N Korea

[Gracie]

What are the chances they could get a missile or two to hit Hawaii or the west coast and why is nobody too concerned about the possibility of it? If it were the middle east waving their tiny fists and threatening us, it would be a different story wouldn't it? So why is NK being pooh pooh'd off? They COULD get help if they hook up with the taliban, ya know. The enemy of my enemy is my friend sort of thing.

Is my wondering about this silly or is there some validation that it COULD happen while most are laughing at the notion?

 

[C_Clayton_Jones]

What are the chances they could get a missile or two to hit Hawaii or the west coast…

Zero.

…and why is nobody too concerned about the possibility of it?

Because it can’t happen.

Is my wondering about this silly…

Yes.

The North Koreans may be crazy but they’re not stupid, they know if they strike South Korea with a nuclear device of some sort their entire country would be obliterated by the United States and it allies.

They are attempting to provoke us, the worst thing we can do is take the bait.

 

[waltky]

Kinda reminds me of Richard Pryor and Chevy Chase tradin' insults skit on SNL years ago...

Prepare for ‘lightning’ strike: Kim Jong-un
Sun, Mar 24, 2013 - North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has inspected a feared special forces unit, ordering them to strike at “lightning speed” once war breaks out, state media reported yesterday.

The inspection comes at a time of escalating tensions on the Korean Peninsula, with multiple threats from the North of an armed response to joint South Korea-US military drills and to UN sanctions imposed after its nuclear test last month. Kim, who holds the rank of Marshal in the Korean People’s Army, on Friday told Unit 1973 during a tour that their mission was to “conquer the strongholds of the enemy,” Pyongyang’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said. “He said once a war breaks out, the unit should storm the heart of the enemies in a flash to strike and destroy the targeted military installations and reactionary ruling institutions of the puppet regime at a lightning speed,” KCNA reported.

Kim emphasized the need to conduct training under simulated battle conditions so the unit would be able to operate in enemy-controlled areas, KCNA said. The special forces unit is believed to be based in the southwestern province of South Pyongan. South Korea and the US launched an annual military drill this month, prompting Pyongyang to announce the scrapping of the 60-year-old Korean War armistice, along with several non-aggression pacts signed with the South.

The North has also threatened nuclear strikes on the Washington and Seou as reprisal for the new round of UN sanctions. Last week, the North Korean leader issued a threat to “wipe out” Baengnyeong, a small frontline South Korean island. While most statements have been dismissed as rhetorical bluster, the threat to Baengnyeong, which has 5,000 civilian residents as well military units, is highly credible and carries the weight of precedent. In 2010, the South Korean naval vessel Cheonan was sunk in the area around Baengnyeong, killing 46 people. Later that same year, North Korea shelled the nearby South Korean island of Yeonpyeong, killing four.

Prepare for ?lightning? strike: Kim Jong-un - Taipei Times

See also:

US, South Korea agree on response plan if North Korea attacks
March 24, 2013 — The U.S. and South Korea signed a contingency plan Friday that give South Korea both U.S. support and the lead in responding in to future North Korea provocations.

The plan is apparently meant to address what one South Korean official described as small-scale “local” North Korean attacks such as the November 2010 shelling of Yeonpyeong Island, which prompted defense officials to begin developing the Counter-Provocation Plan. That attack on the South Korean border island left four people, including two civilians, dead.

However, a statement released by U.S. Forces Korea offered little information about the contingency plan, including what constitutes a “provocation.” The definition is important because the top U.S. general in South Korea currently would lead allied operations should war break out with North Korea. “By completing this plan, we improved our combined readiness posture to allow us to immediately and decisively respond to any North Korean provocation,” the statement said. “The completed plan includes procedures for consultation and action to allow for a strong and decisive combined ROK-US response to North Korean provocations threats.”

USFK did not say why the plan had been developed or why South Korea will lead the response to any future provocations. A spokesman for South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said the contingency plan does not affect U.S. wartime operational control, though he could not specify when an attack will be considered local and when it will rise to the threshold of war. “It’s hard to answer this,” he said. “On our end, if there is a local provocation on our land, we have to respond to it.”

