North Korea (Superthread)

[57Chevy]

NKorea proposes joint investigation with South Korea of deadly sinking of SKorean warship:

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — North Korea, which has vehemently denied accusations that it sank a South Korean warship, is calling for a new joint investigation by both Koreas "to verify objectively the truth of the incident."

In a letter to the Security Council dated Tuesday and obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press, North Korea's U.N. Ambassador Sin Son Ho called for "high-level military talks" between the two Koreas. He also reiterated the North's call for its own inspection team to be sent to the site of the sinking near the tense Korean sea border.

Sin urged the council to "take measures" to help realize these talks before it deals with the results of the international investigation led by South Korea which concluded that North Korea torpedoed the 1,200-ton Cheonan in March, killing 46 South Korean sailors
South Korea sent a letter to the Security Council on June 4 asking the U.N.'s most powerful body to respond to the sinking "in a manner appropriate to the gravity of North Korea's military provocation."

Since then, the council has been holding consultations on a response.

North Korea has warned that its military forces will respond if the Security Council questions or condemns the country over the sinking

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http://www.foxnews.com/world/2010/06/30/nkorea-proposes-joint-investigation-south-korea-deadly-sinking-skorean-warship/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+foxnews%2Fworld+%28Text+-+World%29


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[The Bread Guy]

North Korean soldiers defect to China fuelling fears of imminent military clash
An upsurge in the number of North Korean soldiers defecting into China fuelled fears of food shortages and an imminent military clash.
Julian Ryall, The Daily Telegraph (UK), 12 Jul 10
Article link

Previously considered to be among the regime's most important assets, the North Korean People's Army has always been well provisioned in order to ensure the troops remain loyal.

But a poor harvest and the disastrous revaluation of the North Korean currency in November of last year has worsened the nation's already dire economic straits.

Defectors have claimed that they were required to survive on noodles made of ground corn and that meat or fish were a luxury, a journalist for Japan's Asahi Shimbun reported from the Chinese  city of Shenyang.

On one stretch of the border, Chinese troops apprehended five North Korean soldiers in May alone. Prior to the sinking of the South Korean corvette Cheonan in March, allegedly by a torpedo fired from a North Korean submarine, it was rare for troops to be taken into custody on the Chinese side of the Yalu River.

The defectors have claimed that senior members of the party and the armed forces were stockpiling provisions, another indication that the regime is steeling itself for a military confrontation.

"In the past there have been cases of North Korean troops crossing the border and plundering Chinese farms for their food, which they then took back to their posts in the North," Kim Sang-hun, a human rights activist in Seoul, told The Daily Telegraph.

However, these soldiers chose to return to the North with the supplies ....

More on link

 

[Rifleman62]

The leadership of NK is nuts enough to nuk a region of the country (that they consider unstable) and blame it on the US.

 

[57Chevy]

U.S., S.Korea to hold navy drills against N.Korea
Korea
CAMP CASEY, South Korea -- The United States and South Korea announced on Tuesday they would hold military drills next weekend to send a clear message to the North to curb its aggressive behaviour.

China, North Korea's only powerful ally, has condemned the planned drills and launched its own naval exercises off its eastern coast.

"These defensive, combined exercises are designed to send a clear message to North Korea that its aggressive behaviour must stop, and that we are committed to together enhancing our combined defensive capabilities," visiting U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said in a joint statement with his South Korean counterpart.

Gates will be joined in Seoul on Wednesday by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in a show of support for South Korea after it accused the North of sinking one of its warships last March, killing 46 sailors.

The two will visit the heavily defended Demilitarised Zone (DMZ) border that has divided the peninsula since the 1950-53 Korean War for which there is still no formal peace treaty.

North Korea denies responsibility for the sinking and a U.N. statement earlier this month criticising the sinking, apparently under pressure from China, avoided any mention of Pyonyang.

Pyongyang has recently signalled it wants a return to talks with regional powers on its nuclear weapons programme and which it has boycotted for 1-1/2 years.

Analysts say Washington and Seoul are reluctant to head back into the nuclear talks which in the past the ostracised North has used to leverage benefits from the international community while still pressing ahead with trying to develop a nuclear arsenal.

But they may have little choice with Washington nervous about North Korea's potential to export atomic weapons, while South Korea's leaders do not want to be seen as competely turning their back on their neighbour.

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[CougarKing]

The perfect "gift" for Kim Jong Il on the 60th anniversary of the North Korean invasion of the South: tougher sanctions.

