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“China Should Prepare For Nuclear Conflict”: Beijing Warned To Be Ready As War On Korean Peninsula “Possible At Any Time”

December 17, 2017

“China Should Prepare For Nuclear Conflict”: Beijing Warned To Be Ready As War On Korean Peninsula “Possible At Any Time”

Chinese government advisors and a senior military officer warned Beijing that it must be ready for a war on the Korean peninsula, with the risk of conflict higher than ever before, the SCMP reported on Saturday. They also warned that Beijing, once seen as Pyongyang’s biggest ally with influence over its neighbor, was losing control of the situation.

“Conditions on the peninsula now make for the biggest risk of a war in decades,” said Renmin University international relations professor Shi Yinhong, who also advises the State Council, China’s cabinet. “North Korea is a time bomb. We can only delay the explosion, hoping that by delaying it, a time will come to remove the detonator,” Shi added on the sidelines of a Beijing conference on the crisis.

Shi said US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un were locked in a vicious cycle of threats and it was already too late for China to avert it. However, at best, Beijing could delay a full-blown conflict. Also addressing the conference was Wang Hongguang, former deputy commander of the Nanjing’s Military Region, who warned that war could break out on the Korean peninsula at any time from now on until March when South Korea and the United States held annual military drills.

“It is a highly dangerous period,” Wang said. “Northeast China should mobilise defences for war.”

The warnings continued: Yang Xiyu, a senior fellow at the China Institute of International Studies affiliated with China’s foreign ministry, said conditions on the peninsula were at their most perilous in half a century. “No matter whether there is war or peace, regretfully, China has no control, dominance or even a voice on the issue,” he said. China might already be preparing for the worst.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

ion.

Chinese Navy Begins Live-Fire Drills Off Korean Peninsula

December 15, 2017

Chinese Navy Begins Live-Fire Drills Off Korean Peninsula

Earlier this week, Seoul asked the US to delay joint military exercises with Japan until after the Winter Olympics, ostensibly to avoid provoking North Korea ahead of the 2018 Winter Games. The timing of the request is suspicious – having coincided with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s announcement that the US has offered to begin talks with the North “without preconditions.” While State Department spokesperson Heather Nauert walked back Tillerson’s statement the next day, insisting the North cease its weapons tests before talks can proceed, it is possible such a delay – if undertaken – could be construed as an opening gambit.

US drills in the region have stopped, though it’s unclear whether the US will abide by South Korea’s request. However, the brief lull in the area was interrupted Thursday when local media reported that China has decided to hold military drills of its own.

According to the South China Morning Post, China is now conducting a live-fire exercise off the North Korean peninsula, and is expected to last for four days. In addition to citing security concerns, Beijing also criticized the US for pushing the region toward nuclear war.

The drill in the Bohai Sea started on Thursday afternoon and will last until 4 pm local time next Monday, according to a notice issued by the Liaoning Maritime Safety Administration.

Beijing cordoned off an area of some 276 square kilometers near Lushun in Liaoning province, an important naval base for the People’s Liberation Army’s North Sea Fleet, which is responsible for defending the Bohai and Yellow Seas off the Korean peninsula.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Russia Rebukes US For Sowing “Regional Instability” As Military Drills Begin

December 11, 2017

Russia Rebukes US For Sowing “Regional Instability” As Military Drills Begin

The latest round of military drills involving the US, Japan and South Korea began their latest set of tracking drills on Monday, DW reported, citing sources in the South Korean military.

The drills – which are meant for “practicing tracking an object and sharing information on it among the three countries” – were being held in waters off the coast of Japan, according to Japan’s Defense Minister Itsunori Onodera.

The US and its regional allies are stepping up their military drills in response to North Korea’s decision to test-launch the Hwasong-15, a new ICBM that US intelligence believes has the capacity to strike Washington, DC, as well as nearly any other part of the US – though the degree of accuracy remains questionable.