He said the increasing seriousness of North Korean attacks prompted the chairmen of both countries’ Joint Chiefs of Staffs to begin considering how to respond to other acts of aggression following Yeonpyeong. North Korea is believed to have torpedoed a South Korean warship in March 2010, killing 46 sailors on board, though Pyongyang denies involvement in the incident. North Korea in recent weeks has increased its rhetoric against Washington and Seoul, threatening to turn both into a “sea of fire” following its third nuclear weapons test and the launch of a three-stage rocket.

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[waltky]

Granny says Lil' Kim trainin' up a buncha interweb hackers...

Experts: NKorea training teams of 'cyber warriors'
Mar 24,`13 -- Investigators have yet to pinpoint the culprit behind a synchronized cyberattack in South Korea last week. But in Seoul, the focus is fixed on North Korea, which South Korean security experts say has been training a team of computer-savvy "cyber warriors" as cyberspace becomes a fertile battleground in the nations' rivalry.

Malware shut down 32,000 computers and servers at three major South Korean TV networks and three banks last Wednesday, disrupting communications and banking businesses. The investigation into who planted the malware could take weeks or even months. South Korean investigators have produced no proof yet that North Korea was behind the cyberattack. Some of the malware was traced to a Seoul computer. Without elaborating, police said Monday that some of the malicious code also came from the United States and three European countries, South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported. But South Korea has pointed the finger at Pyongyang in six cyberattacks since 2009, even creating a cybersecurity command center in Seoul to protect the Internet-dependent country from hackers from the North.

It may seem unlikely that impoverished North Korea, with one of the most restrictive Internet policies in the world, would have the ability to threaten affluent South Korea, a country considered a global leader in telecommunications. The average yearly income in North Korea was just $1,190 per person in 2011 - just a fraction of the average yearly income of $22,200 for South Koreans that same year, according to the Bank of Korea in Seoul. But for several years, North Korea has poured money into science and technology. In December, scientists succeeded in launching a satellite into space aboard a long-range rocket from its own soil. And in February, North Korea conducted its third nuclear test.

"IT" has become a buzzword in North Korea, which has developed its own operating system called Red Star. The regime also encouraged a passion for gadgets among its elite, introducing a Chinese-made tablet computer for the North Korean market. Teams of developers came up with software for everything from composing music to learning how to cook. But South Korea and the U.S. believe North Korea also has thousands of hackers trained by the state to carry its warfare into cyberspace, and that their cyber offensive skills are as good as or better than their counterparts in China and South Korea.

"The newest addition to the North Korean asymmetric arsenal is a growing cyber warfare capability," James Thurman, commander of the U.S. forces in South Korea, told U.S. legislators in March 2012. "North Korea employs sophisticated computer hackers trained to launch cyber-infiltration and cyber-attacks" against South Korea and the U.S. In 2010, Won Sei-hoon, then chief of South Korea's National Intelligence Service, put the number of professional hackers in North Korea's cyber warfare unit at 1,000. North Korean students are recruited to the nation's top science schools to become "cyber warriors," said Kim Heung-kwang, who said he trained future hackers at a university in the industrial North Korean city of Hamhung for two decades before defecting in 2003. He said future hackers also are sent to study abroad in China and Russia.

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Papers link Chinese school to army ‘hackers’
Mon, Mar 25, 2013 - Researchers at one of China’s top universities collaborated with a Chinese army unit accused of carrying out hacking attacks on the US, academic papers published online show.

The elite Shanghai Jiaotong University conducted network security research with China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Unit 61398, the co-authored papers accessed by media yesterday revealed. A US security company last month said that the army unit, based in Shanghai, was behind serial hacking attacks on US firms, sparking a war of words between the two powers.

POWER CLASH

A week ago, US President Barack Obama raised several cybersecurity issues with new Chinese President and Chinese Communist Party General Secretary Xi Jinping. Beijing has denied that it engages in hacking and claims that its military is a victim of cyberattacks, most of which have originated in the US. Several researchers at Shanghai Jiaotong’s School of Information Security Engineering published research with members of Unit 61938, with projects dating back to 2007, the easily accessed papers showed.