Washington Post link

U.S. to strengthen sanctions against N. Korea after sinking of S. Korean ship


By Craig Whitlock and Karen DeYoung
Thursday, July 22, 2010

SEOUL -- Searching for new ways to punish North Korea after blaming it for sinking a South Korean warship in March, the Obama administration announced Wednesday that it will strengthen existing sanctions against the North and impose new restrictions on its weapons trade and trafficking in counterfeit currency and luxury goods.

Administration officials traveling here with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates offered few details of what seemed a hastily put-together addition to previously announced warnings and measures reflecting displeasure. On Tuesday, the United States and South Korea said they would hold "large-scale" military exercises in an attempt to deter further hostile acts by North Korea.

Seoul and Washington have also agreed that U.S. commanders will retain operational control of their joint military forces in South Korea, in the event of a new war, until at least December 2015. Previously, the U.S. military was scheduled to hand over operational command in 2012.

Officials from both countries said they had been considering the delay before the March 26 sinking of the Cheonan, but that recent concerns about North Korea clinched the decision.

On an unprecedented joint visit Wednesday to the Demilitarized Zone that divides the two Koreas, Clinton and Gates marked the 60th anniversary of the start of the Korean War. Clinton said that as she gazed through binoculars across the most heavily guarded border in the world, delineated by razor wire and land mines, "it struck me that although it may be a thin line, these two places are worlds apart."

Gates was making his third trip to the DMZ; Clinton had never been there. The defense secretary said his last visit was 20 years ago, when he was director of the CIA.

"It is stunning how little has changed up there and yet how much South Korea continues to grow and prosper," Gates said, standing with Clinton in the rain outside a small U.N. building that straddles the border. "The North, by contrast, stagnates in isolation and deprivation. And, as we saw with the sinking of the Cheonan, it continues its history of unpredictable and, at times, provocative behavior."

Clinton and Gates later laid a wreath at the Korean War memorial and met with their South Korean counterparts. They were to meet Wednesday night with President Lee Myung-bak. Along with a visit to Seoul by Adm. Mike Mullen, the Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman, the meetings and events were intended to send a message of strong U.S.-South Korean relations at a time of heightened tensions in the region.


(....)

Plus, the DPRK has a bad day in court:

Jerusalem Post link

US court fines N. Korea $300m
By HILARY LEILA KRIEGER 
07/22/2010 00:31


Penalty levied for role in '72 Ben-Gurion attack.

WASHINGTON – A US judge has fined North Korea for its role in a 1972 terror attack in Israel, a landmark ruling that for the first time holds Pyongyang accountable for such activity, according to lawyers involved with the case.On the heels of the decision, the US separately announced Wednesday that it was intensifying sanctions on Pyongyang as a response to the sinking of a South Korean warship apparently at the hands of North Korea in March.



The moves have the shared effect of intensifying pressure on the isolated regime of Kim Jong-Il, though few expect his government to pay the $300 million demanded by the court.

In a ruling delivered Friday, US District Court Judge Francisco Besosa in Puerto Rico found North Korea liable for its role in providing material support to the Japanese Red Army and Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, which killed 26 people and wounded more than 80 others in a shooting spree at Lod Airport, now Ben- Gurion Airport.

Many of those killed were tourists from Puerto Rico, including Carmelo Calderon- Molina. His family, along with that of Pablo Tirado-Ayala, who was wounded in the attack, brought the suit in 2006.

“It’s very significant, since it’s the first judgment against North Korea,” said Israeli lawyer Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, who represented the families.

She said the case was motivated in part as a protest against the US’s removing North Korea from its statesponsors- of-terror list, adding that she hoped this would encourage the government to reconsider its decision, since the ruling demonstrated that North Korea “is involved with terrorism.”

Darshan-Leitner acknowledged that it was very unlikely the families would recoup the $78m. in compensatory damages and $300m. in punitive damages awarded by the court, short of a US-North Korea reconciliation in which restitution was part of the conditions for rapprochement. But she said she would seek North Korean assets in the US that could be seized and other means of obtaining some of the owed money in the meantime.


(...)

 

[57Chevy]

N. Korea says U.S. drills pose 'danger' to region
KOREA

HANOI — North Korea on Thursday denounced planned U.S.-South Korean military drills as a "grave" danger to the region and criticized new U.S. sanctions as "hostile".

The comments by a North Korean diplomat in Hanoi at Asia's largest security forum came a day after the United States announced expanded sanctions against the North and two days after Seoul and Washington unveiled plans for joint military exercises.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who arrived in Hanoi on Thursday, is expected to seek stronger regional support for South Korea, which with U.S. backing has sought repercussions for Pyongyang for the sinking a South Korean naval vessel.

