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Billion Dollar Baby

Kim Jong Un scares the Pentagon into blowing a ton of money on its failed missile defense.

BY JEFFREY LEWIS | MARCH 20, 2013

Last week, newly installed SecDef Chuck Hagel sidled up to a podium, flanked by Undersecretary for Policy Jim Miller and Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Sandy Winnefeld, to announce four significant changes to the U.S. missile defense program.

The big news, Hagel announced, was that the United States will add 14 ground-based interceptors to the ground-based midcourse missile defense (GMD) system in Alaska.

We can disagree about how much to spend on what used to be called "national" missile defense (as opposed to point defenses against theater missiles), but does anyone think it's a good idea to spend more money on the current GMD system at Fort Greely, a.k.a. the Disasta' in Alaska, a.k.a. the Blunda' in the Tundra?

As we have discussed in this space before, a recent National Academies panel -- stacked with many long-time supporters of missile defense -- recommended completely replacing the current system with brand-new interceptors, new radars, and a new concept of operations. But I am getting ahead of myself.

Let's start with the reason for reorienting the U.S. missile defense program: North Korea's evolving ballistic missile threat. While the press focuses on North Korea's December satellite launch using an Unha rocket, defense wonks are quietly fretting about a totally different missile. Last year, North Korea paraded six missiles that sure looked like intercontinental ballistic missiles through Kim Il Sung Square. North Korea calls the missile the Hwasong-13, although the Western press calls it the KN-08.

The Unha rocket that North Korea launched in December would struggle to get a nuclear warhead all the way to the continental United States; the KN-08 however is a different kettle of fish. (Sorry Alaska, you're hosed either way. It's not my fault you are so close that Sarah Palin can see Russia from her house.)

The public reaction to the KN-08 was muted -- possibly because Bob Gates spent his last few months in office telling everyone he could that North Korea was about to show off a road-mobile ICBM. (This artful setting of expectations is one of the myriad ways by which Gates distinguished himself as one of our most deft public servants.) Well, that and because reporters routinely confuse the KN-08 with the Unha. The Japanese press, for example, ran a story claiming the Unha rocket was the Hwasong-13, despite the fact that North Korea conveniently labels its missiles with little plaques to the contrary.

Close examination of the KN-08 missiles themselves seemed to indicate they were mockups, rather than the real article. Those of us who lean toward wonky interests had a very interesting, though perhaps not terribly productive, discussion whether these missiles were better described as "fakes" or "missile simulators" that would be followed by real missiles.

Admiral Winnefeld had a chance to provide the authoritative view of the U.S. intelligence community during last week's presser, but punted:

    Q: But do you know if that that KN-08 is a real or a fake missile? And do you know whether it has the range to reach the United States?

    ADM. WINNEFELD: We would probably want to avoid the intelligence aspects of that. But -- but we believe the KN-08 probably does have the range to reach the United States and the -- our assessment of -- of where it exists in its lifetime is something that would remain classified.

Hey, it's a good thing you're not asking us to spend like a billion dollars here in the middle of fiscal austerity, or I might get sort of annoyed that you don't want to tell me why.

Oh, wait, you are asking us to spend a billion dollars in the middle of fiscal austerity. That's right, when asked how much the 14 new interceptors would cost, Jim Miller said "it'll be a little bit less than a billion dollars overall." Pretty soon we'll be talking about real money. (A lot of scratched our heads at how 14 interceptors could cost nearly a billion dollars. George Lewis, writing on the blog Mostly Missile Defense, breaks out the likely cost factors if you are interested.)

It is possible that the U.S. intelligence community believes that North Korea is now deploying the KN-08 without having flight-tested it. In January, anonymous U.S. officials leaked a story to the New York Times about North Korea deploying some sort of new missile, but David Sanger and Thom Shanker garbled the story so badly no one could figure out which missile the source was talking about. (Sanger and Shanker reported that it was the "intermediate-range KN-08," which is a little like describing a "B-52 supersonic submarine.") The leak was presumably intended to put a little flesh on the bones of the annual testimony by Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, who stated, "North Korea has already taken initial steps towards fielding this system, although it remains untested." The best story we have on the subject is from Bill Gertz, which itself tells you something about where we are in terms of situational awareness.

Anyway, let's stipulate that North Korea is now in the process of deploying the KN-08 without a flight test. Stranger things have happened.

We should do something about this. A cynic, however, might observe that adding 14 interceptors is a great trade for the North Koreans. They deploy a few missiles with exactly no successful flight tests and watch the United States spend one billion dollars.

Hey, at least the ground-based midcourse system works so well! That, by the way, is sarcasm. The assembled personages appear not to have read the National Academies report, which described the ground-based midcourse system as "fragile" and recommended stopping the procurement of the ground-based interceptor (sometimes derisively called the George Bush Interceptor.)

The last successful intercept test of the system was in 2008. Overall, the record of flight tests is 8 successes in 15 tries, or a bit over 50 percent. Little wonder the Missile Defense Agency likes to call flight tests "Pucker Time."

The GMD system performs as badly or worse on "intercept" tests -- tests in which it tries to hit a target -- with only two successes in five tries since 2005. Now, you might ask why there have been so few tests of this system since 2005. Well, I am happy to tell you. In 2005, the Welch Panel -- chaired by the Washington institution that is General Larry Welch -- concluded that ongoing test failures were undermining the deterrent value of the system. So, the Missile Defense Agency scaled back testing to less than one intercept test per year as, evidently, integrated flight tests hate our freedoms. Tests are also monstrously expensive, as George Lewis has noted, costing several hundred million dollars or more, depending on how much you spend on figuring out what went wrong.

The poor test record is important to understand why the National Academies concluded the GMD system was "fragile." When you hear a U.S. official expressing "high confidence" in our ability to intercept a North Korean missile, he or she is assuming the GMD system fires five interceptors at each incoming North Korean missile. (Do the math: A mere 50-50 chance of intercept repeated five times against a target will result in an intercept 97 percent of the time.)

The decision to add 14 interceptors for $1 billion, therefore, will pose an almost impenetrable barrier to North Korea -- unless they build three more missiles. Salvo-launching five low-reliability interceptors is hopelessly inefficient. It is much easier for North Korea to build more missiles than it is for us to purchase five times as many interceptors. This is a mug's game.

Now for the really fun part: Let's say one of these interceptors does manage to hit an incoming North Korean missile. While the folks at Greely are celebrating with a little Harlem Shake, what's happening with the other interceptors we shot off? If you said "They are lighting up the early-warning radars as they streak into the heart of Mother Russia," you win a prize! I am sure there is no chance that will spark an accidental nuclear war, the firing-missiles-into-Russia-on-purpose thing. There is no way the Russians could miss a North Korean missile launch or get an itchy trigger finger when they see missiles converging on their country.

Several of my colleagues have mentioned this problem, but it doesn't seem to gain much traction. A couple of years ago, after the Russians admitted they hadn't seen North Korea's 2009 rocket launches, a colleague of mine drafted an open memo.

Quote

    Memorandum

    To: Combatant commanders, present and future

    From: Posterity

    One doesn't want to judge hastily. So: if these accounts are basically accurate -- I stress if -- and until such a time as this mess can be cleared up, the actual use of GMD against a North Korean missile launch in the direction of North America would appear to be an act of madness.

So, let's recap. North Korea parades six missiles though Kim Il Sung Square and then sends them out to South Hamgyong Province or some other barren piece of North Korean real estate. We commit to a $1 billion dollar decision to add 14 interceptors that totally solve the problem, provided the North Koreans don't build nine instead of six ICBMs. By the way, the new interceptors won't be ready until 2017, but we're hoping to have a successful flight test at some point during the wait.

The only downside, assuming you view squandered defense dollars as stimulus, is, having shot down eight North Korean ballistic missiles, we now need to think about a plausible defense against the several hundred nuclear-armed Russian missiles that have been launched by whatever drunken slobodnik succeeds Vladimir Putin. Maybe a space-based laser? Think I am kidding?

Hagel's other three decisions are also worth mentioning, although none is quite so ludicrous as the decision to spend a billion dollars on the 14 interceptors. Secretary Hagel re-announced Secretary Panetta's decision to deploy a new TPY-2 radar to Japan. It is old news, but comparatively welcome at least in part because it runs zero risk of starting an accidental nuclear war with Russia.

Hagel also announced that, per congressional direction, the Defense Department will fund environmental impact studies for an East Coast missile defense site. As I have noted before, the National Academies recommended a third site in New England as part of a comprehensive program to replace the current GMD system. Congress, in its infinite wisdom, decided to adopt the third site idea -- but using the existing interceptors, defeating the entire purpose. Overall, Congress interpreted the National Academies recommendation to suspend further funding for the GMD system as a reason to increase that funding by $400 million. Not to be outdone, Secretary Hagel has now upped that figure to $1 billion dollars. For a system the National Academies study recommends replacing. Doesn't anyone read anymore? I suppose I could suggest they light the money on fire, but as long as the East Coast site is a real policy option, I can keep making Mianus jokes.

Finally, Hagel did manage a bit of sensible policymaking. Hagel rather cleverly used congressional pressure for an East Coast site as an exit strategy from what was to be Phase IV of the European Phased Adaptive Approach -- the plan to place superfast SM-3 IIB interceptors (which at the moment do not exist) in Poland to defend the United States from Iranian missiles (which at the moment do not exist). Normally, any change made by a Democrat to any missile defense architecture will be met with cries of perfidy from certain quarters, but only a few dead-enders seemed to notice the demise of Phase IV. The New York Times didn't even mention that Hagel killed Phase IV in its initial news coverage. (The Washington Post has now published an editorial complaining that everyone missed the big news regarding the cancelation of Phase IV. I've posted some comments at ArmsControlWonk.com.)

Phase IV of the EPAA was little loved. Congressional Republicans hated it because Obama put it in place of George Bush's plan to put ground-based interceptors at a site in Europe. (Now what are they going to name after him?) The Navy hated the idea of going ashore, although they aren't completely off the hook just yet. The Russians weren't the least bit mollified, once they figured out the SM-3 IIB deployment would be every bit as worrisome as the old Bush plan. And the National Academies concluded that, sooner or later, the Iranians could shoot over the thing. The only people who loved Phase IV had a direct financial interest in the outcome, and even they couldn't even be bothered to pay one of the usual suspects to write a favorable op-ed about how Western civilization depended on no fewer than six SM-3 II B interceptors near Gdansk. Some people believe the Russians will be delighted, which I predict will last something like 15 minutes.

And with that, ladies and gentlemen, we have the first major announcement of Chuck Hagel's tenure as secretary of defense. The questions were softballs that Hagel, Miller, and Winnefeld for the most part dodged. Everyone seemed satisfied that North Korea got the message, while South Korea and Japan were surely reassured. One billion dollars! That's a heck of a commitment right there, pal. After a little more tough talk -- Winnefeld announced that "this young lad," a.k.a. Kim Jong Un, "ought to be deterred" by all this -- everybody adjourned in time for our regularly scheduled B-52 over-flight.

Quote from: garbon on March 25, 2013, 10:19:17 PM
<_<

I thought this was going to be about female rappers.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 25, 2013, 10:19:50 PM
:nelson:

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 25, 2013, 11:02:21 PM
The female rapper in question has no way to scare the pentagon into doing anything.

Quote from: garbon on March 25, 2013, 11:06:28 PM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 25, 2013, 11:02:21 PM
The female rapper in question has no way to scare the pentagon into doing anything.

That's what would have made it a great thread. I shouldn't have been so naive about your talents...

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 26, 2013, 01:40:04 AM
I'm thinking of the part where it could accidently provoke the Russians into launching myself.

Quote from: Syt on March 26, 2013, 01:41:02 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 26, 2013, 01:40:04 AM
I'm thinking of the part where it could accidently provoke the Russians into launching myself.

Why would the Russians launch you?

Quote from: Syt on March 26, 2013, 01:41:02 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 26, 2013, 01:40:04 AM
I'm thinking of the part where it could accidently provoke the Russians into launching myself.

Why would the Russians launch you?

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 26, 2013, 12:35:12 AM

Quote from: garbon on March 25, 2013, 11:06:28 PM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 25, 2013, 11:02:21 PM
The female rapper in question has no way to scare the pentagon into doing anything.

That's what would have made it a great thread. I shouldn't have been so naive about your talents...

His full name didn't fit, so I thought using her stage name as a stand in would be amusing. It's not that complicated.

Quote from: Grey Fox on March 26, 2013, 08:13:09 AM
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Quote from: Berkut on March 26, 2013, 11:42:17 AM
I think the ABM system is a giant waste, for the most part.

But that article is so badly written, and so full of logical fallacies that I am thinking about becoming a supporter.

The basic argument is that we should not try to shoot down a fucking nuclear missile fired at the US, because it would take 5 missiles to shoot down 1, and 5:1 is a crappy exchange rate?

Or that we should not try to shoot down a nuclear armed ICBM fired at the US because if we do, surely the Russians, being drunk and all, will immediately launch a massive counter strike against the US? Gosh, couldn't we just, I don't know, call the fucking Russians on the phone and let them know?

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 26, 2013, 06:32:03 PM

Quote from: Berkut on March 26, 2013, 11:42:17 AM
I think the ABM system is a giant waste, for the most part.

But that article is so badly written, and so full of logical fallacies that I am thinking about becoming a supporter.

The basic argument is that we should not try to shoot down a fucking nuclear missile fired at the US, because it would take 5 missiles to shoot down 1, and 5:1 is a crappy exchange rate?

Or that we should not try to shoot down a nuclear armed ICBM fired at the US because if we do, surely the Russians, being drunk and all, will immediately launch a massive counter strike against the US? Gosh, couldn't we just, I don't know, call the fucking Russians on the phone and let them know?

Hasn't that been one of the main crticism of ABM systems since the beginning, that any aggressor state could simply build more missiles faster than we could build interceptors? If their reliability is so poor we need five interceptors to shoot down one missile, then it would seem that is a valid concern.

Quote from: garbon on March 26, 2013, 07:44:33 PM
I don't think we could outspend North Korea.

Quote from: Berkut on March 26, 2013, 07:50:49 PM

Quote from: garbon on March 26, 2013, 07:44:33 PM
I don't think we could outspend North Korea.

Yeah, that is a losing proposition.

Of course, if they just have to build cardboard ICBMs, while we have to build real interceptors, THAT could be a problem...

Quote
US B-2 stealth bombers in South Korea drill

The US has flown two B-2 stealth bombers over South Korea as part of a military exercise.

The US said it demonstrated its forces could conduct "long-range, precision strikes quickly and at will".

The move follows strong rhetoric from Pyongyang and comes a day after it cut a military hotline with the South.

The hotline had been used mainly to facilitate cross-border travel at a joint industrial complex, which was said to be operating normally.

More than 160 South Korean commuters went through border control on Thursday morning to start work at the Kaesong complex, after being approved for entry by North Korea, officials said.

North Korean authorities had used a civilian phone line to arrange the crossing, they added.

The joint project is a source of badly-needed hard currency for the North. Around 120 South Korean firms operate at Kaesong industrial park, employing an estimated 50,000 North Korean workers.

At present, the risk is not one of large-scale war or nuclear attack, but one of miscalculation.

North Korea continues to search for new ways to issue threats - partly in an attempt by the regime to consolidate power at home, and partly in the hope that the US cancels its exercises as President Clinton did. As Pyongyang does so, the West calls their bluff and continues to carry out drills and B-52 flights over the peninsula.

This concerning pattern occurs in the absence of any regular engagement between the US and North Korea. Should it persist, the risk of miscalculation by either side will rise.

North Korea could read a future US move incorrectly and determine that an imminent and existential threat to the regime exists - then choose to pre-empt it. Or, if too many of its bluffs are called, Pyongyang may feel that its rhetoric no longer deters. It may decide that more aggressive action is needed to match its words.
What is driving North Korea's threats?

Pyongyang has been angered both by annual US-South Korea military drills, and the fresh UN sanctions that followed its third nuclear test on 12 February.

The hotline it severed was the last direct official link between the two nations. A Red Cross hotline and another line used to communicate with the UN Command at Panmunjom have already been cut. An inter-Korean air-traffic hotline still exists.

North Korea has also made multiple threats against both the US and South Korea in recent weeks, including warning of a "pre-emptive nuclear strike" on the US and the scrapping of the Korean War armistice.

North Korea is not thought to have the technology to strike the US mainland with either a nuclear weapon or a ballistic missile, but it is capable of targeting some US military bases in Asia with its mid-range missiles.

The US military said in a statement that the B-2 flight showed US "capability to defend the Republic of Korea [South Korea] and to provide extended deterrence to our allies in the Asia-Pacific region".

The two nuclear-capable planes flew from Whitman Air force Base in Missouri to South Korea as part of a "single, continuous" round trip mission during which they dropped "inert munitions on the Jik Do Range", the statement said.

......

Quote from: derspiess on March 28, 2013, 09:40:37 AM
I think we should do something to *really* antagonize them.

Quote from: Berkut on March 26, 2013, 11:42:17 AM
I think the ABM system is a giant waste, for the most part.

But that article is so badly written, and so full of logical fallacies that I am thinking about becoming a supporter.

The basic argument is that we should not try to shoot down a fucking nuclear missile fired at the US, because it would take 5 missiles to shoot down 1, and 5:1 is a crappy exchange rate?

Or that we should not try to shoot down a nuclear armed ICBM fired at the US because if we do, surely the Russians, being drunk and all, will immediately launch a massive counter strike against the US? Gosh, couldn't we just, I don't know, call the fucking Russians on the phone and let them know?

Quote
North Korea 'readies rocket force' after US stealth flights

North Korea says it has put missile units on stand-by to attack US targets in response to US stealth bomber flights over the Korean peninsula.

State news agency KCNA said leader Kim Jong-un signed off on the order at a late-night meeting of top generals.

The time had come to "settle accounts" with the US, KCNA quoted him as saying, with the B-2 flights an "ultimatum".

Pyongyang has been angered by fresh UN sanctions and annual US-South Korea military drills.

The US - which flew two stealth bombers over the peninsula on Thursday as part of the ongoing military drills - has said it is ready for "any eventuality" on the peninsula.

Kim Jong-un placed the rocket units on standby after an emergency meeting at 00:30 on Friday (15:30 GMT), KNCA said.

Tensions in the Korean peninsula are high following North Korea's third nuclear test on 12 February.

North Korea has also made multiple threats against both the US and South Korea in recent weeks, including warning of a "pre-emptive nuclear strike" on the US and the scrapping of the Korean War armistice.

North Korea is not thought to have the technology to strike the US mainland with either a nuclear weapon or a ballistic missile, but it is capable of targeting some US military bases in Asia with its mid-range missiles.

On Wednesday, Pyongyang cut a military hotline with the south - the last direct official link between the two nations.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 28, 2013, 10:33:10 PM
I will say that these last few weeks I've actually seen some Koreans at work be worried that things could get out of hand, something I've never seen before. Even after the Cheonan was sunk and Yeongpyondo was shelled they were just pissed, but they didn't seem to think anything would happen then.

Quote
Secretary of defense Chuck Hagel says u.s. will "unequivocally defend" south korea against any action by north korea

Quote from: mongers on March 28, 2013, 10:47:36 PM
One of the ticker-tape news feeds has this US response:

Quote
Secretary of defense Chuck Hagel says u.s. will "unequivocally defend" south korea against any action by north korea

Quote from: mongers on March 28, 2013, 10:31:10 PM
North Korea ramping up the tension and the missiles, within the last hour unconfirmed reports in S.Korea of heightened activity at Northern missile bases:

Quote from: grumbler on March 28, 2013, 10:42:33 PM
I'm almost hoping the NK regime pulls the trigger.  I think that what will happen then is that the regime will implode and no attack on the south will actually occur. I think we will see some lynchings of the regime's leaders, and a plea for SK to take over.