In response to drills held last week, North Korea warned that it is “ready for nuclear war” with the US. Though its threats have long rung hollow, US, South Korean and Japanese intelligence officials say that the North might soon attain the ability to load a nuclear warhead on its newest ICBM, which would enable it to launch a nuclear strike – or possibly an equally devastating EMP attack.

The exercises are the sixth since June 2016. Two US ships and one each from Japan and South Korea are involved. Meanwhile, the US’s Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) has been deployed in South Korea, infuriating Chinese leaders, who claim there’s little distinction between a missile-defense system and a missile launcher. According to DW, Beijing also worries that THAAD’s radar can peer deep into Chinese territory, compromising its own security.

Following the North’s November test, the US warned Pyongyang that its leadership would be “utterly destroyed” if war erupted. Since then, the Pentagon has staged several shows of force after North Korean military tests.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

These 8 Places Around the World Are Actively Preparing for Nuclear War

December 9, 2017

These 8 Places Around the World Are Actively Preparing for Nuclear War

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Everywhere, it seems like officials are actively preparing for the possibility of nuclear war.

Tensions are high in practically every corner of the world but somehow, despite the proliferation of imminent threats, many people are still blithely unaware of the hell that could be unleashed.

Due to tensions between the US and North Korea, the world is frantically preparing for the possibility of a nuclear attack. The US, China, Russia, North Korea, and South Korea have all shown force with bombers and destroyers, and it seems that it will only be a matter of time before one incident sparks a cascading explosion.

The governments of these 8 places are making preparations, but they’ll be to little avail if people don’t participate and just expect to be rescued.

1) South Korea

In South Korea, their government has urged citizens to get prepared for war, and prepping is becoming mainstream for North Korea’s nearest neighbor and sworn enemy.

The government of South Korea is making every effort to turn its citizens into a country of survivalists. With the ever-increasing threats from the North, South Korean preppers are becoming mainstream, instead of a quirky fringe element…

The South Korean President isn’t taking this lying down. “In case North Korea undertakes provocations against us or our ally, we have the power to destroy (the North) beyond recovery.” This threat most likely will not please the Dear Leader of North Korea, so it’s probably safe to predict even greater hostilities on the horizon.

The South Korean Ministry of Public Administration and Security has issued guidelines for a variety of attacks to their citizens due to the ever-increasing risk of an attack by North Korea…

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

North Korea: US Threats Have Made Outbreak Of War ‘An Established Fact’

December 8, 2017

North Korea: US Threats Have Made Outbreak Of War ‘An Established Fact’

norkor-war-2

North Korea is warning the United States that their “threats” in the form of joint military drills with South Korea are making the outbreak of war “an established fact.” Kim Jong-Un’s regime is now saying that war is unavoidable.

China continues to urge calm between the two heated nations, as two American B-1B heavy bombers joined large-scale combat drills over South Korea on Thursday. These drills are being regarded by North Korea as acts of aggression. According to Reuters, a spokesman for the North’s foreign ministry blamed the drills and “confrontational warmongering” by U.S. officials for making war inevitable.

The flights by the B-1B, one of America’s largest strike aircraft, were supposed to be playing a leading role in Washington’s attempts to increase pressure on North Korea to abandon its weapons program. So far, the flights are having the opposite effect on Kim’s tyrannical regime. In September, B-1Bs were among a formation of U.S. military aircraft that flew further north up North Korea’s coast than at any time in the past 17 years, according to the U.S. Pacific Command. That prompted North Korea’s foreign minister, Ri Yong Ho, to warn that the North could shoot down the U.S. bombers even if they did not enter North Korean airspace.

“The remaining question now is: when will the war break out?” the spokesman said late on Wednesday in a statement carried by North Korea’s official KCNA news agency. “We do not wish for a war but shall not hide from it.”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Weekly Commentary: China Initiating a Global Bear Market?

