I found it interesting in the below article how the North Koreans have pretty much told the Russians they plan to conduct a ICBM test in the near term.  If so it will be additionally interesting to see what trajectory they use to test its full capability because if it lands too close to Hawaii or Alaska it could give the Trump administration the excuse it needs to conduct an attack to destroy their nuclear and missile programs:

The next rocket launch by North Korea could be another Hwasong-12 (HS-12), which is a mobile, solid-fueled, nuclear-capable medium-range ballistic missile, or the Hwasong-14 (HS-14), first tested in July, which is believed to be a two-staged version of the HS-12, giving it a longer and intercontinental range.

“I think they are not done with testing the HS-12 into the Pacific. They also have yet to start testing the HS-14 at anything like its full range,” said Joshua Pollack, a senior research associate with the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey.

“Once they have done that a couple of times, I would be concerned about the potential for an atmospheric nuclear test over the Pacific,” Pollack, also editor of the Nonproliferation Review, told VOA.

Russian media on Friday quoted a lawmaker in Moscow as saying North Korea is preparing to test a long-range missile able to reach the West Coast of the United States.

The comment was made by Anton Morozov, a member of the Russian Duma’s international affairs committee, who was among lawmakers who returned home Friday after a four-day visit to Pyongyang for “high-level meetings.”

“They are preparing for new tests of a long-range missile. They even gave us mathematical calculations that they believe prove that their missile can hit the West Coast of the United States,” Russian media quoted Morozov, a member of a right-wing populist party, as saying.

“As far as we understand, they intend to launch one more long-range missile in the near future,” Morozov explained. “And in general, their mood is rather belligerent.”  [VOA News]

You can read more at the link.

Noted journalist Blaine Harden has a good piece published on the PBS Frontline website that explains why North Korea has such an adversarial relationship with China despite the Kim regime being dependent on their aid:

Kim Il-sung grew up in northeast China, where in the 1930s he became a guerrilla leader and fought alongside Chinese Communist partisans against Japanese occupiers. Without warning, local Communists turned on Kim and his men. Several hundred ethnic Koreans were tortured and murdered in a racist purge based on the party’s paranoid, and false, belief that they were secretly working with the Japanese.

Kim was arrested in China in 1934 and was lucky to survive. He later called the purge “a mad wind … [Koreans] were being slaughtered indiscriminately by [Chinese] with whom they had shared bread and board only yesterday.”

During the Korean War, his bitter memories were compounded by a painfully public loss of face. Kim Il-sung started the war in 1950 by invading South Korea with the backing of Stalin’s Soviet Union. But his army was soon obliterated by an American-led coalition and North Korea all but disappeared — until Chinese forces entered the fight and forced Kim to the sidelines of his own war. China’s top general, Peng Dehuai, chided Kim for his “extremely childish” leadership, telling him, “You are hoping to end this war based on luck.”

Kim Il-sung would never forget how he was treated. After the war, he made sure that China’s role in saving and rebuilding his state was largely erased from official histories. His resentment was compounded in 1980, when China publicly denounced as feudalism his decision to transfer absolute power to his son, Kim Jong Il, a succession that made North Korea the world’s only hereditary Communist kingdom.

Ill feelings between North Korea and China have often been mutual. Mao Zedong regarded Kim Il-sung as rash and doctrinaire — once describing him as “a number-one pain in the butt.” In 1992, China infuriated the Kim family by establishing diplomatic relations with South Korea, the archenemy of the North.  [PBS Frontline]

You can read more at the link, but just like his grandfather Kim Jong-un is being a “pain in the butt” to China.  However, he knows he can be adversarial because the Chinese will likely do nothing to remove the Kim regime because of the alternatives to the “pain in the butt” are worse.  That is why the Chinese will never completely abandon the regime until there is a better alternative offered.

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

In meeting with military, Trump talks of 'calm before the storm' https://t.co/MsryKLsGu4

— NorthKoreaRealTime (@BuckTurgidson79) October 6, 2017

Hikers take in a view from Mangyeongdae Pavilion on a trail of Mount Seorak in eastern Gangwon Province on Oct. 1, 2017. The national park service has started to restrict the number of visitors on the trail to a maximum 2,000 on weekdays and to 5,000 on weekends and holidays for those who have made reservations. It will stay open to Nov. 14.  [Yonhap]

Here is the latest in the war of words between the Kim regime and President Trump:

The latest threat from Kim Jong-un’s rogue state was delivered through state media Rodong Sinmum.

In an extraordinary attack, North Korea branded the US President “the boss of hooligans and gangsters.”

And Kim’s mouthpiece warned Mr Trump is “driving the destiny of the U.S. doomed to ruin into bottomless abyss of total destruction.”

It said: “Recently the US and the South Korean puppet forces staged a combined drill for infiltrating into enemy camp for preemptive attack at strategic objects in the north and introduced a field artillery brigade to South Korea from the US mainland to fire artillery shells.

“Meanwhile, a formation of B-1B nuclear strategic bombers flew over international waters of the East Sea of Korea in a show of force”.

“What matters is the US saber-rattling coincides with the reckless remarks made by Trump, the boss of hooligans and gangsters, at the UN arena that he would totally destroy the DPRK.”  [UK Express]

You can read more of the bluster at the link.

Over at the PBS Frontline website their latest program “North Korea’s Deadly Dictator” can be watched. The program focuses on the assassination of Kim Jong-nam and has a number of interviews with his friends that he went to school with in Europe.  Former North Korean diplomat turned defector Thae Yong-ho and ex-CIA analyst Su Mi Terry also features heavily in the program.

It appears the reason for the assassination was Kim Jong-nam’s criticism of Kim Jong-un combined with the fact that based on his friends’ testimony he planned to move to Switzerland and defect to the West.  For those that regularly read this site there is really nothing new in the program, however for those not familiar with the issue it is a great run down on who Kim Jong-nam was and why his half brother Kim Jong-un is doing the things he has done.

Considering the expansion of Camp Humphreys has been going on for over a decade it would seem surprising that these buildings are not ready yet, but considering all the corruption going on it seems no one is surprised:

Camp Humphreys may accept buildings with minor flaws as planners face a new urgency to complete the long-delayed expansion of the Army garrison and future home of U.S. Forces Korea, the commander says.

Col. Scott Mueller, who assumed command of the garrison in June, stressed that no compromises will be made on “life, health or safety.” But he said cosmetic concerns and less serious problems may be fixed later as long as the facility is ready for use.

“Circumstances have changed now, where in the past they were just construction projects. There were delays that really wouldn’t have operational impact,” he told Stars and Stripes during an interview at his office on Tuesday. “But now we’re looking at it as, ‘Hey we’re moving. Let’s get these buildings done.’”

The relocation effort is gaining momentum amid a growing nuclear and missile threat from North Korea. Mueller said his No. 1 priority is military readiness and base defense, followed by family needs and customer service.  [Stars & Stripes via a reader tip]

You can read more at the link.

Guessing they don't have an office in Pyongyang https://t.co/zCfwrjbDki

— Alastair Gale (@AlastairGale) October 6, 2017

South Korean soldiers dispatched to Lebanon as U.N. peace-keeping forces hold a joint memorial service for their ancestors on the Chuseok holiday on Oct. 4, 2017, in this photo provided by South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff. (Yonhap)