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The war drums are starting to beat again.

The North Korean media lashed out at the “double-dealing” US for “hatching a criminal plot” against Pyongyang, days after Donald Trump told Secretary of State Mike Pompe to cancel his upcoming trip to North Korea. In an editorial, Rodong Sinmun, the official newspaper of the North’s ruling party, said that US units based in Okinawa, Japan were staging drills aimed at “infiltration into Pyongyang.” The paper was citing an unnamed South Korean media outlet.

The US “is busy staging secret drills involving man-killing special units while having a dialogue with a smile on its face,” the paper wrote, adding that Pyongyang cannot help but note “the double-dealing attitudes” of Washington.

Resorting to language last week during the peak of the tensions between the US and North Korea, the newspaper said that “such acts prove that the US is hatching a criminal plot to unleash a war against the DPRK [North Korea] and commit a crime which deserves merciless divine punishment.”

The editorial, which did not mention the Pompeo visit, urged Washington to give up the “pointless military gamble” and implement the Singapore agreement, in which the leaders pledged to work towards a complete denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula.

It wasn’t clear which drills the North was referring to; Okinawa is host to nearly half of the 47,000 US troops based in Japan. The troops repeatedly hold military exercises in the area.

A spokesman at the US Embassy in Seoul told Reuters that he had no information about the military exercise mentioned in the paper.

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

The Coming Crisis with Iran

April 4, 2018

The Coming Crisis with Iran

Photo by DAVID HOLT | CC BY 2.0

With the appointments of Mike Pompeo as secretary of state and John Bolton as national security adviser, Donald Trump has signaled his preparedness by the May 12deadline to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal and ramp up pressure on North Korea if it refuses to denuclearize. The two moves would have interactive consequences: casting aside the Iran nuclear deal is likely to be read in Pyongyang as indicating that the US cannot be trusted to keep its commitments. It might also be read as a signal that should nuclear talks with Trump fail, a US attack on North Korea’s missile and nuclear sites could be in the offing.

The always precarious state of US relations with Iran, and with the Middle East as a whole, will be blown apart should Trump nix the nuclear deal. Iran is likely to immediately resume production of nuclear-weapon grade materials. US relations with its European allies will be deeply unsettled, another bitter pill will be added to relations with Russia and China (both of which endorsed the nuclear deal), the Israeli far right will be emboldened to join in pressuring (and perhaps attacking) Iran, and the Saudis and others will be encouraged to produce their own nuclear weapons.

Most important of all, ending US participation in the nuclear agreement will bring it closer to war with Iran. In John Bolton we already have a top official who is on record as favoring an attackon Iran’s, as well as North Korea’s, nuclear facilities. That record is consistently wrong in its predictions about Iran; Bolton made it appear that war was inevitable and negotiations with Iran a fruitless alternative. Especially worrisome is his obliviousness to international law and to the human consequences of belligerent actions.

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

If There’s a War in Korea, Blame Trump

February 6, 2018

If There’s a War in Korea, Blame Trump

Brainwashed Americans believe that Kim Jong-un is responsible for the confrontation between Pyongyang and Washington, but nothing could be further from the truth. The real problem is not Kim’s nuclear weapons but Washington’s 65 year-long military occupation that continues to reinforce a political solution that was arbitrarily imposed on a sovereign nation in order to split the country in two, install a puppet regime in the south, establish a permanent military presence to defend US commercial interests, and maintain control of a strategically-located territory that is a critical part of Washington’s plan to encircle Russia and China to remain the dominant global power throughout the century. Simply put, Washington is 100 percent responsible for the current confrontation just as it has been responsible for every flare-up for the last 7 decades.

Even so, fighting back against the relentless outpouring of US-backed state propaganda is no easy task. So allow me to defend the position of the DPRK with just one, brief analogy that will help to put things into perspective:

Imagine if the Korean army decided to deploy tens of thousands of combat troops to fight on the side of the South during the Civil War. And let’s say, that these forces were so successful that they were able to kill 3 million Americans while reducing every business and factory, every home and hospital, every church and university, to smoldering rubble. As a result of Korean meddling, the North was unable to win the war, but was forced to settle for an armistice that permanently split the US into North and South allowing Korea to install its stooges in the capitol of Richmond while it established military bases in every southern state from Virginia to Louisiana.

