War Drums: U.S. Says It Sent B-2 Stealth Bombers Over South Korea...

[paulitician]

UPDATE: At 6:40 PM ET, CBS news reported Kim has given orders to rocket and missile commanders to fire on US targets, in retaliation for our B-2 flights into South Korea.


(CNN) -- The United States said Thursday it sent stealth bombers to South Korea to participate in annual military exercises amid spiking tensions with North Korea.

The B-2 Spirit bombers flew more than 6,500 miles from Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri to South Korea, dropping inert munitions there as part of the exercises, before returning to the U.S. mainland, the U.S Forces in Korea said in a statement.

The mission by the planes, which can carry both conventional and nuclear weapons, "demonstrates the United States' ability to conduct long range, precision strikes quickly and at will," the statement said.

More:
U.S. says it sent B-2 stealth bombers over South Korea - CNN.com

 

[SteadyMercury]

Man I feel sorry for the two pilots in a cramped bomber for a 13k mile trip to drop dummy bombs.

 

[Samson]

Man I feel sorry for the two pilots in a cramped bomber for a 13k mile trip to drop dummy bombs.

The copilot:

 

[waltky]

What sequester?...

Air Force says B-2 mission over South Korea cost $2.1M
March 29, 2013 > The Air Force says it cost $2.1 million to send two nuclear-capable B-2 bombers on a training exercise over South Korea that was widely viewed as a show of force in response to weeks of threats from North Korea.

The service's Global Strike Command said Friday in a statement that the total flight time for the B-2s was 75 hours. The aircraft made the more than 6,500-mile round trip from Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri to a South Korean island range on Thursday.

North Korea has threatened nuclear strikes on Washington and Seoul.

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said the decision to send the B-2s for drills with South Korea was part of normal military exercises with a close ally and not intended to provoke a reaction from North Korea.

Air Force says B-2 mission over South Korea cost $2.1M - News - Stripes

See also:

Hagel: B-2s not intended to provoke North Korea
March 28, 2013 WASHINGTON -- America's unprecedented decision to send nuclear-capable B-2 stealth bombers to drop dummy munitions during military drills with South Korea this week was part of normal exercises and not intended to provoke a reaction from North Korea, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Thursday.

Hagel acknowledged, however, that North Korea's belligerent tones and actions in recent weeks have ratcheted up the danger in the region, "and we have to understand that reality." Speaking to Pentagon reporters, both Hagel and Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the B-2 bombers were a message intended more for allies than Pyongyang. "The North Koreans have to understand that what they're doing is very dangerous," Hagel said. "I don't think we're doing anything extraordinary or provocative or out of the ... orbit of what nations do to protect their own interests." The U.S., he added, must make it clear to South Korea, Japan and other allies in the region that "these provocations by the North are taken by us very seriously and we'll respond to that."

U.S. Forces Korea announced in a statement Thursday that two B-2 stealth bombers flew from an air base in Missouri and dropped dummy munitions on a South Korean island range before returning home. The Pentagon said this was the first time dummy munitions had been dropped over South Korea, but late Thursday said it was unclear whether there ever had been any B-2 flights there. The joint drills are likely to heighten the already escalating tensions between the U.S. and North Korea that have played out in recent weeks, including Pyongyang's threat to carry out nuclear strikes on Washington and Seoul. North Korea has ramped up its rhetoric in response to the recent U.S. military exercises and also the U.N. sanctions over North Korea's nuclear test last month.

Use of the stealthy B-2 bombers added something of an exclamation point to the training mission, which had already included older but also nuclear-capable B-52 bombers. "They're telling the North Koreans, we can attack you in ways in which you can see us coming, and we can also attack you potentially in ways in which you cannot see us coming," said retired Air Force Col. Cedric Leighton, a North Korean intelligence expert who served on the Joint Staff and the National Security Council. "So it's a message to the North Koreans that they have to be very careful how they proceed next with their military efforts and their political efforts. "

Asked if the U.S. has seen North Korea take any actual threatening military steps in response to the bombers, Dempsey said the North has moved some artillery units across the demilitarized zone from Seoul and some maritime units along the coasts. But so far, he said, "We haven't seen anything that would cause us to believe they are movements other than consistent with historic patterns and training exercises." The military drills are only the latest U.S. response to what officials see as a growing North Korean threat. The Pentagon is also planning to beef up its defenses against a potential North Korean missile attack on the U.S.