Relations across the divided peninsula have deteriorated after Seoul accused Pyongyang of torpedoing one of its warships in March, killings 46 sailors.

The large-scale joint military exercises scheduled to begin on July 25 are the first overt military response to the attack on the South Korean warship.

"This move is not only a grave threat to peace and stability of the Korean peninsula but also to the region," North Korean official Ri Tong-il, a member of Pyongyang's delegation at the security forum, told reporters.

"It also violates the spirit of the UN Security Council president's statement," he added, referring to a UN statement which condemned the sinking of the ship Cheonan but did not cite North Korea by name.

China, North Korea's only powerful ally, has harshly criticized the military drills and launched its own naval exercises off its eastern coast.

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[57Chevy]

North Korea threatens 'physical response' to U.S. military exercise:

Hanoi, Vietnam (CNN) -- North Korea vowed Friday that there would be a "physical response" in reaction to the planned joint military exercises between the United States and South Korea.

"There will be a physical response against the threat imposed by the United States militarily," North Korea spokesman Ri Tong Il told reporters outside the Association of Southeast Asian Nations meeting.

About 8,000 military personnel from the United States and South Korea are scheduled to participate in joint military exercises beginning this weekend.

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KOREA
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[zipperhead_cop]

Could they be so stupid as to actually take action against an American vessel?  I bet that doesn't get ignored by the UN. 

 

[57Chevy]

U.S. calls on North Korea to avoid 'provocative words'
KOREA

WASHINGTON, July 24, 2010 (AFP) - The United States called on North Korea Saturday to avoid "provocative words" after Pyongyang threatened a nuclear response to new US sanctions and joint US naval exercises with South Korea.

"We are not interested in a war of words with North Korea," said State Department spokesman Philip Crowley.

"What we need from North Korea is fewer provocative words and more constructive action."

North Korea said earlier Saturday it was ready for a "retaliatory sacred war" in response to ramped-up US pressure against Pyongyang, including joint US-South Korean naval exercises.

"The army and people... will legitimately counter with their powerful nuclear deterrence the largest-ever nuclear war exercises to be staged by the US and the South Korean puppet forces," North Korea’s National Defense Commission said.

Seoul and Washington have said their four-day joint exercises, scheduled to begin Sunday, are a bid to deter North Korea’s "aggressive" behavior.

"This is irresponsible and precisely why we are committed to denuclearization of the Korean peninsula," Crowley told AFP.

The North routinely threatens military action in response to joint military exercises by the United States and South Korea, saying they are a rehearsal for war.

But tensions in the region have been particularly high for the past two months, after Washington and Seoul accused the North of torpedoing a South Korean warship, killing 46 people.

The North denies involvement and says the "smear campaign" is a pretext for aggression.

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[tomahawk6]

Right now the North is doing what they do best - threaten. Its all talk. Now if they want to launch some missiles or try another nuclear test then things get amped up a bit. Unless the Chinese let their attack dog slip its leash its all a distraction.

 

[57Chevy]

U.S., South Korea stage naval exercise despite nuclear threats
KOREA

SEOUL, July 25, 2010 (AFP) - The U.S. and South Korea on Sunday launched a major naval exercise involving a nuclear-powered US aircraft carrier in the Sea of Japan despite North Korea’s threats of nuclear retaliation.

The drill is the first in a series intended "to send a clear message to North Korea that its aggressive behaviour must stop," US Defence Secretary Robert Gates and the South’s Defence Minister Kim Tae-Young said in a joint statement this week after talks.

South Korea and the United States, citing the findings of a multinational investigation, accuse the North of torpedoing a South Korean warship near the tense Yellow Sea border in March.

The communist North denies involvement in the sinking of the Cheonan, which claimed 46 lives.

The US-led United Nations Command said the four-day drill would involve about 20 ships, including the aircraft carrier USS George Washington, and some 200 fixed-wing aircraft.

Around 8,000 service personnel from the two allies were to take part in the show of force.

"The USS George Washington left the southern port of Busan around 7:00am Sunday (2200 GMT Saturday). It’s sailing towards the Sea of Japan (East Sea) for the exercise," a US military spokesman told AFP.

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[thunderchild]

I think that it is more likely that China "occupies" North Korea rather then let it start a war that will cause millions of deaths and has no hope of  winning.  Any Ideas?

 

[Edward Campbell]

China and the USA are both using the sinking of the ROK corvette and the ongoing US/ROK exercises in the Sea of Japan to press their own regional agendas.