December 2, 2017

Weekly Commentary: China Initiating a Global Bear Market?

Chair Yellen is widely lauded for her accomplishments at the Federal Reserve. For the most part, her four-year term at the helm of the Fed boils down to four (likely soon to be five) little rate hikes over 24 months. Most lavishing praise upon Janet Yellen believe she calibrated “tightenings” adeptly and successfully. Yet financial conditions have obviously remained much too loose for far too long. This predicament was conspicuous in the markets this week. A test of a North Korean ICBM that could reach the entire U.S. modestly pressured equities for about five minutes – then back to the races.

Bubble Dynamics are in full force. The Dow gained 674 points this week. The Banks were up 5.8%, the Broker/Dealers gained 4.5% and the Transports jumped 5.9%. The Semiconductors were hit 5.6%. Bitcoin traded as high (US spot) as $11,434 and as low as $9,009 in wild Wednesday trading. Curiously, the VIX traded up 15% to 11.43.

It used to be that markets would fret the Fed falling “behind the curve,” fearing central bankers would be compelled to employ more aggressive tightening measures. Not these days. Any fear of central bank-imposed tightening is long gone. There is little fear of anything.

I recall writing similar comments back with the Bush tax cuts: “I’m as much for lower taxes as anyone. Yet I question the end results when tax cuts exacerbate late-stage Bubble excess.” And I seriously question the merits of aggressively slashing corporate tax rates when the federal government is $20 TN in debt. One of these days the bond market is going to wake up and impose some much need fiscal discipline. In a different era, the Treasury market would be forcing some realism upon Washington politicians (and central bankers).

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Little Rocket Man’s Risky Game

December 1, 2017

Little Rocket Man’s Risky Game

In the morning darkness of Wednesday, Kim Jong Un launched an ICBM that rose almost 2,800 miles into the sky before falling into the Sea of Japan.

North Korea now has the proven ability to hit Washington, D.C.

Unproven still is whether Kim can put a miniaturized nuclear warhead atop that missile, which could be fired with precision, and survive the severe vibrations of re-entry. More tests and more time are needed for that.

Thus, U.S. markets brushed off the news of Kim’s Hwasong-15 missile and roared to record heights on Wednesday and Thursday.

President Donald Trump took it less well. “Little Rocket Man” is one “sick puppy,” he told an audience in Missouri.

U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley told the Security Council that “if war comes … the North Korean regime will be utterly destroyed.” She then warned Xi Jinping that “if China does not halt the oil shipments” to North Korea, “we can take the oil situation into our own hands.”

Is Haley talking about bombing pipelines in North Korea — or China?

The rage of the president and bluster of Haley reflect a painful reality: As inhumane and ruthless as the 33-year-old dictator of North Korea is, he is playing the highest stakes poker game on the planet, against the world’s superpower, and playing it remarkably well.

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Reason: Kim may understand us better than we do him, which is why he seems less hesitant to invite the risks of a war he cannot win.

While a Korean War II might well end with annihilation of the North’s army and Kim’s regime, it would almost surely result in untold thousands of dead South Koreans and Americans.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

North Korea Says “Completed State Nuclear Program”; Warns “The Whole US Is In Range”

November 29, 2017

North Korea Says “Completed State Nuclear Program”; Warns “The Whole US Is In Range”

North Korea claims its “new ICBM can put whole U.S. mainland within range,” says it has “realized great historic cause of completing state nuclear force”

* * *

Following the successful test-firing of its longest range ICBM yet today, Yonhap News reports, citing North Korean media, that North Korea will make an important announcement at noon Seoul time (10:30pm ET).

Presumably, Kim’s comments will be a braggadocio reaction to President Trump and General Mattis’ comments (begins around 6:30):

Mattis warned “[North Korea] R&D is accelerating and they now appear to have the capability to launch an ICBM attack on anywhere in the world” to which Trump replied “we will take care of it… it is a situation we will handle.”