MORE

 

[waltky]

Granny says, "You go, gurl...

South Korean President Vows Strong, Swift Military Response if North Provokes
April 01, 2013 — In the continuing tit-for-tat exchange of rhetoric between the two Koreas, the president in Seoul has issued her toughest statement yet.

Park Geun-hye on Monday was quoted as telling her defense minister that “There should be a strong response in initial combat without any political consideration," should there be any provocation against South Korea and its people. The statement comes a day after North Korea's leader laid down what he calls a “new strategic line,” saying that under no circumstances would North Korea's nuclear weapons be a bargaining chip in the political or economic arena. Kim Jong Un also vowed to expand the nuclear arsenal of the impoverished and isolated state. North Korea's rubber stamp legislature, the Supreme People's Assembly, was scheduled to meet Monday, but no details have been released by state media.

Pyongyang also makes strong warnings

North Korea has reacted vociferously in recent weeks to annual joint military exercises between South Korea and the United States. Those drills have included unusual demonstrations of U.S. air power, including simulated long-range bombing runs by B-52 and B-2 strategic bombers. A pair of U.S. Air Force F-22A Raptor jets from Kadena Air Base on the Japanese island of Okinawa on Sunday flew to Osan Air Base, 65 kilometers south of Seoul. The stealth fighters are participating in the Foal Eagle exercise.

South Korean marines are to stage four exercises together with the U.S. Marine Corps. The war games will include landings, and maneuvering of mechanized units. In the past weeks, Pyongyang declared the 1953 armistice invalid, vowed a pre-emptive nuclear strike against the U.S. mainland and American Pacific bases, cut a pair of hotlines with the South and then declared a state of war in effect. The combative rhetoric came after the United Nations Security Council approved additional sanctions on Pyongyang following last December's long-range rocket launch and February's nuclear test - the third by North Korea.

Washington, Seoul express concern

Despite the war talk from Pyongyang, which the White House says it takes seriously, there is no sense of panic in Seoul. But concern continues to rise, especially about Pyongyang's threat to stop operations at the only joint venture facility with the South. On Monday, operations were normal at the Kaesong Industrial Complex, just north of the demilitarized zone where hundreds of South Korean managers supervise small factories in which North Korean workers manufacture household goods. Analysts say an unprecedented closure of the facility would be an ominous sign as it is a significant source of desperately needed hard currency for the North.

South Korean President Vows Strong, Swift Military Response if North Provokes

See also:

ANALYSIS: US playing with fire in N Korea policy: expert
Mon, Apr 01, 2013 - Soaring tensions on the Korean Peninsula have seen dire North Korean threats met with an unusually assertive US response that analysts warn could take a familiar game into dangerous territory.

By publicly highlighting its recent deployment of nuclear-capable B-52 and stealth bombers over South Korea, Washington has at times almost appeared to be purposefully goading an already apoplectic Pyongyang. “There certainly seems to be an element of ‘let’s show we’re taking the gloves off this time’ about the US stance,” said Paul Carroll, program director at the Ploughshares Fund, a US-based security policy think tank. The North has responded in kind, declaring on Saturday that it is now in a “state of war” with South Korea. Security crises on the Korean Peninsula have come and gone over the decades and have tended to follow a similar pattern of white-knuckle brinkmanship that threatens, but finally pulls back from catastrophic conflict.

