That is what the below report in the Hankyoreh is speculating could happen if North Korea launches a rocket in October:
The main variable in future diplomatic trends is the question of whether North Korea will launch a long-range rocket. There has been discussion of the possibility of North Korea testing a long-range rocket on the pretext of putting a satellite into orbit on Oct. 10, the 70th anniversary of the foundation of the Korean Workers’ Party.
Indeed, a video was posted on Uriminzokkiri, a website that North Korea uses to send propaganda to South Korea, in which the anchor said, “South Korea’s opposition parties, press, and experts urged the government not to cast a chill on inter-Korean relations, which are starting to thaw at last, simply because North Korea launches a satellite.”Experts suspect that North Korea’s suggestive comments are intended to provide justification for the upcoming rocket launch. (………………)
This could also lead to renewed calls from the US and Japan to deploy THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) on the Korean Peninsula to defend against North Korean rockets. If South Korea is dragged into a discussion of THAAD, opposition from China could strain relations between the two countries. [Hankyoreh]
If North Koreans would be so shocked to see President Park seated next to Chinese President Xi maybe the activist groups should start launching their propaganda balloons into North Korea with DVDs and images of this fact:
Park Geun Hye’s recent visit to China to attend 70th anniversary celebrations marking the end of WWII has been the subject of much attention and analysis, a fair amount of which speculated that the special treatment bestowed on the South Korean leader by Beijing portends stronger bilateral ties between the two nations going forward.
Lee Tae Hwan, head of the Chinese research center at Sejong Institute, said that South Korea and China’s joint criticism of North Korea’s aggravations on the Korean Peninsula sends a strong message to the North that it should cease and prevent further provocations.
“This comes ahead of the upcoming 70th anniversary of the founding of the Workers’ Party in October, when many expect the North to launch a missile or execute another show of strength. Remarks coming out of the China-South Korea meeting will undoubtedly place major pressure on the North,” he explained.
Cho Bong Hyun, a senior researcher from IBK Economic Research Institute, surmised that North Korea “must feel cornered,” after China backed South Korea’s stance that further provocations by North Korea on the Korean Peninsula are “unacceptable.”
“As a nation that was trying to recover its ‘blood-ally’ relationship with China, North Korea probably feels left out in the cold as China is trying to press ahead with a trilateral summit meeting among South Korea, China, and Japan,” Cho asserted.
The marked absence of commentary regarding North Korea’s nuclear development on China’s part, however, divided opinions on the implications for the recent Sino-South Korea interactions. The less skeptical of those watching the issue assert that China’s overt criticism of North Korea’s provocation is a clear indication of its stance and proof positive of consensus with South Korea on the nuclear issue as well.
Cho does urge caution and hasty conclusions from one meeting, noting that “it’s too much to expect denuclearization of North Korea through a single discussion between China and South Korea.” Now, he added, “it is imperative to devise strategies and continuously cooperate with China in order to realize a denuclearized Korean Peninsula.” [Daily NK]
It is always heart warming to see the images of the separated families meeting during these infrequent family reunions, but I always wonder how much the Kim regime receives from the ROK in return for hosting them?:
This file photo, taken on Feb. 20, 2014, shows the reunions of family members separated by the 1950-53 Korean War held at Mount Kumgang in North Korea. (Yonhap)
Ryoo Si-bong, 76, cannot sleep well these days on anticipation that South and North Korea’s recent landmark deal on easing military tension may make his lifelong wish come true: meeting his older sister living in North Korea.
Until the 1950-53 Korean War broke out, Ryoo, who used to live in China’s northeastern region of Manchuria, never thought he would not be able to see his sister again when she moved to North Korea after marriage.
Following several failed attempts to join the state-arranged family reunions, Ryoo is now voicing hope that he may have a chance to meet his 92-year-old sister as the two Koreas agreed in late August to resume the much-awaited reunions of families separated by the war.
“I want to know whether she is alive or not. My lifelong wish is to meet my sister before I die,” Ryoo said, showing an undelivered letter that he wrote to her two years ago while missing her. “This time, I want to be picked for the upcoming reunion event.”
Ryoo is among more than 66,000 surviving South Korean family members separated by the Korean War, which ended in a truce, not a peace treaty, leaving South and North Korea technically at war.
Inter-Korean relations have long been strained amid North Korea’s nuclear and missile provocations, but burgeoning signs of better ties are now growing, backed by the two Koreas’ deal on easing a recent military standoff.