Trump then tweeted later this evening: “After North Korea missile launch, it’s more important than ever to fund our gov’t & military! ”

North Korea announces that it “successfully” fired a new Hwasong-15 missile with improved technology, according to an announcement read on state-run television on Wednesday.

Kim gave the order to test fire the missile, state-run Korean Central News Agency said.

“After watching the successful launch of the new type ICBM Hwasong-15, Kim Jong Un declared with pride that now we have finally realized the great historic cause of completing the state nuclear force, the cause of building a rocket power,” KCNA said.

The new missile “brings the whole US mainland within North Korea’s range.”

None of which is news as we already reported these details.

But perhaps the most notable claims is that North Korea says it has “realized great historic cause of completing state nuclear force”

Russian Diplomat’s Warning: ‘Apocalyptic Scenario’ Likely On Korean Peninsula

November 28, 2017

Russian Diplomat’s Warning: ‘Apocalyptic Scenario’ Likely On Korean Peninsula

igormorgulov

The tense situation over North Korea’s nuclear program has one top Russian diplomat sounding the alarm. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Igor Morgulov said that the world can no longer turn a “blind eye” to alarming speed with which North Korea is advancing their weapons of mass destruction.

North Korea’s nuclear program could evolve into an “apocalyptic” scenario, Morgulov said. He was speaking at the opening of the eighth annual Asian Conference of the Valdai Discussion Club, which is being held in Seoul, South Korea, CNBC reports. “I hope that a common sense, pragmatism, and an instinct of self-preservation would prevail among our partners,” Morgulov added.

The Russian diplomat’s remarks come amid global concerns over North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s refusal to abandon his nuclear ambitions despite mounting international pressure. North Korea has conducted a record number of long-range missile tests this year, and in early September it carried out its sixth and most powerful nuclear test.

Tensions continue to heighten as Kim and President Donald Trump trade numerous threats and insults. Over the summer, Trump warned Pyongyang it would be met with “fire and fury” if it didn’t stop threatening the U.S. In late September while addressing the United Nations for the first time, he threatened to “totally destroy” North Korea if it forced the U.S. to defend itself or its allies. In a speech to South Korea’s National Assembly, president Trump denounced Kim’s regime but also offered the erratic leader a path to peace if he agreed to cease long-range missile tests and move toward denuclearization. North Korea rejected his offer and said the president had “begged” for nuclear war during his Asia trip.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Flirting With War in North Korea

November 15, 2017

Flirting With War in North Korea

Photo by Stefan Krasowski | CC BY 2.0

The most surprising part about Donald Trump’s Wednesday speech, directed at the North Korean regime via Tokyo, is that more people of a certain type weren’t gushing over it. After all, if sending cruise missiles at Syria makes a man presidential, condemning North Korea accurately as “a hell that no person deserves” and sounding vaguely concerned about its miserable treatment of its civilians should make Trump worthy of Mr. Rushmore

Trump is locked into an eternal squabble with Kim. This is nothing new for the United States — we’ve been messing with Korea for 70 years. On the other hand, Trump is usually a blowhard almost in the manner that the Kim family tends to be. Trump hasn’t released any dramatic videos of what it would like if the US nuked North Korea, but he’s done the American version — constantly threatening terrible things towards a nation that has had a victim complex since its inception, as well as delivering goofy schoolyard insults like “little rocketman” at a regime that clearly believes that it is to its benefit to acquire and keep nuclear weapons.

Never mind his vague nods to anti-interventionism on the campaign trail. Trump started his presidency by enthusiastically bombing the same countries his predecessors did. He even joined in on the hot new presidential trend, helping to eliminate members of the Awlaki family(and at least a dozen other civilians, in the disastrous SEAL January raid in Yemen).