North Korean founding leader Kim Il-sung and his son and successor Kim Jong-il were both considered skilled practitioners of this high-stakes game of who-blinks-first diplomacy. They ensured that Pyongyang had enough form to lend its threats credibility, having engineered provocations that ranged from blowing up a South Korean civilian airliner in 1987 to shelling a South Korean island in 2010. The current crisis, with Pyongyang lashing out at a combination of a new round of UN sanctions and South Korea-US military exercises, diverges from precedent in terms of the context and the main characters involved. It follows the two landmark events that triggered the UN sanctions and redrew the strategic balance on the peninsula: the North’s successful long-range rocket launch in December last year and its third — and largest — nuclear test in February this year.

Both may have emboldened North Korea to overplay its hand, while at the same time prompting Washington to decide there was already too much at stake to consider folding. “Rhetorical salvos are one thing, while rocket launches and nuclear tests are quite another,” Carroll said. In addition, both North and South Korea have new, untested leaders with a strong domestic motivation to prove their mettle in any showdown. Bruce Klingner, a Korea expert at the conservative Heritage Foundation in Washington, believes the danger of “miscalculation” is especially high from young North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. Kim Jong-un was not only emboldened by the successful rocket and nuclear tests, but “also by the knowledge that Seoul and Washington have never struck back in any significant way after previous deadly attacks.”

However, this time around, South Korea has signaled it would respond with interest, and the message sent by the B-52 and stealth bomber flights is that it has the US firmly in its corner. Peter Hayes, who heads the Nautilus Institute, an Asia-focused think tank, said that the B-52 deployment carried a particular and potentially dangerous resonance. After a bloody border incident in 1976 left two US soldiers dead, the US spent weeks sending B-52 flights up the Korean Peninsula, veering off just before they entered the North’s air space. Then-US secretary of state Henry Kissinger said that he had “never seen the North Koreans so scared.” Hayes warned that replaying the B-52 threat could prove to be “strategically stupid” by reviving the North’s historic and deep-rooted fear of a US nuclear strike.

ANALYSIS: US playing with fire in N Korea policy: expert - Taipei Times

 

[waltky]

Granny says, "Dat's right - dat oughta give lil' Kim a bad case o' crotch itch...

U.S. Navy warship moving closer to North Korea
April 1st, 2013 - The U.S. Navy is moving a warship and a sea-based radar platform closer to the North Korean coast in order to monitor that country's military moves, including possible new missile launches, a Defense Department official said Monday.

The decisions to move at least one ship and the oil rig-like SBX-1 are the first of what may be other naval deployments, CNN has learned. They follow weeks of belligerent rhetoric from North Korea, including threats to use nuclear weapons. The United States and South Korea have gone ahead with joint military exercises despite the threats, and South Korea warned Monday that any provocative moves from North Korea would trigger a strong response "without any political considerations." The United States and South Korea have gone ahead with joint military exercises despite the threats, and South Korea warned Monday that any provocative moves from North Korea would trigger a strong response "without any political considerations."

The United States has bolstered the exercises with shows of force that included overflights by nuclear-capable B-2 stealth bombers, massive Cold War-era B-52s and F-22 Raptor stealth fighters. "If there is any provocation against South Korea and its people, there should be a strong response in initial combat without any political considerations," South Korean President Park Geun-hye said at a meeting with senior defense and security officials, according to her office. Her comments came after North Korea rattled off fresh volleys of bombastic rhetoric over the weekend, declaring that it had entered a "state of war" with the South and labeling the U.S. mainland a "boiled pumpkin," vulnerable to attack. The two Koreas are technically still at war after their conflict in the early 1950s ended in a truce not a peace treaty.

The secretive regime of Kim Jong Un has delivered a steady stream of verbal attacks against South Korea and the United States in recent weeks, including the threat of a nuclear strike. It has lashed out at the U.S.-South Korean military drills currently under way and at the tougher U.N. sanctions that were slapped on it after its latest nuclear test in February. Analysts have expressed heavy skepticism that the North has the military capabilities to follow through on many of its melodramatic threats. But concerns remain that it could carry out a localized attack on South Korea, as it did in November 2010 when it shelled Yeongpyeong Island, killing four people.

