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Born at the Crest of the Empire

Friday, June 19, 2009

Crazy N. Korea

The N. Koreans are threatening to launch a missile towards Hawaii.

This is designed to be provocative, and it is. But before everybody goes nuts (which I think they will,) I kinda want to add this reminder to the discussion. North Korea currently has a truck, ship, and railcar based nuclear threat,
But North Korea has yet to demonstrate it has the ability to build a nuclear warhead that could be fitted onto the tip of one of its ballistic missiles.
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8 Comments:

  • Probably all hinges on how hard the US pushes the ship search. A target has been selected.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 7:59 AM  

  • Well, it'll be brought down short of Hawaii, it's just a tactic.

    (It's interesting. Does the US use its missile defense and potentially show it doesn't work? Is North Korea's missile that accurate over distance/are they going to show their own tech weakness?)

    By Blogger mikevotes, at 10:14 AM  

  • Odd people the North Koreans. Not crazy enough to target Hawaii IMO. They might want to show they have the range though. I'm more interested to see what happens with the ship search. That will be the spark.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 11:03 AM  

  • I think alot of people make the mistake to think the N. Koreans aren't calculating.

    They just kinda work on a different math than the rest of the world. Because of their political position, military, virtually impenetrable leadership, they can push the US much further than others without as much risk.

    The US can get in to sow dissent. Can't effectively threaten military action in country. Doesn't really have any options.

    The N. Koreans on the other hand, only have threats to negotiate with. without leveraging their bomb, their nation and regime would collapse.

    As for ship searches, the first confrontation is going on now.

    http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/06/19/military-set-intercept-north-korean-ship-suspected-proliferatin-missiles-nukes/

    By Blogger mikevotes, at 2:30 PM  

  • I think the NK nuclear threat to the US is non-existent. Seoul and Tokyo are the the ones who need to worry.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 3:01 PM  

  • On second thoughts I guess there is a chance NK could sell a bomb to terrorists but I still think the main threat is to South Korea and Japan... and perhaps China. It's just something they have to live with.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 3:11 PM  

  • With all the monitoring that has been done, the US could determine after a little time whether the fuel from a nuke came from N. Korea.

    Their bombs are useful for bartering, demonstration, and deterrence, but they are next to useless as offensive weapons. They would be annihilated.

    By Blogger mikevotes, at 5:53 PM  

  • Exactly.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 6:26 PM  

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