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Career
Name:	U 137
Builder:	Ordzhonikidze Yard, Leningrad
Yard number:	252
Laid down:	January 12, 1956 [1]
Launched:	November 16, 1956
Commissioned:	September 17, 1957
Struck:	1990s
Homeport:	Leiepaja
Fate:	Museum ship
General characteristics
Class and type:	Whiskey-class submarine
Displacement:	1,030 tons
Length:	76 m (249 ft 4 in)
Beam:	6.7 m (22 ft 0 in)
Draft:	4.6 m (15 ft 1 in)
Propulsion:	Diesel-electric 2 × 37-D diesels, 2,000 bhp each. 150 kW electric engines for creep drive. Engines new 1987.
Speed:	13 knots (24 km/h) submerged 18 knots (33 km/h) surfaced
Range:	12,000 nmi (22,000 km) to 15,000 nmi (28,000 km)
Test depth:	~400-450 meters [2]
Complement:	~60
Armament:	6 × torpedo tubes 18 torpedoes or 24 mines

For German submarines designated U-137, see Unterseeboot 137.

U137 was the unofficial Swedish name of a Soviet submarine, the actual designation of which was S-363, based on its tactical number, as the Soviets considered names of most of its submarines to be classified at the time and didn't disclose them. This Whiskey class submarine of the Baltic Fleet became famous under the U137 designation when it ran aground 10 km from Karlskrona, one of the larger naval bases of the Swedish fleet, on the East coast of Sweden on October 27, 1981. Image File history File links This is a lossless scalable vector image. ... Image File history File links No_Photo_Available. ... Image File history File links Naval_Ensign_of_the_Soviet_Union. ... Leningrad (Russian: Ленинград) may mean: St. ... is the 12th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... A car from 1956 Year 1956 (MCMLVI) was a leap year starting on Sunday (link will display full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 320th day of the year (321st in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... A car from 1956 Year 1956 (MCMLVI) was a leap year starting on Sunday (link will display full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 260th day of the year (261st in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1957 (MCMLVII) was a common year starting on Tuesday (link displays the 1957 Gregorian calendar). ... Whiskey class submarines (locally known as project 613, 644, and 665) are a class of military submarines that the Soviet Union built in the cold war period. ... For other uses, see Submarine (disambiguation). ... A number of vehicles use a diesel-electric powerplant for providing locomotion. ... Unterseeboot 137 (U-137) was the designation of two U-boats. ... CCCP redirects here. ... Whiskey class submarines (locally known as project 613, 644, and 665) are a class of military submarines that the Soviet Union built in the cold war period. ... Russian Baltic Fleet sleeve ensign The Baltic Fleet (Russian: Балтийский флот, in the Soviet period - The Double Red Banner Baltic Fleet - Дважды Краснознамённый Балтийский флот) is located at the Baltic Sea and headquartered in Kaliningrad, the other major base is at Kronstadt, located in the Gulf of Finland. ... Karlskrona is a city in south-eastern Sweden. ... is the 300th day of the year (301st in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... AUGUST 25 1981 US Marine Sean Vance is Born on the 25th of August {ear nav|1981}} Year 1981 (MCMLXXXI) was a common year starting on Thursday (link displays the 1981 Gregorian calendar). ...

Standoff

When the Swedish Defence Research Agency secretly started measuring for radioactive materials through the hull, using a specially configured coast guard boat, they detected something that was almost certainly Uranium-238 inside the submarine. They speculated it originated from a nuclear weapon – a torpedo, in the upper port tube.^{[citation needed]} The yield of this weapon was estimated to approximately the same as the bomb dropped over Nagasaki in 1945. However, no nuclear weapon on board U 137 was ever officially confirmed by the Soviet authorities.^[1] Vasily Besedin later confirmed that there were nuclear warheads on some of the torpedoes, and that the crew was ordered to destroy the boat, including these warheads, if Swedish forces tried to take control over the vessel.^[2]. Recent interviews and investigations of Russian officers and naval commanders involved in this situation revealed that the U 137 commander had orders to launch the vessel's nuclear weapons against Swedish targets if any attempt was made from the Swedish forces to capture the vessel.^{[citation needed]} Radioactive decay is the set of various processes by which unstable atomic nuclei (nuclides) emit subatomic particles. ... For the 2002 South Korean film, see The Coast Guard (film). ... There are two objects with this name: Unterseeboot 238 Uranium-238, the most common isotope of uranium This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ... The mushroom cloud of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki, Japan, 1945, rose some 18 kilometers (11 mi) above the hypocenter A nuclear weapon derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions of fusion or fission. ... The torpedo, historically called a locomotive torpedo, is a self-propelled explosive projectile weapon, launched above or below the water surface, propelled underwater toward a target, and designed to detonate on contact or in proximity to a target. ... Torpedo tubes of the French SNLE Redoutable A torpedo tube is a device for launching torpedoes in a horizontal direction. ... // The explosive yield of a nuclear weapon is the amount of energy discharged when the weapon is detonated, expressed usually in the equivalent mass of trinitrotoluene (TNT), either in kilotons (thousands of tons of TNT) or megatons (million of tons of TNT), but sometimes also in terajoules (1 kiloton of... Megane-bashi (Spectacles Bridge) Nagasaki   listen? (長崎市; -shi, literally long peninsula) is the capital and the largest city of Nagasaki Prefecture located at the south-western coast of Kyushu, Japan. ... Year 1945 (MCMXLV) was a common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar). ...