Now, Trump truly joined the American Empire family with his summer speech to the UN, in which he declared that the US “may have no choice but to totally destroy” North Korea if it does not behave.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Red Lines & Lost Credibility

November 7, 2017

Red Lines & Lost Credibility

A major goal of this Asia trip, said National Security Adviser H. R. McMaster, is to rally allies to achieve the “complete, verifiable and permanent denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.”

Yet Kim Jong Un has said he will never give up his nuclear weapons. He believes the survival of his dynastic regime depends upon them.

Hence we are headed for confrontation. Either the U.S. or North Korea backs down, as Nikita Khrushchev did in the Cuban missile crisis, or there will be war.

In this new century, U.S. leaders continue to draw red lines that threaten acts of war that the nation is unprepared to back up.

Recall President Obama’s, “Assad must go!” and the warning that any use of chemical weapons would cross his personal “red line.”

Result: After chemical weapons were used, Americans rose in united opposition to a retaliatory strike. Congress refused to authorize any attack. Obama and John Kerry were left with egg all over their faces. And the credibility of the country was commensurately damaged.

There was a time when U.S. words were taken seriously, and we heeded Theodore Roosevelt’s dictum: “Speak softly, and carry a big stick.”

After Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait in August 1991, George H.W. Bush said simply: “This will not stand.” The world understood that if Saddam did not withdraw from Kuwait, his army would be thrown out. As it was.

But in the post-Cold War era, the rhetoric of U.S. statesmen has grown ever more blustery, even as U.S. relative power has declined. Our goal is “ending tyranny in our world,” bellowed George W. Bush in his second inaugural.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Real Nuclear Triad: Energy, Weapons and Waste

November 7, 2017

The Real Nuclear Triad: Energy, Weapons and Waste

Photo by Maxwell Hamilton | Public Domain

Clear and Present Danger

Never before has the unbreakable connection between nuclear energy, weapons and waste been so blatantly obvious to the public eye…yet, with so little notice.

Although President Trump has threatened to obliterate North Korea and its 25 million people ‘with fire and fury the like of which the world has never seen,’ the NYT is reporting that America’s Asian allies doubt Washington’s ‘resolve’ to defend them with nuclear weapons and they want their own – an idea recently also floated by Trump himself.

In a new twist on the last century’s discredited ‘Atoms for Peace’ meme, the new nuclear delusion seems to be that the more countries that have nuclear weapons (Iran and North Korea excepted), the more ‘secure’ the world will become.

Speaking recently at Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota, Trump’s VP Mike Pence, a self-declared devout Christian who ‘gave my life to Jesus,’ declared “… there’s no greater force for peace in the world than the United States nuclear arsenal.”

Implication: every country should feel safer if they have a nuclear arsenal of their own. That seems precisely Kim Jong-Un’s own calculus, given his country’s previous horrific carpet-bombing experience with the US – “we… eventually burned down every town in North Korea,” Gen. Curtis LeMay told Congress – not to mention the recent history of Iraq, Libya and Syria.

Nuclear Circular Firing Squad

As agitation reportedly builds in South Korea and Japan for building their own nuclear arsenals, the Times reveals that, as a result of the radioactive waste output of their already existing nuclear energy reactor fleets, each of these tiny countries has accumulated enough weapons-grade plutonium to produce – respectively – 4,600 and 6,000 nuclear bombs.

How about that? Nations without their own ‘commercial power’ nukes must certainly take note.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Pentagon Says Securing North Korean Nuclear Sites Would Require “Ground Invasion”

November 5, 2017

Pentagon Says Securing North Korean Nuclear Sites Would Require “Ground Invasion”

With President Donald Trump arriving in Japan today to kick off a 10-day Asia tour, the Washington Post is reporting that the only way to locate and secure all of North Korea’s nuclear weapons sites “with complete certainty” would be a ground invasion, and in the event of conflict, Pyongyang could use biological and chemical weapons, the Pentagon told lawmakers in a newly released assessment of what war on the Korean Peninsula might look like.

