Shown are rip currents dragging swimmers away from Haeundae beach in the southeastern port city of Busan on July 31, 2017. Rescue workers said they have successfully saved all 70 swimmers who were swept away. (Yonhap)
The ROK military likely has personnel planning for all kinds of contingencies, but people are living in a fantasy land if they think President Moon is any where near authorizing a preemptive strike on North Korea:
According to a report in South Korea’s Munhwa Ilbo newspaper, which cites an unidentified government official, South Korea’s military is preparing a “surgical strike” scenario that could wipe out North Korean command and missile and nuclear facilities following an order by S.Korea’s President Moon Jae-in. Munhwa adds that the military is to report the scenario to presidential office after completing it as early as August 1.
As the report details, South Korea’s Special Forces are preparing a special strike op which would be launched in response to President Moon Jae-In’s order to remove the North Korean leadership in case of emergency. This operation is taking place in addition to separate preparations currently conducted by the country’s military forces.
Targeted by the surgical strike would be North Korea’s core facilities. As part of the operation, South Korea’s forces would launch Taurus cruise missiles from F-15 fighters, which would be able to strike all key facilities in Pyongyang and can also strike the office of the Chairman of the Labor Party, Kim Jong Eun, at the Pyongyang Labor Party headquarters. [Zero Hedge]
Below is an interesting read from a ROK Drop favorite, Professor B.R. Myers who criticizes a fellow professor, John Delury who has long been a go to quote person for the New York Times in regards to North Korea issues:
Let me say straight off that I like Professor John Delury very much on a personal level. I defy anyone to spend time in his company (as I did recently at a conference in Macao) and not like him. But I’m losing patience with this sort of thing:
“The key to understanding Kim Jong-un’s long-term strategy has to do with ‘byungjin,’ ” said John Delury, a professor at Yonsei University in Seoul. Byungjin, or parallel advance, is Mr. Kim’s policy of developing the economy alongside the nuclear program.
“Ideally, from his perspective, he could replicate the Chinese model by normalizing foreign relations, from the U.S. down, on the basis of a nuclear deterrent,” Mr. Delury said. Only then, with its economy, in theory, allowed to catch up to its neighbors’ and its leadership accepted abroad, could North Korea feel secure.
Make that: Ideally, from the West’s perspective. There is no basis in North Korea’s domestic discourse for such an interpretation of Kim Jong Un’s vision. None whatsoever.
The Yonsei professor belongs to a group of frequent Air Koryo flyers whose usual response to such criticism is to allude pregnantly to discussions they had with North Korean officials just the other day, on their fortieth or fiftieth trip to Pyongyang.
And a fat lot of good all that inside info has done them. No faction of the commentariat has been so spectacularly wrong so often. A list of the alleged breakthroughs, game-changing reforms and historic agreements these people have rushed to herald over the past 25 years would make for sobering reading. [Sthele Press]
You can read the rest at the link, but Myers believes the engagement crowd is now attempting to use a new term “byungjin” to essentially make excuses for Kim Jong-un’s provocations as being part of larger strategy to develop the economy much like the term “juche” was thrown around during Kim Jong-il’s reign over North Korea.
I just find it amazing that after all these decades the engagement crowd still thinks the Kim regime wants Chinese style reforms when clearly opening the economy would put the regime at risk.
US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson had some interesting things to say about North Korea:
Rex Tillerson
The United States does not seek a regime change in North Korea, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said Tuesday, as tensions renewed over the country’s nuclear and missile programs.
North Korea conducted its second test of an intercontinental ballistic missile last week, fueling concerns that the communist nation may be close to delivering a nuclear weapon to the U.S. mainland.
Pyongyang said the test was aimed at giving a “stern” warning to the U.S., which is bent on employing sanctions and pressure on North Korea and justifies the regime’s will to develop nuclear weapons with threats of war.
“We do not seek a regime change. We do not seek the collapse of the regime,” Tillerson said in a surprise appearance at a State Department press briefing. “We do not seek an accelerated reunification of the peninsula. We do not seek an excuse to send our military north of the 38th parallel.” (…..)
He noted, however, that the U.S. does not blame China for the North Korean nuclear conundrum and Pyongyang “does not define” Washington’s relationship with Beijing. (….)
“Given the history of enmity and mistrust, this is no doubt a hard message for the North to accept at face value. But I believe it is sincere and worth the North exploring.” [Yonhap]
This photo, carried by North Korea’s propaganda outlet Uriminjokkiri on July 31, 2017, shows a female band performing in Pyongyang the same day to celebrate its July 28 launch of a second intercontinental ballistic missile. (Yonhap)
A submarine launched ICBM would really be the holy grail of North Korea strategic deterrence strategy if successfully developed:
The United States has detected evidence that North Korea conducted yet another ejection test for a submarine-launched ballistic missile just a couple of days after carrying out its second intercontinental ballistic missile test, CNN reported.
The ejection test, carried out Sunday, is the third this month and fourth this year, CNN reported, citing an unidentified defense official. That shows the communist nation is working hard to make progress in its SLBM development.
An ejection test is designed to see whether a missile can be ejected by high pressure steam out of the launch canister in a submarine and into the air before its engine ignites and takes flight. Sunday’s test took place at the Sinpo shipyard, the North’s main submarine development center, CNN said. [Yonhap]
That did not take long, the Moon administration is now reconsidering the deployment of the additional four THAAD launchers:
Residents of Seongju and Gimcheon, North Gyeongsang, stage a rally near the Blue House on Monday to protest the order by President Moon Jae-in to discuss the deploying of additional Thaad launchers with Washington. [YONHAP]South Korea’s National Defense Ministry announced Monday that discussions with the United States have begun on the “temporary deployment” of four additional mobile launchers for the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (Thaad) system, which would technically complete a full Thaad battery – but the minister said hours later that even that decision can be “reconsidered if the local public expresses fear.”
Moon Sang-gyun, the ministry’s spokesman, said during a regular press briefing Monday morning that the two countries will decide together whether to deploy four more launchers, but didn’t mention by when or how a conclusion will be reached.
If Seoul and Washington do decide to deploy additional launchers, the delivery process will be “transparent,” Moon stressed when asked whether the military would carry out an unnoticed, late-night operation like the one done by the former Park Geun-hye administration.
The ministry’s announcement was made two days after President Moon Jae-in ordered his aides during a National Security Council meeting to start discussions with their U.S. counterparts on deploying four additional launchers in Seongju County, North Gyeongsang, some 300 kilometers (186 miles) south of Seoul. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
You can read more at the link, but it looks like the THAAD drama will continue.
This article focuses on the trash left on Korean beaches, but the litter problem isn’t just isolated to beaches. This same problem is also occurring in Korea’s mountains where picnickers leave others to clean up their messes as well:
Street cleaners sort trash at Haeundae Beach in Busan, July 29. / Yonhap
From beer cans to water bottles, leftover chicken, watermelon rinds and dirty clothes, major beaches across the nation are suffering from summer vacationers leaving tons of trash mounting daily.
Local governments have stepped up efforts to clean the mess, putting in more manpower and expanding cleaning hours, but had little to no success.
At Millak Waterside Park in Busan, collected trashes during weekdays an average of 2.5 tons of trash is collected each day, according to local officials. This doubles on weekends.
It takes four hours for 10 city street cleaners and volunteers to sort through and properly recycle the trash.
“I’m OK with people enjoying their vacation by eating and drinking near the beach,” said a city street cleaner. “What I don’t understand is why they disappear without cleaning up their mess.” [Korea Times]