Displays of strength

See also:

Map Purports to Show Kim Jong-un’s Wish List of Missile Targets in the U.S.
April 1, 2013 – A photograph released by North Korea’s news mouthpiece over the weekend seems to show a map of American sites that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un evidently would like to target.

The map is fuzzy, but it appears to show four arrows crossing the Pacific Ocean from the Korean peninsula, their points ending in the vicinities of the East Coast, the mountain states (or possibly Texas), the West Coast and Hawaii. South Korean media say the heading of the map reads, in Korean, “The Strategic Forces’ Plan to Strike the U.S. Mainland.” The photo, one of several released by Pyongyang’s KCNA news agency, purports to show Kim holding an emergency meeting of top military brass in the early hours of Friday morning.

A KCNA bulletin said Kim had convened “an urgent operation meeting” in response to the U.S. decision to fly two B-2s stealth bombers over South Korea as part of a military drill, and that he had ordered strategic rocket forces “to be on standby to fire so that they may strike any time the U.S. mainland, its military bases in the operational theaters in the Pacific, including Hawaii and Guam, and those in south Korea.” In a subsequent bulletin at the weekend, Pyongyang said it had now entered into a “state of war” with South Korea, and threatened to “immediately punish any slightest provocation hurting its dignity and sovereignty with resolute and merciless physical actions without any prior notice.”

If the map in the photo is meant to show Kim’s desired U.S. targets, among the possibilities could be the Vandenberg Air Force Base northwest of Los Angeles, one of two locations of ground-based ballistic missile interceptors (the other is Fort Greely, Alaska); and the Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado, home to the U.S. Army’s Space and Missile Defense Command and the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), which oversees aerospace warning and control. Also visible in another of the photos released by KCNA was a map of Seoul, the South Korean capital and a city of more than 10 million people, just 30 miles south of the demilitarized zone dividing the two Koreas.

Kim’s behavior and rhetoric has become more threatening in recent weeks, but Western experts do not generally believe North Korea currently has the ability to threaten the continental United States with missiles. Pyongyang last December launched a three-stage “Unha-3” carrier rocket carrying an observation satellite, essentially the same as the Taepondong-2 long-range missile that it has under development. The Center for Nonproliferation Studies in Monterey, Calif. said then that a rocket like the Unha-3 could “in theory” carry a nuclear payload up to 10,000 kilometers, or some 6,200 miles. “North Korea has already demonstrated capabilities that threaten the United States and the security environment in East Asia,” Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told Congress last month, delivering the intelligence community’s annual report on threats facing the U.S.

MORE

 

[Franticfrank]

If the US is 'playing with fire' and ends up provoking North Korea, then so be it. I don't think these threats should be ignored - the young dictator should be intimidated and shown what might happen if he persists. A survey from 2012 shows that Americans always considered Iran and China the country's greatest enemies, with North Korea in third. I wonder if the threat of direct nuclear strikes on American cities will change this? Really, such threats shouldn't be ignored...Iraq was invaded for less.

 

[there4eyeM]

Man I feel sorry for the two pilots in a cramped bomber for a 13k mile trip to drop dummy bombs.

The copilot:

On a trip THAT long, the autopilot ought to be able to handle some time 'hands off'.

 

[JoeB131]

Man I feel sorry for the two pilots in a cramped bomber for a 13k mile trip to drop dummy bombs.

The copilot:

If this plane is a rockin', don't come a-knocking!

 

[waltky]

First B-2's, now F-22's...

US sends F 22 Raptor fighter jets to warn North Korea
Monday 1st April, 2013 WASHINGTON - The United States has sent two F-22 Raptor fighter jets to take part in military drills in South Korea amid an intensifying campaign of threats from North Korea.

The advanced, radar-evading F-22 Raptors were deployed to Osan Air Base, the main U.S. Air Force base in South Korea, from Japan to support ongoing bilateral exercises, the U.S. military command in South Korea said in a statement. It also urged North Korea to restrain itself. "(North Korea) will achieve nothing by threats or provocations, which will only further isolate North Korea and undermine international efforts to ensure peace and stability in Northeast Asia," the statement said. On Monday South Korean President Park Geun-hye appeared to give her country's military permission to strike back at any attack from the North, saying she took the North's escalating threats "very seriously," South Korean news agency Yonhap reported. "As commander-in-chief of the armed forces, I will trust the military's judgment on abrupt and surprise provocations by North Korea," she said, according to Yonhap.