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on March 29, 2013, 03:14:31 AM
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Quote from: 11B4V on March 28, 2013, 11:18:29 PM

Quote from: mongers on March 28, 2013, 10:31:10 PM
North Korea ramping up the tension and the missiles, within the last hour unconfirmed reports in S.Korea of heightened activity at Northern missile bases:

They better make it count.  :lol:

QuoteSEOUL, March 29 (Yonhap) -- North Korea's missile sites have recently shown increased activities in the wake of the communist nation's threat to strike South Korea and the United States in response to their ongoing military drill involving nuclear-capable bombers, military sources in Seoul said Friday.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 28, 2013, 10:33:10 PM
I will say that these last few weeks I've actually seen some Koreans at work be worried that things could get out of hand, something I've never seen before. Even after the Cheonan was sunk and Yeongpyondo was shelled they were just pissed, but they didn't seem to think anything would happen then.

Quote from: OttoVonBismarck on March 29, 2013, 07:47:01 AM
I think China still has some of the same calculus it always did in regard to North Korea but they've come to a realization supporting North Korea is causing such big problems for them that not supporting them is no longer really a big deal. So North Korea not only is fashing the harshest sanctions ever from the West, even China has turned its back on them.

QuoteIf that happens Kim and by extension the military leadership have to decide if they want full war or they capitulate. If Kim capitulates he'll have no credibility with the military leadership and most likely loses power. If he doesn't, it's possible there is a military coup as forces inside the military may recognize the catastrophic outcome of war with basically the entire Western world, South Korea, and possibly China.

Quote from: OttoVonBismarck on March 29, 2013, 07:53:54 AM
I've always wondered what the ROK and US Forces Korea's contingency plans were for that situation. In fact I've sometimes wondered, since it's been like this for decades, if maybe Seoul should have been basically abandoned gradually despite the massive costs of doing so. Its close proximity to the North has basically always meant the North has in its pocket the ability to wipe out South Korea's biggest, most important city in any war.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on March 29, 2013, 08:19:26 AM
Nothing will happen.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on March 29, 2013, 08:19:26 AM
Nothing will happen.

Quote from: OttoVonBismarck on March 29, 2013, 08:21:43 AM

Quote from: Admiral Yi on March 29, 2013, 08:19:26 AM
Nothing will happen.

Something will happen.

Quote from: frunk on March 29, 2013, 09:33:26 AM
It's at a state that I would think almost any invading power would be if not welcomed at least meet minimal resistance.

Quote from: KRonn on March 29, 2013, 08:54:45 AM
If fighting breaks out, which doesn't cause the NK regime to implode or be removed via a coup, and the North tries to fight it out, should we think that China would intervene on behalf of the North Koreans? Would China allow its troublesome ally to be over run? As some have pointed out, supporting NK may really not be worth it to China anymore, support being trouble than cutting them loose, but I wonder what China's thinking will be if there's a shootout on the Peninsula, with SK and US troops advancing into the North.  I also can't imagine China would be happy with the prospects of a Democratic Korea on their border.

Quote from: Ed Anger on March 29, 2013, 11:38:03 AM
Uh-oh. Austin is on his target list. Val, get your bug out bag ready.

Quote from: Syt on March 29, 2013, 11:56:26 AM
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Quote from: Syt on March 29, 2013, 11:54:46 AM
I would imagine they march in from the north and create a "safety zone" of sorts (i.e. occupy it) with little objection from the West.

QuoteSouth Koreans can't have much interest in re-uniting with the North - it would dwarf the troubles/costs of German unification as the disparity between SK and NK is exponentially higher than between FRG and GDR.

Quote from: 11B4V on March 29, 2013, 12:21:30 PM
Great table for wargames though.  :thumbsup:

QuoteViewpoint: What is driving North Korea's threats?
By Andrea Berger
Royal United Services Institute

More than 40,000 US and South Korean troops are currently conducting military manoeuvres on the Korean Peninsula, as part of the annual Foal Eagle exercise.

US bombers, fighter aircraft and submarines have made their way to the region in an effort to "enhance the security and readiness" of South Korea.

Those exercises are seen as a visible way for Washington to reassure Seoul of the reliability of its alliance and extended deterrence commitment.

North Korea allegedly reads the purpose of these exercises differently, claiming that they could be a cover for preparations for a surprise attack. In response, Pyongyang has drawn on the tool most familiar to it: fiery threats of escalation.


Words of war
International coverage of tensions with North Korea creates the impression that their recent threats in response to military exercises come out of the blue. In fact, Pyongyang has loudly objected to joint manoeuvres for decades.

Where North Korea's latest threats diverge from past practice is in their intensity and specificity.

Over the last month, Pyongyang promised to shred the 1953 armistice agreement and shut off the hotline at the border region. It then announced it had increased the combat-readiness level of its artillery forces, with targeting that it claimed would put US bases in Guam and Hawaii in the crosshairs.

Most audacious was Pyongyang's announcement that it reserves the right of pre-emptive nuclear war against Washington or Seoul.

Though Pyongyang has followed through on cutting off the hotline at Panmunjom, there is little reason to suspect that it will deliver on some of its other promises, at least anytime soon.

One reason for this is that a major audience for Kim Jong-un's tough talk is domestic. The young leader was promoted quickly through the ranks of the Korean People's Army by his late father, despite having done little to earn those qualifications. Standing up to North Korea's enemies will help Kim Jong-un consolidate his military and political power.

A second cause for temporary calm is North Korea's technological shortcomings in the nuclear and missile fields.

Most analysts agree that it is unlikely that Pyongyang has successfully mastered the technology needed to get a nuclear warhead atop a ballistic missile and deliver it to Washington - yet.

However, its recent missile launch and nuclear test demonstrate that North Korea is eager to advance its capabilities in that direction.


Fear of military exercises
While we may repudiate Pyongyang's threats and their specific formulation as largely domestically-directed bluster, it is possible that North Korea's underlying insecurities are sincere.

Concerns that military exercises could be used as a veil to prepare a surprise attack on North Korea seem incomprehensible from a Western standpoint. "War games" are just that, and their political value in reassuring a nervous South Korea is an important added political benefit.

But North Korea, which thinks in "military-first" terms and prioritises self-reliance in its affairs, may be sceptical that joint exercises are just about readiness to respond to attack or benignly demonstrating an alliance commitment to South Korea.

Possibly cementing North Korea's divergent interpretation is the fact that in 1950, Pyongyang itself used exercises for the malign purpose it now sees in Foal Eagle.

In June 1950, Pyongyang put in place a plan that concealed large-scale military movement towards the 38th parallel under the guise of training exercises. In the midst of these war games, several participating divisions headed south for Seoul, triggering the Korean War.

Previous US administrations have tacitly acknowledged that the gap in understanding between Washington and Pyongyang about the purpose of military manoeuvres is vast.


Risking miscalculation
President Clinton repeatedly cancelled the annual Team Spirit exercises to quell Pyongyang's worries and incentivise negotiations on its nuclear programme.

At present, the risk is not one of large-scale war or nuclear attack, but one of miscalculation.

North Korea continues to search for new ways to issue threats - partly in an attempt by the regime to consolidate power at home, and partly in the hope that the US cancels its exercises as President Clinton did. As Pyongyang does so, the West calls their bluff and continues to carry out drills and B-52 flights over the peninsula.

This concerning pattern occurs in the absence of any regular engagement between the US and North Korea. Should it persist, the risk of miscalculation by either side will rise.

North Korea could read a future US move incorrectly and determine that an imminent and existential threat to the regime exists - then choose to pre-empt it. Or, if too many of its bluffs are called, Pyongyang may feel that its rhetoric no longer deters. It may decide that more aggressive action is needed to match its words.

One test of the sincerity of North Korean fears over military manoeuvres will be to gauge the regime's rhetoric once exercises conclude in late April.

Ways out of the current situation are limited. Talks between Washington and Pyongyang are unlikely to convince North Korea to forfeit its nuclear programme.

But dialogue on Korean peninsula security, including the issue of military exercises, could help prevent further misunderstanding and miscalculation. It could ensure North Korea hears not just the strong messages of alliance security tailored for Seoul.

Washington should also be cautious with any subsequent efforts to visibly reassure allies which might counter-productively exacerbate North Korea's potential insecurities. Moves such as keeping nuclear-capable military assets in the region could unnecessarily prolong the risk of miscalculation after the Foal Eagle exercises end.

Quote from: KRonn on March 29, 2013, 01:01:55 PM
Yeah right, the US and SK should just react as sheepishly as before, grant concessions, take little action when NK sinks ships or shells SK citizens. I think now the US and SK are really just calling NK's bluffs, saying screw you "we've all been there, done that and it hasn't worked. Now you can stew in your own cesspool."

Quote from: Razgovory on March 29, 2013, 02:43:29 PM

Quote from: KRonn on March 29, 2013, 01:01:55 PM
Yeah right, the US and SK should just react as sheepishly as before, grant concessions, take little action when NK sinks ships or shells SK citizens. I think now the US and SK are really just calling NK's bluffs, saying screw you "we've all been there, done that and it hasn't worked. Now you can stew in your own cesspool."

Wait, who granted them concessions?  NK is angry about a new set of sanctions, and word is China is enforcing them.  I guess Beijing is unhappy about the nuclear stunt last month.

Quote from: 11B4V on March 29, 2013, 12:04:44 PM
That pic is worth a thousand words Syt. Imagine the cloak and dagger BS going on behind the scenes with the old guard. Would probably make a good HBO miniseries.

Quote from: PDH on March 29, 2013, 04:39:16 PM
The candy dish is a nice touch.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on March 29, 2013, 04:29:48 PM
Maybe releasing these photos is not quite the public relations triumph they had hoped for.

Still can't get over those hats.

Quote from: Ed Anger on March 29, 2013, 04:42:27 PM

Quote from: PDH on March 29, 2013, 04:39:16 PM
The candy dish is a nice touch.

It is full of candy corn.  :yuk:

Quote from: PDH on March 29, 2013, 08:22:35 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on March 29, 2013, 04:42:27 PM

Quote from: PDH on March 29, 2013, 04:39:16 PM
The candy dish is a nice touch.

It is full of candy corn.  :yuk:

Probably all that hard candy that melts into a huge mass of striped stuff and green bits that one has to smash with a hammer.  Grandma candy

Quote from: Ed Anger on March 29, 2013, 08:24:46 PM

Quote from: PDH on March 29, 2013, 08:22:35 PM
Probably all that hard candy that melts into a huge mass of striped stuff and green bits that one has to smash with a hammer.  Grandma candy

That is the good stuff. Especially the green striped ones.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on March 29, 2013, 08:26:07 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on March 29, 2013, 08:24:46 PM

Quote from: PDH on March 29, 2013, 08:22:35 PM
Probably all that hard candy that melts into a huge mass of striped stuff and green bits that one has to smash with a hammer.  Grandma candy

That is the good stuff. Especially the green striped ones.

What a fag. 
No wonder your shits are fucked up all the time.

Quote from: lustindarkness on March 29, 2013, 03:02:35 PM
So those pics show that Baja California Mexico is toast? Why not target San Diego a little bit north?

Quote from: derspiess on March 29, 2013, 08:40:52 PM
Oh SORRY :lol:

Sugar is overrated.

Quote from: Ed Anger on March 29, 2013, 08:45:17 PM

Quote from: derspiess on March 29, 2013, 08:40:52 PM
Oh SORRY :lol:

Sugar is overrated.

So is booze, boozy mac booze.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on March 29, 2013, 07:42:40 AM
Hey, Timmay...what's your personal contingency plan in the event shit gets real?  A gallon of bottled water and pillows in the windows?

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 29, 2013, 09:15:00 PM
As you can see I'm well south of Seoul.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on March 29, 2013, 08:46:36 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on March 29, 2013, 08:45:17 PM

Quote from: derspiess on March 29, 2013, 08:40:52 PM
Oh SORRY :lol:

Sugar is overrated.

So is booze, boozy mac booze.

No shit. 
What the fuck, derfetus.  YOU HAFF KIDS

Quote from: derspiess on March 29, 2013, 09:22:15 PM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on March 29, 2013, 08:46:36 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on March 29, 2013, 08:45:17 PM

Quote from: derspiess on March 29, 2013, 08:40:52 PM
Oh SORRY :lol:

Sugar is overrated.

So is booze, boozy mac booze.

No shit. 
What the fuck, derfetus.  YOU HAFF KIDS

I also got a wife. And a ride home.  :moon:

Quote from: CountDeMoney on March 29, 2013, 09:18:49 PM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 29, 2013, 09:15:00 PM
As you can see I'm well south of Seoul.

No, you're pretty much fucked.  Enjoy the light show, pudding.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on March 29, 2013, 08:19:26 AM
Nothing will happen.

Quote from: Ed Anger on March 29, 2013, 09:22:30 PM
Timmay will be shot at an American checkpoint, when he fails to tell them who won the World Series in 1941.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 29, 2013, 09:25:03 PM
Seedy, I'm like a 120km south of the city limits.

Quote from: 11B4V on March 29, 2013, 09:36:00 PM
Perhaps we can make him a special "Languish Press Badge". He can say he's on special assignment. Hansy could be his camera man. :D

Quote from: PDH on March 29, 2013, 04:39:16 PM
The candy dish is a nice touch.

Quote from: 11B4V on March 30, 2013, 11:31:50 AM
He's watching again.
(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimg1-cdn.newser.com%2Fimage%2F927378-0-20130330065909.jpeg&hash=89e6b3b8316bf7d232e7c48b506676eb627dc484)

Quote from: Razgovory on March 30, 2013, 02:51:26 PM

Quote from: 11B4V on March 30, 2013, 11:31:50 AM
He's watching again.
(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimg1-cdn.newser.com%2Fimage%2F927378-0-20130330065909.jpeg&hash=89e6b3b8316bf7d232e7c48b506676eb627dc484)

I love this photo.  Kim Jong Un, stalker of a nation.

Quote from: derspiess on March 30, 2013, 03:54:38 PM

Is that chubby-faced kid his protégé?

Quote
The DPRK's cult of military life is different from its Prussian or Japanese counterparts in that training is seen as going with and not against the grain of the recruit's instincts. Discipline is all well and good, but must never diminish the race's unique spontaneity.Indeed, in one "historical" novel from the 1950s, Kim Il Sung commands the headstrong young protagonist to stay away from the guerilla fighting in the hope that this order will be disregarded!

The film The Youths of the SS Seagull (Kalmaegiho ch'ǒngnyǒndŭl,1961) invites the audience to side with the boyish hero as he cheerfully flouts the rules of his ship, annoying superiors no end.Needless to say, he does so for the sake of the collective,overstaying his shore leave to win a prize pig for his crewmates' dinner, and so on. Still, such a story would have been inconceivable in the USSR.Even in war, soldiers are depicted as overgrown children. A tankdriver in the story Tank No. 214 (Ttangkǔ 214 ho, 1953):The skin was dark, but the face was both noble and adorable, like the face of a small child. Chǒn Ki-ryǒn's expression didn't even change when he rolled over the enemy.... Chǒn was a twenty one year old boy. A voice within Comrade Sǒ suddenly called out, "You kill people with a smile, you little rascal, you were born to beat the enemy!"

For all the army-as-school rhetoric, depictions of life in uniform dwell more on its healthy fraternal joys than its intellectual or physical rigors.

Boisterousness is smiled upon as the mark of truly Korean naivety and innocence. In 2006 a magazine article told approvingly of soldiers who vaulted a fence in a mad rush to welcome Kim Jong Il's sedan.

There has been no shortage of historical incidents—from the Panmunjom axe-killings of 1976 to the recent shooting of a South Korean tourist at the Kumansan resort, to say nothing of the army's maraudings during the famine—which indicate that this celebration of instinctive behavior has affected the culture of the real-life military. This in turn seems to have contributed to a certain friction between the military and the civilian population. At the very least, the latter is not unenvious of the special position accorded to the former. Hence the media's constant and strident emphasis on the need for unity and cooperation between soldiers and civilians.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 31, 2013, 04:29:01 AM
An important thing to remember in these tense times.

The Cleanest Race Page 65 and 66.

Quote
The DPRK's cult of military life is different from its Prussian or Japanese counterparts in that training is seen as going with and not against the grain of the recruit's instincts. Discipline is all well and good, but must never diminish the race's unique spontaneity.Indeed, in one "historical" novel from the 1950s, Kim Il Sung commands the headstrong young protagonist to stay away from the guerilla fighting in the hope that this order will be disregarded!

The film The Youths of the SS Seagull (Kalmaegiho ch'ǒngnyǒndŭl,1961) invites the audience to side with the boyish hero as he cheerfully flouts the rules of his ship, annoying superiors no end.Needless to say, he does so for the sake of the collective,overstaying his shore leave to win a prize pig for his crewmates' dinner, and so on. Still, such a story would have been inconceivable in the USSR.Even in war, soldiers are depicted as overgrown children. A tankdriver in the story Tank No. 214 (Ttangkǔ 214 ho, 1953):The skin was dark, but the face was both noble and adorable, like the face of a small child. Chǒn Ki-ryǒn's expression didn't even change when he rolled over the enemy.... Chǒn was a twenty one year old boy. A voice within Comrade Sǒ suddenly called out, "You kill people with a smile, you little rascal, you were born to beat the enemy!"

For all the army-as-school rhetoric, depictions of life in uniform dwell more on its healthy fraternal joys than its intellectual or physical rigors.

Boisterousness is smiled upon as the mark of truly Korean naivety and innocence. In 2006 a magazine article told approvingly of soldiers who vaulted a fence in a mad rush to welcome Kim Jong Il's sedan.

There has been no shortage of historical incidents—from the Panmunjom axe-killings of 1976 to the recent shooting of a South Korean tourist at the Kumansan resort, to say nothing of the army's maraudings during the famine—which indicate that this celebration of instinctive behavior has affected the culture of the real-life military. This in turn seems to have contributed to a certain friction between the military and the civilian population. At the very least, the latter is not unenvious of the special position accorded to the former. Hence the media's constant and strident emphasis on the need for unity and cooperation between soldiers and civilians.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 31, 2013, 04:29:01 AM
An important thing to remember in these tense times.

The Cleanest Race Page 65 and 66.

Quote
The DPRK's cult of military life is different from its Prussian or Japanese counterparts in that training is seen as going with and not against the grain of the recruit's instincts. Discipline is all well and good, but must never diminish the race's unique spontaneity.Indeed, in one "historical" novel from the 1950s, Kim Il Sung commands the headstrong young protagonist to stay away from the guerilla fighting in the hope that this order will be disregarded!

The film The Youths of the SS Seagull (Kalmaegiho ch'ǒngnyǒndŭl,1961) invites the audience to side with the boyish hero as he cheerfully flouts the rules of his ship, annoying superiors no end.Needless to say, he does so for the sake of the collective,overstaying his shore leave to win a prize pig for his crewmates' dinner, and so on. Still, such a story would have been inconceivable in the USSR.Even in war, soldiers are depicted as overgrown children. A tankdriver in the story Tank No. 214 (Ttangkǔ 214 ho, 1953):The skin was dark, but the face was both noble and adorable, like the face of a small child. Chǒn Ki-ryǒn's expression didn't even change when he rolled over the enemy.... Chǒn was a twenty one year old boy. A voice within Comrade Sǒ suddenly called out, "You kill people with a smile, you little rascal, you were born to beat the enemy!"

