Tag: North Korea

I would like to see him try because Japan and Okinawa already have Patriot and Aegis missile defenses while THAAD was deployed to Guam specifically to defend against the Musudan missile threat.  I will be more concerned if they successfully develop an submarine launched ballistic missile capability:

Leader Kim Jong-Un threatened US military bases across the Pacific after North Korea’s test of a powerful new missile triggered emergency UN Security Council talks on curbing Pyongyang’s nuclear programme.

Kim, who personally monitored Wednesday’s Musudan missile test, applauded a “great event” that significantly bolstered the North’s pre-emptive nuclear attack capability, the official KCNA news agency reported.

“We have the sure capability to attack in an overall and practical way the Americans in the Pacific operation theatre,” Kim was quoted as saying.

A Korean-language version of the same report had Kim referring to “the American bastards.”

The Musudan has a theoretical range of anywhere between 2,500 and 4,000 kilometres (1,550 to 2,500 miles), with the upper estimate covering US military bases as far away as Guam.

After a string of failures in recent months, North Korea tested two Musudans on Wednesday, one of which flew 400 kilometres into the Sea of Japan (East Sea).

KCNA said the missile had been fired at a high angle to simulate its full range, and had reached a maximum height of more than 1,400 kilometres.

The test “marked an important occasion in further strengthening the nuclear attack capacity of our state,” Kim said.  [AFP]

You can read more at the link, but this picture released by North Korea shows how much Kim Jong-un had invested in the successful development of the Musudan:

These two looked happier than Lebron James winning the NBA Championship.

This announcement by North Korea makes it pretty clear that they are deliberately organizing the Chinese fishing boats to intrude into South Korea as a form of asymmetric warfare against the South:

North Korea on Monday slammed South Korea for its operation with the United Nations Command (UNC) to repel Chinese fishing boats operating illegally in neutral waters between the two Koreas, calling the move a “military provocation.”

This marks the North’s first official reaction to South Korea and the UNC’s joint crackdown on Chinese fishing vessels operating in the neutral waters of the Han River estuary.

Fishing vessels that are officially registered with either South or North Korea are allowed into the neutral waters. Each side could send military police officers into the no man’s land to enforce rules under the armistice agreement.

South Korea’s move is aimed at “escalating the intrusion into the hotspot waters in the West Sea of Korea into the inland to secure a chance for military provocation,” the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said in an English dispatch.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link, but I continue to believe if the ROK seizes the illegal Chinese fishing boats and then auctions them off and gives jail time to the crew members that would end the incentive for these people to illegally fish in South Korean waters.

https://twitter.com/pearswick/status/744693726249791488

North Korea as expected fired off two more Musudan missiles.  The first one was considered a failure after it blew up shortly after launch.  However, the second launch analysts have not determined if it was successful or not:

North Korea launched what appeared to be two Musudan intermediate-range ballistic missiles (IRBMs) from its east coast early Wednesday morning, with the first test-firing assumed to have been unsuccessful, the Joint Chiefs of Staff said.

At around 5:58 a.m., North Korea fired off what is presumed to be a Musudan missile from near Wonsan along the east coast, but it seems to have ended in failure, the JCS said, without further details

About two hours later at 8:05 a.m., the North launched another missile presumed to be the same type of IRBM from the same area, the JCS noted.

Whether the second missile’s launch was successful was not immediately known. All previous launches of the missile ended in failure, dealing a blow to the credibility of North Korea’s missile program.

On April 15, North Korea first test-fired the Musudan missile as the country kickstarted its ballistic missile tests and development following North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s much-published orders to accelerate the country’s nuclear and missile sophistication the previous month.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link, but the Joong Ang Ilbo is reporting the first one traveled 150 kilometers before exploding and the second one traveled 400 kilometers:

North Korea launched back-to-back Musudan missiles Wednesday, one of which flew 400 kilometers (250 miles), South Korean military officials said.

While 400 kilometers fell far short of the Musudan’s 3,500-kilometer capability, which puts U.S. military bases in the Pacific within range, South Korea was alarmed at the technological progress shown.

Pyongyang carried out its fifth and sixth intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) tests at 5:58 a.m. and 8:05 a.m. Wednesday from the eastern coast city of Wonsan in Kangwon Province, the Joint Chiefs of Staff reported.