The deployment and Park's remarks came as tensions approached an all-time high between Pyongyang and Washington. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has ratcheted up the rhetoric against both South Korea and the United States, especially after two B-2 stealth bombers took part in joint exercises with the South Korean military. The bombers, capable of delivering nuclear weapons, flew from Whitman Air Force Base in Missouri, dropped dud bombs on a South Korean range and returned home. The bombers' mission came after threats from North Korea to attack U.S. soil with missiles, a capability the North reportedly does not yet possess. The deployment of F-22s from Japan to South Korea had been planned for some time, according to Army Lt. Col. Catherine Wilkinson, a Pentagon spokeswoman. "The F-22 Raptors are one of many alliance capabilities available for the defense of the Republic of Korea," Wilkinson said.

Tensions have been high since Kim Jong-un ordered a nuclear weapons test in February, breaching U.N. sanctions and ignoring warnings from North Korea's closest ally, China, not to do so. That test, North Korea's third since 2006, drew more U.N. sanctions aimed to pressure the Pyongyang to stop its nuclear weapons program. North responded adversely by ratcheting up warnings and threats of war. The U.S. military did not say how many of the F22 planes were flown to South Korea from Kadena Air Base in Okinawa. The statement described Sunday's deployment as part of routine shifts of air power among bases in the Western Pacific that U.S. forces have been conducting since 2004. North Korea said on Saturday it was entering a "state of war" with South Korea, but Seoul and its ally the United States played down the statement from the official KCNA news agency as the latest in a stream of tough talk from Pyongyang. On Saturday, North Korea said it had entered a "state of war" against South Korea, according to a statement reported by the North's official news agency, KCNA.

The exercise, called Foal Eagle, is meant to reinforce "the U.S. commitment of its most advanced capabilities to the security of the Republic of Korea," according to the statement. The U.S. Navy is shifting a guided-missile destroyer in the Pacific to waters off the Korean peninsula in the wake of ongoing rhetoric from North Korea, U.S. defense officials said. The USS Fitzgerald is capable of intercepting and destroying a missile, should North Korea decide to fire one off, the officials said. Still, U.S. defense officials insist that there is nothing to indicate that North Korea is on the verge of another launch. The White House on Monday said the United States hasn't seen large-scale movements from North Korean military forces in the aftermath of harsh rhetoric from the reclusive government. "I would note that despite the harsh rhetoric we are hearing from Pyongyang, we are not seeing changes to the North Korean military posture, such as large-scale mobilizations and positioning of forces," Carney said.

US sends F 22 Raptor fighter jets to warn North Korea | Big News Network

See also:

North Korea plans to restart all nuclear facilities
Tuesday 2nd April, 2013 - North Korea Tuesday said it would restart a nuclear reactor it had shut more than five years ago, sharply raising the stakes in the escalating standoff with the United States and its allies.

The North's state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported that the reclusive state's atomic energy department intends to "readjust and restart all the nuclear facilities" at its main nuclear complex, in Yongbyon. Those facilities include a uranium enrichment facility and a reactor that was "mothballed and disabled" under an agreement reached in October 2007 during talks among North Korea, the United States and four other nations, KCNA said United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said the crisis over North Korea had gone too far and he appealed for dialogue and negotiation to resolve the situation. "Nuclear threats are not a game. Aggressive rhetoric and military posturing only result in counter-actions, and fuel fear and instability," Ban, a South Korean, told a news conference during a visit to Andorra.

