Stars and Stripes reporter Yoo Kyong Chang contributed to this report.