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

Who Are the Leading State Sponsors of Terrorism?

December 31, 2017

Who Are the Leading State Sponsors of Terrorism?

As 2017 draws to a close, it is difficult to be optimistic about what will be coming in the new year. The American President, whose margin of victory was certainly based on his pledge to avoid unnecessary wars, has doubled down on Afghanistan, refuses to leave Syria even though ISIS has been defeated, and is playing serious brinksmanship with a psychopathic and unpredictable regime in Pyongyang. The White House has also bought into the prevailing largely fabricated narrative about a Russia and has decided to arm Ukraine with offensive weapons, which has already resulted in a sharp response from Moscow and will make détente of any kind between the two leading powers all but impossible in the upcoming year.

But, as I have observed before, the red hazard light that continues to be blinking most brightly relates to Washington’s relationship with Iran, which has unnecessarily deteriorated dramatically over the past year and which brings with it collateral problems with Russia and Turkey that could trigger a much wider conflict. I say unnecessarily because all the steps taken to poison the relationship have come out of Washington, not Tehran. The Trump administration refused to certify that the Iranians had been in compliance with the nuclear agreement negotiated in 2015 and has since escalated its verbal attacks, mostly at the United Nations, claiming that the regime in Tehran is the major source of terrorism in the world and that it is seeking hegemony over a broad arc of countries running westward from its borders to the Mediterranean Sea.

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

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…

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…

North Korea Conducts Mass Evacuation Drills, Blackout Exercises

October 29, 2017

North Korea Conducts Mass Evacuation Drills, Blackout Exercises

A rare blackout exercise and mass evacuation drill took place in North Korea last week according to NK News, citing “multiple sources.” The wartime preparations were not visible in Pyongyang, but were seen in “secondary, tertiary cities and towns” on the eastern coast of the country. NK News and “multiple sources” stressed these drills are “extremely rare.” Such “blackout and evacuation” drills are extremely rare in North Korea, multiple other sources with long experience working inside or on the country told NK News, making it difficult to gauge their purpose amid the current atmosphere.

Chun In-bum, a retired three star lieutenant general from the South Korean army, said “I have never heard of this type of training exercises before in North Korea, but am not surprised. They must realize how serious the situation is.” An NK News confidential “source” with-in North Korea added to the gravity of the situation: “I have never heard of evacuation exercises happening before.”

“There used to be air raid drills in 2003, but not since then,” the source said, who didn’t want to be identified due to the sensitivities of talking about military issues to the media. “A mass evacuation would be impossible not to notice.”

The North Korean war preparation exercise drill takes place as the U.S. Navy plans to stage an extremely rare, three-carrier exercise in the next few weeks off the Korean Peninsula, which could coincide with President Trump’s visit to South Korea, Japan, and China next month. The joint drills, the first in 10 years, are possible because of a rare confluence of carrier deployment schedules, according to the Pentagon.

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

Associated Press Associates Itself With War

October 26, 2017

Associated Press Associates Itself With War

Robert Burns and Matthew Pennington of the Associated Press tell us:

“U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis is visiting the Korean Peninsula at a momentous juncture in the faltering effort to persuade Pyongyang to halt and dismantle its nuclear weapons program. Ominous questions hang in the air.”

Why momentous? North Korea has in the past been successfully so persuaded. And it’s subsequently been antagonized and threatened until it recommenced. This has gone on for decades, while it’s been 64 years since a peace treaty should have been signed that never has been. It’s been 14 years since North Korea resumed building nukes. It’s been ten grueling months of Trump’s regime during which nasty comments and threats have been passed back and forth across the Pacific schoolyard. What makes this moment momentous? Stay tuned. AP will explain.

“Is diplomacy failing? Is war approaching?”

Is the wind blowing? Are you kidding? Are diplomacy and war external forces that impose themselves on humanity? North Korea has been very clear and reasonable in its demands, even while screaming its threats and defiance. If the United States will stop moving missiles and planes and ships close to a country it once destroyed, and stop threatening to destroy it again, North Korea will discuss doing what Iraq and Libya did before they were attacked: disarming. The question is not “Is war approaching?” “Ominously!” The question is: will Trump and his subordinates continue to refuse to negotiate? Will they insist on war?

