TA-ANALYSIS: Pakistani Reports 'NK has nukes;' NK, US at 'brink of nuclear war'

Chronic7, I couldn't agree with you more regarding the Bush administration's motivation to invade Iraq. Between Halliburton milking dough out of the US taxpayer and the oil profits, pockets are being lined in the GOP. If terrorism were truly targeted, a more global approach would be used, rather than occupying a middle-eastern nation rich in non-renewable fossil fuels.

if a terrorist organization or other country were to set off a nuke in the us, what do i think would happen? the us would select a few likely candidates and retaliate against them with an overwhelming response to the effect of removing those countries from the face of the earth...it would be justified by indicating it was to protect our nation, no other nations would enter the fray, and the un would object to it all and want to have discussions.

Supposing the only way a NK nuke could get to the US were via smuggling it in, I'd be inclined to agree that yes, America would retaliate against North Korea and a couple other purportedly purportedly nuke-sharing nations like Iran. Capital cities in these countries would be levelled by American nukes within hours of America losing a city.

As far as other countries staying out of it: well, if we sent a nuke at Iran, the Muslim world would explode -- it would be the spark to the powder keg. Even if such retribution were somehow justified (nukes are never justifiable), the chaos which would erupt would be outstanding.

If it were North Korea that America nuked, I don't think there'd be too much regional instability. Granted, once NK detected a nuke launch (which I don't think they're capable of), I believe they'd send artillery at South Korea and a nuke at Tokyo.

"During the 1980s and 1990s, Western governments became increasingly convinced that covert nuclear and ballistic missile collaboration was taking place between China, Pakistan and North Korea. According to the Washington Post, "U.S. intelligence operatives secretly rifled [Khan's] luggage ... during an overseas trip in the early 1980s to find the first concrete evidence of Chinese collaboration with Pakistan's bomb effort: a drawing of a crude, but highly reliable, Hiroshima-sized weapon that must have come directly from Beijing, according to U.S. officials."

Excerpt taken from.
en.wikipedia.org...

Collaboration for ballistic missiles and nuclear.

I did a little research on NK's ability to deliver a warhead to the west coast of the US.

Here is an article from over 5 years ago that was very interesting.

From the article:

A more profound development came later in the form of reported U.S. intelligence assessments regarding the missile test. These findings are that: 1) the third stage of the missile, claimed as a satellite by North Korea, traveled over 3,000 miles and landed in waters near Alaska. 2) North Korea will have a missile capable of striking Alaska and Hawaii by 2002, for practical purposes an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM). 3) North Korea is constructing underground sites to deploy these missiles (which suggests deployment as early as 2000). 4) North Korea will have a longer-range ICBM capable of striking the U.S. west coast and other parts of the continental United States within five years.

This is from 5 years ago...so I dug as little more and I found this little piece from a guy named William R Johnston. Scroll down towards the bottom. I don't know the validity of this at all, but he claims that as of Jan '00, NK had 13 warheads

Here is a pretty cool site about ICBM stats. It says that the Taepo Dong 2 has a range of 3,400 miles.

Some say the the Taepo Dong 3 will have a range of 5,000 miles. That would reach the freakin west coast and that is where I live

This article claims that the Taepo Dong 3 would have a range of over 9,000, which I don't think is true, but that would mean that NK would be able to strike ANYWHERE in North America.

This is really scary. I mean we can try to protect our borders and such from people carrying in suitcase bombs or whatnot. But the leader of North Korea is a lunatic and if he has the ability top deliver a warhead in this manner, we better do something about it.

Perhaps the best thing we can do to this "lunatic" is stop putting sanctions on it and going back on our treaties with them.

This isn't "caving in" to North Korea's demands. Nor is it being weak or unfirm in our resolve. It is doing the right thing regardless of international reputation, sticking to your word, and is free trade. I ask you, what Bush-backer wouldn't like those reasons??

I think such a policy of fairness instead of "us-them, do-what-we-say-or-else" yelling would do much to resolve the conflict. Everybody wins!*


*unless you define a policy shift as losing.

Originally posted by Cascadian1
A final possibility: after seeing what happened to Spain's elections after the train bombings, North Korea could hope to fuddle US elections this fall by putting a mushroom cloud over Seattle, Portland, or Tokyo.

Nice, seeing as I live about 45 miles outside Portland.
Still, I suppose I'll be able to watch the mushroom clouds and get a scoop for ATSNN

Did anyone watch Dubya's press conference last night? how he was talking about that his policies on dealing with terrorists will not change. and that he would use military force again, like in Iraq, if need be.

who thinks he was hinting towards attacking North Korea? maybe he was threatening them?

I think his comments were more along the lines of a dog pissing around a tree. He was just marking his territory.

I tend to believe he won't go after N. Korea (unless they attack first). Look the nation is split already, another invasion (even after a potential re-election) that is not a response to a direct attack would get him impeached.

Even his supporters are starting to balk at the number of US dead in the last two weeks. He can't afford to kill off anymore young men and women. We learned how to impeach a president recently and it was for far less than Bush as done.

nativeokie said

I tend to believe he won't go after N. Korea (unless they attack first). Look the nation is split already, another invasion (even after a potential re-election) that is not a response to a direct attack would get him impeached.

I agree that another war built on reasons as tenuously as Iraq was will lead to a massive falling out of support for Bush. Another attack with another smoking gun would absolutely reignite the American "level the b*stards" wrath. However, America could gently prod North Korea into opening fire.

Now that I think more on it, honestly if any city in the world were hit with a nontraditional nuke (suitcase, etc), I think the US would retaliate against NK or Iran within a month (within a week if nuke were in USA). America would use it as a "See I toldja so" reason to continue on with this PNAC agenda.