For all the army-as-school rhetoric, depictions of life in uniform dwell more on its healthy fraternal joys than its intellectual or physical rigors.

Boisterousness is smiled upon as the mark of truly Korean naivety and innocence. In 2006 a magazine article told approvingly of soldiers who vaulted a fence in a mad rush to welcome Kim Jong Il's sedan.

There has been no shortage of historical incidents—from the Panmunjom axe-killings of 1976 to the recent shooting of a South Korean tourist at the Kumansan resort, to say nothing of the army's maraudings during the famine—which indicate that this celebration of instinctive behavior has affected the culture of the real-life military. This in turn seems to have contributed to a certain friction between the military and the civilian population. At the very least, the latter is not unenvious of the special position accorded to the former. Hence the media's constant and strident emphasis on the need for unity and cooperation between soldiers and civilians.

Quote from: lustindarkness on April 01, 2013, 10:50:33 AM
So, has Lil' Kim send us his April Fools nuke yet?

Quote(2nd LD) Park calls for powerful response to N. Korean provocations
SEOUL, April 1 (Yonhap) -- President Park Geun-hye instructed South Korea's military Monday to set aside any political considerations and respond powerfully in the event of North Korean provocations, as Pyongyang has churned out near-daily threats of war on the divided peninsula.

   Park made the unusually tough remark during a policy briefing at the defense ministry, saying she takes "very seriously" a recent string of North Korean moves and threats, such as the scrapping of a nonaggression treaty, the cutoff of a military hotline and the weekend declaration that inter-Korean ties have entered a "state of war."

   "The reason for the military's existence is to protect the country and the people from threats. If any provocations happen against our people and our country, it should respond powerfully in the early stage without having any political considerations," Park said.

   "As commander-in-chief of the armed forces, I will trust the military's judgment on abrupt and surprise provocations by North Korea as it is the one that directly faces off against the North," she said. "Please carry out your duty of guarding the safety of the people without getting distracted even a bit."

   In recent weeks, Pyongyang has sharply ratcheted up tensions with repeated war threats against the South in anger over joint military exercises between South Korea and the United States as well as a new U.N. Security Council resolution adopted in response to its third nuclear test on Feb. 12.

   It has declared the 1953 armistice, which ended the three-year Korean War, null and void, severed all hotlines with the South and threatened to launch nuclear attacks on South Korea and the mainland United States.

   Last week, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un also put strategic rocket units on standby, threatening to strike targets in South Korea, the U.S. and military bases in Hawaii and Guam. And on Saturday, the North declared that inter-Korean relations have entered a state of war and threatened to shut down a joint industrial complex in its border city of Kaesong.

During the briefing, Park had a video call with the commander of the Navy's Second Fleet responsible for defense of the western sea border with North Korea and called for strong preparedness, according to presidential spokesman Yoon Chang-jung.

   "The West Sea is where North Korean provocations have concentrated, and I remember that more provocations happened in the crab-catching season," Park said during the call. "On the shoulders of the Second Fleet is the heavy responsibility of not only guaranteeing the safety of fishermen and their livelihoods, but also (safeguarding) security and peace" of the country.

   Park also had a similar video call with an Army division commander.

   She also called for rooting out draft dodging, saying the crime gives the people a sense of unfairness, which she said could ultimately lead to a shaking in the country's security, according to the spokesman.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 01, 2013, 11:03:32 PM
Don't really like this at all. That's just asking for things to spiral out of control.

QuoteNorth Korea: We're restarting shut nuke facilities

SEOUL, South Korea North Korea vowed Tuesday to restart all mothballed facilities at its main Yongbyon nuclear complex, adding to tensions already raised by near daily warlike threats against the United States and South Korea.

The reactor was shut down in 2007 as part of international nuclear disarmament talks that have since stalled.

A spokesman for the General Department of Atomic Energy said that the facilities to be restarted make up a graphite-moderated 5 megawatt reactor. It generates spent fuel rods laced with plutonium and is the core of the Yongbyon nuclear complex. The reactor, when fully running, is capable of churning out one atomic bomb worth of plutonium -- the most common fuel in nuclear weapons -- a year.

The move will boost fears in Washington and among its allies about North Korea's push for nuclear-tipped missiles that can reach the United States, technology it is not currently believed to have.

Pyongyang conducted its third nuclear test in February, prompting U.N. sanctions that have infuriated its leaders and led to the current tensions. The country has since declared that making nuclear arms and a stronger economy are the nation's top priorities.

North Korea added the 5-megawatt, graphite-moderated reactor to its nuclear complex in 1986 after seven years of construction. The country began building a 50-megawatt and a 200 megawatt reactor in 1984, but their construction was suspended under a 1994 nuclear deal with Washington.

North Korea has long said that the reactor operation is aimed at generating electricity. It takes about 8,000 fuel rods to run the reactor. Reprocessing the spent fuel rods after a year of reactor operation could yield about 7 kilograms of plutonium -- enough to make at least one nuclear bomb, experts say.

The development follows a speech by the nation's leader Sunday in which Kim Jong Un said the North's nuclear weapons are a deterrent to potential aggressors and a basis for its prosperity, the Reuters news service reports.

The speech was published in full by the country's KCNA news agency on Tuesday, Reuters says, adding that the speech "appeared to emphasize a shift to economic development."

Quote from: CountDeMoney on April 01, 2013, 11:15:09 PM
I think it's interesting that the US is openly telegraphing military asset movement for a change.  Usually when NK acts up, all that stuff hides behind the scenes.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 01, 2013, 11:03:32 PM
Don't really like this at all. That's just asking for things to spiral out of control.

Quote from: Razgovory on April 02, 2013, 08:35:44 AM
I'm not clear what kind of submission can be gained from either the US or SK.

Quote from: DGuller on April 02, 2013, 08:37:48 AM
Whatever NK is trying to get by playing the game they've played.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 02, 2013, 07:21:56 AM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on April 01, 2013, 11:15:09 PM
I think it's interesting that the US is openly telegraphing military asset movement for a change.  Usually when NK acts up, all that stuff hides behind the scenes.

After the tree chopping incident the US flew daily flights of B52s from Guam up to the DMZ and back.  Gestures are meant to be seen.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 02, 2013, 08:43:11 AM

Quote from: DGuller on April 02, 2013, 08:37:48 AM
Whatever NK is trying to get by playing the game they've played.

Food aid.  Maybe fuel. 

You don't deny NK food aid by out-chickening them.  You deny it to them by not giving it.

Quote from: DGuller on April 02, 2013, 08:37:48 AM

Quote from: Razgovory on April 02, 2013, 08:35:44 AM
I'm not clear what kind of submission can be gained from either the US or SK.

Whatever NK is trying to get by playing the game they've played.

Quote from: DGuller on April 02, 2013, 08:37:48 AM
Whatever NK is trying to get by playing the game they've played.

Quote from: Sheilbh on April 02, 2013, 08:37:57 PM
Apparently DPRK aren't allowing about 450 South Koreans to return home from the Kaesong industrial centre :mellow:

Another 200 waiting to start their shift can't get in :mellow:

Quote from: Razgovory on April 02, 2013, 08:46:27 PM

Quote from: Sheilbh on April 02, 2013, 08:37:57 PM
Apparently DPRK aren't allowing about 450 South Koreans to return home from the Kaesong industrial centre :mellow:

Another 200 waiting to start their shift can't get in :mellow:

Now, that might be serious.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on April 02, 2013, 09:03:32 PM
Lil' Kim never struck me as the "human shield" type.  It's never worked before.

Quote from: derspiess on April 02, 2013, 09:14:46 PMBtw I just read that someone in the North tried to off Kim a couple weeks ago.  First I had heard of that.

Quote from: Jacob on April 02, 2013, 09:23:57 PM

Quote from: derspiess on April 02, 2013, 09:14:46 PMBtw I just read that someone in the North tried to off Kim a couple weeks ago.  First I had heard of that.

Link?

Quote from: Sheilbh on April 02, 2013, 08:37:57 PM
Apparently DPRK aren't allowing about 450 South Koreans to return home from the Kaesong industrial centre :mellow:

Another 200 waiting to start their shift can't get in :mellow:

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 02, 2013, 09:43:15 PM
Tim is checking his coolie and rickshaw right now.

Quote from: derspiess on April 03, 2013, 12:30:31 PM
China is apparently moving assets close to its border with North Korea.  Question is, what for?  I assume they have a treaty in place to help the Norks, but I wonder if they would follow through.

Quote
US to move missiles to Guam after North Korea threats

The US is moving an advanced missile system to the Pacific island of Guam as a precaution following threats by North Korea, the Pentagon has said.

The Department of Defence said it would deploy the ballistic Terminal High Altitude Area Defense System (Thaad) in the coming weeks.

Pyongyang has threatened to target South Korea and the US in recent weeks.

The state's warlike rhetoric follows new UN sanctions and joint military drills by the US and South Korea.

The Thaad system includes a truck-mounted launcher, interceptor missiles, and AN/TPY-2 tracking radar, together with an integrated fire control system.

The Pentagon said in a statement the missile system would be moved to Guam as a "precautionary move to strengthen our regional defence posture against the North Korean regional ballistic missile threat".

"The United States remains vigilant in the face of North Korean provocations and stands ready to defend US territory, our allies, and our national interests," the statement added

Quote from: lustindarkness on April 03, 2013, 12:42:39 PM

Quote from: derspiess on April 03, 2013, 12:30:31 PM
China is apparently moving assets close to its border with North Korea.  Question is, what for?  I assume they have a treaty in place to help the Norks, but I wonder if they would follow through.

I can only hope it it to block the retreating North Koreans.

Quote from: derspiess on April 03, 2013, 02:53:39 PM
Well part of the reason seems to be concern over waves of NK refugees, though I'm sure we won't see the PLA mowing down waves of NK civilians as they try to cross the river.

QuoteThe other reason is to demonstrate to the Norks that China would fulfill its obligations.  What China would actually do if the Norks provoked a war, who knows. 

QuoteAlso read that there hasn't been any significant Nork military activity noticed since last Friday (too lazy to go back & look up the source), so its kinda odd that the US seems to be upping the ante by a small amount each day.

QuoteN. Korea approves nuclear strike on United States

By Jung Ha-Won (AFP) – 22 minutes ago 

SEOUL — North Korea dramatically escalated its warlike rhetoric on Thursday, warning that it had authorised plans for nuclear strikes on targets in the United States.

"The moment of explosion is approaching fast," the North Korean military said, warning that war could break out "today or tomorrow".

Pyongyang's latest pronouncement came as Washington scrambled to reinforce its Pacific missile defences, preparing to send ground-based interceptors to Guam and dispatching two Aegis class destroyers to the region.

Tension was also high on the North's heavily-fortified border with South Korea, after Kim Jong-Un's isolated regime barred South Koreans from entering a Seoul-funded joint industrial park on its side of the frontier.

In a statement published by the state KCNA news agency, the Korean People's Army general staff warned Washington that US threats would be "smashed by... cutting-edge smaller, lighter and diversified nuclear strike means".

"The merciless operation of our revolutionary armed forces in this regard has been finally examined and ratified," the statement said.

Last month, North Korea threatened a "pre-emptive" nuclear strike against the United States, and last week its supreme army command ordered strategic rocket units to combat status.

But, while Pyongyang has successfully carried out test nuclear detonations, most experts think it is not yet capable of mounting a device on a ballistic missile capable of striking US bases or territory.

Mounting tension in the region could however trigger incidents on the tense and heavily-militarised border between North and South Korea.

There was no immediate American reaction to the North's latest statement, but US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Pyongyang represented a "real and clear danger" to the United States and to its allies South Korea and Japan.

"They have nuclear capacity now, they have missile delivery capacity now," Hagel said after a strategy speech at the National Defense University. "We take those threats seriously, we have to take those threats seriously."

"We are doing everything we can, working with the Chinese and others, to defuse that situation on the peninsula. I hope the North will ratchet its very dangerous rhetoric down," he said.

The Pentagon said it would send ground-based THAAD interceptor batteries to protect US bases on the island of Guam, complementing two Aegis anti-missile destroyers already dispatched to the region.

The THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defence) is a truck-mounted system that can pinpoint an enemy missile launch, track the projectile and launch an interceptor to bring it down.

Guam is a US island territory 3,380 kilometres (2,100 miles) southeast of North Korea in the Pacific and is home to 6,000 American military personnel, as well as bases for submarines and strategic bombers.

The new defensive measures came as Pyongyang stopped South Korean staff members from entering the Kaesong complex, a shared industrial zone funded by Seoul but 10 kilometres inside the North.

Pyongyang said the 861 South Koreans already in the zone could leave, but the move cut the last practical cooperation between the rival powers and was seen as a dramatic escalation in the crisis.

South Korea's defence ministry said it had contingency plans that included "military action" if the safety of its citizens in Kaesong was threatened.

China, the North's sole major ally, appealed for "calm" from all sides and Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister Igor Morgulov said he was worried that the situation could spiral out of control.

Describing the Kaesong ban as "very regrettable", South Korea's Unification Ministry urged the North to normalise access immediately.

"Otherwise," the ministry warned, "not only will inter-Korean relations be negatively affected but North Korea will invoke greater criticism and isolation from the international community."

It said 33 South Koreans had returned from Kaesong, with hundreds staying on to keep their companies running smoothly.

Around 53,000 North Koreans work at 120 South Korean plants at the complex, which was still operating normally Wednesday.

Tensions have soared on the Korean peninsula since December, when the North test launched a long-range rocket. In February, it upped the ante once again by conducting its third nuclear test.

Washington has deployed nuclear-capable US B-52s, B-2 stealth bombers and two US destroyers to South Korean air and sea space.

This week, the North warned it would reopen its mothballed Yongbyon reactor -- its source of weapons-grade plutonium. The North shut down Yongbyon in July 2007 under a six-nation aid-for-disarmament accord.

Experts say it would take at least six months to get the reactor back up and running, after which it will be able to produce one bomb's worth of weapons-grade plutonium per year.

QuoteN. Korea approves nuclear strike on United States
In a statement published by the state KCNA news agency, the Korean People's Army general staff warned Washington that US threats would be "smashed by... cutting-edge smaller, lighter and diversified nuclear strike means".

Quote from: derspiess on April 03, 2013, 12:30:31 PM
China is apparently moving assets close to its border with North Korea.  Question is, what for?  I assume they have a treaty in place to help the Norks, but I wonder if they would follow through.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 03, 2013, 04:15:44 PM
"We couldn't find enough TNT to fake a bigger one."  :(

QuoteN. Korea approves nuclear strike on United States   

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 03, 2013, 07:11:33 PM
News reporter ratings:

Kyung Lah CNN: I'd cum in her chinky eyes. 4 boners out of 5.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on April 03, 2013, 07:23:09 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 03, 2013, 07:11:33 PM
News reporter ratings:

Kyung Lah CNN: I'd cum in her chinky eyes. 4 boners out of 5.

Can't touch Melissa Lee on CNBC though.

QuoteThe Next Korean War
Conflict With North Korea Could Go Nuclear -- But Washington Can Reduce the Risk
Keir A. Lieber and Daryl G. Press
April 1, 2013

As North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un issues increasingly over-the-top threats -- including intimations that he might launch nuclear strikes against the United States -- officials in Washington have sought to reassure the public and U.S. allies. North Korea, they say, may initiate cyberattacks or other limited provocations, but the leaders in Pyongyang wish to survive, so they are highly unlikely to do anything as foolhardy as using nuclear weapons.

Despite those assurances, however, the risk of nuclear war with North Korea is far from remote. Although Pyongyang's tired threats are probably bluster, the current crisis has substantially increased the risk of a conventional conflict -- and any conventional war with North Korea is likely to go nuclear. Washington should continue its efforts to prevent war on the Korean Peninsula. But equally important, it must rapidly take steps -- including re-evaluating U.S. war plans -- to dampen the risks of nuclear escalation if conventional war erupts.

Ironically, the risk of North Korean nuclear war stems not from weakness on the part of the United States and South Korea but from their strength. If war erupted, the North Korean army, short on training and armed with decrepit equipment, would prove no match for the U.S.–South Korean Combined Forces Command. Make no mistake, Seoul would suffer some damage, but a conventional war would be a rout, and CFC forces would quickly cross the border and head north.

At that point, North Korea's inner circle would face a grave decision: how to avoid the terrible fates of such defeated leaders as Saddam Hussein and Muammar al-Qaddafi. Kim, his family, and his cronies could try to escape to China and plead for a comfortable, lifelong sanctuary there -- an increasingly dim prospect given Beijing's growing frustration with Kim's regime. Pyongyang's only other option would be to try to force a cease-fire by playing its only trump card: nuclear escalation.

It's impossible to know how exactly Kim might employ his nuclear arsenal to stop the CFC from marching to Pyongyang. But the effectiveness of his strategy would not depend on what North Korea initially destroyed, such as a South Korean port or a U.S. airbase in Japan. The key to coercion is the hostage that is still alive: half a dozen South Korean or Japanese cities, which Kim could threaten to attack unless the CFC accepted a cease-fire.

This strategy, planning to use nuclear escalation to stalemate a militarily superior foe, is not far-fetched. In fact, it was NATO's strategy for most of the Cold War. Back then, when the alliance felt outgunned by the massive conventional forces of the Warsaw Pact, NATO planned to use nuclear weapons coercively to thwart a major conventional attack. Today, both Pakistan and Russia rely on that same strategy to deal with the overwhelming conventional threats that they face. Experts too easily dismiss the notion that North Korea's rulers might deliberately escalate a conventional conflict, but if their choice is between escalation and a noose, it is unclear why they would be less ruthless than those who once devised plans to defend NATO.

Even if the United States and South Korea anticipated the danger of marching to Pyongyang and adopted limited objectives in a war, nuclear escalation would still be likely. That's because the style of conventional war that the United States has mastered over the past two decades is highly escalatory.

The core of U.S. conventional military strategy, refined during recent wars, is to incapacitate the enemy by disabling its central nervous system -- its ability to understand what is happening on the battlefield, make decisions, and control its forces. Against Serbia, Libya, and Iraq (twice), the key targets in the first days of conflict were not enemy tanks, ships, or planes but leadership bunkers, military command sites, and means of communication. This new American way of war has been enormously effective. But if directed against a nuclear-armed opponent, it would pressure the enemy to escalate a conflict.

Preventing escalation in the midst of a war would require convincing North Korea's leaders that they would survive, and so attacks designed to isolate and blind the regime would be counterproductive. Once airstrikes began pummeling leadership bunkers and severing communication links, the Kim regime would have no way of discerning how minimalist or maximalist the CFC's objectives were. It would face powerful incentives to make the CFC attacks stop immediately -- a job for which nuclear weapons are well suited.

The sliver of good news is that North Korea may not yet have the capabilities to carry out this strategy. It may not be able to tip its ballistic missiles with a nuclear payload, and its other means of delivering nuclear weapons remain limited. Given the rate of progress, however, if the regime does not have these capabilities today, it will soon.

What can be done? First, Washington and Seoul must make every effort to avoid war in the current crisis. The United States is undoubtedly (and appropriately) quietly reinforcing U.S. forces in the region, and the CFC is understandably considering what red lines might trigger a pre-emptive conventional strike. But the fact that war with North Korea probably means nuclear war should temper any consideration of limited pre-emptive strikes. Pre-emption means war, and war means nuclear.

Second, U.S. and South Korean planners need to develop truly limited conventional military options for the Peninsula -- limited not merely in their objectives but also in terms of the military operations they unleash. Perhaps the greatest danger of all is if the U.S. president and the South Korean president incorrectly believe that they have limited military options available; they and their senior advisers may not fully appreciate that those supposedly limited options in fact entail hundreds of airstrikes against high-value targets, such as leadership, command-and-control systems, and perhaps even against nuclear-weapons sites.