Subjects of the joint research include the design of an “intrusion monitoring system” for computer networks and ways to evaluate “attack graphs,” which show how an adversary can break into a computer system. None of the papers described plans to carry out cyberattacks on foreign targets. The university was not immediately available for comment yesterday.

CYBERTHREAT

Xue Zhi, a co-author of one of the papers and vice president of the school, is the developer of China’s leading “cyberpenetration attack platform,” the university’s Web site says. Shanghai Jiaotong University is one of China’s flagship educational institutions and has attracted members of China’s business and political elite, with former Chinese president Jiang Zemin among its alumni. The US Department of Defense has approved a fivefold expansion of its cybersecurity force to include 4,900 troops and civilians over the coming years in response to growing online threats, the Washington Post reported in January.

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2013/03/25/2003557962

 

[waltky]

Granny says, "The inmates have gotten loose an' takin' over the loony bin...

NKorea calls nukes country's 'life' at big meeting
Mar 31,`13 -- A top North Korean decision-making body issued a pointed warning Sunday, saying that nuclear weapons are "the nation's life" and will not be traded even for "billions of dollars."

The comments came in a statement released after North Korean leader Kim Jong Un presided over the plenary meeting of the central committee of the ruling Workers' Party. The meeting, which set a "new strategic line" calling for building both a stronger economy and nuclear arsenal, comes amid a series of near-daily threats from Pyongyang in recent weeks, including a vow to launch nuclear strikes on the United States and a warning Saturday that the Korean Peninsula was in a "state of war."

Pyongyang is angry over annual U.S.-South Korean military drills and a new round of U.N. sanctions that followed its Feb. 12 nuclear test, the country's third. Analysts see a full-scale North Korean attack as unlikely and say the threats are more likely efforts to provoke softer policies toward Pyongyang from a new government in Seoul, to win diplomatic talks with Washington that could get the North more aid, and to solidify the young North Korean leader's image and military credentials at home.

North Korea made reference to those outside views in the statement it released through the official Korean Central News Agency following the plenary meeting. North Korea's nuclear weapons are a "treasure" not to be traded for "billions of dollars," the statement said. They "are neither a political bargaining chip nor a thing for economic dealings to be presented to the place of dialogue or be put on the table of negotiations aimed at forcing (Pyongyang) to disarm itself," it said.

North Korea's "nuclear armed forces represent the nation's life, which can never be abandoned as long as the imperialists and nuclear threats exist on earth," the statement said. North Korea has called the U.S. nuclear arsenal a threat to its existence since the 1950-53 Korean War, which ended in a truce, not a peace treaty, leaving the peninsula still technically at war. Pyongyang justifies its own nuclear pursuit in large part on that perceived U.S. threat.

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Why N. Korea regime is scary
Fri March 29, 2013 > Scott A. Snyder is senior fellow for Korea studies and director of the program on U.S.-Korea policy at the Council on Foreign Relations. Before joining CFR, Snyder was a senior associate in the international relations program of The Asia Foundation, where he founded and directed the Center for U.S.-Korea Policy and served as The Asia Foundation's representative in Korea.

North Korea, under its untested young leader Kim Jong Un, has ratcheted up the threats toward South Korea and the United States to unprecedented levels and with greater intensity than ever before. A torrent of threats has flowed from North Korean spokesmen, including a promise of preemptive nuclear strikes on the United States and calls to "break the waists of the crazy enemies, totally cut their windpipes and thus clearly show them what a real war is like." North Korean brinkmanship, bluff, and bluster are stock elements in its diplomatic toolkit, but why have the threats become so outsized, and how worried should we be? Is North Korea playing the same game it has always played, or does the now-nuclear playbook of a rash young leader represent a new threat the we cannot afford to ignore?

In some respects, we have seen this movie before. North Korea has long used its bluff and bluster as a form of self-defense to keep potential enemies off guard, to strengthen internal political control, magnify external threats to promote national unity, and to symbolically express dissatisfaction when international trends are not going its way. This year, converging factors are squeezing North Korea, creating a stronger-than-usual response in the face of seemingly greater international pressure.

