North Korea Warns on War on Penninsula

[G_j]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-4518221,00.html

North Korea Warns on War on Penninsula

Monday September 27, 2004 7:01 PM


UNITED NATIONS (AP) - North Korea warned on Monday that the danger of war on the Korean peninsula ``is snowballing'' and blamed the United States Monday for intensifying threats to attack the Communist nation and destroying the basis for negotiations to resolve the dispute over Pyongyang's nuclear program.

But Vice Foreign Minister Choe Su Hon told the U.N. General Assembly's ministerial meeting that North Korea is still ready to dismantle its nuclear program if Washington abandons its ``hostile policy'' and is prepared to coexist peacefully.

At the moment, however, he said ``the ever intensifying U.S. hostile policy and the clandestine nuclear-related experiments recently revealed in South Korea are constituting big stumbling blocks'' and make it impossible for North Korea to participate in the continuation of six-nation talks on its nuclear program.

``Therefore, if the six-party talks are to be resumed, the basis for the talks demolished by the United States should be properly set up and the truth of the secret nuclear experiments in South Korea clarified completely,'' Choe said.

..more..

[Az_lefty]

1. good grief....I thought the headline said "War on Pennsylvania"

[Salluc]

37. War on Pennsylvania - LOl

I know this is a fantastically serious issue, but I have to admit I love your malapropism. That would be a story about the Republicans, not NK.

[daleo]

2. North Korea doesn't even need nukes to create mushroom clouds

Imagine the mushroom clouds they could manage if the "actually" had atomic weapons.

[Radius]

3. Translation

We are starving over here, the motherland folded up and the Chinese have cut us off. Our million man army is really hungry. Can you hurry up and bail us out?

[tedzbear]

4. Your translation is American media propaganda.

I'm afraid the million man army is well fed and ready to roll at a moment's notice (not to mention their five nukes). It's the civilians who are starving and living in poverty.

IMHO, N Korea is China's "wayward" stepson who commits the necessary provocations to remind the USA that China, not Japan, is the big boss in Asia. N Korea dances to the strings pulled by Beijing.

:nuke:


correction: sp.

[AndyTiedye]

5. That's an Awfully Conciliatory-Sounding Threat

[saskatoon]

18. andy's post

yes and the way I read that was "if the USA had anyone else in their other than Bush they might be able to cut a deal but they aren't about to with that smart ass.

[Radius]

6. They have had 50 years

to do something, they haven't.

They have no foreign economy other than selling weapons and drugs.

War on the peninsula would screw up Chinese money. They like money and their cheap labor has made them plenty. Open war would really mess that up.

Beijing greed has been around longer than the little red book.

IMHO

Edit: They are a parasite, looking for a host.

[tedzbear]

9. Of course China won't let N Korea actually start a war.

That is not their objective. Beijing hopes N Korea's threats will keep the Asian sphere of influence under its control. The whole point is to keep Japan and the USA in the back seat while China drives the car.

[PATRICK]

12. That common sense won't look so hot in

retrospect. War madness can be only one incident away if the peace structures are stripped away as they have been. The reason they have done nothing of course is the guarantee of losing and that China is against another, worse repeat, an impossible replay of the first Korean War.

Yet conducting diplomacy like ravenous clowns ourselves facing a less than stable dictatorship does not guarantee reason will prevail. Call their bluff too many times and who knows? Actually we have come perilously close to touching off the touchy paranoid North. We did not act then like stupid adolescents teasing the lions. That is the Viagra soaked neocon chortling going on now. It is a guarantee of bad trouble that FINALLY the nation is vaguely becoming aware of- thanks to the North simply having nukes.

Larger issues are still ignored which are even more dangerous in the long term. All to bait a cornered wolf, while the administration indolently goes about the business of pillaging the world's resources. This is the character of our clown- and those whose voices he heeds.

[Radius]

14. NK

Has been nuts for years. Clinton came very close to a war with them.
China has no interest in aiding North Korea. China cut their oil off to get their attention, called it a technical malfunction.
China is interested in the Dollar and continuing economic growth. The big losers here would be S. Korea or Japan. Who would be targets of a first conventional strike. China has no interest in coming to help them like they did in the 50's. After a conventional strike, NK would be systematically destroyed. Do not confuse winning peace and guerrilla war and open war. Iraq now is not a reflection on open warfare capability. In an open war NK would lose air protection in a day or two and then be hammered to pieces with b52, b1, f-x strikes round the clock. This would involve major cities and loss of life on a huge scale. NK has no naval capability to speak of and the PAC fleet would assist in doing massive damage. They would be subjected to complete devastation.

NK does not want a war they can't win. China doesn't want a war period. Japan is a considerable military power and has no onterest in being attacked by NK. In reality we don't want a war either.

In a nuclear scenario the scenario is so unbalanced that it is not even worth discussing. I would be sure f-117 and b-2's are prepared to penetrate their airspace and deliver a first strike should the conditions be met. If they fire first the subs will kill them all. Thousands of megatons dumped on them would stop their ability to function at any level. They aren't even a confirmed nuclear power.