Third, American and South Korean leaders should urge China to develop "golden parachute" plans for the North Korean leadership and their families. Leaders in Pyongyang will keep their nuclear weapons holstered during a war only if they believe that they and their families have a safe and secure future somewhere. In the past, China has been understandably reluctant to hold official talks with the United States about facilitating the demise of its ally. But the prospect of nuclear war next door could induce Beijing to take more direct steps, including preparing an escape plan now and revealing it to Kim as soon as a first shot is fired.

More broadly, the strategic dilemma Washington faces today extends beyond the current standoff with North Korea: how to run a network of global alliances when nuclear weapons allow enemies to nullify the United States' superior military might. American officials used to extol the ability of nuclear weapons to stalemate powerful enemies. Now the shoe is on the other foot. There is every reason to believe that North Korea has adopted NATO's old strategy. As the current standoff is making frighteningly clear, deterring escalation, especially during conventional wars, is not last century's concern; it may be the single toughest strategic problem confronting the United States for decades to come.

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 03, 2013, 07:24:10 PM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on April 03, 2013, 07:23:09 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 03, 2013, 07:11:33 PM
News reporter ratings:

Kyung Lah CNN: I'd cum in her chinky eyes. 4 boners out of 5.

Can't touch Melissa Lee on CNBC though.

I think Cramer is nailin' her.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on April 03, 2013, 08:31:27 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 03, 2013, 07:24:10 PM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on April 03, 2013, 07:23:09 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 03, 2013, 07:11:33 PM
News reporter ratings:

Kyung Lah CNN: I'd cum in her chinky eyes. 4 boners out of 5.

Can't touch Melissa Lee on CNBC though.

I think Cramer is nailin' her.

That is an incredibly disgusting image.
Probably uses sound effects.

Quote from: Sheilbh on April 03, 2013, 07:56:09 PM
I thought this piece was interesting and a bit sobering:

QuoteThe Next Korean War
Conflict With North Korea Could Go Nuclear -- But Washington Can Reduce the Risk
Keir A. Lieber and Daryl G. Press
April 1, 2013

Quote from: derspiess on April 03, 2013, 08:53:10 PMKinda has the same wimpish tone as the opinion piece I posted the other day.  Thanks for the advice, but we've taken the pussy route and backed down and it has gotten us nowhere.  Nothing's gonna happen, but we should be ready to stomp Kim's nuts if he fucks with us again.

QuoteMy question is: after all this belligerence, could he still pull back and call off the crisis without a devastating loss of credibility? Put bluntly, if he does nothing now, would Kim lose face irretrievably?

His answer might be to stage a controlled incident, such as the shelling of the South Korean island by the North's artillery that claimed four lives in 2010. On that occasion, the South showed heroic restraint and chose not to hit back. In present circumstances, however, South Korea might well retaliate. If so, would Kim then have to retaliate for the retaliation? And then how would the South respond? It's not hard to see how a cycle of escalation might begin.

Despite everything, the real danger is not that Kim will consciously decide to launch a general war. Instead, the real peril is that he might try to get away with another incident like the bombardment of the island – and end up provoking a conflict by mistake.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on April 03, 2013, 09:02:19 PM
Considering the latest test and the guesstimates of how much of their estimated stockpile of fissionable material they used up to pop it off, they may not even have enough for a workable weapon at this time.

Ergo, the time to stomp nuts is now.

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 03, 2013, 09:14:44 PM
KILL

Quote from: katmai on April 03, 2013, 09:16:44 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 03, 2013, 09:14:44 PM
KILL

Just tell us when REDRUM BONER LEVEL 1 mkay?

Quote from: Sheilbh on April 03, 2013, 09:10:32 PM
I think him fucking with you is less likely. It's Japan and South Korea who'd get fucked.

QuoteIt's not about backing down. I mean the article's quite clear that there's a possibility of a conventional war, but there needs to be a different strategy than with Saddam or Milosevic because, in the last resort, Kim has nukes.

QuoteSo you probably should encourage the Chinese to build him a comfortable water-ski in Beijing, just in case. Similarly if conventional US strategy could make the situation seem far worse to the regime and make it more difficult for them to climb down, then it should probably be changed.

QuoteIt would be worthwhile developing limited conventional target lists so there can be an adaptable response. And finally be careful, the last thing that's needed is for big talk from politicians - they should be calm, deliberate and very measured in what they say, again so they can be adaptable.

QuoteI also think that the Telegraph chief foreign correspondent made a good point on this:

QuoteMy question is: after all this belligerence, could he still pull back and call off the crisis without a devastating loss of credibility? Put bluntly, if he does nothing now, would Kim lose face irretrievably?

His answer might be to stage a controlled incident, such as the shelling of the South Korean island by the North's artillery that claimed four lives in 2010. On that occasion, the South showed heroic restraint and chose not to hit back. In present circumstances, however, South Korea might well retaliate. If so, would Kim then have to retaliate for the retaliation? And then how would the South respond? It's not hard to see how a cycle of escalation might begin.

Despite everything, the real danger is not that Kim will consciously decide to launch a general war. Instead, the real peril is that he might try to get away with another incident like the bombardment of the island – and end up provoking a conflict by mistake.

QuoteObviously it depends on what information leaders are getting but I think it's possible they could stage an heroic attack somewhere, but then pull back to avoid humiliation/claim victory. If there's indications that's going on that should be an important factor in deciding whether or not to escalate. However difficult it is for the South Koreans.

But then who knows? For some reason I keep on thinking of Father Ted 'careful now' :lol: I still think this is all linked to internal power plays we don't know about or understand. Or there's the worrying possibility that it isn't just a rogue regime but a mental one.

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 03, 2013, 09:28:34 PM
I miss the old WHERE ARE THE CARRIERS page at strategypage during times like this.

Quote from: derspiess on April 03, 2013, 09:34:06 PMWe have a commitment to defend South Korea.  He fucks with them and he's fucking with us.  And his dad & grandpa fucked with us directly on multiple occasions.  I don't want war, but if it happens it'd be nice to settle some accounts.

QuoteI'd love for the Chinese to help out.  Thing is, I'm not sure they're grown up enough to do anything to assist in NK regime change, even if doing so means less fighting on the peninsula.

QuotePoliticans on our side should avoid bluster-- but they should be very clear and firm in what they say, and be ready to back it up.  I'm tired of the chicken shit rhetoric of the past.

QuoteSo the implication is that we should just continue to be blubbering vaginas and let him do his act of aggression without responding?  No thanks.

QuoteMy gut tells me Kim won't do anything.  He & his generals see us (or certainly ought to) preparing for a stronger response than we've offered in the past.  I'd wager that he'll try to pull his internal propaganda coup this time without shooting at us or the South Koreans.

Quote from: Sheilbh on April 03, 2013, 09:49:14 PM
This is the wrong way to see it. The Chinese won't want to help you, they won't want to assist in regime change. But if there's a prospect of conventional war on the peninsula and that it could escalate then it's in their interests to avoid that. If they can do that by offering Kim a way out - possibly with building a more pliable Chinese client state - then that's a good thing. But what then can't happen is for American politicians to start sounding off about the Chinese sheltering Kim - as would be the case if someone took Saddam or Milosevic. It would be in China's interests, but it would help too.

Quote from: derspiess on April 03, 2013, 10:10:09 PM
Btw, does anyone have an idea of Chinese public opinion regarding North Korea?  I know Jacob mentioned they have an unkind nickname for Kim Jong Un, but I'd be interested to know how much Chinese popular support there is, particularly among the ultranationalist crowd, toward the Norks.  I'd suspect there's still a connection due to the Korean War history.  And if there is, that would be something of an obstacle for the Chinese leadership to act the way we think they should.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on April 03, 2013, 10:19:36 PM
I think China would be quite upset with us if we retaliate against North Korean use of a nuclear weapon with our own nuclear response. 
That would be poorly received in Beijing.

Quote from: Jacob on April 03, 2013, 11:10:29 PM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on April 03, 2013, 10:19:36 PM
I think China would be quite upset with us if we retaliate against North Korean use of a nuclear weapon with our own nuclear response. 
That would be poorly received in Beijing.

Yes. I can picture them being pretty unhappy about that. I expect lots of other people would too.

Quote from: Jacob on April 03, 2013, 11:10:29 PM
If the N. Koreans did succeed in killing Americans with a nuclear weapon at what point would nuclear retaliation be unavoidable? I'm assuming that a nuclear suitcase killing one guy on a boat and poisoning five other dudes wouldn't necessitate nuking Pyongyang... but beyond that?

Quote from: Queequeg on April 03, 2013, 11:46:52 PM
Good.  Japan has suffered enough atomic horror without the fucking Norks.

QuoteThe U.S. nuclear posture has a vital role to play in regional security architectures. Proliferating states must understand that any attack on the United States, or our allies and partners, will be defeated, and any use of nuclear weapons will be met with a response that would be effective and overwhelming. The President, as Commander-in-Chief, will determine the precise nature of any U.S. response.  But by pursuing nuclear weapons, such states must understand that they have significantly raised the stakes of any conflict.

Quote from: Sheilbh on April 03, 2013, 07:56:09 PM
I thought this piece was interesting and a bit sobering:

QuoteIf the North Korean Peoples Army (KPA) were to start a doctrinal, conventional artillery barrage focused on South Korean forces, we could expect to see around three thousand casualties in the first few minutes, but the casualty rate would quickly drop as the surprise wears off and counter-battery fires slow down the North Korean rates of fire.  If the KPA were to engage Seoul in a primarily counter-value fashion by firing into Seoul instead of primarily aiming at military targets, there would likely be around thirty-thousand casualties in a short amount of time.

QuoteBut what then can't happen is for American politicians to start sounding off about the Chinese sheltering Kim - as would be the case if someone took Saddam or Milosevic. It would be in China's interests, but it would help too.

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 01:40:05 AM

QuoteBut what then can't happen is for American politicians to start sounding off about the Chinese sheltering Kim - as would be the case if someone took Saddam or Milosevic. It would be in China's interests, but it would help too.

A Brit putting down his chips on appeasement. Who would have thought?! :P

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 02:42:01 AM
"don't criticize China if they decide to shelter the most fucked up Orwellian dictator of our age, they might get angry!"

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 02:42:01 AM
"don't criticize China if they decide to shelter the most fucked up Orwellian dictator of our age, they might get angry!"

Quote from: Razgovory on April 04, 2013, 03:10:16 AM

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 02:42:01 AM
"don't criticize China if they decide to shelter the most fucked up Orwellian dictator of our age, they might get angry!"

Still not appeasement.  China isn't the one saber-rattling, North Korea is.  Not criticizing China wouldn't appease North Korea.  If the US abandoned South Korea, that would be appeasement.  Allowing the ruling clique to escape justice in return for seeing North Korea dissolve peacefully is a good deal in my book.

Quote from: Razgovory on April 04, 2013, 03:29:21 AM
The situation was about the North Korean leadership fleeing to China, not China taking over North Korea. :huh:  Get the beets out of your ears.

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 03:37:20 AM

Quote from: Razgovory on April 04, 2013, 03:29:21 AM
The situation was about the North Korean leadership fleeing to China, not China taking over North Korea. :huh:  Get the beets out of your ears.

Sheilbh talked about China giving shelter to Kim and co. And I was talking about the same thing.

Quote from: Razgovory on April 04, 2013, 03:50:11 AM

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 03:37:20 AM

Quote from: Razgovory on April 04, 2013, 03:29:21 AM
The situation was about the North Korean leadership fleeing to China, not China taking over North Korea. :huh:  Get the beets out of your ears.

Sheilbh talked about China giving shelter to Kim and co. And I was talking about the same thing.

I was under the impression that Shelf was talking about it in the context of the article of Kim and co fleeing the country, not giving shelter by taking over the country.

Quote from: Martinus on April 04, 2013, 04:40:25 AM
Sheilbh was talking about Kim being given shelter in China.

Quote from: Martinus on April 04, 2013, 04:40:25 AM
Btw, China taking over NK is still preferable to Kim ruling NK, both internally and internationally.

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 04:44:43 AM

Quote from: Martinus on April 04, 2013, 04:40:25 AM
Btw, China taking over NK is still preferable to Kim ruling NK, both internally and internationally.

No, it isn't. It would become the Alsace-Loraine of the region.

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on April 04, 2013, 05:14:58 AM
If the South Koreans start acting stupid we could always dump them.

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on April 04, 2013, 05:14:58 AM
If the South Koreans start acting stupid we could always dump them.

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 04:00:35 AM

Quote from: Razgovory on April 04, 2013, 03:50:11 AM

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 03:37:20 AM

Quote from: Razgovory on April 04, 2013, 03:29:21 AM
The situation was about the North Korean leadership fleeing to China, not China taking over North Korea. :huh:  Get the beets out of your ears.

Sheilbh talked about China giving shelter to Kim and co. And I was talking about the same thing.

I was under the impression that Shelf was talking about it in the context of the article of Kim and co fleeing the country, not giving shelter by taking over the country.

I wasn't talking about giving shelter by taking over the country, initially, either. But I suspect if the Chinese are stepping in so majorly, it will bear a price tag

QuoteNorth Korea moves missile with 'considerable range' to east coast
Hours after North Korea's military says it is ready to strike the U.S. with 'smaller' nuclear weapons, South Korean defense officials report Pyongyang has moved a missile to its east coast.

North Korea has moved a missile with "considerable range" to its east coast, South Korea's defense minister said Thursday, but he added that there are no signs that Pyongyang is preparing for a full-scale conflict.

The report came hours after North Korea's military warned that it has been authorized to attack the U.S. using "smaller, lighter and diversified" nuclear weapons. It was the North's latest war cry against America in recent weeks. The reference to smaller weapons could be a claim that Pyongyang has improved its nuclear technology.

South Korean Defense Minister Kim Kwan-jin said he did not know the reasons behind the North's missile movement, and that it "could be for testing or drills."

He dismissed reports in Japanese media that the missile could be a KN-08, which is believed to be a long-range missile that if operable could hit the United States.

Kim told lawmakers at a parliamentary committee meeting that the missile has "considerable range" but not enough to hit the U.S. mainland.

The range he described could refer to a mobile North Korean missile known as the Musudan, which has a range of 3,000 kilometers (1,800 miles). That would make Japan and South Korea potential targets — along with U.S. bases in both countries — but there are doubts about the missile's accuracy.

The Pentagon announced that it will deploy a missile defense system to the U.S. Pacific territory of Guam to strengthen regional protection against a possible attack.

Experts say North Korea has not demonstrated that it has missiles capable of long range or accuracy. Some suspect that long-range missiles unveiled by Pyongyang at a parade last year were actually mockups.

"From what we know of its existing inventory, North Korea has short- and medium-range missiles that could complicate a situation on the Korean Peninsula (and perhaps reach Japan), but we have not seen any evidence that it has long-range missiles that could strike the continental U.S., Guam or Hawaii," James Hardy, Asia Pacific editor of IHS Jane's Defence Weekly, wrote in a recent analysis.

Kim Kwan-jin said that if North Korea were preparing for a full-scale conflict, there would be signs including the mobilization of a number of units, including supply and rear troops, but South Korean military officials have found no such preparations.

"(North Korea's recent threats) are rhetorical threats. I believe the odds of a full-scale provocation are small," he said. But he added that North Korea might mount a small-scale provocation such as its 2010 shelling of a South Korean island, an attack that killed four people.

Pyongyang has been railing against joint U.S. and South Korean military exercises taking place in South Korea and has expressed anger over tightened U.N. sanctions for its February nuclear test. Many of the threats come in the middle of the night in Asia — daytime for the U.S. audience.

Analysts say the threats are probably efforts to provoke softer policies from South Korea, to win diplomatic talks with Washington and to solidify the image of young North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

At times, Pyongyang has gone beyond rhetoric.

On Tuesday, it announced it would restart a plutonium reactor it had shut down in 2007. A U.S. research institute said Wednesday that satellite imagery shows that construction needed for the restart has already begun.

For a second day Thursday, North Korean border authorities denied entry to South Koreans who manage jointly run factories in the North Korean city of Kaesong. South Koreans already at the plant were being allowed to return home.

Defense Minister Kim said South Korea has prepared a military contingency plan should North Korea hold South Korean workers hostage in Kaesong, Kim said. He wouldn't elaborate.

Outraged over comments in the South about possible hostage-taking and a military response from Seoul, a North Korean government-run committee threatened to pull North Korean workers out of Kaesong as well.

North Korea's military statement Thursday, from an unnamed spokesman from the General Bureau of the Korean People's Army, said its troops had been authorized to counter U.S. "aggression" with "powerful practical military counteractions," including nuclear weapons.

It said America's "hostile policy" and "nuclear threat" against North Korea "will be smashed by the strong will of all the united service personnel and people and cutting-edge smaller, lighter and diversified nuclear strike means."



North Korea has moved a missile with "considerable range" to its east coast, South Korea's defense minister said Thursday, but he added that there are no signs that Pyongyang is preparing for a full-scale conflict.

The report came hours after North Korea's military warned that it has been authorized to attack the U.S. using "smaller, lighter and diversified" nuclear weapons. It was the North's latest war cry against America in recent weeks. The reference to smaller weapons could be a claim that Pyongyang has improved its nuclear technology.

South Korean Defense Minister Kim Kwan-jin said he did not know the reasons behind the North's missile movement, and that it "could be for testing or drills."

He dismissed reports in Japanese media that the missile could be a KN-08, which is believed to be a long-range missile that if operable could hit the United States.

Kim told lawmakers at a parliamentary committee meeting that the missile has "considerable range" but not enough to hit the U.S. mainland.

The range he described could refer to a mobile North Korean missile known as the Musudan, which has a range of 3,000 kilometers (1,800 miles). That would make Japan and South Korea potential targets — along with U.S. bases in both countries — but there are doubts about the missile's accuracy.

The Pentagon announced that it will deploy a missile defense system to the U.S. Pacific territory of Guam to strengthen regional protection against a possible attack.

Experts say North Korea has not demonstrated that it has missiles capable of long range or accuracy. Some suspect that long-range missiles unveiled by Pyongyang at a parade last year were actually mockups.

"From what we know of its existing inventory, North Korea has short- and medium-range missiles that could complicate a situation on the Korean Peninsula (and perhaps reach Japan), but we have not seen any evidence that it has long-range missiles that could strike the continental U.S., Guam or Hawaii," James Hardy, Asia Pacific editor of IHS Jane's Defence Weekly, wrote in a recent analysis.

Kim Kwan-jin said that if North Korea were preparing for a full-scale conflict, there would be signs including the mobilization of a number of units, including supply and rear troops, but South Korean military officials have found no such preparations.

"(North Korea's recent threats) are rhetorical threats. I believe the odds of a full-scale provocation are small," he said. But he added that North Korea might mount a small-scale provocation such as its 2010 shelling of a South Korean island, an attack that killed four people.

Pyongyang has been railing against joint U.S. and South Korean military exercises taking place in South Korea and has expressed anger over tightened U.N. sanctions for its February nuclear test. Many of the threats come in the middle of the night in Asia — daytime for the U.S. audience.

Analysts say the threats are probably efforts to provoke softer policies from South Korea, to win diplomatic talks with Washington and to solidify the image of young North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

At times, Pyongyang has gone beyond rhetoric.

On Tuesday, it announced it would restart a plutonium reactor it had shut down in 2007. A U.S. research institute said Wednesday that satellite imagery shows that construction needed for the restart has already begun.