The U.N. Security Council resolution passing financial sanctions on North Korea following its satellite and nuclear tests were tougher than expected, and coincide with U.S.-South Korea military exercises organized to show political resolve to deter North Korean aggression. The establishment of a U.N. Commission of Inquiry into North Korea's human rights situation tarnishes the standing of the new leadership. North Korea's over-the-top responses belie a sense of vulnerability. North Korea has a record of testing the mettle of each new South Korean leader through threats and provocation in an apparent hazing ritual that also determines its strategies toward the South.

South Korea has responded threat for threat in recent weeks to signal to North Korea that it will not be blackmailed by its neighbor's seeming nuclear advantage. Recent South Korean media reports of military plans to target thousands of statues of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il in North Korea are virtually guaranteed to throw North Koreans into a frenzy of effort to defend and show loyalty to the Kim family leadership.

More http://us.cnn.com/2013/03/28/opinion/snyder-north-korea/index.html?hpt=hp_bn7

 

[Katzndogz]

Either no one takes Un seriously or no one really gives a flying crap is the US takes a hit or, there is a secret glee that the US will finally get what's coming. I would just like to see little kimmee kick obama's ass. Just to see the look on his face when a deranged little twerp like Kim Jong Un puts the insufferable fool in his place. I'd break down and watch one of obama's interminable speeches just to see him shit his pants.

 

[Bill Angel]

What are the chances they could get a missile or two to hit Hawaii or the west coast…

Zero.

…and why is nobody too concerned about the possibility of it?

Because it can’t happen.

Is my wondering about this silly…

Yes.

The North Koreans may be crazy but they’re not stupid, they know if they strike South Korea with a nuclear device of some sort their entire country would be obliterated by the United States and it allies.

They are attempting to provoke us, the worst thing we can do is take the bait.

I agree that their military capabilities are not up to making good on their threats, at the present time st least. But the USA had military assets in South Korea and in the waters off the Korean peninsula. What if the North Koreans attacked some of those assets with conventional weapons? Would that not provoke the USA into staging counterattacks against North Korea?

 

[ScienceRocks]

Where is your war, fatass? Did you pussy out?

 

[konradv]

Either no one takes Un seriously or no one really gives a flying crap is the US takes a hit or, there is a secret glee that the US will finally get what's coming. I would just like to see little kimmee kick obama's ass. Just to see the look on his face when a deranged little twerp like Kim Jong Un puts the insufferable fool in his place. I'd break down and watch one of obama's interminable speeches just to see him shit his pants.

You have secret glee that the US will get what's coming, just so you can watch Obama shit his pants? As I suspected, you're a sick POS.

 

[Katzndogz]

What are the chances they could get a missile or two to hit Hawaii or the west coast…

Zero.



Because it can’t happen.

Is my wondering about this silly…

Yes.

The North Koreans may be crazy but they’re not stupid, they know if they strike South Korea with a nuclear device of some sort their entire country would be obliterated by the United States and it allies.

They are attempting to provoke us, the worst thing we can do is take the bait.

I agree that their military capabilities are not up to making good on their threats, at the present time st least. But the USA had military assets in South Korea and in the waters off the Korean peninsula. What if the North Koreans attacked some of those assets with conventional weapons? Would that not provoke the USA into staging counterattacks against North Korea?

All those questions were answered by the attack on Benghazi.

 

[Katzndogz]

Either no one takes Un seriously or no one really gives a flying crap is the US takes a hit or, there is a secret glee that the US will finally get what's coming. I would just like to see little kimmee kick obama's ass. Just to see the look on his face when a deranged little twerp like Kim Jong Un puts the insufferable fool in his place. I'd break down and watch one of obama's interminable speeches just to see him shit his pants.

You have secret glee that the US will get what's coming, just so you can watch Obama shit his pants? As I suspected, you're a sick POS.

Did you think I was keeping a secret? You are a bigger dolt than your dear beloved messiah.

 

[ScienceRocks]

I hope the people rise up and kill the bastards as he has dishonored his nation by looking like a pussy. Asian cultures don't like being seen as losing face.