But this is moot, because their economic system has proven not-viable and they are looking for a host. A big juicy titty to suck on because they can't hack it in the asian economic system.

[daleo]

21. Review your history of World War I

When major powers get involved in a war with smaller powers, other major powers can be dragged in very quickly, whether by entangling alliances or just a desire to protect a status quo or perceived balance of power. Unloading planeloads full of nuclear bombs or missiles on North Korea could produce a global conflagration very quickly. This is a very dangerous prospect, especially with an intellectual lightweight like Bush at the helm.

[jayfish]

22. You Leave Out A Couple...

key consequences in your scenario. The first being the destruction of Seoul and the massive loss of life stemming from that destruction. In your scenario NK gets to pound Seoul for, at-least, two days with it's 5000+ artillery tubes. Once NK air-defense is down (two days seems a bit optimistic IMO)it would probably take weeks to destroy those batteries and render them ineffective as a tactical threat. The second consequence would be the likely death of thousands of American military personnel north of Seoul and south of the DMZ. Finally, I'm not so sure it would be that easy for America to launch such a disproportionately massive retaliatory nuclear strike in response to a nuclear detonation by NK. There are more people than just the North and South Koreans who would be affected by such a strike (most notably China) and they would not be real happy. For once though I would have to agree with the rest of your assessment.

Jay

[Radius]

30. NPR

Not the radio station. Would dictate that if nuclear weapons were used against troops we would respond in kind.

If they nuked our people in SK or Japan they would receive a massive nuclear strike in return. China and SK would not be part of the equation. China has no interest in a nuclear war with us. They can not maintain mad equivalence against the current arsenal.

We have sold the south Koreans radar guided counter battery systems like MLARS. We also maintain our systems there. These also tie into air control systems. Their arty would kill tens of thousands but as a fairly static system would take counter battery from much more advanced systems. It would be a horrible thing.

I really hope this is all moot. Judging from the past 50 years, including some very hot incidents, they are just making noise.

[Sterling]

31. "Clinton came very close to a war with them."?

I think you are over stating it just a tad. He never used the kind of axis of evil rhetoric and I don't remember a huge build up of military power over there on our part during his two terms either.

[Radius]

33. It was close

Remember the picture of him on the FOP with the binocs. That was a hot period of this old conflict.

Much to his credit he never used that rhetoric.

[jayfish]

36. It Was Much Closer Than The Axis Of Evil Rhetoric.

Clinton had plans to attack N. Korea reactor

<SNIP>
ROTTERDAM, The Netherlands -- Former U.S. President Bill Clinton says he had plans in the early 1990s to attack and destroy North Korea's nuclear facilities after the secretive communist state was found to be producing weapons-grade plutonium.

At the time, he said, North Korea had plans to produce between six and eight nuclear weapons per year.

"We actually drew up plans to attack North Korea and to destroy their reactors and we told them we would attack unless they ended their nuclear program," Clinton told a security forum in the Dutch port city of Rotterdam Sunday.
</SNIP>

I remember that we sent also a bunch of Patriot systems over there and had lots of ships on the move. It was pretty dicey.

Jay

[saskatoon]

19. Patrick's post

Wish I could have put it that succintly. I agree heartily with all you said, you made excellent points.

[shadu]

7. You are one smart bear!

The US ain't messin' with NK now or anytime soon.
China would sink our battleship!
Between the US debt they hold and the products we
buy from them they have us over a barrel.
NK knows this, of course.

[shadu]

8. China would not allow US troops on her eastern front

No troops. No bases. None of it.
They could sink our economy without firing a
single shot. This war is over before it begins.

[tedzbear]

10. Good point.

China doesn't have to fire one shot. They can start selling our bonds and hold Euros instead of dollars in their reserves.

But they would pay a price starting an economic war: recession and deflation.

[Radius]

11. China's economy is tied to ours at the hip..

If we sink, so do they. We are their largest customer.

There will be no war, the norcomms are looking for a concession.

They are running out of friends, IMHO.

[olddad56]

13. here is yet another theory.

That North Korea is playing it straight up. Perhaps they are telling The Bush administration that they are willing to engage in all out nuclear war if provoked. And maybe, just maybe, that is the reason the Bush administration will continue to provoke them. Maybe George Almighty is thinking that the sooner he can bring about Armageddon, the sooner he and the other chosen few will be whisked away in that big silver spaceship to that new home in the sun. Don't forget that this cowboy isn't about conventional logic. Perhaps war everywhere is part of his plan. Perhaps God told him that this was what needed to happen. Just food for thought, I don't really believe this theory, but if it can be imagined, it can happen.

One thing that I can't imagine is 4 more years of Bush without nuclear bombs going off somewhere on the planet.

[Radius]

15. No MAD

They could strike out with a few nuclear weapons (that they might not even have) and would be answered with thousands of megatons of nuclear weapons. They would all die. The equation is unbalanced.