The Pentagon, in a letter to lawmakers, said that a full discussion of U.S. capabilities to “counter North Korea’s ability to respond with a nuclear weapon and to eliminate North Korea’s nuclear weapons located in deeply buried, underground facilities” is best suited for a classified briefing.

The letter also said that Pentagon leaders “assess that North Korea may consider the use of biological weapons” and that the country “has a long-standing chemical weapons program with the capability to produce nerve, blister, blood and choking agents.”

The Pentagon repeated that a detailed discussion of how the United States would respond to the threat could not be discussed in public.

The letter noted that Seoul, the South Korean capital, is a densely populated area with 25 million residents.

The Pentagon’s candid assessment appears to validate claims made by former White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon, who famously said in an interview with the American Prospect before he was forced out of his White House job that there are no “good” military options for toppling the Kim regime. A ground invasion, he said, would lead to millions of casualties in the South Korean capital of Seoul from conventional weapons fire.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Make No Mistake: “Tensions Are Heating Up” With North Korea

November 5, 2017

Make No Mistake: “Tensions Are Heating Up” With North Korea

kimjongunwar

Unprecedented actions occurred over the last two weeks as the tensions between the United States and North Korea remain at an all-time high. The North Koreans (as reported by Reuters and AP news) have been conducting mass evacuation drills for cities and towns. These drills have been augmented with “blackout” drills, where lights are either cut or masked in homes and businesses to make them less readily visible.

U.S. Secretary of defense Mattis has announced that President Trump (who travels with the “football,” the apparatus with the nuclear launch codes) will not be limited by Congress and will act on his (the President’s) executive authority to conduct a first-strike against North Korea. Mattis went on to say that such would occur if North Korea had either launched, or if a launch was imminent against the U.S. Although these statements were not ambiguous, the latter is certainly subjective: after a nuclear war or strike, how would it be verified that a launch by North Korea had been imminent?

A new Cold War has taken shape and materialized over the course of the past several years. The Mainstream Media (MSM) is quick to “paint” one side as the “hero/good guy” and the other as the “villain.” In this case the villain in journalistic obfuscation (the piece is “journalistic” and not objective journalism) is the The Sun. Here are two excerpts. You make the call, with the underlined words being the “sticking point”:

“President Donald Trump sent a nuclear-capable B-2 stealth bomber from Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri on a long-range mission to the Pacific this weekend.”

Here’s number two:

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

South Korea Says Another North Korean Missile Test Is Imminent

November 2, 2017

South Korea Says Another North Korean Missile Test Is Imminent

It has been more than six weeks since North Korea has conducted a missile test, the longest lull so far this year, but that could be about to change, Reuters reported, citing unnamed South Korean military officials.

South Korean intelligence has detected a flurry of activity including the movement of vehicles has been detected at the North’s missile research facilities in Pyongyang, where the most recent missile test was conducted, pointing to another possible launch, South Korea’s Intelligence Service said in a briefing to lawmakers. It did not say how the activity was detected.

To be sure, this isn’t the first time South Korea has detected movement near the launch site. Similar reports emerged one month ago. The restive North also abstained during an Oct. 10 national holiday, and the Oct. 18 beginning of China’s National Party Congress. It’s believed North Korea is developing a new long range missile capable of reliably striking targets on the US mainland. Meanwhile, the North has made no secret of its plans to perfect a nuclear-tipped missile capable of reaching the U.S. mainland. It regularly threatens to destroy the United States and its “puppet”, South Korea.

“There is a possibility of a new missile launch given the active movement of vehicles around the missile research institute in Pyongyang. The North will constantly push for further nuclear tests going forward, and the miniaturization and diversification of warheads,” the intelligence agency said at the briefing.

As the North prepares for its next missile test, concerns surrounding its nuclear-testing facility in the northwestern town of Punngye-ri have intensified as scientists from China, the US and South Korea have warned that another nuclear test could trigger a full-on collapse of the mountain above the underground test site.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

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