Author: GIKorea

I would love just once to have someone in the media ask who the foreign infiltrators are that are threatening to invade Dokdo:

The South Korean armed forces launched a two-day military exercise to defend the easternmost islets of Dokdo on Sunday amid growing tensions over trade and their shared history, in a show of its staunch defense stance against Japan’s repeated claims to sovereignty over the cluster of rocks in the East Sea.

The Navy announced that the drill involves Navy, Air Force and Army forces, such as naval warships and aircraft, as well as Army and Marine Corp troops.

“Indeed, it’s an exercise to guard our sovereignty and territory,” Cheong Wa Dae spokesperson Ko Min-jung said at a press briefing.

She added that it’s a regular training and asked media not to attach excessive “political” meaning to it.

The drills have been held twice a year, usually in June and December, to better fend off possible foreign infiltrations to the rocky outcroppings and the surrounding waters.

Yonhap

The closest thing to a “foreign infiltration” that has happened on Dokdo was back in 2006 the Japanese said they were going to have a ship full of scientists conduct an underwater survey of the ocean in the vicinity of Dokdo which they never ended up doing.

Meanwhile in recent months you have China claiming Korean territory and flying bombers over it and the Russians have actively violated Korean airspace over Dokdo with their war planes and there was never a rush to conduct a military exercise in response.

The North Koreans are unhappy about comments Secretary of State Mike Pompeo recently made:

 North Korea’s foreign minister on Friday called U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo a “poisonous plant of American diplomacy” and vowed to “shutter the absurd dream” that sanctions will force a change in Pyongyang.

The North’s blistering rhetoric may dim the prospect for an early resumption of nuclear negotiations between the countries. A senior U.S. diplomat said earlier this week that Washington was ready to restart the talks, a day after U.S. and South Korean militaries ended their regular drills that Pyongyang called an invasion rehearsal.

North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho made the comments to protest Pompeo’s remarks in an interview in which he said that Washington will maintain crippling sanctions on North Korea unless it denuclearizes.

Ri said he couldn’t just let the “reckless remarks” by Pompeo pass by him because they came amid a possible restart of the nuclear talks. Ri said Pompeo is a “brazen” man because he “had begged for” North Korean denuclearization and improved bilateral ties when he visited Pyongyang and met leader Kim Jong Un several times.

Associated Press

You can read more at the link, but I don’t put too much stock into this tit-for-tat exchange; they have wanted Pompeo gone since this past April. This is all posturing for negotiations on a denuclearization deal. Once the North Koreans start going after President Trump that is when you know the negotiations are officially over because Trump will respond in kind. I don’t see this happening until next year which is the timeframe Kim Jong-un has given to try and work out a deal.

This all comes down to if the Trump administration wants to sign a “pretend denuclearization” deal to make the North Korea problem go away for the next election cycle or have it dominate headlines next year when Kim Jong-un restarts long range missile testing because a deal isn’t reached.

Cho Kuk was a mber of Sanomaeng (Socialist Workers League of Korea). Its goal was to overthrow #SouthKorean system for workers' socialist revolution by armed uprising. Cho said he's not ashamed of it. Moon designated Cho to be the Justice Minister.https://t.co/uA6GW88ejv

— Tara O (@DrTaraO) August 22, 2019

Please leave anything you want to discuss in the comments section.

It appears that the North Koreans have yet more features of their new missile systems to test:

South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff says that North Korea fired two unidentified projectiles believed to be short-range ballistic missiles into the East Sea Saturday morning from the eastern town of Sondok in South Hamgyong Province.

The JCS said the missiles were fired at 6:45 and 7:02 a.m. and both flew about 380 kilometers at a maximum altitude of 97 kilometers and a top speed of over Mach six-point-five.

The JCS also said it will share information on the latest launches with Japan following Tokyo’s request as the bilateral intelligence-sharing pact of the General Security of Military Information Agreement, or GSOMIA, is still in effect. 

The South Korean military is monitoring the situation in case of additional launches.

According to Japan’s Kyodo news agency, the Tokyo government also announced North Korea appears to have fired a ballistic missile but the projectiles did not reach Japanese waters or its exclusive economic zone.

Saturday’s launch comes eight days after the regime’s last firing on August 16th but it’s the first since a South Korea-U.S. joint military exercise ended this past Tuesday.

KBS World Radio

You can read more at the link, but you have to love the irony of South Korea pushing for a boycott of Japan over a trade dispute while wanting to reopen the Kaesong Industrial Park despite North Korea regularly firing missiles designed to destroy the ROK.

If true this would help explain why North Korea so easily blew off a food aid offer from South Korea this summer:

North Korea is accepting 800,000 tons of rice from China to help feed its people after turning down a smaller aid package from South Korea last month, according to a Japanese news report on Tuesday. 

Citing a South Korean official and a trader on the border between China and North Korea, a report from the Japanese daily Asahi Shimbun said China was preparing to ship 800,000 tons of rice to North Korea through maritime channels, probably in addition to other foodstuffs like corn that would make the total size of the aid around one million tons. 

Beijing’s decision to provide food assistance to the North was made after Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to Pyongyang in June, the report said, although no formal announcement has been made about it. 

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link.

Which have been greater: the anti-Abe or anti-Moon protests? I have heard there were massive anti-Moon demonstrations that the administration controlled broadcast media did not report. https://t.co/118yQUvhtZ

— David Maxwell (@DavidMaxwell161) August 22, 2019