Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

North Korea Accused of Testing an ICBM With Missile Launch Into Space (examiner.com)

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the why-not-stick-with-intra-continental dept.

MarkWhittington writes: Reuters reported that North Korea launched a long-range missile that is said to have placed a satellite into space. The launch happened much to the consternation of North Korea's neighbors, South Korea and Japan, as well as the United States. Pyongyang claimed that the missile launch was part of that country's peaceful space program. But, other countries are pretty sure that the launch was a test of an ICBM capable of placing a nuclear weapon on any target in the world, particularly the United States.

4 of 287 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Anything NK does is suspicious by Great+Big+Bird · · Score: 4, Interesting

    They will be tolerated in so much as they keep a buffer between them and South Korea. They do not want another democratic neighbour to stir up trouble.

    The limits to this arrangement are of course in question.

  2. Re:Anything NK does is suspicious by meerling · · Score: 4, Interesting

    From what I've seen, even China is getting sick of North Korean antics and have started applying political pressure behind the scenes for them to chill out. Unfortunately, it seems as though NK is ignoring it and going rogue, which is a really bad idea as it's really only the influence that China wields that keeps them from getting steamrolled by any of several other countries or groups.

  3. Re:Anything NK does is suspicious by dsmatthews9379 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    That sounds logical. The only other reason I can see is that they are letting NK force the West into developing more advanced ICBM counter measure technologies because they are confident that they will then be able to steal it and thereby undermine the West's ICBM capabilities. Ask yourself what would Sun Tzu do?

  4. Re:Anything NK does is suspicious by encad · · Score: 5, Interesting

    That sounds logical. The only other reason I can see is that they are letting NK force the West into developing more advanced ICBM counter measure technologies because they are confident that they will then be able to steal it and thereby undermine the West's ICBM capabilities. Ask yourself what would Sun Tzu do?

    Interesting thought and the US was/is (?) developing that tech with variing results and more for propaganda reasons against russia, which upset them on hillarious levels, even with the knowledge that they have enough firepower to overcome any of these systems.

    Beside their wanna-be nuclear ordenance NK has also enough firepower at the DMZ that they can easily shell Seoul into ground zero with conventional weaponary which seems even more dangerous, because MAD (without the M in NKs case) is not really effectiv as they still can fire at billions of people even after the capital was nuked to the ground.

    Probably the only acceptable answer to them firing an ICBM would be return fire by the 5 permanent members of the security council, with total annihilation of NK damn the consequences, because if one gets to fire it and nothing happens afterwards, others will try as well (looking at you India/Pakistan/Israel/Iran).

    China already mentioned quite public that they don't like NK acting up, but in contrast to my statement above they also might not be in the position to intervene without a major incident and are now between a rock and a hard place:

    - Keep that shitty dictator and send him enough money to keep his kingdom and hope that it destabilizes from inside and stays inside or
    - actively act against him and try to explain why half SK would look like the eastern french border after WWI

    Would be interesting to see how Sun Tzu manages this one.