“Mattis’ second trip as Pentagon boss to Seoul will take place Friday, following his consultations with Asian partners on a unified approach to resolve the North Korea crisis. In the Philippines, his Japanese counterpart spoke darkly of an ‘unprecedented, critical and imminent’ threat posed by the North’s repeated demonstrations of its ability to launch an intercontinental-range missile, potentially armed with a nuclear warhead.”

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

CONFIRMED: North Korea has enough oil to survive embargo

September 10, 2017

CONFIRMED: North Korea has enough oil to survive embargo

While a full scale oil embargo against North Korea is unlikely, the reality is that North Korea would be able to survive such a measure with comparative ease.

The United States has recently suggested a global oil embargo against North Korea, something both China and Russia oppose. The DPRK’s neighbours to the north support UN sanctions against Pyongyang, but have firmly opposed unilateral US sanctions against North Korea.

Russia and China have made a commitment never to support sanctions against Pyongyang which could negatively impact on the civilian population of their neighbour and this would almost certainly include a full-scale oil embargo.

On the contrary, Russia’s plan to de-escalate tensions on the Korean peninsula is to develop trilateral economic initiatives linking South and North Korea to Russia. Given the realities on the peninsula, Russia’s ‘carrot’ is seen as preferable on both sides of the 38th parallel to Washington’s increasingly bellicose ‘stick’.

But even if Donald Trump was somehow able to convince the world to engage in an oil embargo against North Korea, North Korea would appear to have enough domestic oil reserves to make up for the loss of imports.

In addition to large reserves of domestic coal and the increased reliance on green energy in the form of hydroelectric power , North Korea’s domestic oil reserves are likely far greater than previous conservative estimates have indicated.

Even prior to the new threat of sanctions, North Korea has been increasingly self-sufficient in beginning to tap its still largely unused oil reserves.

In 2015, when relations between the DPRK and the rest of the world were somewhat better than they are at present, independent oil exploration expert Michael Rego investigated North Korea’s oil potential.

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

China Warns Trump: “We Will Back North Korea If The US Strikes First”

September 10, 2017

China Warns Trump: “We Will Back North Korea If The US Strikes First”

All day Saturday, South Korea braced for a possible new missile test by North Korea as the provocative northern neighbor marked its founding anniversary, just days after its sixth and largest nuclear test rattled global financial markets and further escalated tensions in the region. Throughout the week, South Korean officials warned the North could launch another intercontinental ballistic missile, in defiance of U.N. sanctions and to further provoke the US. As Reuters reports, Pyongyang marks its founding anniversary each year with a big display of pageantry and military hardware. Last year, North Korea conducted its fifth nuclear test on the Sept. 9 anniversary.

Ultimately, September 9 came and went, and North Korea did nothing, perhaps signalling its eagerness to de-escalate. Or perhaps not, and Kim is simply looking to surprise his adversaries with the ICBM launch date. Experts have said the rogue, isolated regime is close to its goal of developing a powerful nuclear weapon capable of reaching the United States, something Trump has vowed to prevent.

Celebrating its founding anniversary, a front-page editorial of the Saturday edition of North Korea’s official Rodong Sinmun said the country should make “more high-tech Juche weapons to continuously bring about big historical events such as a miraculous victory of July 28.”. The July date refers to the intercontinental ballistic missile test (Juche is North Korea’s homegrown ideology of self-reliance that is a mix of Marxism and extreme nationalism preached by state founder Kim Il Sung, the current leader’s grandfather).

Meanwhile, South Korean nuclear experts, checking for contamination, said on Friday they had found minute traces of radioactive xenon gas but that it was too early to link it to Sunday’s explosion.

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

“Armageddon Risk” Returns: North Korea Predicts “Catastrophe” As Massive U.S. War Games Begin Monday

August 18, 2017

“Armageddon Risk” Returns: North Korea Predicts “Catastrophe” As Massive U.S. War Games Begin Monday

Traders barely had time to enjoy the lull from the “Armageddon trade” – the rising possibility of a nuclear exchange between the US and North Korea, which peaked over the weekend when various US officials said a nuclear war is not imminent, echoed by a statement by N. Korea’s state-run news agency KCNA, before a new set of worries promptly took over, chief among them the ongoing slow motion train wreck in Donald Trump’s administration coupled with yesterday’s double terrorist attacks in Spain. Alas, “nuclear war” risk is about to come back with a vengeance because on Monday US and South Korea are scheduled to begin joint military exercises, a massive show of force which every time in the past has infuriated North Korea, sometimes triggering a show of force.