The announcement by the North's General Department of Atomic Energy came two days after their leader, Kim Jong-un, said his nuclear weapons were not a bargaining chip and called for expanding his country's nuclear arsenal in "quality and quantity" during a meeting of the Central Committee of the ruling Workers' Party of Korea. A speech by Kim Jong-un, given on Sunday but published in full by KCNA on Tuesday, appeared to dampen any prospect of a direct confrontation with the United States by emphasising that nuclear weapons would ensure the country's safety as a deterrent. "Our nuclear strength is a reliable war deterrent and a guarantee to protect our sovereignty," Kim said. "It is on the basis of a strong nuclear strength that peace and prosperity can exist and so can the happiness of people's lives."

Kim's speech, delivered to the central committee meeting of the ruling Workers Party of Korea, hinted at a small shift away from threats against Seoul and Washington, but it remained some distance from calling any kind of end to the crisis. If Pyongyang restarts the nuclear facilities, it would have longer-term implications for the region's security. Reactivating the aged Soviet-era reactor at the Yongbyon nuclear plant would yield plutonium, a tested path to stockpile more fissile material. The White House criticized the announcement. "North Korea's announcement that it will reopen or restart its nuclear facilities at Yongbyon is another indication of its pattern of contradicting its own commitments and its pattern of violating its international obligations," spokesman Jay Carney said.

The United States is urging Russia and China to do more to rein in North Korea, Carney said. Tensions on the Korean Peninsula have led Pyongyang to sever a key military hotline with Seoul and declare void the 1953 armistice that stopped the Korean War. The United States flew B-2 stealth bombers capable of carrying conventional or nuclear weapons, Cold War-era B-52s and F-22 Raptor stealth fighters over South Korea during the annual military exercises. On Monday, Seoul warned that any provocative moves from North Korea would trigger a strong response "without any political considerations."

North Korea plans to restart all nuclear facilities | Big News Network

 

[paulitician]

First B-2's, now F-22's...

US sends F 22 Raptor fighter jets to warn North Korea
Monday 1st April, 2013 WASHINGTON - The United States has sent two F-22 Raptor fighter jets to take part in military drills in South Korea amid an intensifying campaign of threats from North Korea.

The advanced, radar-evading F-22 Raptors were deployed to Osan Air Base, the main U.S. Air Force base in South Korea, from Japan to support ongoing bilateral exercises, the U.S. military command in South Korea said in a statement. It also urged North Korea to restrain itself. "(North Korea) will achieve nothing by threats or provocations, which will only further isolate North Korea and undermine international efforts to ensure peace and stability in Northeast Asia," the statement said. On Monday South Korean President Park Geun-hye appeared to give her country's military permission to strike back at any attack from the North, saying she took the North's escalating threats "very seriously," South Korean news agency Yonhap reported. "As commander-in-chief of the armed forces, I will trust the military's judgment on abrupt and surprise provocations by North Korea," she said, according to Yonhap.

The deployment and Park's remarks came as tensions approached an all-time high between Pyongyang and Washington. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has ratcheted up the rhetoric against both South Korea and the United States, especially after two B-2 stealth bombers took part in joint exercises with the South Korean military. The bombers, capable of delivering nuclear weapons, flew from Whitman Air Force Base in Missouri, dropped dud bombs on a South Korean range and returned home. The bombers' mission came after threats from North Korea to attack U.S. soil with missiles, a capability the North reportedly does not yet possess. The deployment of F-22s from Japan to South Korea had been planned for some time, according to Army Lt. Col. Catherine Wilkinson, a Pentagon spokeswoman. "The F-22 Raptors are one of many alliance capabilities available for the defense of the Republic of Korea," Wilkinson said.

Tensions have been high since Kim Jong-un ordered a nuclear weapons test in February, breaching U.N. sanctions and ignoring warnings from North Korea's closest ally, China, not to do so. That test, North Korea's third since 2006, drew more U.N. sanctions aimed to pressure the Pyongyang to stop its nuclear weapons program. North responded adversely by ratcheting up warnings and threats of war. The U.S. military did not say how many of the F22 planes were flown to South Korea from Kadena Air Base in Okinawa. The statement described Sunday's deployment as part of routine shifts of air power among bases in the Western Pacific that U.S. forces have been conducting since 2004. North Korea said on Saturday it was entering a "state of war" with South Korea, but Seoul and its ally the United States played down the statement from the official KCNA news agency as the latest in a stream of tough talk from Pyongyang. On Saturday, North Korea said it had entered a "state of war" against South Korea, according to a statement reported by the North's official news agency, KCNA.