For a second day Thursday, North Korean border authorities denied entry to South Koreans who manage jointly run factories in the North Korean city of Kaesong. South Koreans already at the plant were being allowed to return home.

Defense Minister Kim said South Korea has prepared a military contingency plan should North Korea hold South Korean workers hostage in Kaesong, Kim said. He wouldn't elaborate.

Outraged over comments in the South about possible hostage-taking and a military response from Seoul, a North Korean government-run committee threatened to pull North Korean workers out of Kaesong as well.

North Korea's military statement Thursday, from an unnamed spokesman from the General Bureau of the Korean People's Army, said its troops had been authorized to counter U.S. "aggression" with "powerful practical military counteractions," including nuclear weapons.

It said America's "hostile policy" and "nuclear threat" against North Korea "will be smashed by the strong will of all the united service personnel and people and cutting-edge smaller, lighter and diversified nuclear strike means."

U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Washington is doing all it can to defuse the situation.

"Some of the actions they've taken over the last few weeks present a real and clear danger and threat" to the U.S. and its allies, Hagel said Wednesday.

South Korea's Defense Ministry said its military is ready to deal with any provocation by North Korea. "I can say we have no problem in crisis management," deputy ministry spokesman Wee Yong-sub told reporters.

The defense minister, however, was criticized by lawmakers over a North Korean defector who stole a South Korean fishing boat Wednesday night and fled back to North Korea across the western sea border.

Kim said South Korean radar has a "blind spot" in the area and South Korean troops were unaware the defector was fleeing until he almost reached the North Korean side. Lawmakers questioned his military's readiness to detect and counter enemy troops who might use similar blind spots.

This spring's annual U.S.-South Korea drills have incorporated fighter jets and nuclear-capable stealth bombers. The allies insist they are routine exercises. Pyongyang calls them rehearsals for a northward invasion and says it needs nuclear weapons to defend itself.

On Sunday, Kim Jong Un led a high-level meeting of party officials who declared building the economy and "nuclear armed forces" as the nation's priorities.

Pyongyang is believed to be working toward building an atomic bomb small enough to mount on a long-range missile. Long-range rocket launches designed to send satellites into space in 2009 and 2012 were widely considered covert tests of missile technology, and North Korea has conducted three underground nuclear tests.

"I don't believe North Korea has the capacity to attack the United States with nuclear weapons mounted on missiles, and won't for many years. Its ability to target and strike South Korea is also very limited," nuclear scientist Siegfried Hecker, a senior fellow at the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University, said this week.

In comments posted to CISAC's website, Hecker said North Korea knows a nuclear attack would be met with "a devastating nuclear response."

Hecker has estimated that North Korea has enough plutonium to make several crude nuclear bombs. Its announcement Tuesday that it would restart a plutonium reactor indicated that it intends to produce more nuclear weapons material.

The U.S.-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies has analyzed recent commercial satellite imagery of the Nyongbyon nuclear facility, where the reactor was shut down in 2007 under the terms of a disarmament agreement. A cooling tower for the reactor was destroyed in 2008.

The analysis published Wednesday on the institute's website, 38 North, says that rebuilding the tower would take six months, but a March 27 photo shows building work may have started for an alternative cooling system that could take just weeks. Experts estimate it could take three months to a year to restart the plant.

Quote from: Warspite on April 04, 2013, 07:25:57 AM
If a missile has considerable range, why move it to the coast?

Quote from: Razgovory on April 04, 2013, 06:22:12 AM

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 04:00:35 AM

Quote from: Razgovory on April 04, 2013, 03:50:11 AM

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 03:37:20 AM

Quote from: Razgovory on April 04, 2013, 03:29:21 AM
The situation was about the North Korean leadership fleeing to China, not China taking over North Korea. :huh:  Get the beets out of your ears.

Sheilbh talked about China giving shelter to Kim and co. And I was talking about the same thing.

I was under the impression that Shelf was talking about it in the context of the article of Kim and co fleeing the country, not giving shelter by taking over the country.

I wasn't talking about giving shelter by taking over the country, initially, either. But I suspect if the Chinese are stepping in so majorly, it will bear a price tag

That's great but has nothing to do with what Shelf was talking about.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 04, 2013, 09:07:37 AM
Nothing will happen.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 04, 2013, 09:07:37 AM
Nothing will happen.

Quote from: DGuller on April 04, 2013, 09:08:30 AM
Nothing will happen intentionally, but when rhetoric gets this overheated, things can take off on their own.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 04, 2013, 09:13:28 AM

Quote from: DGuller on April 04, 2013, 09:08:30 AM
Nothing will happen intentionally, but when rhetoric gets this overheated, things can take off on their own.

Bet?

Quote from: DGuller on April 04, 2013, 09:17:07 AM
What are the condition by which to evaluate the bet?

Quote from: derspiess on April 04, 2013, 09:19:06 AM
I'm with Yi.  Stand down, Ed.

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 04, 2013, 09:20:41 AM

Quote from: derspiess on April 04, 2013, 09:19:06 AM
I'm with Yi.  Stand down, Ed.

I want to foam at the mouth and chant USA! as the clutter munitions fall.

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 09:18:09 AM
IDK people. In the past when nothing happened it was because the NK tantrum resulted in aid packages.

Will NK leadership know when to stop the tantrum when it is NOT working?

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 04, 2013, 09:20:34 AM

Quote from: DGuller on April 04, 2013, 09:17:07 AM
What are the condition by which to evaluate the bet?

At least one person killed or wounded due to enemy action.

Quote from: Sheilbh on April 04, 2013, 09:28:19 AM
I'd up that a little. Four were killed in the 2010 shelling and I could easily see that much happening.

Quote from: Legbiter on April 04, 2013, 09:26:17 AM
I don't think it's about squeezing an extra shipment of rice out of SK. It's probably more about Fat Kim establishing himself as a tough cookie to the NK elite. Also, to signal to the Chinese not to enforce the new sanctions on NK.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 04, 2013, 09:29:32 AMIs cash located in same position as mouth?

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 04, 2013, 09:20:34 AM

Quote from: DGuller on April 04, 2013, 09:17:07 AM
What are the condition by which to evaluate the bet?

At least one person killed or wounded due to enemy action.

Quote from: DGuller on April 04, 2013, 09:49:08 AM
Would the shelling of islands, or sinking of warships, have qualified as enemy action?

QuoteAlso, what's the timeframe?  Obviously sooner or later one of the Koreans would be killed due to enemy action.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 04, 2013, 09:51:02 AM

Quote from: DGuller on April 04, 2013, 09:49:08 AM
Would the shelling of islands, or sinking of warships, have qualified as enemy action?

:mellow:

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 04, 2013, 09:58:12 AM
How in the world is shelling an island or sinking a warship ambiguous in terms of enemy action?

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 04, 2013, 09:58:12 AM
How in the world is shelling an island or sinking a warship ambiguous in terms of enemy action?

Quote from: DGuller on April 04, 2013, 10:20:16 AM
I guess that's a yes then.

I would put the odds of someone dying due to enemy action in the next to weeks at 6:1.  My $1x to your $6x, in other words.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 04, 2013, 10:21:15 AM

Quote from: DGuller on April 04, 2013, 10:20:16 AM
I guess that's a yes then.

I would put the odds of someone dying due to enemy action in the next to weeks at 6:1.  My $1x to your $6x, in other words.

No good.

Quote from: DGuller on April 04, 2013, 10:25:27 AM
What do you think the odds are?

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 04, 2013, 10:27:04 AM

Quote from: DGuller on April 04, 2013, 10:25:27 AM
What do you think the odds are?

There are participants in this thread who are talking as if war is the odds-on probability.  I personally would be OK with even odds.

Quote from: Pitiful Pathos on April 04, 2013, 04:54:27 AM
It seems the implicit assumption is that nothing short of NK actually initiating war constitutes a casus belli.  Claiming to have WMD's and making endless bellicose threats against the USA and its allies isn't enough to justify a preemptive action. 

Of course it's largely to due to China and the damage war could cause to S.Korea or possiblyJapan, but still, it adds another dimension on how to think about the war with Iraq in 2003.

Quote from: mongers on April 04, 2013, 10:49:47 AM
I could see something like a N.Korean commando raid like the one a couple of decades ago that tried to kill the S.Korean president.

Or maybe something like that submarine reconnaissance incident.

The advantage of these types of attacks is N.Korea gets to blow it's war trumpet and the S.Koreans stomp on it, but don't necessarily have to escalate into a major cross border retaliation, all the action having taken place in the south. 

So that's my 'bet' for the next couple of weeks.

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 07:33:11 AM
Sheilbh was talking about hoping the US would not protest if China gave shelter to the NK leadership, since it would be dangerous. I called that out as appeasement.
You and Marty started talking about various different things. Thats pretty much what happened.

Quote from: Neil on April 04, 2013, 10:56:16 AM

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 07:33:11 AM
Sheilbh was talking about hoping the US would not protest if China gave shelter to the NK leadership, since it would be dangerous. I called that out as appeasement.
You and Marty started talking about various different things. Thats pretty much what happened.

That's not what appeasement is though.

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 10:58:16 AMmoral cowardice is moral cowardice.

Quote from: Valmy on April 04, 2013, 11:46:16 AM
This is clearly being done for their own domestic consumption so they will not intend to really do anything.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 04, 2013, 11:52:31 AM
Souks would be consistent.

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 10:58:16 AM

Quote from: Neil on April 04, 2013, 10:56:16 AM

Quote from: Tamas on April 04, 2013, 07:33:11 AM
Sheilbh was talking about hoping the US would not protest if China gave shelter to the NK leadership, since it would be dangerous. I called that out as appeasement.
You and Marty started talking about various different things. Thats pretty much what happened.

That's not what appeasement is though.

moral cowardice is moral cowardice.

QuoteBeijing rejects North's envoy request

Apr 04,2013

BEIJING - Pyongyang has allegedly asked Beijing to send them an envoy in order to improve their soured relations, but Beijing turned it down, seen as a warning regarding the regime's recent warmongering rhetoric.

Quote from: Berkut on April 04, 2013, 12:37:14 PM
So at what point does a threat become a causus belli for pre-emptive action?

Quote from: Berkut on April 04, 2013, 12:37:14 PM
So at what point does a threat become a causus belli for pre-emptive action?

Quote from: derspiess on April 04, 2013, 12:39:53 PMIMO it happened sometime last week.  Not that I want it to happen yet, but I think we'd be justified.

Quote from: Jacob on April 04, 2013, 12:41:46 PM

Quote from: derspiess on April 04, 2013, 12:39:53 PMIMO it happened sometime last week.  Not that I want it to happen yet, but I think we'd be justified.

I think last week there were moments where it could have been justified, but it would have had to be in the moment - i.e. "they're about to do something, HIT THEM FIRST!"

Now it seems that they're not about to do something other than talk and posture, so the CB for events last week seem a little stale.

Quote from: derspiess on April 04, 2013, 12:45:01 PMUnless/until the threats are officially rescinded by the DPRK the CB remains IMO.

Quote from: Jacob on April 04, 2013, 12:41:46 PM

Quote from: derspiess on April 04, 2013, 12:39:53 PMIMO it happened sometime last week.  Not that I want it to happen yet, but I think we'd be justified.

I think last week there were moments where it could have been justified, but it would have had to be in the moment - i.e. "they're about to do something, HIT THEM FIRST!"

Now it seems that they're not about to do something other than talk and posture, so the CB for events last week seem a little stale.

Quote from: 11B4V on April 04, 2013, 11:50:18 AM
Norks??? Who gave them that name. Suppose the South is Sorks... :rolleyes:

Quote@StevieJohnson13: "War is nothing to be played with. I apologize North Korea.......but if y'all do bomb 1st... Bomb Foxboro, Mass. Sincerely, #BillsMafia"

Quote


(LEAD) N. Korean missile launch sites show increased activities: sources
By Kim Eun-jung
SEOUL, March 29 (Yonhap) -- North Korea's missile sites have recently shown increased activities in the wake of the communist nation's threat to strike South Korea and the United States in response to their ongoing military drill involving nuclear-capable bombers, military sources in Seoul said Friday.

   The latest move comes after the North Korean military on Tuesday put its strategic rocket units on the highest level of combat readiness, threatening to strike targets in South Korea as well as U.S. bases in Hawaii and Guam.

   Following the U.S. military's unprecedented announcement that its nuclear-capable B-2 stealth bombers participated in the joint military drill in the South, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un on Friday ordered the country's strategic rocket forces to assume combat ready status in a fresh threat to hit U.S. bases with its long-range missiles.

   Amid heightened tensions, South Korean and U.S. forces have focused their intelligence efforts on monitoring the North's missile sites, which have shown brisk activities.

   "North Korea's launch sites to fire off mid- and long-range missiles have recently shown increased movement of vehicles and forces," the official said, asking for anonymity. "We are closely watching possibilities of missile launches."

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North Korea's missile launch site in Dongchan-ri, located in the northwestern region (Yonhap file photo)

Another source said several vehicles were seen moving to the Tongchang-ri missile site on the western coast, in what seemed like preparations for testing its long-range missiles.

   Seoul's defense ministry saw the latest move as a "follow-up measure" to the North Korean military's announcement of the heightened level of combat readiness, but it did not elaborate on "a rocket preparation plan" signed in the North.

   Tensions on the peninsula have risen after the North launched a long-range rocket in December 2012 and conducted its third nuclear test last month, which drew new rounds of U.N. sanctions on the isolated state.

   After the North announced it had voided the Armistice Agreement and cut the military hotline connecting two Koreas, concerns rose over unprovoked attacks by the recalcitrant neighbor, which launched deadly attacks near the western maritime border in 2010.

   Although Pyongyang has routinely denounced past annual drills in the South, Seoul and Washington have taken its bellicose rhetoric more seriously this year as the North has even threatened an "all-out battle" and "pre-emptive nuclear strike" against the U.S. mainland, which are unusually intense threats.

   Outside watchers, however, consider Pyongyang's latest remarks to be aimed at strengthening control domestically and building military credentials, raising doubts over whether it has the technology to build an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of hitting the U.S. mainland.

   On Friday morning, a North Korean Mig-21 fighter jet flew near South Korea's front-line airspace, known as the Tactical Action Line (TAL), and returned to its base, according to military officials. The supersonic fighter jet has a maximum speed of about 2,000 km/h.

   The provocative flight prompted the South Korean Air Force to dispatch a KF-16 fighter, they said, without further elaboration.

   TAL is the point between 20 and 50 kilometers north of South Korean airspace. Any aircraft approaching that line compels fighter jets in the South to scramble.

Quote

ANALYST: US Military Expects North Korean Missile Launch

Enough bluster: Apparently Kim Jong-Un intends to walk the walk.

A prominent arms analyst has told an Australian think-tank that U.S. troop movements west of the peninsula indicate that a North Korean missile launch is imminent.

From the Lowy Institute for International Policy:

"The United States, Australia and other allies appear to be taking important policy decisions on the basis of the imminent deployment of the KN-08. If this is the case, they should say so directly and provide the basis for asserting the imminent deployment of the KN-08," said Jeffrey Lewis, founding editor of Arms Control Wonk.

The impending launch comes on the heels of intelligence about missile movements on the western side of the peninsula. Pentagon Press Secretary told reporters yesterday that "test flights" of certain missile systems were possible.

The surest sign of intent occurred Wednesday morning when North Korea delayed the passage of and then blocked hundreds of South Korean workers from the shared Kaesong market. If the market remains closed on Thursday, it would be another strong indicator of intent.

This measure from Kim Jong-Un follows significant troop movements on behalf of both the U.S. and China. Bill Gertz of the Washington Free Beacon recently reported that troops have begun staging in two of China's northeast provinces.

Those provinces both align with known nuclear sites inside North Korea.

Meanwhile, the U.S. has moved an advanced radar and two Aegis class destroyers off the west coast. The $900 million SBX radar array has been compared to the Iron Dome in Israel, only much more accurate — and the Aegis-class destroyers are particularly adept at knocking missiles out of the sky.

The kicker, though, is that until recently, analysts thought these particular North Korean missiles were just a prop. Little is known about KN-08 road-mobile missile, other than from what was seen at a parade in April 2012.

(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fstatic4.businessinsider.com%2Fimage%2F514378b1ecad04f01000000d-400-300%2Fnorth-korea-missile-1.jpg&hash=e3af2092081453ad8d5b778491755d715532b046)
The KN-08.

Analysts say it could be medium-range, or worse, an intercontinental variety. Still, they have no idea what to expect.

There's also talk about the somewhat less terrifying Musudan, which is believed to be a varient of the SCUD — a missile more fit for terrifying soft-targets, like population centers, rather than taking out military targets.

Though Gertz and other analysts tend to believe China's troop movements are in support of North Korea, recent calls from Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel to top military leadership in China indicate some level of cooperation.

Recently, the Army released information about a wargame concerning the fall of Kim Jong-Un, the collapse of the government, and follow on actions to protect the estimated eight nuclear warheads in North Korean possession.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 04, 2013, 05:16:12 PM
Why a new thread when we had one going with almost 300 replies?

Quote from: Jacob on April 04, 2013, 05:28:18 PM
Merged :)

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 04, 2013, 05:16:12 PM
Why a new thread when we had one going with almost 300 replies?

Quote from: fahdiz on April 04, 2013, 05:48:38 PM
(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.imgur.com%2FT7u9COs.png&hash=6e04a71379761a9baaf87b887d07505c847ea0fd)

Quote from: Jacob on April 04, 2013, 05:28:18 PM
Merged :)

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 04, 2013, 06:15:06 PM
Mod abuse.

Quote from: Jacob on April 04, 2013, 06:24:18 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 04, 2013, 06:15:06 PM
Mod abuse.

Would you like some?

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 04, 2013, 06:32:27 PMXiacob's inner authoritarian shines through.

Quote from: Jacob on April 04, 2013, 07:05:56 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 04, 2013, 06:32:27 PMXiacob's inner authoritarian shines through.

You're in management. You understand.

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 04, 2013, 06:32:27 PM

Quote from: Jacob on April 04, 2013, 06:24:18 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 04, 2013, 06:15:06 PM
Mod abuse.

Would you like some?

Xiacob's inner authoritarian shines through.

Quote from: derspiess on April 04, 2013, 07:06:58 PMHe'll be Central Committee in no time.

Quote from: Jacob on April 04, 2013, 07:12:08 PM

Quote from: derspiess on April 04, 2013, 07:06:58 PMHe'll be Central Committee in no time.

I am well loved by the people.

Quote from: MadImmortalMan on April 04, 2013, 07:01:41 PM
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-04-03/two-north-korean-submarines-disappeared

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 04, 2013, 07:48:21 PM
Timmay has loaded his anime pillows on his escape rickshaw.

Quote from: 11B4V on April 04, 2013, 07:51:06 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 04, 2013, 07:48:21 PM
Timmay has loaded his anime pillows on his escape rickshaw.

:D Dont fret Tim. It will be just a bright light then nothing.

Quote from: DGuller on April 04, 2013, 07:54:02 PM

Quote from: 11B4V on April 04, 2013, 07:51:06 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 04, 2013, 07:48:21 PM
Timmay has loaded his anime pillows on his escape rickshaw.

:D Dont fret Tim. It will be just a bright light then nothing.

:hmm:  Depends on how close he is.

Quote from: Lettow77 on April 04, 2013, 07:56:53 PM
But if tim is evaporated by nork nuclear nonsense, who will post the news thread about it?  :hmm:

Quote from: Lettow77 on April 04, 2013, 07:16:12 PM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=560bR8-cNsI

pure-hearted otome who regard the welfare of the sacred isles :wub:

Quote from: lustindarkness on April 04, 2013, 08:30:55 PM
Why did we start calling them "norks"?