Held every fall in South Korea, the Ulchi-Freedom Guardian war games are the world’s largest computerized command and control exercise. Some 30,000 U.S. soldiers and more than 50,000 South Korean troops usually take part, along with hundreds of thousands of first responders and civilians, some practicing for a potential chemical weapons attack.

Scheduled long before the recent diplomatic fallout between Washington and Pyongyang, the U.S. and South Korean militaries will simulate warfare with North Korea from Aug. 21 to 31, well aware that North Korea could respond with another missile test, according to McClatchy.

In light of this perceived provocation by North Korea, which will almost certainly prompt some reaction, Scott A. Snyder, a Korea specialist with the Council on Foreign Relations said “Over the course of the next two weeks I expect tensions to escalate. This is always a sensitive issue, but it is more hair-trigger as the North Koreans are very sensitive to the likely additional nuclear-capable aircraft flyovers.”

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

An Angry Beijing Responds: “We Will Never Dance To Trump’s Tune”

August 3, 2017

An Angry Beijing Responds: “We Will Never Dance To Trump’s Tune”

With just one day to go until the Trump administration launches the first salvo in what could develop into a full-scale trade war between the US and China, there is the issue of a diplomatic (hopefully) resolution of escalating situation in North Korea, one which Citi today said is “increasingly likely” to involve military action. On this issue, China is becoming increasingly displeased with Trump’s relentless twitter badgering, and as AFP reports, “Trump-style outbursts are no way to get China to bend to the US’s will.”

The animosity between D.C. and Beijing has been building up for months, as the two capitals have long traded blame over the failure to rein in the North, but last week’s breakthrough in North Korean missile technology has raised the specter of a strike by Pyongyang on American cities, escalating the rhetoric.

“I am very disappointed in China,” President Donald Trump tweeted after the North boasted last week that the entire mainland US was within range of its intercontinental ballistic missiles. “Our foolish past leaders have allowed them to make hundreds of billions of dollars a year in trade, yet they do NOTHING for us with North Korea, just talk.”

While China – North Korea’s main trade partner and ally – has repeatedly countered that it does not hold the key to the crisis and has rejected Trump’s attempts to link the issue to the trade relationship, keeping official responses to Trump’s 140-character outbursts restrained, state media has been less muted.

“Trump is quite a personality,” an opinion piece published Monday by the Xinhua state news agency said. “But emotional venting cannot become a guiding policy for solving the nuclear issue … and even less should (the US) stab China in the back.”

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

North Korea claims fully successful ‘miniaturized hydrogen bomb’ test

January 6, 2016

North Korea claims fully successful ‘miniaturized hydrogen bomb’ test

North Korea has announced it has successfully tested a miniaturized hydrogen bomb following an “artificial seismic event” that has likely become the country’s fourth known nuclear test.

In a “special and important” announcement at noon, North Korean TV claimed that the country has successfully conducted a hydrogen bomb test at 10:00am local time.

“Through the test conducted with indigenous wisdom, technology and efforts, the DPRK fully proved that the technological specifications of the newly developed H-bomb for the purpose of [the] test were accurate and scientifically verified the power of [the] smaller H-bomb,” the statement said.

“It was confirmed that the H-bomb test, conducted in a safe and perfect manner, had no adverse impact on the ecological environment,” it added.

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Here’s the English bulletin from KCNA, North Korea’s central news agency

10:51 PM – 5 Jan 2016 · Winchester, NV, United States

The announcement followed the USGS detection of a 5.1 magnitude earthquake in the vicinity of a known Pyongyang nuclear site.

The epicenter of the jolt was located 19 kilometers (12 miles) east-northeast of Sungjibaegam, Ryanggang Province, at a depth of 10 kilometers, according to preliminary data from the US Geological Survey (USGS). Similar seismic activity in roughly the same area was recorded on February 12, 2013, prior to North Korea claiming its third successful underground nuclear test.

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

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