 

[konradv]

Either no one takes Un seriously or no one really gives a flying crap is the US takes a hit or, there is a secret glee that the US will finally get what's coming. I would just like to see little kimmee kick obama's ass. Just to see the look on his face when a deranged little twerp like Kim Jong Un puts the insufferable fool in his place. I'd break down and watch one of obama's interminable speeches just to see him shit his pants.

You have secret glee that the US will get what's coming, just so you can watch Obama shit his pants? As I suspected, you're a sick POS.

Did you think I was keeping a secret? You are a bigger dolt than your dear beloved messiah.

You're the one that that was talking about your secret glee. Better a dolt that a POS shit like you. Say what you want about liberals, but no matter how much Bush was hated I don't recall anyone saying they hoped we'd be attacked.

 

[Bill Angel]

Zero.



Because it can’t happen.



Yes.

The North Koreans may be crazy but they’re not stupid, they know if they strike South Korea with a nuclear device of some sort their entire country would be obliterated by the United States and it allies.

They are attempting to provoke us, the worst thing we can do is take the bait.

I agree that their military capabilities are not up to making good on their threats, at the present time st least. But the USA had military assets in South Korea and in the waters off the Korean peninsula. What if the North Koreans attacked some of those assets with conventional weapons? Would that not provoke the USA into staging counterattacks against North Korea?

All those questions were answered by the attack on Benghazi.

On September 25, in an address before the United Nations General Assembly President Obama stated, "The attacks on our civilians in Benghazi were attacks on America...And there should be no doubt that we will be relentless in tracking down the killers and bringing them to justice."

SEE
2012 Benghazi attack - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Mac1958]

.

If North Korea shot off a rocket they'd be as likely to hit Australia as Hawaii. Most likely, the middle of the open sea.

Their closed society and hyper-propaganda have made them very naive. They seem to think they can scare us into giving in on sanctions. I'd guess the stealth bombers Obama sent over there delivered a pretty clear message. They probably know what bad shape they're in.

.

 

[there4eyeM]

Overlooking the enormous hypocrisy between what people were sold about Saddam and Iraq compared to the situation with N.K., the capacity of that undernourished nation to do much of anything to America is not much greater than was Iraq's.
If, through lunacy or mistake, L'il Kim sets something off, the Chinese will certainly intervene at least in a diplomatic sense to try to keep others out and at the same time reign in their vassal state. It depends on how far things have gone. A great deal of damage and death is possible, but it will almost certainly be limited to the Korean Peninsula.

 

[FA_Q2]

What are the chances they could get a missile or two to hit Hawaii or the west coast…

Zero.

Says who?

AFAIK, they already have that capability. I also believe that they can hit the west coast. That is about as far as it gets but they CAN hit us.

Will they? I doubt it. No matter how dumb the leader is I don’t think that other, powerful men in the government would allow it.

 

[Bill Angel]

What are the chances they could get a missile or two to hit Hawaii or the west coast…

Zero.

Says who?

AFAIK, they already have that capability. I also believe that they can hit the west coast. That is about as far as it gets but they CAN hit us.

Will they? I doubt it. No matter how dumb the leader is I don’t think that other, powerful men in the government would allow it.

All the talk is about missiles. The North Koreans have more than enough Plutonium to assemble a nuclear device. They could just put the device on a ship, sail the ship into a US port, and then detonate the thing!

 

[FA_Q2]

Zero.

Says who?

AFAIK, they already have that capability. I also believe that they can hit the west coast. That is about as far as it gets but they CAN hit us.

Will they? I doubt it. No matter how dumb the leader is I don’t think that other, powerful men in the government would allow it.

All the talk is about missiles. The North Koreans have more than enough Plutonium to assemble a nuclear device. They could just put the device on a ship, sail the ship into a US port, and then detonate the thing!

That’s a little harder though. It would have to be hidden in a shipment because any ship that comes out of N. Korea, beelines for the states and tries to get near the mainland is going to be sunk LONG before it gets there.

Our capabilities are scary tbh. The things we can do in the air as far as surveillance would make your skin crawl. A Korean suicide ship would never get close. A hidden cargo package might make it but that is more dubious because I am not sure if it would pass all the way here without getting notices as we don’t actually trade with N. Korea. I don’t know enough about shipping to know if it is feasible.