“The first one disappeared after it was detected by radar while the second one flew about 400 kilometers,” said a Joint Chiefs of Staff official who asked not to be named.  (……..)

The South Korean military believes the first missile exploded in midair after flying about 150 kilometers. The second missile fired two hours later appeared to have exploded or crashed into the sea after flying 400 kilometers.

The exact causes of the failures are still being determined by Seoul and Washington.

It is possible that North Korea intended its sixth Musudan missile to fall after flying 400 kilometers to prevent it from going over Japan, which would have prompted the country to respond militarily.  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read more at the link, but I doubt North Korea would try and fly a Musudan over Japan without being very confident that the missile would work.  They have fired over Japan before, but never with a missile under development like the Musudan is.  I don’t think Kim Jong-un would want to deal with a potential retaliatory military response if a failed missile landed in Japan.  It is pretty clear though that Kim Jong-un is committed to testing the Musudan until his scientists perfect the technology.  These latest missile tests seem to indicate they are getting closer to that goal.

Here is the latest of the North Korea restaurant worker defector case:

A Seoul court held a hearing Tuesday after a group of lawyers challenged the legitimacy of the South Korean government holding a group of North Korean restaurant workers who defected in April in a state protection facility.

Last month, the Lawyers for a Democratic Society, also referred to as Minbyun, filed a petition with the Seoul Central District Court questioning whether the defectors came to the South out of their own free will, after the country’s top spy agency denied an interview with the defectors.

The defectors themselves did not attend the first hearing at the Seoul Central District Court on Tuesday afternoon, but their legal representatives did. On the same day, the National Intelligence Service (NIS) decided that the 13 North Korean restaurant workers would not be sent to a defector resettlement facility but rather be kept in a protection facility that it operates.

The group of 12 female workers and their male manager who worked at Ryugyong in Ningbo, Zhejiang Province, one of Pyongyang’s many overseas restaurants in China, defected to the South in early April.  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read the rest at the link, but I am still suspicious of these progressive lawyers who seem like they are more about representing North Korean interests than the best interests of these defectors.

US airplanes bomb a train depot near Wonsan, DPRK, in 1950. (via US National Archives). #KoreanWar pic.twitter.com/ORDa7naIlt

— Adam Cathcart (@adamcathcart) June 20, 2016

Hwang In-cheol holds up a sign saying “North Korea…Be Free My Father” at an event to send a letter to U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon in the border city Paju, north of Seoul, on June 17, 2016. His father Hwang Won has been in captivity since December 1969, when a South Korean plane carrying Hwang, a radio producer, and 50 other crew members and passengers was hijacked by a North Korean agent on its way from the eastern South Korean city of Gangneung to Seoul. (Yonhap)

For those interested the story of how Mr. Hwang’s dad was taken hostage can be read at the below link:

• DMZ Flashpoints: The 1969 Hijacking of Korean Airlines YS-11

It appears the North Koreans are determined to keep testing the Musudan until they get it to work:

North Korea is said to have deployed an intermediate-range missile to Wonsan, Gangwon Province on Tuesday.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff said that it is closely monitoring the North for possible missile launches.

A military official said that such preparation follows four failed test-firings of Musudan intermediate-range missiles in April and May.

The military is said to believe that the North will launch a Musudan missile as early as Tuesday or Wednesday.  [KBS World Radio]

You can read more at the link, but four of these Musudans have exploded shortly after launch.  If they keep executing these tests the North Koreans will probably through trial and error eventually get it to work.  The significance of them getting this missile to work is that they can then range US military bases on Okinawa and Guam with the Musudan.

North Korea has "no trust, no expectations" for Trump or Clinton, officials say https://t.co/QJEWa1PCy1

— Alastair Gale (@AlastairGale) June 20, 2016

Well known North Korean sympathizing professor Bruce Cumings thinks a Trump presidency would be interesting based on some of his campaign rhetoric about North Korea:

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump could bring a number of “interesting” things to the U.S. presidency, including how the real estate tycoon would deal with North Korea, an American professor said.

Bruce Cumings, a University of Chicago professor with deep expertise on Korea, made the remark in a recent article in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, noting that Trump has expressed a willingness to hold direct talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.

“If Hillary Clinton becomes president, she will undoubtedly continue the policy of isolation and denuclearization of North Korea. Any number of things would make a Trump presidency interesting, to say the least, but one of them is to see what he would really do in regard to Korea policy,” Cumings said.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.