Quote from: 11B4V on April 04, 2013, 07:51:06 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 04, 2013, 07:48:21 PM
Timmay has loaded his anime pillows on his escape rickshaw.

:D Dont fret Tim. It will be just a bright light then nothing.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 04, 2013, 08:31:56 PM

Quote from: 11B4V on April 04, 2013, 07:51:06 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 04, 2013, 07:48:21 PM
Timmay has loaded his anime pillows on his escape rickshaw.

:D Dont fret Tim. It will be just a bright light then nothing.

The closest is about a hundred miles away. I'd be fine from their little firecrackers.

Quote from: lustindarkness on April 04, 2013, 08:30:55 PM
Why did we start calling them "norks"?

Quote from: 11B4V on April 04, 2013, 08:31:47 PM

Quote from: lustindarkness on April 04, 2013, 08:30:55 PM
Why did we start calling them "norks"?

Who knows they probably heard it on the net some where. :rolleyes:

Quote from: derspiess on April 04, 2013, 08:53:42 PM

Quote from: 11B4V on April 04, 2013, 08:31:47 PM

Quote from: lustindarkness on April 04, 2013, 08:30:55 PM
Why did we start calling them "norks"?

Who knows they probably heard it on the net some where. :rolleyes:

First place I heard it was on a podcast last year.

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 04, 2013, 08:54:27 PM

Quote from: derspiess on April 04, 2013, 08:53:42 PM

Quote from: 11B4V on April 04, 2013, 08:31:47 PM

Quote from: lustindarkness on April 04, 2013, 08:30:55 PM
Why did we start calling them "norks"?

Who knows they probably heard it on the net some where. :rolleyes:

First place I heard it was on a podcast last year.

Ok Mart.  :rolleyes:

Podcasts.  :rolleyes:

Quote from: katmai on April 04, 2013, 09:12:05 PM
And remember El jefe, not in the face!

Quote12.35 Malcolm Moore has more on the British embassy evacuation. A Foreign Office spokesman told us the following:

Quote It said that the North Korean government would be unable to guarantee the safety of embassies and international organisations in the country in the event of conflict from April 10.

The Foreign office declined to disclose how many staff are working in Pyongyang, but said no decision had yet been taken on whether to pull out. "We are considering next steps," the spokesman said.

Quote

In North Korea, nine is the magic number

An analysis of the regime's significant dates shows nine rules, meaning we should be worried on Friday 5 April (5+4=9)

    Jang Jin-sung, editor-in-chief of New Focus International   
    guardian.co.uk, Friday 5 April 2013 11.18 BST   

North Korea is a notoriously secret society, led by an equally secretive dynasty of Kims. But as hostilities with the west over the country's nuclear programme escalate, revelations from deep within the regime might shed some light on what is guiding its leaders' actions.

Apparently it's the number nine.

It all started at the time of Korea's liberation from Japanese occupation, when there were eight shamans representing the eight provinces of Korea. Out of these, the strongest shaman was thought to be the one from of Pyongan-do. He is said to have told Kim Il-sung that the destiny of his bloodline was aligned with the ninth number, which is considered auspicious in east Asia.

Perhaps it was because of this that Kim Il-sung declared the founding date of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea to be 9 September. Although there were five provinces at the time, he increased the number to nine. The Supreme Guard Command, Kim's personal bodyguard corps, was named Unit 963 (double nine is an especially lucky combination).

The Kims have their own food chain, also using the number nine. Throughout North Korea you will find so-called No 9 farms and No 9 work details, specially assigned by the central party's financial administration department. Their produce is used to feed the Kims, and these meals are called No 9 products.

The second Kim is said to have repeatedly stressed the fact that his birthday fell on 16 February (1+6+2=9). He decreed that the numberplates of his vehicles should read 2.16; and then, so as to disguise his personal vehicles, assigned this as a common numberplate for all of North Korea's inner elite.

Kim Jong-il was appointed to the highest military post on 24 December (2+4+1+2=9). His appointment as party secretary, which effectively formalised his powers, was made three years and three months after the death of his father, Kim Il-sung.

Applying this to recent North Korean history, we note that Kim Jong-il gave his son, Kim Jong-un, his first public role as general of the Korean People's Army on 27 September 2010 (2+7=9, plus the 9th month, equals double nine). On 11 April (20)12 (1+1+4+1+2=9) Kim Jong-un was appointed first secretary of the Workers' party. Then on 18 July 2012, he was appointed to the rank of marshal.

When North Korea makes international news with an impending rocket launch or nuclear test, outside analysts often cite recent birthdays of the Kims, or other state anniversaries, as influencing the choice of date. But a closer look suggests it has more to do with the number nine.

The country's first nuclear test took place on 9 October 2006. The second long-range rocket launch was on 5 April 2009 (5+4=9 and nine of 2009, double nine). The next one was successfully launched on 12 December 2012 (1+2+1+2+1+2=9). There was a nuclear test on 12 February (20)13 (1+2+2+1+3=9). A recent North Korean propaganda video released on YouTube, in which the east coast of the US is consumed in a "sea of fire", features a rocket labelled No 9.

So, it all adds up. Three generations of the Kim family seem to have been fixated on nines. In the current climate this suggests that we should all be on our guard today, Friday 5 April (5+4=9). If we make it safely to Saturday, the world is probably safe from a nuclear attack until the 14th or, perhaps, the 23rd.

Quote from: Legbiter on April 05, 2013, 08:07:52 AM
South Korea is deploying two warships with missile-defence systems to counter the North Korean missile threat.

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Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 05, 2013, 06:42:44 AM
Really not a good sign.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/northkorea/9973577/North-Korea-missile-threat-latest-live.html

QuoteSEOUL (AFP) - North Korea told Russia on Friday to consider evacuating its embassy in Pyongyang, as reports suggesting the North was preparing an imminent missile launch prompted a fresh spike in global concern.

An embassy spokesman told Russian news agencies that the North Korean foreign ministry had suggested they "examine the question of evacuating employees" from the mission.

The spokesman said he believed a similar suggestion had been made to other diplomatic missions in the capital.

Quote from: Maladict on April 05, 2013, 09:41:00 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 05, 2013, 06:42:44 AM
Really not a good sign.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/northkorea/9973577/North-Korea-missile-threat-latest-live.html

Don't they have some crazy calendar of their own?

Quote from: Pitiful Pathos on April 05, 2013, 09:53:46 AM
Surely when one state is credibly threatening nuclear destruction of others, there comes a point at which a preemptive strike is warranted...

Quote from: Legbiter on April 05, 2013, 08:07:52 AM
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Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 05, 2013, 11:29:58 AM
:D

Wonder where they found the old dude to play the officer.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 04, 2013, 10:27:04 AM

Quote from: DGuller on April 04, 2013, 10:25:27 AM
What do you think the odds are?

There are participants in this thread who are talking as if war is the odds-on probability.  I personally would be OK with even odds.

Quote from: DGuller on April 05, 2013, 11:48:34 AM
Is it just me, or does this not seem like the most effective infantry formation?  Although I do find it impressive that the guy can fire with his eyes closed.
(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Ftimemilitary.files.wordpress.com%2F2013%2F04%2Fint_northkorea.jpg%3Fw%3D480%26amp%3Bh%3D320%26amp%3Bcrop%3D1&hash=745e626143508d8fa432332c18ca4c323c579486)

Quote from: DGuller on April 05, 2013, 11:39:08 AM
How about 1.5:1 odds, and we have a deal.  :)

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 05, 2013, 11:57:39 AM

Quote from: DGuller on April 05, 2013, 11:39:08 AM
How about 1.5:1 odds, and we have a deal.  :)

OK.  How much skin?

Quote from: DGuller on April 05, 2013, 12:01:22 PM
Going by our past amounts, I'd say I get $30 if someone gets killed due to enemy actions in the period ending April 19th 11:59 PM EST, and if no one gets killed, you get $20.  I can go higher if you want.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 05, 2013, 12:05:06 PM
I accept on the condition that you're not aware of a casualty already.

Quote
Since I've accepted, why the sudden spike in probability?

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 05, 2013, 02:26:48 PM
As long as it's not by shelling or while on a warship.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 05, 2013, 02:26:48 PM
As long as it's not by shelling or while on a warship.

Quote from: Pitiful Pathos on April 05, 2013, 09:53:46 AM
Surely when one state is credibly threatening nuclear destruction of others, there comes a point at which a preemptive strike is warranted...

Quote from: mongers on April 05, 2013, 06:10:23 PM
Now the North Koreans have marched us all up to the top of the hill, what next ?  The climb down ?   <_<

Quote from: 11B4V on April 05, 2013, 07:33:13 PM
Are we sure that Kimmy is not being manipulted somehow by the old guard? He is may not be like his father or grandfather who apparently knew when to back down.

Quote from: Sheilbh on April 05, 2013, 07:54:34 PM

Quote from: 11B4V on April 05, 2013, 07:33:13 PM
Are we sure that Kimmy is not being manipulted somehow by the old guard? He is may not be like his father or grandfather who apparently knew when to back down.

Again, who knows? But I've read that one conclusion that analysts are drawing from the past couple of weeks is that Kim is definitely in charge. Until now they felt there was more of what you describe going on. But for whatever reason North Korean specialists apparently strongly suspect that Kim is very much in control.

Quote#2 of a 3 STAGE PROCESS LEADING TO 'TERRORIST ATTACKS'?

The latest escalation comes after comments made by an anonymous source at South Korea's JoongAng ilbo, one month ago, that suggest the embassy warning could be a final step before a terrorist attack orchestrated by Pyongyang.

In a report about an assassination attempt on Kim Jong Un, the JoongAng Ilbo source warned that the North Korean leader had "secretly ordered that a three-stage scenario be drawn up to really heighten fear of nuclear war."

    The first stage is issuing war threats against the South and spreading the idea that a war is imminent, the source said.

    The second stage is reportedly forcing foreigners in the North to leave the country, warning that their personal safety cannot be guaranteed in time of war. The North would also inform foreign diplomatic missions in Pyongyang to pull out their citizens.

    The third step will be a terrorist attack on a public installation in the South such as an airport, or an armed attack like the sinking of the Cheonan, the source said.

The same source warned that while Kim Jong Un "doesn't really want a war", he wants to solve domestic discontent, "by heightening the sense of crisis and find a way to get sanctions like South Korea's May 24 sanctions removed".

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 05, 2013, 09:22:49 PM
Lol, some great pics of the North's shitty air force. Love the photo of their SPECTRE style runway tunneled through a mountain.

freekorea.us/2007/04/29/the-north-korean-air-force-by-google-earth/ (http://freekorea.us/2007/04/29/the-north-korean-air-force-by-google-earth/)

Quote from: mongers on April 05, 2013, 09:42:36 PM
using google maps to look at the DMZ,

Quote from: derspiess on April 05, 2013, 09:48:25 PM

Quote from: mongers on April 05, 2013, 09:42:36 PM
using google maps to look at the DMZ,

Nice to hear I'm not the only one who's been doing that :D

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 06, 2013, 07:14:47 PM
:lol:

War mongler?

Quote from: 11B4V on April 06, 2013, 07:18:04 PM

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 06, 2013, 07:14:47 PM
:lol:

War mongler?

Obviously created by someone in the Southeast US. :D

Quote
North Korea tension prompts US missile test delay

The US Pentagon has delayed an intercontinental ballistic missile test scheduled for next week, defence officials say.

The Minuteman 3 test was put off because of concerns that it could be misinterpreted by North Korea, amid fears of a conflict.

It could be postponed till May.

North Korea has issued a series of unusually strong threats since it was sanctioned by the UN in March for carrying out a third nuclear test.

It has threatened nuclear strikes on the US, formally declared war on the South, and pledged to reopen a nuclear reactor in defiance of UN Security Council resolutions.

A Pentagon official said the US wanted to "avoid any misperception or miscalculation" that might result from the test.

US and South Korean officials have sought to play down fears of a conflict on the Korean peninsula in recent days.

On Friday, North Korea warned it would not be able to guarantee the safety of embassy staff in the event of a war, but no foreign governments have announced plans to evacuate their embassies.
....

Quote from: mongers on April 06, 2013, 08:27:08 PM
US 'blinks' ?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-22056387 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-22056387)

Quote from: 11B4V on April 06, 2013, 08:35:34 PM

Quote from: mongers on April 06, 2013, 08:27:08 PM
US 'blinks' ?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-22056387 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-22056387)

No, going to let them do it all on their own.

Quote from: mongers on April 06, 2013, 08:37:31 PM

Quote from: 11B4V on April 06, 2013, 08:35:34 PM

Quote from: mongers on April 06, 2013, 08:27:08 PM
US 'blinks' ?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-22056387 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-22056387)

No, going to let them do it all on their own.

Well, I think they have only one decision point left, climb down or do 'something' and the next/final move is the S.Koreans/Americans.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 06, 2013, 08:30:38 PM
Blink or saber rattle, those are the only two choices.

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 06, 2013, 08:57:41 PM
That's no fun.

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 06, 2013, 08:57:41 PM
That's no fun.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on April 06, 2013, 08:34:36 PM
Oh, bullshit.  It's a courtesy to the Chinese, Russians and our allies that we're not launching ICBMs at this particularly sensitive time.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 06, 2013, 09:13:43 PM
You need to jog off some of the fat that's settled in your brain.

QuoteSources at Dyess AFB have confirmed to Douglass that seven planes were launched at night a couple of days ago. Two of them were spares: they returned to the airbase near Abilene, Texas, while the remaining five continued to their final destination.

Unfortunately, the source could not say where the Lancers eventually landed.

Quote from: derspiess on April 07, 2013, 05:44:18 PM
I guess my bromance with the Administration is over. Sucks that they pussed out right when we could have cornered that fat millennial fuck.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 08, 2013, 01:11:49 AM

Quote from: derspiess on April 07, 2013, 05:44:18 PM
I guess my bromance with the Administration is over. Sucks that they pussed out right when we could have cornered that fat millennial fuck.

Elaborate on what you wanted them to do.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 08, 2013, 01:11:49 AM

Quote from: derspiess on April 07, 2013, 05:44:18 PM
I guess my bromance with the Administration is over. Sucks that they pussed out right when we could have cornered that fat millennial fuck.

Elaborate on what you wanted them to do.

Quote from: DGuller on April 08, 2013, 08:35:55 AM
Anyone dead yet? :unsure:

Quote from: Viking on April 08, 2013, 04:55:40 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 08, 2013, 01:11:49 AM

Quote from: derspiess on April 07, 2013, 05:44:18 PM
I guess my bromance with the Administration is over. Sucks that they pussed out right when we could have cornered that fat millennial fuck.

Elaborate on what you wanted them to do.

I'd actually like to see some proof this derpie/'bama bromance

Quote from: sbr on April 08, 2013, 07:53:32 AM
So derspiess, where do we get the money to fight this war you want so badly?

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 08, 2013, 01:11:49 AM

Quote from: derspiess on April 07, 2013, 05:44:18 PM
I guess my bromance with the Administration is over. Sucks that they pussed out right when we could have cornered that fat millennial fuck.

Elaborate on what you wanted them to do.

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 08, 2013, 08:40:58 AM

Quote from: DGuller on April 08, 2013, 08:35:55 AM
Anyone dead yet? :unsure:

Just my war boner.

Quote from: 11B4V on April 06, 2013, 08:35:34 PM

Quote from: mongers on April 06, 2013, 08:27:08 PM
US 'blinks' ?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-22056387 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-22056387)

No, going to let them do it all on their own.

QuoteI wanna set the world on fire
Until it's burning bright for You
It's everything that I desire
Can I be the one You use?

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 08, 2013, 05:59:46 PM
For Seedy, an artwork of a B-2 nuke strike on Fatty Arbuckle Un:

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 08, 2013, 09:34:54 PM
Apparently my students believe once Korea is untied that they should fight China for the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Region.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yanbian_Korean_Autonomous_Prefecture

Yeah...good luck with that.

Quote(2nd LD) N. Korea calls on foreigners living in S. Korea to devise evacuation plans
SEOUL, April 9 (Yonhap) -- North Korea on Tuesday called on foreigners living in South Korea to devise evacuation plans, further escalating tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

   North Korea's Asia-Pacific Peace Committee (KAPPC) said in a statement monitored in Seoul that foreign nationals should find out in advance where they can take shelter as well as examine evacuation plans to leave the country.

   The committee, an organ of the ruling Workers' Party that oversees inter-Korean affairs, said the North does not want to see foreigners in the South hurt in the case of war.

   "The committee informs all foreign institutions and enterprises and foreigners including tourists in Seoul and all other parts of South Korea that they are requested to take measures for shelter and evacuation in advance for their safety," the KAPPC's English dispatch said. There are some 1.4 million foreigners in South Korea.

   "The United States and the South Korean puppet warmongers are now watching for a chance to start war against the DPRK after massively introducing weapons of mass destruction, including nuclear war hardware into south Korea," it said.

   DPRK stands for the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, the North's official name.

   The statement, read by the organization's spokesman, warned that if conflict breaks out, the North will conduct an all out "merciless sacred retaliatory war". The official added the Korean Peninsula is on the brink of a thermonuclear war and current developments can pose grave challenges for the whole of the Asia-Pacific region.

   The remarks come as the communist country has repeatedly said it will turn Seoul and Washington into a "sea of fire" and launch pre-emptive nuclear attacks against its enemies.

   North Korea observers in Seoul said the latest rhetoric is part of an ongoing effort by the North to ratchet up tensions on the peninsula.

   "Fueling tension has been a trademark tactic employed for decades by the North to deal with outside pressure against its bad behavior and win concessions," said a government official, who declined to be identified. Pyongyang has come under international criticism for conducting its third nuclear test on Feb. 12 and launching a long range rocket last December.

   Others observers in Seoul speculated that pushing up tensions may have been timed with the launch of the Musudan intermediate-range ballistic missile. There has been growing conjecture that the missile, carried on a mobile transporter, will be launched Wednesday. The missile has a range of 3,000-4,000 kilometers and could be programmed to target U.S. bases in Guam.

   Besides threatening to attack its enemies with nuclear weapons, Pyongyang nullified the Armistice Agreement that ended the Korean War (1950-53), saying it will no longer honor non-aggression pacts signed with South Korea and more recently said it would pull its workers out of the Kaesong Industrial Complex.

   The complex, located in North Korea, is the only remaining economic link between the two countries, and its closure could act as a destabilizing force.

Quote from: Razgovory on April 09, 2013, 03:48:17 AM
They are still playing this game?

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on April 09, 2013, 09:12:46 AM

Quote from: Razgovory on April 09, 2013, 03:48:17 AM
They are still playing this game?

It's kind of like a Languish board game. Everyone else is sick of playing and ready to quit, while North Korea is hectoring them about sending in their turns.

Quote from: derspiess on April 09, 2013, 10:37:31 AM
So, anybody got any plans tomorrow for Missile Launch Day?

Quote from: Razgovory on April 09, 2013, 03:48:17 AM
They are still playing this game?

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 09, 2013, 01:16:35 PM
I really dont' see any substantive difference between his antics and Bed Head's.

Quote from: Queequeg on April 09, 2013, 01:17:53 PM
He seems to be ratcheting this up without even the pretense of aspiring to talks.  I always remember Bed Head having tantrums in the hope that it would lead to more favorable talks. 

Quote from: Caliga on April 09, 2013, 02:26:38 PM
I'm not entirely convinced he's really the one in charge in North Korea.