The exercise, called Foal Eagle, is meant to reinforce "the U.S. commitment of its most advanced capabilities to the security of the Republic of Korea," according to the statement. The U.S. Navy is shifting a guided-missile destroyer in the Pacific to waters off the Korean peninsula in the wake of ongoing rhetoric from North Korea, U.S. defense officials said. The USS Fitzgerald is capable of intercepting and destroying a missile, should North Korea decide to fire one off, the officials said. Still, U.S. defense officials insist that there is nothing to indicate that North Korea is on the verge of another launch. The White House on Monday said the United States hasn't seen large-scale movements from North Korean military forces in the aftermath of harsh rhetoric from the reclusive government. "I would note that despite the harsh rhetoric we are hearing from Pyongyang, we are not seeing changes to the North Korean military posture, such as large-scale mobilizations and positioning of forces," Carney said.

US sends F 22 Raptor fighter jets to warn North Korea | Big News Network

See also:

North Korea plans to restart all nuclear facilities
Tuesday 2nd April, 2013 - North Korea Tuesday said it would restart a nuclear reactor it had shut more than five years ago, sharply raising the stakes in the escalating standoff with the United States and its allies.

The North's state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported that the reclusive state's atomic energy department intends to "readjust and restart all the nuclear facilities" at its main nuclear complex, in Yongbyon. Those facilities include a uranium enrichment facility and a reactor that was "mothballed and disabled" under an agreement reached in October 2007 during talks among North Korea, the United States and four other nations, KCNA said United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said the crisis over North Korea had gone too far and he appealed for dialogue and negotiation to resolve the situation. "Nuclear threats are not a game. Aggressive rhetoric and military posturing only result in counter-actions, and fuel fear and instability," Ban, a South Korean, told a news conference during a visit to Andorra.

The announcement by the North's General Department of Atomic Energy came two days after their leader, Kim Jong-un, said his nuclear weapons were not a bargaining chip and called for expanding his country's nuclear arsenal in "quality and quantity" during a meeting of the Central Committee of the ruling Workers' Party of Korea. A speech by Kim Jong-un, given on Sunday but published in full by KCNA on Tuesday, appeared to dampen any prospect of a direct confrontation with the United States by emphasising that nuclear weapons would ensure the country's safety as a deterrent. "Our nuclear strength is a reliable war deterrent and a guarantee to protect our sovereignty," Kim said. "It is on the basis of a strong nuclear strength that peace and prosperity can exist and so can the happiness of people's lives."

Kim's speech, delivered to the central committee meeting of the ruling Workers Party of Korea, hinted at a small shift away from threats against Seoul and Washington, but it remained some distance from calling any kind of end to the crisis. If Pyongyang restarts the nuclear facilities, it would have longer-term implications for the region's security. Reactivating the aged Soviet-era reactor at the Yongbyon nuclear plant would yield plutonium, a tested path to stockpile more fissile material. The White House criticized the announcement. "North Korea's announcement that it will reopen or restart its nuclear facilities at Yongbyon is another indication of its pattern of contradicting its own commitments and its pattern of violating its international obligations," spokesman Jay Carney said.

The United States is urging Russia and China to do more to rein in North Korea, Carney said. Tensions on the Korean Peninsula have led Pyongyang to sever a key military hotline with Seoul and declare void the 1953 armistice that stopped the Korean War. The United States flew B-2 stealth bombers capable of carrying conventional or nuclear weapons, Cold War-era B-52s and F-22 Raptor stealth fighters over South Korea during the annual military exercises. On Monday, Seoul warned that any provocative moves from North Korea would trigger a strong response "without any political considerations."

North Korea plans to restart all nuclear facilities | Big News Network

Getting pretty serious. Stay tuned.