Sweden's Conservative government at the time was determined to safeguard Sweden's national integrity. As the Soviet recovery fleet appeared off the coast on the first day, a fixed coastal artillery battery locked onto the ship's showing there where active coastal batteries on the islands to the Soviets. The fleet didn't turn immediately and as they came closer to the 12-mile territorial limit the battery was ordered to go into war mode on its targeting radar turning it from a single frequency radar to a jump frequency one. The Soviet fleet reacted almost immediately to this and everything except a heavy tugboat turned and stayed in international waters, the tugboat was quickly met by Swedish torpedo boats and it left as well. 19th century coastal artillery guns preserved in Suomenlinna fortress in Helsinki Coastal artillery is the branch of armed forces concerned with operating mobile anti-ship artillery or fixed gun batteries in coastal fortifications. ...

Days later as the Soviet Captain was being interrogated the weather was very bad and the Soviet submarine sent a distress call. In Swedish radar control centers the storm was interfering with the radar image. Soviet jamming could also have been a factor. As the Soviet submarine sent its distress call two ships from the nearby Soviet armada passed the 12 mile limit headed for Karlskrona. This produced the most dangerous period of the crisis and is the time where the Swedish Prime Minister gave his famous order to "Hold the Border" to the military. The coastal battery now fully manned as well as the mobile coastal artillery guns and mine stations went to "action stations". The Air Force scrambled strike aircraft armed with modern anti-ship missiles and reconnaissance aircraft knowing full well that the weather didn't allow rescue helicopters to fly in the event of an engagement. After a tense 30 minutes Swedish FAC's had met the ships and identified them a West German grain carriers, the crisis was over.

Interpretations

At the time the incident was generally seen as a proof of widespread Soviet infiltration of the Swedish coastline, but this interpretation is still open to debate. The generally held belief in Sweden is that the submarine was there to spy on torpedo tests being performed by the Swedish Navy.^{[citation needed]} See: espionage, urban exploration, entryism, heating, ventilation, and air conditioning. ... The torpedo, historically called a locomotive torpedo, is a self-propelled explosive projectile weapon, launched above or below the water surface, propelled underwater toward a target, and designed to detonate on contact or in proximity to a target. ... The Swedish Naval Ensign Coat of arms of the Swedish Navy The Swedish Navy (Swedish: Marinen) is the naval branch of the Swedish Armed Forces. ...

In an interview in 2006, Vasily Besedin, the political officer on board, gave a different picture. The vessel had dual navigation systems, a well-trained crew and the captain, Pyotr Gushchin, was among the best. On board was staff officer Joseph Avrukevich, who was trained in security techniques. Besedin claimed the incident was caused by an error in calculations by the navigation officer.^[3]

The area in which the Soviet submarine ran aground was at the time a restricted military zone, where no foreign nationals were allowed. The exact location served as one of only two routes that could be used to move bigger ships from the naval base in Karlskrona to open water. Although the submarine did not make it far into the archipelago, it had required at least two exact turns at specific points in order to get where it was.^{[citation needed]}

This incident is popularly known in the West as "Whiskey on the rocks". In Soviet Navy the sub became to be known as "Swedish Komsomolets", a pun on both the incident, and the then widespread tendency to give the subs Komsomol-themed names. Komsomol (Комсомол) is a syllabic abbreviation word, from the Russian Kommunisticheski Soyuz Molodiozhi (Коммунистический союз молодёжи), or Communist Union of Youth. The organisation served as the youth wing of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union ( CPSU), the youngest members being fourteen years old, the upper limit for an age...

Links

• Short Documentary
• Story of the incident with photos

References