Quote
N.Korea 'Planning Fresh Missile Test Soon'

North Korea notified foreign diplomats from several countries of its plan to launch a missile over Japan toward the Pacific Ocean around Wednesday, the Sankei Shimbun reported citing informed sources.

The North on Friday urged foreign embassies to evacuate their missions in Pyongyang, saying it cannot guarantee the safety of staff.

South Korea believes the North may test a Mudusan-type missile with a range of 3,000 to 4,000 km as early as Tuesday, given that communication on the east coast has been on the increase.
[email protected] / Apr. 09, 2013 13:28 KST

Quote from: derspiess on April 09, 2013, 04:02:48 PM
All of which means the time for us to strike is now :menace:

Quote from: MadImmortalMan on April 09, 2013, 04:07:29 PM
Do they have some sort of soldier-farmer system like Cao Cao or something?

Quote from: Caliga on April 09, 2013, 04:28:32 PM
A while back I read an article that made me burn with anger re: the North Korean government.  As you people have either heard before or will not at all be surprised to hear, the North Koreans keep a lot of people in concentration camps where they basically work them to death, Nazi-style.  The rations are so meager at said camps that the inmates will pick bits of corn out of cow shit and fight over who gets to eat them. :cry:

Quote from: Queequeg on April 09, 2013, 01:10:13 PM
Anyone else wonder if Kim Jong-un isn't some how psychologically broken in a way that his father or grandfather weren't?  He's never known anything but supreme power. I actually wonder if he even understands how much of a laughingstock his country is.

Quote

North Korea's nuclear weapons and missile programs pose a serious threat to the United States and
to the security environment in East Asia, a region with some of the world's largest populations, militaries,
and economies. North Korea's export of ballistic missiles and associated materials to several countries,
including Iran and Syria, and its assistance to Syria's construction of a nuclear reactor, destroyed in 2007,
illustrate the reach of its proliferation activities. Despite the Six-Party Joint Statements issued in 2005
and 2007, in which North Korea reaffirmed its commitment not to transfer nuclear materials, technology,
or know-how, we remain alert to the possibility that North Korea might again export nuclear technology.

North Korea announced on 12 February that it conducted its third nuclear test. It has also displayed
what appears to be a road-mobile ICBM and in December 2012 placed a satellite in orbit using its Taepo
Dong 2 launch vehicle. These programs demonstrate North Korea's commitment to develop long-range
missile technology that could pose a direct threat to the United States, and its efforts to produce and
market ballistic missiles raise broader regional and global security concerns.
Because of deficiencies in their conventional military forces, North Korean leaders are focused on
deterrence and defense. The Intelligence Community has long assessed that, in Pyongyang's view, its
nuclear capabilities are intended for deterrence, international prestige, and coercive diplomacy. We do
not know Pyongyang's nuclear doctrine or employment concepts. Although we assess with low
confidence that the North would only attempt to use nuclear weapons against US forces or allies to
preserve the Kim regime, we do not know what would constitute, from the North's perspective, crossing
that threshold.
--------------------


North Korea
Kim Jong Un has quickly consolidated power since taking over as leader of North Korea when his
father, Kim Jong Il, died in December 2011. Kim has publicly focused on improving the country's troubled
economy and the livelihood of the North Korean people, but we have yet to see any signs of serious
economic reform.
North Korea maintains a large, conventional military force held in check by the more powerful South
Korean-US military alliance. Nevertheless, the North Korean military is well postured to conduct limited
attacks with little or no warning, such as the 2010 sinking of a South Korean warship and the artillery
bombardment of a South Korean island along the Northern Limit Line. (For information on North Korea's
nuclear weapons program and intentions, see the Proliferation section.)

Quote from: Queequeg on April 09, 2013, 06:35:42 PM
What are MREs like?  Will I be able to get bul go gi on occasion?

Quote from: Caliga on April 09, 2013, 06:43:31 PM
I wanted to eat one the other week (forget why) but Princesca yelled at me. :(

Quote from: Queequeg on April 09, 2013, 01:10:13 PM
Anyone else wonder if Kim Jong-un isn't some how psychologically broken in a way that his father or grandfather weren't?  He's never known anything but supreme power. I actually wonder if he even understands how much of a laughingstock his country is.

QuoteI really dont' see any substantive difference between his antics and Bed Head's.

Quote
I'm not sure what those differences mean, but I think they mean something

Quote from: Queequeg on April 09, 2013, 06:35:42 PM
What are MREs like?  Will I be able to get bul go gi on occasion?

Quote(2nd LD) S. Korea should weigh departure from NPT, lawmaker says
By Lee Chi-dong
WASHINGTON, April 9 (Yonhap) -- In an effort to counter North Korea's military threats, South Korea should keep all options on the table, including withdrawal from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT), a senior South Korean politician said Tuesday.

   "Facing an extraordinary threat to national security, South Korea may exercise the right to withdraw from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty as stipulated in article 10 of the treaty," Rep. Chung Mong-joon, former leader of the ruling Saenuri Party, said, addressing the 2013 Carnegie International Nuclear Policy Conference. "South Korea would then match North Korea's nuclear progress step-by-step while committing to stop if North Korea stops."

   The two-day forum opened Monday to discuss nuclear nonproliferation, deterrence, disarmament and energy, drawing 800 experts and officials from more than 45 countries and international organizations, according to the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

   The seven-term lawmaker emphasized that Seoul should be given this leeway as a "law-abiding member of the global community who is threatened by a nuclear rogue state."

   Some in South Korea even say, he noted, the only way to solve the North Korean nuclear problem is for the country to follow the India-Pakistan example, or the case of Israel.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 10, 2013, 03:42:14 AM
Lets hope not

Quote from: Berkut on April 10, 2013, 11:07:21 AM
As long as SK is convinced that the US will treat a nuclear attack on them as a nuclear attack on the US, this is just posturing. And not very healthy posturing at that.

And I think the US has made it pretty clear that no matter what happens, NK using a nuke on anyone would result in NK having a issue with continuing existence.

There is no actual utility to SK becoming a nuclear power, at least in regards to NK.

Quote from: DGuller on April 10, 2013, 05:50:19 PM
Yeah, but it's bad geopolitics to perpetually rely on your ally for your existence.  That's why Israel can be so troublesome to US despite the latter's unwavering support.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 10, 2013, 05:38:39 PM
Christine Anampour and Fareed Zakarias were just on the Wolfman Show.  Chris said we absolutely must a high level envoy to Pyongyang.  We must....engage.

Fareed totally shot her down.  Called it the worst thing we could do.  Wasn't nice about it at all.

Pretty good TV.

Quote from: HVC on April 10, 2013, 06:34:26 PM
can't we just let china invade? i mean how much worst could a chinese north korea be then a north korean north korea?

Quote from: MadImmortalMan on April 10, 2013, 06:23:02 PM

Quote from: DGuller on April 10, 2013, 05:50:19 PM
Yeah, but it's bad geopolitics to perpetually rely on your ally for your existence.  That's why Israel can be so troublesome to US despite the latter's unwavering support.

All it takes is a little doubt. My understanding is SK already has popular problems with the American presence.

Quote from: Sheilbh on April 10, 2013, 07:39:54 PM
I imagine things like the end of Iraq have probably helped too.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on April 10, 2013, 06:36:27 PM

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 10, 2013, 05:38:39 PM
Christine Anampour and Fareed Zakarias were just on the Wolfman Show.  Chris said we absolutely must a high level envoy to Pyongyang.  We must....engage.

Fareed totally shot her down.  Called it the worst thing we could do.  Wasn't nice about it at all.

Pretty good TV.

Fareed's only a weenie when it involves the Muddled East.  If Lil' Kim wore a bathrobe and insulted people's mustaches with his shoe, Fareed would be all for engagement.
Shame the Zionist Entity isn't closer to the Korean Peninsula.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 11, 2013, 04:26:53 AM
Anyone who hasn't read the Cleanest Race yet, check out this lecture, it'll give you a lot of insight on why the North acts the way they do.
http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/292562-1

QuoteBeing stubborn on nukes no way out for NK
Global Times | 2013-4-11 0:08:01
By Global Times

Today is the first anniversary since Kim Jong-un took power. This is a celebratory occasion for North Korea. However, outside the country, there are worries that the North may take new moves to escalate the situation.

Since the transition of Pyongyang's leadership, the outside world has been speculating over the future direction of the regime. North Korea is sure to change, because its current situation is unsustainable and is placing huge pressure on the country. Escaping this pressure fits the North's interests and would allow the country to meet external expectations.

During the past year, the nuclear issue has remained at the center of the North's domestic and foreign policies. The new leadership has shown its resolve, which is to develop nuclear technologies, rather than solve the nuclear crisis. The regime has taken an extreme path.

Many believe North Korea will eventually focus on improving its people's livelihoods. But others think that it needs a more secure international environment for its economic development, so they keep guessing the country's real intentions, even as the North keeps escalating tension.

Pyongyang should clearly understand that it does not have the capability to dominate the situation in the Korean Peninsula. Its nuclear capacity to some extent makes it feel secure, but at the same time it worsens its international strategic environment. Pyongyang should drop its illusions that it can make the world stay silent over its desire for nuclear arms through its hard-line stance and deceptions.

The international community will never permit North Korea to have the legal status of a nuclear country, because it would lead to more devastating consequences. A number of Asian countries have acquired nuclear weapons, but none of them use them in the manner North Korea envisions.

The North Korean regime has to face up to the difficulties in returning to the international community if it refuses to give up its nuclear ambitions. Even if the US and South Korea make concessions, the North still confronts problems such as sanctions and economic obstacles. Concrete moves are needed to solve the current dilemma that the North faces.

China respects North Korea, but it also holds the responsibility of preserving peace in Northeast Asia. Pyongyang's nuclear issue concerns China's national interests. We hope that the North Korean regime can stay rational and pay attention to the interests of the whole region as its bottom line. We also hope that its moves will not pose threats to the peace and stability of China's northeastern area.

North Korea has more difficulties in opening itself up to the world. The stances of South Korea, Japan and the US are partly the reason. Regardless of the situation, we believe the North still has a chance and we regret that it has become mired in this crisis. We hope the crisis is only temporary.

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 11, 2013, 07:16:14 PM
CNN is in full panic mode right now.

Quote from: DGuller on April 11, 2013, 07:20:15 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 11, 2013, 07:16:14 PM
CNN is in full panic mode right now.

What's going on?

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 10, 2013, 07:59:16 PM
I don't see the connection.

Quote from: Sheilbh on April 11, 2013, 07:30:44 PM
General global anti-Americanism rose because of things like Iraq. It now seems to have subsided. So anti-American presence sentiment in Korea ebbed and flowed based on that. Now it's back to a harder core group.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 11, 2013, 07:37:39 PM
Korean anti-Americanism long predates Iraq.

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 11, 2013, 07:16:14 PM
CNN is in full panic mode right now.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 11, 2013, 07:37:39 PM

Quote from: Sheilbh on April 11, 2013, 07:30:44 PM
General global anti-Americanism rose because of things like Iraq. It now seems to have subsided. So anti-American presence sentiment in Korea ebbed and flowed based on that. Now it's back to a harder core group.

Korean anti-Americanism long predates Iraq.

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 11, 2013, 07:45:49 PM
And Apolo Ohno.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on April 11, 2013, 07:40:56 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 11, 2013, 07:16:14 PM
CNN is in full panic mode right now.

Sorry, Parks and Recreation is on.

Quote from: derspiess on April 11, 2013, 07:52:50 PM
Live TV?  Bleh.

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on April 11, 2013, 07:54:27 PM

Quote from: derspiess on April 11, 2013, 07:52:50 PM
Live TV?  Bleh.

CDM's watching commercials so we don't have to.  :cool:

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on April 11, 2013, 07:54:27 PM
CDM's watching commercials so we don't have to.  :cool:

Quote from: derspiess on April 11, 2013, 07:56:36 PM
My son gets violent if he has to watch commercials.  And he's friggin' spoiled into thinking I can instantly dial up whatever the hell he wants to watch, even specific episodes.  Which is almost true, I guess.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on April 11, 2013, 07:59:37 PM

Quote from: derspiess on April 11, 2013, 07:56:36 PM
My son gets violent if he has to watch commercials.  And he's friggin' spoiled into thinking I can instantly dial up whatever the hell he wants to watch, even specific episodes.  Which is almost true, I guess.

You won't have to worry about him snorting crushed Ritalin in a few short years, as he'll be freebasing it by then.

Quote from: Razgovory on April 11, 2013, 08:31:40 PM
I wonder if nuking Tokyo would improve the economy.

Quote from: 11B4V on April 11, 2013, 08:37:30 PM

Quote from: Razgovory on April 11, 2013, 08:31:40 PM
I wonder if nuking Tokyo would improve the economy.

War is good for business.

Quote from: fahdiz on April 11, 2013, 08:42:56 PM
Small wars are actually good for the species. They're like pressure valves to prevent giant wars.

Quote from: Razgovory on April 11, 2013, 08:31:40 PM
I wonder if nuking Tokyo would improve the economy.

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 11, 2013, 07:21:46 PM

Quote from: DGuller on April 11, 2013, 07:20:15 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 11, 2013, 07:16:14 PM
CNN is in full panic mode right now.

What's going on?

A line in pentagon intel report was accidentally declassified and blabbed by a congresscritter saying NK can deliver a nuke on a missile.

Quote from: KRonn on April 12, 2013, 12:31:39 PMWhat did Japan do that Kim wants to spout bombastic talk at them?

Quote from: KRonn on April 12, 2013, 12:31:39 PM
I still say Iran with nukes is the bigger threat.

Quote from: Queequeg on April 12, 2013, 01:08:36 PM
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2013/04/the-political-scene-how-serious-is-north-koreas-nuclear-threat.html

Most recent New Yorker Political Scene podcast was on this topic, thought it was worth listening to.

Quote from: Ed Anger on April 12, 2013, 02:19:26 PM

Quote from: Queequeg on April 12, 2013, 01:08:36 PM
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2013/04/the-political-scene-how-serious-is-north-koreas-nuclear-threat.html

Most recent New Yorker Political Scene podcast was on this topic, thought it was worth listening to.

No podcast is worth listening to.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on April 12, 2013, 01:29:11 PM

Quote from: KRonn on April 12, 2013, 12:31:39 PM
I still say Iran with nukes is the bigger threat.

Yup.  North Korea wants them for the whole prestige-and-regime-preservation angle.
Iran actually wants to remove an entity they believe should not and cannot exist from the map.

Quote from: KRonn on April 12, 2013, 05:30:08 PMYep. And for a radical regime like them to have nukes is a lot more scary.

Quote from: Jacob on April 12, 2013, 05:36:44 PM

Quote from: KRonn on April 12, 2013, 05:30:08 PMYep. And for a radical regime like them to have nukes is a lot more scary.

Not to argue about the level of radicalism of the Iranian regime, but it's not like North Korea isn't radical.

Quote from: Jacob on April 12, 2013, 05:36:44 PM

Quote from: KRonn on April 12, 2013, 05:30:08 PMYep. And for a radical regime like them to have nukes is a lot more scary.

Not to argue about the level of radicalism of the Iranian regime, but it's not like North Korea isn't radical.

Quote from: fahdiz on April 12, 2013, 11:55:50 PM

Quote from: Jacob on April 12, 2013, 05:36:44 PM

Quote from: KRonn on April 12, 2013, 05:30:08 PMYep. And for a radical regime like them to have nukes is a lot more scary.

Not to argue about the level of radicalism of the Iranian regime, but it's not like North Korea isn't radical.

Iran has more friends and more money than NK does.

Quote from: Razgovory on April 13, 2013, 02:27:26 AM

Quote from: fahdiz on April 12, 2013, 11:55:50 PM

Quote from: Jacob on April 12, 2013, 05:36:44 PM

Quote from: KRonn on April 12, 2013, 05:30:08 PMYep. And for a radical regime like them to have nukes is a lot more scary.

Not to argue about the level of radicalism of the Iranian regime, but it's not like North Korea isn't radical.

Iran has more friends and more money than NK does.

Indeed.  At the end of the day, North Korea is an annoyance, throwing tantrums but unable to project any influence beyond it's borders.  Iran on the other hand is much larger and powerful country with allies and friendly terrorist organizations and economic clout.

QuotePerhaps it is because I first went to school in Palermo, Sicily, that I have always found North Korea's conduct entirely logical and wholly transparent. In both places, extortion by intimidation is routinely practiced, though much more subtly in Sicily.

The transparency is not due to anything revealed by North Korea's string of rulers, from whom it is pointless to expect any change of policy -- just because the previous one liked Japanese food and film stars, or because the current Kim spent time in a Swiss boarding school. The regime, past and present, continues to exceed even Stalin's Soviet Union in its pervasive secrecy, but what remains in full public view is more than enough to explain its frenetically aggressive stance.

Even visitors closely escorted between North Korea's very few approved sites cannot miss the vital clues. Take the Pyongyang No. 1 Duck Barbecue Restaurant, the Pyongyang Number One Boat Restaurant, Pyulmori (a "Swiss" cafe), or the Austrian Helmut Sachers Kaffee -- among the few foreign-style eateries in the entire country besides Jilin-Chinese canteens in the border area. That one can eat palatable food in Pyulmori is phenomenal, but what is much more revealing is that both cafes serve authentic coffee actually extracted from real coffee beans.

All of North Korea's varied and extreme economic dysfunctions converge in its crippling shortage of foreign currency. Once the bulk of it is used to import military components, supplies, and subsystems from China (including the erector launcher vehicles for its ballistic missiles), very little foreign exchange is left. There is virtually none to import machinery to relaunch the country's hopelessly antiquated manufacturing industry, which totters on with decades-old Soviet machine tools and even some Japanese equipment from the 1930s. There is no foreign currency to import contemporary medicines for the population, which must make do with North Korean knockoffs of Chinese knockoffs of Western generics. There is no foreign currency to import even the cheapest forms of starch -- maize, sorghum, low-grade wheat -- when crops fail, so deadly famines are recurrent.

Yet there is enough foreign currency to import the coffee beans distilled at Pyulmori and Helmut Sachers Kaffee. The few half-starved cows sometimes seen browsing in harvested fields explain the unappealing bulgogi offered in the fancy restaurants, though North Korean waters do better in supplying the octopus, squid, and fish offered at the floating seafood house. But to procure a good espresso, the officials who allocate foreign currency -- automatically the supreme power in the land -- clearly found it necessary to set aside other priorities to import good roasted beans. Of course, none of this would explain anything if these were primarily tourist establishments operated to earn foreign currency. Stalin's body was hardly cold when communist regimes opened up for business with hard-currency shops, hotels, restaurants, and bars (not lacking in hard-currency companionship), which today still comprise Cuba's only successful industry.

But Pyongyang's ultraprime eateries are not that. A few foreign tourists end up dining there by way of relief from grim hotel canteens, along with a handful of humanity-loving NGO workers (who never miss out on luxuries and thus frequent these places), but both groups are simply too small to matter. Most customers are North Koreans who fall into two entirely distinct classes. First: anxious, pinched, and pallid men (rarely women) in standard blue North Korean suits, visibly excited by the heady foreign luxuries on offer -- members of midranking delegations from near or far that have wrangled or won access. The second class is the much better-dressed, better-fed singles and couples nonchalantly eating and drinking as if real coffee were an everyday pleasure for them. These are the likely parents of the children seen enjoying Pyongyang's splendidly polychrome merry-go-round expensively imported from Italy. (And this being the land of the portly Kim Jong Un, these children of the rich and privileged are apple-cheeked and distinctly chubby in a land where most children are visibly underweight.) No, these nonchalant eaters are not the winners of the capitalist free-for-all, entrepreneurs, top corporate professionals, or sports stars; they're high-ranking officials or military officers and their families, who support the Kim dynasty and win the perks of his favor.