Currently, the DPRK is playing into America's hands by creating "fears" when none should exist. In the longer term China hopes that, as there usually is, there will be a counter-reaction to the US "security" posture. Their hope, perhaps even their plan, is that there will be no DPRK action at all, and, in a month or so, the incipient anti-Americanism that is growing in Japan and ROK and, indeed, all the ASEAN nations will assert itself.

Secretary Clinton's recent remarks re: South China Seas dispute settlement provoked the strongest language from a Chinese foreign minister that I have heard in many years and, as far as I can tell from watching/reading both Chinese (CCTV News) and Western/Asian channels (CNN Asia, BBC, etc) and newspapers, the "expert" (TV talking head/columnist) reaction is that the US poked China in the eye and China poked back, surprisingly quickly and shockingly harder.

My quesstimate: China is willing (but able?) to play "hardball" with the current US administration in this (East and South-East Asia) region. The DPRK is a Chinese tool which, to date, it has, mostly - the sinking of the corvette being an exception, used carefully and effectively.

I repeat: the Chinese aim, in the medium to long term, is a united Korea - under Seoul's capitalist and democratic leadership, but without a US military presence on the Korean peninsula.

The Chinese have, broadly, proved to be pretty good at setting achievable, long term goals and seeing them through to fruition.

 

[CougarKing]

The U.S. nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS George Washington (bottom) and the South Korean Navy's Landing Platform Helicopter ship Dokdo leave for a U.S.-South Korea joint naval and air exercise at a South Korean naval port in Busan, about 420 km (262 miles) southeast of Seoul, July 25, 2010. The aircraft carrier is participating in the massive combined air and naval exercise held by South Korea and the U.S. in the East Sea from July 25 to 28 to demonstrate their deterrence plans against North Korea, according to the defence ministries of the two countries. REUTERS/Jo Jung-Ho/Yonhap

 

[zipperhead_cop]

Slight hijack observation...
Are there any non-nuclear powered aircraft carriers anymore?  It always strikes me as 80's style hype when the news always tacks "NUCLEAR POWERED" on to a vessels designation.  Who cares? If it was bio-diesel or solar powered, that might be interesting.  Nuclear?  Not so much. 

[/hijack]

 

[Oldgateboatdriver]

The answer is no, for the USA anyway, Zipperhead. The last conventional US carrier, the John F. Kennedy was decommissioned in 2007.

However, there are conventional carriers in other countries: India, Italy, France, Brazil, the UK, and more if you look at "baby carriers".

 

[CougarKing]

More pics of the joint USN-ROKN exercise:

The Los Angeles-class attack submarine USS Tucson (SSN 770) is underway ahead of the U.S. nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS George Washington (first row, 2nd L) and South Korean Navy's Landing Platform Helicopter ship Dokdo  (first row, 2nd R) during the U.S.-South Korea joint naval and air exercise in the open sea east of South Korea July 26, 2010. North Korea has declared a "sacred war" against the United States and South Korea in retaliation for the allies' military drills that began on Sunday, accusing them of driving the Korean peninsula to the brink of explosion. The drills are aimed at boosting deterrence against the North. REUTERS/Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Adam K. Thomas-US Navy/Handout

REUTERS/Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Adam K. Thomas-US Navy/Handout

REUTERS/South Korean Navy/Handout

 

[zipperhead_cop]

The answer is no, for the USA anyway, Zipperhead. The last conventional US carrier, the John F. Kennedy was decommissioned in 2007.

However, there are conventional carriers in other countries: India, Italy, France, Brazil, the UK, and more if you look at "baby carriers".

Thanks for the info, good to know 

I still don't get how the energy system of a vessal has anything to do with a given news item though. 

 

[Oldgateboatdriver]

If I may suggest a possibility here: Perhaps these journalists use the same rule as these forums, that you do not use acronyms unless universally understood.

I look at the caption on the picture and see, for instance that they describe the Dodko but do not use naval identifier for it either.

The description before either ship corresponds to their naval identifier:

Dodko  is LPH 6111: LPH stands for Landing Platform Helicopter.

The Washington is CVN 73, meaning Aircraft-carrier (CV) Nuclear powered.

The use of N, for nuclear, is of importance for naval planning purposes and is used for all classes of ships to distinguish the nuclear ones from the non nuclear (for instance, SSK is a hunter-killer submarine, while a SSN is a Nuclear powered hunter-killer submarine.) In naval circles, knowing the type of propulsion (classic vs nuclear) permits planning taking into consideration issues of speed, need for resupply in fuel, range, maximum transit speeds etc. So it is important to know.

 

[57Chevy]

The largest warships ever built. A small city that goes 30kt........amazing 
Other information: Nuclear Powered Aircraft Carriers