South and North Korea have agreed to make efforts to improve their ties and push for the resumption of the family reunions on the occasion of Korea’s fall harvest holiday, Chuseok, slated for late September. The family reunions were last held in February 2014. [Korea Times]
I guess the good news is that if you take the Chinese government at their word they are not planning to send troops into downtown Seoul again to destroy the ROK. On the other hand I think everyone knows peaceful reunification is never going to happen as long as the Kim regime remains in power in North Korea:
President Park Geun-hye on Friday said South Korea and China could quickly begin various discussions on how to achieve a peaceful unification between South and North Korea.
“Peaceful unification is the fundamental and the quickest way to resolve nuclear and other issues,” Park said in a press gaggle aboard Air Force One on the way back to Seoul from a trip to China, referring to tensions on the Korean Peninsula.
Tensions persist on the divided peninsula over the North’s pursuit of its missile and nuclear weapons program. The communist country has a track record of staging provocations against South Korea.
The North — which conducted three nuclear tests — has repeatedly vowed to develop its economy and nuclear arsenal in tandem, viewing its nuclear programs as a powerful deterrent against what it claims is Washington’s hostile policy against it.
South Korea “would cooperate with China for a peaceful unification,” Park said. “Various discussions could begin as soon as possible on how to achieve a peaceful unification.” She did not provide a specific time frame. [Korea Herald]
I like this type of engagement with North Korea where reforesting the environment is beneficial to both sides, however Seoul should not have agreed to pay for their studies in Germany. Instead they should have offered them to train in South Korea. If the Kim regime can afford nuclear weapons and ICBMs, they can afford to send their own scholars to school in Germany. By the way I guess this guy won’t be going to training in Germany:
Seoul plans to provide funding for North Korean forestry specialists to study in Germany, a U.S. news report said Saturday, in its latest effort to restore deforested mountains in the North.
Under the plan, South Korea will help around 30 North Korean experts study in Germany by providing US$70,000, according to the Voice of America (VOA), which cited the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations.
The specialists will visit Germany in four batches between September and November. Germany, with forests covering one-third of its area, has one of the world’s leading forestry industries. [Korea Times]
The report doesn’t say whether the changes were made after or before the recent cross border incident that led to a negotiated settlement between the North and the South. If these changes were made afterwards maybe Kim Jong-un was not aware of the operation to plant landmines on the southern side of the DMZ? It seems unlikely to me though because that would be something pretty audacious for a military commander to think he could get away with doing something like that without consulting the regime inner circle first:
Kim Jong Un, the querulous North Korean leader, said the recent standoff with South Korea was resolved not through negotiation but “thanks to the tremendous military muscle” of the country’s nuclear weapons.
Some analysts have suggested that Pyongyang’s recent eagerness to hold talks with Seoul could be a sign of domestic vulnerability for Kim, whose official titles include first chairman of the National Defense Commission and supreme commander of the Korean People’s Army.
But according to North Korea’s version of events, last weekend’s standoff with South Korea was a sign of the former’s strength.
“We protected the dignity and sovereignty of the country, the gains of the revolution and the happiness of the people by our own efforts amid the tempest of the history without anybody’s support and sympathy,” Kim told officials at a meeting to analyze and review the “revolutionary measures” the regime had taken over the past week, according to the country’s official Korean Central News Agency.
The news report, published Friday, also said that the 30-something leader had dismissed some members of the Central Military Commission, which is responsible for the Korean Workers’ Party’s military policies, and appointed new ones. But it did not say which officials had been replaced. The dismissals come after an extended period of sometimes-brutal personnel changes in North Korea, notably Kim’s execution of his defense minister this year. [Stars and Stripes]
Like I suspected the ROK offered the North Koreans some significant financial rewards if they apologized for the landmine attack. basically what his comes down to is that two ROK soldiers had to have their legs blown off so the ROK could pay off the North Koreans to apologize. This is another example of why the North Koreans commit provocations, because they work:
A landmark inter-Korean deal to resolve heightened cross-border tensions could give fresh momentum to bilateral economic cooperation that has been stalled due to strained relations between the archrivals, analysts said Tuesday.
The agreement, reached early Tuesday after marathon negotiations, defused the military standoff triggered by a land-mine explosion that maimed two South Korean soldiers on Aug. 4, and an artillery exchange on Thursday.
Excluding the joint industrial complex in Kaesong North Korea, inter-Korean economic projects have been in limbo since South Korea imposed a blanket ban on economic cooperation and personnel exchanges in March 2010, in retaliation for the North’s sinking of a South Korean naval vessel near the western maritime border.
Observers said the overnight breakthrough could make it possible for the two sides to restart negotiations on suspended economic cooperation projects and possibly lifting the sanctions.