A "palace system" drives the entire regime and its policies: To keep the Helots in isolated servitude cut off from the outside world, a stance of relentless bellicosity is kept up by the rulers year after year, decade after decade. Even though there has been no war for two generations, North Korean life is shaped by nonstop war propaganda, war censorship, martial law, and above all, a centrally planned war economy in which resources are allocated not exchanged.

But the inward projection of bellicosity is not enough, because the North Korean economy is so unproductive, especially in earning foreign exchange. To feed the palace system, North Korea must also extract payoffs from the outside world: some from enabling NGOs (food aid from which allows domestic food production to be used for army rations), some from the United States and Japan in exchange for Pyongyang's nuclear promises (never kept), but most from the fellow Koreans of the South (whose payoffs are won by sheer intimidation). South Korean President Kim Dae-jung won the 2000 Nobel Peace Prize for his unprecedented reconciliation summit with Kim Jong Il, a moment when peace and even unification seemed imminent. Only later did the truth leak out: The summit had been purchased for $100 million in cash. Unsurprisingly, it led to nothing.

Unwilling to deter North Korea -- which would require a readiness to retaliate for its occasionally bloody attacks and constant provocations, thereby troubling business and roiling the Seoul stock market -- South Korea has instead preferred to pay off the regime with periodic injections of fuel and food aid, but most consistently by way of the North-South Kaesong industrial zone, in which some 80,000 North Korean workers are paid relatively good wages by South Korean corporations. The workers themselves receive very little of their salaries, of course, the majority of which gets funneled back to Pyongyang and makes up the North's largest consistent source of foreign currency. Even under supposedly "hard-line" South Korean presidents, the Kaesong transfer has continued. It was not shut down when the North sunk South Korea's Cheonan warship, killing 46 sailors; nor when the North opened artillery fire on a South Korean island, killing two soldiers and two civilians; nor when the North tested a nuclear device and launched a long-range ballistic missile. Even as the present crisis has unfolded, it was the paying South that feared an interruption of production at Kaesong, not the North, which reaps the benefits. And when media in South Korea noted with much relief that Kaesong was still open, the North Koreans promptly shut it down.

Having successfully extracted payoffs so consistently through threats and occasional attacks, the North is naturally at it again. Even though another nuclear test and the threatened launch of a mobile long-range ballistic missile appear imminent, a payoff from the South, not war on the Korean Peninsula, is the likely outcome. And Pyongyang knows this.

Meanwhile, South Korea has matched the North's bellicosity with its own strategic perversity: It remains obsessed with an utterly unthreatening Japan and has been purchasing air power to contend with imagined threats from Tokyo as opposed to the real ones just north of the demilitarized zone. Seoul is simply unwilling to acquire military strength to match its vastly superior economy. Instead, it spends billions of dollars to develop its proudly "indigenous" T-50 jet fighters, Surion helicopters, and coastal defense frigates -- alternatives for which could be much better, and cheaper, imported from the United States. Meanwhile, gaping holes remain in South Korean defenses (and thus we see the ridiculous spectacle of last-minute scrambling for missing equipment and munitions in the present crisis). And the cycle continues: Because the South allows itself to remain so vulnerable, it cannot react effectively against North Korea's perpetual threats and periodic attacks. Instead, Seoul checks its bank account and gets ready for the next payoff.

It's time for this to end. The United States cannot force the North to give up its bellicosity, but surely it can force the South to renounce its perversity. The price of continued U.S. protection should be the adoption of a serious defense policy, the closure of the Kaesong racket, and a complete end to cash transfers to the North, whatever the excuse. Pyongyang may still try to pick a fight, but at least this will eliminate the incentive to persist in this monstrous extortion strategy.

Quote from: Queequeg on April 13, 2013, 07:46:54 PM
Jimmy, how serious do Koreans take their claims to Korean-inhabited bits of Manchuria?

Quote from: 11B4V on April 13, 2013, 07:39:21 PM
Dude sounds like a whiny bitch

Quote from: Jacob on April 14, 2013, 08:13:43 PM
The Chinese rumour mill has it that young Kim hasn't been seen for two weeks. There's speculation of internal changes.

Just a rumour, though...

Quote from: derspiess on April 14, 2013, 08:39:23 PM
Sounds too good to be true.  What is interesting though is that in some of the last pictures of him he had a bandage on his wrist.

Quote from: Jacob on April 14, 2013, 08:13:43 PM
The Chinese rumour mill has it that young Kim hasn't been seen for two weeks. There's speculation of internal changes.

Just a rumour, though...

Quote from: Jacob on April 14, 2013, 08:13:43 PM
The Chinese rumour mill has it that young Kim hasn't been seen for two weeks. There's speculation of internal changes.

Just a rumour, though...

Quote from: DGuller on April 15, 2013, 07:42:27 AM

Quote from: Jacob on April 14, 2013, 08:13:43 PM
The Chinese rumour mill has it that young Kim hasn't been seen for two weeks. There's speculation of internal changes.

Just a rumour, though...

Chinese-made rumors are not very reliable, in my experience.

Quote from: Jacob on April 15, 2013, 12:07:14 AM
Heh, even if it's true who knows if it's good?

Quote from: Jacob on April 14, 2013, 08:13:43 PM
The Chinese rumour mill has it that young Kim hasn't been seen for two weeks. There's speculation of internal changes.

Just a rumour, though...

Quote from: Sheilbh on April 15, 2013, 08:48:24 PM
Apparently China, for the first time, didn't issue any statement or give any extra food aid for Kim Il Sung's birthday :mellow:

QuoteTraders say that what isn't crossing, for now, is anything that could be seen as useful to the North Korean military. "The sanctions are very serious," said Qin, a 66-year-old truck driver who has been driving back and forth across the Friendship Bridge since the 1990s. "Before, things like chemical products and pipes and steel were very common. Now, very few of these things are going across and the main products going in are fertilizer, washing powder, cooking oil, daily things. It's all civilian trade. If there are any forbidden things, they have to be smuggled."

QuoteChina made a show of closing the local branch of the Kwangson Bank (listed in United Nations' documents as the Foreign Trade Bank) earlier this year after the United States designated it a "key financial node in North Korea's weapons-of-mass-destruction apparatus." But other banks in Dandong said they were still able to send cash directly to accounts in Pyongyang. "We haven't received notice to stop any of our services," an employee of the China Construction Bank, which has known ties to the Kwangson Bank, told The Globe and Mail.

Quote from: garbon on April 24, 2013, 10:52:23 AM
I had a dream last night that somehow, because of NK belligerence, the US decided to launch missiles against Hong Kong. I recall being confused by the connection but then also wondered if Mono would be safe. :hmm:

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 24, 2013, 11:47:30 AM
Thanks to the folks who posted in this thread.  Reminded me I'm up 20 on DGuller. :)

Quote from: mongers on April 24, 2013, 05:44:23 PM
Yeah, what's real odd about this, from verge of war, to bam, nothing, crisis as flat as last weeks birthday balloons and near zero media comment on that.

It's as if the whole thing really was an internal North Korea war hysteria crisis, and we in the West and the rest of the East, inadvertently tuned into a channel we shouldn't have been watching.

Quote from: DGuller on April 24, 2013, 12:16:22 PM

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 24, 2013, 11:47:30 AM
Thanks to the folks who posted in this thread.  Reminded me I'm up 20 on DGuller. :)

Checking your PMs would've reminded you as well. :contract:

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on April 25, 2013, 02:29:30 AM

Quote from: DGuller on April 24, 2013, 12:16:22 PM

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 24, 2013, 11:47:30 AM
Thanks to the folks who posted in this thread.  Reminded me I'm up 20 on DGuller. :)

Checking your PMs would've reminded you as well. :contract:

So in the grand scheme of things, which of you has won more money off the other?

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 29, 2013, 12:18:02 AM
What a bizarre country.

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/pyongyang-glitters-nkorea-dark-19059868#.UX4A7EqU61h

Quote from: Peter Wiggin on April 29, 2013, 08:49:53 AM
Jersey Shore is America's enemy within.

Quote from: garbon on April 29, 2013, 09:14:13 AM
I think that is overstating matters by quite a bit.

Quote from: garbon on April 29, 2013, 09:30:43 AM
Yeah but for the most part it is still localized to Jersey and even more so as we move away from when that show was running.

Quote from: garbon on April 29, 2013, 10:05:53 AM
Sure but then that's nothing specific to the Jersey Shore. Might as well blame Real World...or youtube. :D

QuoteNorth Korea's Kim Jong Un kills family of executed uncle, report claims

BEIJING — After executing his powerful uncle last month, North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un took his purge to an extreme degree by putting to death almost all the uncle's direct relatives, including children, according to an unconfirmed report by the South Korean news agency Yonhap.

If the wave of killings is ever confirmed, it suggests Kim's brutality exceeds even that of his father and grandfather, his predecessors in power, said one North Korea expert Monday. The move also reveals Kim's fear of opposition forces, said Hong Kwan-hee at Korea University.

Citing multiple but unnamed sources, Yonhap said Kim ordered the killings, which took place after the Dec. 12 execution of Jang Song Thaek, husband of Kim's aunt, the daughter of the regime's founding father Kim Il Sung. Jang's removal surprised most North Korea watchers, as he was considered the second most powerful figure in the highly repressive and isolated state.

"The executions of Jang's relatives mean that no traces of him should be left," one source told Yonhap. "The purge of the Jang Song Thaek people is under way on an extensive scale from relatives and low-level officials."

The relatives killed include Jang's sister, Jang Kye-sun; her husband Jon Yong-jin, North Korea's ambassador to Cuba; Jang Yong-chol, ambassador to Malaysia; a nephew of Jang Song Thaek, and Jang Yong-chol's two sons, said Yonhap. All had been recalled to Pyongyang in early December. The sons, daughters and grandchildren of Jang's two deceased elder brothers were also executed, sources told Yonhap.

Some of them were shot to death as they were dragged from their homes, the report said, while some relatives by marriage, including the wife of the ambassador to Malaysia, were instead banished to live with their families in remote villages. North Korean defectors have long reported that the regime often punishes entire extended families for the alleged crimes of one family member.

Executing the extended family also recalls traditional punishments under past dynasties such as the Joseon, said Korea University's Hong. The "possibility is quite high" that the Yonhap report proves accurate, said Hong, but he cautioned that South Korea's spy agency has yet to issue any confirmation of the alleged events over the border.

North Korea remains so removed from the world, and its behavior so bizarre and belligerent, that strange and sometimes fictitious stories quickly gain global currency. Pyongyang did not confirm how Jang was executed last month. Into that information gap rushed a rapidly viral story that he was fed to starving dogs, although that tale originated in the mind and blog of a satirical writer based in mainland China.

Kim Jong Un's extermination of Jang's family, if confirmed, highlights "his fear that other family members could form an anti-Kim Jong Un movement, so this is a measure for rooting out opposition," said Hong. The scale of the purge appears more wide-ranging than similar punishments imposed by Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il, Kim Jong Un's father, he said.

Kim seems more brutal, radical and unstable than his father and grandfather, said Hong. "In the short run this kind of action could give him a stronger power base, but in the long run North Korea will be faced by very fundamental political instability," Hong predicted. Kim's own instability, and reported quick temper, also endangers the entire Korean peninsula, he said.

The U.S. Special Representative for North Korea policy, Ambassador Glyn Davies, is visiting Beijing today and Tuesday, to discuss China's troublesome neighbor and the regional response to North Korea's nuclear program. He then flies to South Korea and Japan. China is the North's only significant ally, and a vital source of food, fuel and diplomatic support.

Quote from: derspiess on February 24, 2014, 09:05:06 PM
Good ol' Mr. Yoon.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on February 24, 2014, 08:44:24 PM
Mr. Yoon: Tim, do you have something urgent to work on?

Tim: No.

Mr. Yoon: Then why are you here? Go home for the rest of the week.

Tim: Ok!

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 03, 2014, 05:32:56 AM
Wow, I hate so much galbi tonight!  :licklips:

Quote from: Jacob on March 05, 2014, 05:27:17 PM
Hey Tim - how long does it take to get from Seoul to Busan, and what's the most convenient way to make that trip?

Quote from: jimmy olsen on March 05, 2014, 05:46:33 PM

Quote from: Jacob on March 05, 2014, 05:27:17 PM
Hey Tim - how long does it take to get from Seoul to Busan, and what's the most convenient way to make that trip?

KTX bullet train. Think it's probably closer to a 3 hour trip than 2 if I recall right.

QuoteNorth Korea: Men required to get Kim Jong-un haircuts

(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fnews.bbcimg.co.uk%2Fmedia%2Fimages%2F73817000%2Fjpg%2F_73817643_mm00221184.jpg&hash=818557c16df200a5723a77887dda624412cf6cd3)

Men in North Korea are now required to get the same haircut as their leader Kim Jong-un, it is reported.

The state-sanctioned guidelines were introduced in the capital Pyongyang about two weeks ago, media reports say. They are now being rolled out across the country - although some people have reservations about getting the look.

"Our leader's haircut is very particular, if you will," one source tells Radio Free Asia. "It doesn't always go with everyone since everyone has different face and head shapes." Meanwhile, a North Korean now living in China says the look is actually unpopular at home because people think it resembles Chinese smugglers. "Until the mid-2000s, we called it the 'Chinese smuggler haircut'," the Korea Times reports.

It seems that haircuts have been state-approved in North Korea for some time - until now people were only allowed to choose from 18 styles for women and 10 for men. Earlier, North Korea's state TV launched a campaign against long hair, called "Let us trim our hair in accordance with the Socialist lifestyle".

Late leader Kim Jong-il, who ruled North Korea for 17 years, sported a bouffant hairstyle, reportedly in order to look taller.

Quote from: Grey Fox on March 26, 2014, 10:42:11 AM
Those women in that picture, all want to suck his dick. That old dude too. That other dude did it & was not impressed.

Quote from: Jacob on March 06, 2014, 12:30:09 AM
Thanks for the link. I'll let you know if I'm there, and whether it'll be during the weekend. Still in the planning stages.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 02, 2014, 09:41:25 PM
It's amazing how uneven my Korean vocabulary is.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 02, 2014, 10:29:17 PM
4 years.

Everyone talks to me in English. I know enough Korean to get around at stores and such. Where, what, when questions and the like.

Quote from: alfred russel on April 02, 2014, 10:14:06 PM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 02, 2014, 09:41:25 PM
It's amazing how uneven my Korean vocabulary is.

It isn't amazing that after 5 years of language immersion you know a few sort of tricky words. It is amazing that after 5 years it don't know the basics.

Korea is wasted on Tim.

Quote from: Valmy on April 02, 2014, 10:53:01 PM
What if there was a foreign looking person who was not a foreigner, grew up in Hong Kong, and spoke native level Cantonese.  Is that a thing or would that confuse and freak out people?

Quote from: Monoriu on April 02, 2014, 10:45:28 PM

I always speak to a foreigner in English whenever I see one in HK.  The rule is, if there is one foreigner in a meeting, everybody speaks English.  Shame on anyone who cannot do so.  The whole point is, we learn English to accommodate them, not the other way round.  That's why they are here to teach our kids English.

Quote from: Valmy on April 02, 2014, 10:53:01 PM
What if there was a foreign looking person who was not a foreigner, grew up in Hong Kong, and spoke native level Cantonese.  Is that a thing or would that confuse and freak out people?

Quote from: garbon on March 26, 2014, 11:10:07 AM

Quote from: Grey Fox on March 26, 2014, 10:42:11 AM
Those women in that picture, all want to suck his dick. That old dude too. That other dude did it & was not impressed.

I don't think they are all like DGuller is with Obama. :unsure:

Quote from: alfred russel on April 02, 2014, 11:01:02 PM


I get the dynamic, but Tim is over there long term. Aside from making his day to day life easier with all the Koreans that don't speak English, he is going to seem either odd or lazy to live there so long and not learn the language. If he plans to stay longer, he really needs to learn the language to integrate with a wife and family.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 03, 2014, 12:37:23 AM
German is easier to learn than Korean by several degrees of magnitude.

Quote from: Grey Fox on March 26, 2014, 10:42:11 AM
Those women in that picture, all want to suck his dick. That old dude too. That other dude did it & was not impressed.

QuoteI get the dynamic, but Tim is over there long term. Aside from making his day to day life easier with all the Koreans that don't speak English, he is going to seem either odd or lazy to live there so long and not learn the language. If he plans to stay longer, he really needs to learn the language to integrate with a wife and family.

Quote from: Monoriu on April 02, 2014, 11:48:25 PM
Yeah, there are lots of these people, and they never cease to freak me out.  Even if I hear perfect Cantonese from, say, a Brit, I always respond in English. 

Quote from: Syt on April 03, 2014, 12:12:31 AM
My two English colleagues make an effort to learn German. I applaud their tenacity, but it's just so much easier to communicate to them in English rather than in halting pidgin German.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on April 03, 2014, 01:18:17 PM
Korean vowels are bone simple.  Ah, eeh, eh, oh, ooh.  That's it.  :huh:

Quote from: jimmy olsen on April 02, 2014, 10:57:01 PM

Quote from: Valmy on April 02, 2014, 10:53:01 PM
What if there was a foreign looking person who was not a foreigner, grew up in Hong Kong, and spoke native level Cantonese.  Is that a thing or would that confuse and freak out people?

Sometimes you speak in what you know is for sure correct Korean and they just look at you with blank eyes not understanding you because Korean coming from a foreign just isn't a thing that could possibly happen.

Quote from: celedhring on April 03, 2014, 02:20:22 PM
When I lived in NYC, hispanic people at bodegas and such would look at me with freaky eyes when I addressed them in Spanish. Then again, my accent was probably funny to them.

Quote from: Queequeg on April 03, 2014, 02:23:07 PM

Quote from: celedhring on April 03, 2014, 02:20:22 PM
When I lived in NYC, hispanic people at bodegas and such would look at me with freaky eyes when I addressed them in Spanish. Then again, my accent was probably funny to them.

Do you have a Catalan accent?  Do you look Spanish?  I confess, I don't really know what Catalans even look like.   :hmm:

Quote from: Queequeg on April 03, 2014, 02:23:07 PM
Do you have a Catalan accent?  Do you look Spanish?  I confess, I don't really know what Catalans even look like.   :hmm:

Quote from: Queequeg on April 03, 2014, 02:23:07 PM

Quote from: celedhring on April 03, 2014, 02:20:22 PM
When I lived in NYC, hispanic people at bodegas and such would look at me with freaky eyes when I addressed them in Spanish. Then again, my accent was probably funny to them.

Do you have a Catalan accent?  Do you look Spanish?  I confess, I don't really know what Catalans even look like.   :hmm:

Quote from: The Brain on April 03, 2014, 02:43:22 PM
I think they have two hulls.

Quote from: celedhring on April 03, 2014, 03:11:55 PM

Quote from: Queequeg on April 03, 2014, 02:23:07 PM

Quote from: celedhring on April 03, 2014, 02:20:22 PM
When I lived in NYC, hispanic people at bodegas and such would look at me with freaky eyes when I addressed them in Spanish. Then again, my accent was probably funny to them.

Do you have a Catalan accent?  Do you look Spanish?  I confess, I don't really know what Catalans even look like.   :hmm:

I have a thick Catalan accent, but my Hispanic friends couldn't tell the difference from a generic "peninsula" accent.

I'm 6'0, broad, with light complexion and blond.