A nuclear weapon going off somewhere in our lifetime is a very probable event. This will happen regardless of who is in office. It is a constant threat.

[PATRICK]

16. Fear plus paranoia equals peace?

We had better add something else to that equation. It is not rational or stable and neither are many NK leaders and officers with their families starving. All they need is some far fetched plan and a match. OR they will find other covert means under this pressure. Anyone saner nation would rather than simply surrender the keys to Bushco.

[PATRICK]

17. This presumption

with its sense of security is typical of pre 911 Bush. "Who woulda thought?" A great justification in retrospect were it not for the criminal inattention and goading leading up to another nightmare coming true.

[Radius]

24. Catch-22

The choices are very limited here:

We can support them financially and they will continue to export weapons and be nuts. We've tried this they just fucked us over.

We can encourage them to join the Asian economy and be productive. Working pretty well for china. But they don't seem to receptive to this. They being Lil Kim.

We can take a defensive posture like we have for 50 years. Wait for them to implode, like the USSR.

We can hit them first.

None are a really good choice. Unless you have a crystal ball they could all be justified in hindsight. The only logical thing to do is to be defensive and wait them out. Hopefully the Chinese will assist here because they don't want their economy messed up by the norcomms.

[bpilgrim]

23. "The equation is unbalanced"

you can say that again...

NK got W over a barrel, yet we got TOTAL SPECTRUM DOMINANCE over them.

the world fears what WE might do first MORE than they do NK these days and NK knows we won't risk moving first against NK while we are stuck in Iraq, so they use the cover of our EXTREME BEHAVIOR to move their agenda forward while we are left with only 1 option, the unthinkable, if we did decide to move against them.

of course with the neoCONs at the helm there is no tell'n just what they might do next...


peace

[Radius]

27. Cool Pic

But I think they really are looking for concessions, ie money. They have no real economy. They are a parasitic nation looking for an infusion of cash.

There are reserves in Europe and at home that could be used in an open war. Open being like gw1 and the beginning of gw2. Massive military strikes from the air. General bombing of cities and military assets. They would be hit hard from air and sea the minute the crossed the 38th and would get no reprieve. Infantry assaults, not guerrilla win the peace kind of actions. Nuclear weapons don't have to be used to run over NK. NK knows this. South Korea is not a pushover and would not sit by and be overrun.

They haven't done anything yet. They have had plenty of time to exploit the Iraq situation, they have not.

This is a pattern for them, they have always been big saber rattlers, for as long as I can remember. Nothing new about this weenie shake.

[bpilgrim]

32. 2.5 mile wide mushroom cloud

"They have had plenty of time to exploit the Iraq situation, they have not."

is their nuclear program still active?
are they upstaging the neoCONs msg 'the world is a safer place'?

ball's in the neoCONs court and we can't move militarily on them now unless we use nukes and everyone KNOWS this.

peace

[Radius]

34. They were

See edit*
sure quick to invite everyone to check it out. We would have detected fallout if they set off a nuke, as well as thermal signature, and gamma bloom.

No one knows what they have but Lil Kim. But we have massive naval and air capability and 100k plus troops in Europe. Not every guy and gal in the military is in Iraq.

We aren't talking hearts and minds here. This would be a huge open war, conventional, and they would loose. Everyone would loose.

We would not go nuke first, didn't the first time wouldn't now.

They are weenie shaking to get a handout, IMHO.


Edit: If you were talking about the shot in your post my mistake. I figured you were referring to their unexplained cloud. Ignore OT comments.

[G_j]

25. you are only supposed to

think that in private!

"I can't imagine is 4 more years of Bush without nuclear bombs going off somewhere on the planet. "

...but yes, he is quite capable of that I fear.

[Parche]

20. north korea

I hope they have a pre emptive war and invade a country
just like the US

[TrogL]

26. See what moving those ships caused

Dubya wants war with North Korea before November. He's out of troops, so it's going to be nuclear.

[Radius]

29. Old School

You forget the primary mission of the US military has been to fight a two front war since ww2. This would be a classic open war.

USSR and China were the original assumed players.

There are reserves in Europe, japan, s Korea and else where. The US maintains 2 surface fleets, fractions of one are committed in the gulf. Entire carrier groups are tasked in the pacific.

If they kicked off a war, which they will not, they would not be able to maintain air cover and would be bombed relentlessly. They have a million man army, we killed more Chinese in the Korean war than that, without, B52s, Stealth Jets, and the ability to pour explosives on them 24x7. South Korea had no defensive capability. They are a functional military, trained, and equipped with modern weapons. NK uses soviet era equipment. This would be an open war, not a win the peace deal, like Iraq. It would kill millions of people.

NK has no interest in being crushed.

In a nuclear war they have no chance.

[oneighty]

28. Oh boy!

Another Korean war.

This time I will not go.

180

[goodboy]

35. But we're safer now, right? nt