The latest deal does not mention lifting Seoul’s comprehensive sanctions although it calls for high-level talks to take place as soon as possible which can touch on broader outstanding issues.
North Korea watchers speculated that Pyongyang raised the issue of lifting sanctions and the resumption of tours to the Mount Kumgang resort on its southeast coast, which were halted in July 2008 when a South Korean female tourist was shot dead by a North Korean soldier.
Seoul demanded Pyongyang allow a renewed on-site probe into the death of the tourist and take measures to ensure the safety of its citizens. Pyongyang, however, claimed it had done everything it could, including a verbal promise by then leader Kim Jong-il to make sure no such tragedy would happen again. [Yonhap]
South Korean President Park Geun-hye has dropped everything on her schedule to meet and encourage the ROK military in the wake of the recent exchange of fire on the DMZ with the North Koreans:
President Park Geun-hye, Defense Minister Han Min-koo (left) and National Security Office chief Kim Kwan-jin visit the headquarters of the Third Army in Yongin, Gyeonggi Province, Friday. Cheong Wa Dae
Following the exchange of fire, Kim presided over an emergency meeting of the ruling Workers’ Party’s Central Military Commission, instructing frontline units to switch to a “wartime state” and fully arm themselves starting from 5 p.m. on Thursday, state media said.
The North last made the “quasi-state of war” declaration in November 2010 when it shelled a South Korean border island in the West Sea.
“Military commanders were urgently appointed and dispatched for operations to strike the enemy’s means of psychological warfare and quell possible counteraction if it did not stop the propaganda broadcasts,” the official Korean Central Television reported.
President Park Geun-hye urged the South Korean military to stay ready to react immediately to any further provocation and blasted Pyongyang for churning out security threats during her visit to a field army command in Yongin, Gyeonggi Province.
The trip, which came after she shelved her scheduled tour to southern parts of the country, was designed to examine its readiness posture and encourage soldiers, Cheong Wa Dae spokesman Min Kyung-wook said. She was briefed by commanders there on their plans to respond to potential attacks and the current movements by the North Korean military.
Presiding over a video conference with operational commanders later in the day, Defense Minister Han Min-koo also called for airtight readiness and effective situation management, saying that after the deadline the North may stage a provocation “in any way.” [Korea Herald]
The ROK has no plans to give into North Korean demands which the Kim regime assuredly knew they would not. The demand is just being made to justify a future provocation. It appears the leading theory is that they will fire missiles into the Sea of Japan or a cyberattack of some kind in the near term. It will probably be both since it appears the North Koreans are already gearing up to fire missiles:
Separately, North Korea seems to be gearing up to fire missiles, an official said, a move that could be seen as a show of force against South Korea amid escalating tensions.
“The North is showing signs of shooting off a Scud missile near Wonsan and a Rodong missile in North Pyongan Province,” the official said, citing detection results of its joint radar system with the United States. [Yonhap]
Besides launching another DMZ provocation, a naval engagement in the Yellow Sea is always a possibility, but I don’t think they would try this now because the ROK military’s guard is way up right now. However, they could try and fire an anti-ship missile from their mainland somewhere into the Yellow Sea near at ROK vessel. I don’t think they would actually try and sink a ROK ship like they did the Cheonan because it would be too easy to pin the blame on them. Remember they have never admitted to sinking the Cheonan. They have fired these anti-ship missiles into the Sea of Japan before so firing them into the congested waters of the Yellow Sea would be a pretty good provocation. Another, but unlikely provocation is to detain someone at the Kaesong Industrial Complex. They have done this before and have set conditions to do it again, but I think at this point another provocation using Kaesong would probably lead to its closure which has been a cash cow for the Kim regime:
Meanwhile, South Korea said it has measures to ensure the safety of its nationals who are temporarily staying in the North.
It said it has put a partial ban on the entry of its nationals into an inter-Korean joint factory park in the North’s western border city of Kaesong.
The factory park, the last remaining symbol of inter-Korean cooperation, is home to 120 small South Korean factories producing garments, shoes, watches and other labor-intensive goods. More than 54,000 North Koreans work in the complex. [Yonhap]
I think this is all leading to the bigger provocation coming up which is when they try and do their expected October space launch. The launch would once again violate United Nations sanctions and be a major media event where once again North Korea will be dominating the headlines. The bottom line is that I don’t expect to see North Korea out of the news anytime soon; what they plan to do to dominate the headlines is still open to debate.
What does everyone else think the Kim regime will try to do in the coming weeks?
