As Pyongyang Advances Nuclear, Missile Skills, U.S. Missile Shield Gains Greater Importance; Analyst: Pyongyang Wants Nuke Missiles
North Threatens To Attack South Korea; Gates Suggests Rewards For North Korea Over
North Korea is moving a large missile, perhaps another Taepo Dong-2, toward a launch site in the northeastern sector of the isolated nation, and there are signs the North also may be poised to detonate yet another nuclear weapon in an underground test soon.
Mitt Romney, former Republican presidential candidate and former governor of Massachusetts, in remarks yesterday and today expresses astonishment that with a worsening missile threat worldwide, the Obama administration at this of all times would choose to cut funding for U.S. missile defense programs. As well, analysts suggests renegade acts by North Korea show it is bent upon no less that gaining ICBMs tipped with nuclear weapons. (Please see separate story in this issue.)
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, on a trip to Asia, suggested at one point that the United States is weary of providing rewards (food, fuel and more) to Pyongyang, only to have the North erupt on another rampage of illicit acts. However, Gates later toned down those remarks, saying it is true that the North is “provocative” in its actions, but the United States doesn’t see a “crisis” there, and therefore no major change in U.S. policy toward the rogue communist dictatorship is being prepared.
Leaders from Japan, South Korea and the United States met to discuss the situation.
But it is unclear just what sort of concrete action they might take.
Rather, North Korea may suffer little punishment for its recent renegade actions — detonating a nuclear bomb in an underground test and firing several more missiles — so that U.S. missile defense capabilities are becoming even more critically needed.
The Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) system is designed specifically to counter long-range missiles that North Korea might launch to strike U.S. cities.
That latest nuclear blast was expected, but nonetheless unwelcome. (Please see Space & Missile Defense Report, Friday, May 22, 2009.)
Leaders of major nations scolded North Korea for its obstinate refusal to honor its past promises to work toward a denuclearized Korean Peninsula.
Even China, an erstwhile ally of North Korea, and Russia criticized Pyongyang.
But whether new sanctions with teeth are applied against the North remains to be seen.
The outlaw actions by the isolated communist dictatorship came as President Obama is proposing to cut U.S. missile defense programs, including the GMD system, by a total $1.2 billion, down to an overall $7.8 billion, in the upcoming fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2010.
After the nuclear blast and the missile tests, Pyongyang then lurched to another pugnacious stance by threatening to attack South Korea if ships from the North are inspected for missiles or weapons of mass destruction such as nuclear arms being proliferated to other nations. That prompted U.S. and South Korean forces to shift to the second-highest alert level, Watch Condition II.
In the wake of all these outlaw actions by the North, it was excoriated with criticism that included condemnations by members of the Obama administration.
President Obama termed the bellicose actions “a grave threat to the peace and security of the world.”
His Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, termed the nuclear and missile tests “provocative and belligerent,” adding that the United States will honor its commitment to defend South Korea and Japan.
Pyongyang also declared invalid the 1953 truce ending the Korean War, or police action.
The North “has chosen to violate the specific language of U.N. Security Council Resolution 1718,” which outlaws such tests, Clinton said. “It has ignored the international community. It has abrogated the obligations it entered into through the six-party talks. And it continues to act in a provocative and belligerent manner toward its neighbors.
“There are consequences to such actions,” Clinton said, noting that the U.N. is weighing possible options. She didn’t provide a list of those consequences.
As well, Susan Rice, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, termed the rebel actions of the North “a grave violation of international law and a threat to the region and international peace and security.”
The roasting of the North was bipartisan, with both parties in Washington condemning the reckless acts.
For example, Rep. John M. McHugh (R-N.Y.), ranking Republican on the House Armed Services Committee (HASC), and Rep. Michael Turner (R-Ohio), ranking Republican on the HASC strategic forces subcommittee, flailed the nuclear and missile tests as “unacceptable and antagonistic.” The defiance “demands firm action from the United States and international community, which should generate tough consequences for Pyongyang.”
But McHugh and Turner acknowledged the United States and United Nations thus far haven’t moved North Korea from its outlaw stance. The isolated regime “defied a U.N. Security Council resolution by demonstrating a long-range ballistic missile, [which] highlights the ineffectiveness of our responses to-date. These have resulted in little more than the occasional ‘wrist slap’. The international community’s response to such actions may have implications beyond the region as other nations, especially Iran, take note.”
Iran is producing nuclear materials and has mastered the technology of intercontinental ballistic missiles. Further, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said Israel should be wiped from the map, that Israel soon shall cease to exist, and that he envisions a world without the United States.
Abroad, many nations abhorred the North Korean testing, with words flying but little occurring in the way of action.
Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso said such acts “can never be tolerated.”
In China, a statement said the government was “resolutely opposed” to the illicit tests.
And in Russia, the North Korean minister was summoned to the Foreign Ministry and informed that Moscow views the tests with “serious concern.”
But given that North Korea is ruled by a man, Kim Jong Il, who will countenance the starvation and deaths of his citizens rather than surrender his nuclear armaments and missiles, it is unclear what steps the United Nations could take that would dissuade him.
It will take some time to assess the underground nuclear test, which was somewhat more powerful than a nuke test the North conducted in 2006. It may not have been as powerful as the atomic bombs that the United States dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 as a means to end World War II without having to see hundreds of thousands of allied troops die during an invasion of Japan.