#KimIlSung: "Reunifying our divided country is the highest national duty and the most important revolutionary task for our Party and people."

Q. Could Kim have meant reunification

a. On Seoul's terms?
b. On his terms?
c. Per pan-peninsular public opinion?
d. On UN terms?

— Sung-Yoon Lee (@SungYoonLee1) March 11, 2019

It looks like more people are beginning to catch on to my idea that the North Koreans may attempt a satellite launch:

The expert added that a more likely explanation was that the North is feigning a missile launch to press Washington for a renegotiation and would not go forward with the act since too much is at stake. 

Another possibility, according to a South Korean government source who asked not to be named, is that the North is preparing to actually launch a satellite equipped with technology recently brought in from friendly countries like China.

“The last time the North shot up a satellite was in 2016 with the launch of the Kwangmyongsong-4,” the source said. 

“Since then, North Korea has been focusing on obtaining satellite technology through unofficial cooperation with other countries or by hacking, and latest intelligence suggests they have completed a new reconnaissance satellite.”

North Korea maintains a distinction between military testing of its ballistic missiles and that of its satellites, though nuclear experts abroad say the fact that the same type of rockets are used for both purposes makes that difference hollow.

UN Security Council Resolution 1718 – approved unanimously by all members in 2006 – forbids any type of rocket launches from the North, be it for satellite or missile purposes.

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link, but I thought they may attempt a satellite launch to give them plausible deniability they are testing ICBMs and say they have every right to peaceful space exploration. This also gives the Chinese and Russians some cover to shutdown any more sanctions the US may try to impose after the launch through the United Nations.

This becomes a way the Kim regime can increase tensions and put pressure back on the Trump administration with likely little consequences.

The new Dong Maeng exercise has ended:

South Korea and the United States wrapped up their new, weeklong combined defense exercise on Tuesday, amid worries that the apparent downsizing of their springtime drills could hurt military readiness.
The allies launched the Dong Maeng command post exercise on Monday last week, replacing the Key Resolve exercise to support ongoing diplomacy to denuclearize North Korea and foster lasting peace on the divided peninsula. Dong Maeng is the Korean word for alliance.
The computer simulation exercise was half the duration of the usually two-week Key Resolve. It apparently focused on bolstering the combined defense capabilities with a counterattack portion of its predecessor removed.

The exercise involved members from the South Korean defense ministry, Joint Chiefs of Staff and operations commands of the Army, Navy and Air Force, and those from the South Korea-U.S. Combined Forces Command, U.S. Forces Korea and Indo-Pacific Command.
Despite the allies’ decision to conduct the exercise on a smaller scale and in a low-key manner, the North’s official Korean Central News Agency denounced it as a breach of its joint statements with Seoul and Washington aimed at enhancing bilateral relations.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

It is speculated that this release was a political favor that Malaysia gave to Indonesia’s President Joko Widodo who goes up for re-election next month:

 An Indonesian woman held for two years on suspicion of killing North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s half brother was freed from custody Monday after Malaysian prosecutors unexpectedly dropped the murder charge against her.
Siti Aisyah cried and hugged her Vietnamese co-defendant, Doan Thi Huong, before leaving the courtroom and being ushered away in an embassy car. She told reporters that she had only learned Monday morning that she would be freed.

“I feel very happy,” she said later at a news conference at the Indonesian Embassy. “I didn’t expect that today will be my freedom day.”
The two young women were accused of smearing VX nerve agent on Kim Jong Nam’s face in an airport terminal in Kuala Lumpur on Feb. 13, 2017. They have said they thought they were taking part in a prank for a TV show. They had been the only suspects in custody after four North Korean suspects fled the country the same morning Kim was killed.
The High Court judge discharged Aisyah without an acquittal after prosecutors applied to drop the murder charge against her. They did not give any reason.

The trial will resume Thursday, with prosecutors expected to reply to a request by Huong’s lawyers asking the government to similarly withdraw the charges against her.
Indonesia’s government said its continual high-level lobbying resulted in Aisyah’s release. The foreign ministry said in a statement that she was “deceived and did not realize at all that she was being manipulated by North Korean intelligence.”
It said Aisyah, a migrant worker, believed that she was part of a reality TV show and never had any intention of killing Kim.

MSN via a reader tip

You can read much more at the link, but I like how they call Aisyah a migrant worker when she was a prostitute in Malaysia and that is how the North Korean agent recruited her.

Anyway her co-defendant Doan Thi Huong from Vietnam I suspect will get released as well since Aisyah was let go. The four North Korean agents that organized the murder all fled back to North Korea which means likely no one will be held responsible for murdering someone with a dangerous nerve agent in the middle of a busy international airport.

LKP lawmaker Na Kyeong-won said at the National Assembly, "Pres Moon should stop acting like KJU's spokesperson."

Democratic Party lawmakers demanded an apology. Its leader, Lee Hae-chan, said Na could be charged with contempt of the Head of State.
https://t.co/tTD6e6Zffj

— John Lee (The Korean Foreigner) (@koreanforeigner) March 12, 2019

#NorthKoreaStory
1. Build them & they will come & pay
2. Pretend to dismantle them & they'll pay more
3. Repeat & they'll pay even more
4. Act weird & threaten war, repeat Step 2, reap more goodies
5. Sequelize until #USFK are evicted
6. Complete the Vietnam Model of Unification https://t.co/ewCAaAXnA8

— Sung-Yoon Lee (@SungYoonLee1) March 9, 2019

An Air Force lieutenant got in struggle for “strangling” a Korean taxi driver:

A U.S. Air Force 1st lieutenant assigned to the 51st Fighter Wing at Osan Air Base was reprimanded in February for strangling a Korean national after a night of drinking, according to a recent discipline update.

The lieutenant “grabbed a Korean National taxi driver’s neck while riding in the taxi after 1 a.m., the curfew time for U.S. forces in Korea,” Capt. Rachel Salpietra, a 51FW spokeswoman, told Task & Purpose.
The driver declined to press criminal or civil charges and accepted a voluntary settlement from the service member, Salpietra said, adding that alcohol “appears to have been involved” in the incident.

Task and Purpose via a reader tip

The article was headlined that he strangled the taxi driver, but grabbing his neck with no charges filed is quite different. Nevertheless the lieutenant was given an Article 15 and the punishment shared in an email that was headlined as “strangling” a taxi driver.

This caused people on the popular Air Force amn/nco/snco Facebook page to complain:

A senior airman found guilty of larceny for stealing a blanket was reduced in rank to an E-3 and forced to forfeit $1,116 in pay a month for two months.

Another senior airman found guilty of stealing a blanket and jacket was reduced in rank to an E-3 and slapped with 45 days restriction. (….)

“What I’m going to take from this is if you get cold, strangle a Korean national,” wrote one Air Force amn/nco/snco reader, “but whatever you do, DON’T STEAL A EFFING BLANKET.”

The difference is that the two airman robbed a Korean store for those items. So what is worse grabbing a taxi driver by the neck while drunk past curfew or willfully robbing a store?

The other thing to remember is that the airman can likely recover career wise from their discipline, the lieutenant on the other hand has his career ended since any promotion board will see the Article 15 and reprimand.