The Republic of Korea is consistently and systematically advancing its missile programs across multiple domains, and some results of this process raise logical questions. For example, earlier Defense Express mentioned how South Korean Hyunmoo-2 tactical ballistic missile is visually suspiciously similar to russian Iskander.
However, it shouldn't come as surprising considering there was a project developed by South Korea aiming to basically recreate the russian P-800 Oniks anti-ship missile. Let's discuss this episode in more detail.
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How Koreans Fired an Oniks Copy
The first reports about a South Korean missile resembling the russian Oniks date back to September 2021. The Korean military had carried out successful tests of their allegedly new missile, with visual evidence to confirm the hit on target.
The very fact South Korea got a supersonic missile was interesting at the time as the country only used to have one type of anti-ship missile, the SSM-700K C-Star, which is still in operation.
There was little known about the new missile. Specifications were kept classified but experts estimated that it was 6.6 meters long and weighed 1.5 tons. The warhead mass was 250 kg, and the operational range between 300 and 600 kilometers, or up to 370 miles. The cruising speed was believed to be Mach 3.
Some were predicting that the ROK military would use its Oniks copy to reinforce coastal defenses or KDX-III destroyers, and that Seoul needs them for deterring China rather than North Korea.
Source of Technologies and Current State of the Program
It mostly remained without attention for how long South Korea was developing this missile, overshadowed by the question, here did they get missile technologies from.
One popular assumption is that the Koreans could have received blueprints from russians themselves, specifically directly from the state-owned Almaz-Antey arms corporation.
There's an interesting nuance, though: in the same September 2021, naval expert H I Sutton published an infographic illustrating the layout of South Korean KSS-III submarine.
Sutton claimed that the vessel could be equipped with BrahMos missiles, an Indian copy of Oniks created and produced in cooperation with the russians. There were no prior indications that ROK was interested in procuring those.
Regardless, apart from the test footage, there is nothing known about the further progress on the anti-ship missile as of 2024.
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