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Beren wrote:Regardless of whatever the nuclear device was North Korea is clearly a heavily armed nuclear power with Russia and China behind its back, so not even the King of Twitter would be insane enough to unleash "Fire and Fury" without a really good reason, which could cost him the presidency or even more.
Zionist Nationalist wrote:China and Russia will not fight for North korea
Beren wrote:Would you guarantee that? There was a Korean War and we know what happened, so we don't have to guess much whether what would happen again. North Korea is not an isolated country without allies.
Zionist Nationalist wrote:That was a completely different geopolitical situation
Yahoo News wrote:With Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, at his side, Mattis said, "Any threat to the United States or its territories, including Guam, or our allies will be met with a massive military response -- a response both effective and overwhelming." Those words alone were within the usual bounds of U.S. commentary on answering North Korean aggression. But he seemed to take it a step further with the reference to "total annihilation."
North Korea's dramatic testing of a sixth nuclear device has once again raised fears of rising tensions in north-east Asia and the prospect of war breaking out on the Korean peninsula.
The size of the latest test - equivalent to a 6.3 magnitude earthquake - suggests a step-change in the destructive power of the North's nuclear assets.
It was five to six times larger than its last test in September 2016, and potentially seven times as large as the atomic bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima.
But it is too early to assess Pyongyang's boast to have successfully tested a hydrogen bomb. The North has made similar uncorroborated claims in the past, but irrespective of the precise nature of the explosion, there seems little doubt that the destructive capacity of Pyongyang's nuclear arsenal has increased substantially.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-41143589
The Independent
NewsWorldAmericasUS politics
US not looking at 'total annihilation' of North Korea but has 'many options', says Defence Secretary
James Mattis says any threat by Pyongyang to the US or its allies will be met by a 'massive military response'
Mythili Sampathkumar New York Sunday 3 September 2017
US Defence Secretary James Mattis and General Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, arrive to speak to the press about the situation in North Korea at the White House in Washington DC on 3 September 2017 NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/Getty Images
Defence Secretary James Mattis has said the US is not looking for the "total annihilation" of North Korea, but stressed that there were "many options" in how to respond to Pyongyang's latest nuclear bomb test.
Mr Mattis said Donald Trump met with a small group of military and defence officials at the White House after US intelligence officials confirmed that the test of a bomb that is reportedly ready to fit onto an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).
"We made it clear we have the ability to defend ourselves and our allies," Mr Marris said.
READ MORE
TRUMP SAYS 'WE'LL SEE' WHEN ASKED IF US WOULD ATTACK NORTH KOREA
Mr Mattis said North Korea's leader Kim Jong-un should "take heed" of the United Nations Security Council's "unified voice" on the issue, as shown by its decision to impose sanctions as well as its "commitment to denuclearise the Korean peninsula".
The Defence Secretary also stressed the "iron-clad" commitments of the US to allies like South Korea and Japan.
"Any threat to the US", its territories like the Pacific island of Guam, or its allies would be met with a "massive military response ... both effective and overwhelming," Mr Mattis said.
He said the group of military advisers had briefed the President on each of the military responses available.
Mr Trump has previously made it known that "all options are on the table" with regards to North Korea, raising fears of war. And, as he left church on Sunday morning, he said simply "we'll see" when asked by a reporter if military action would be taken.
Mr Mattis, however, has said that the US will never run out of diplomatic solutions, implying that military action against Mr Kim would be a last resort.
READ MORE
What you need to know about North Korea's hydrogen bomb
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Trump condemns 'hostile and dangerous' North Korea over nuke test
A few months ago, it was reported that North Korea had developed the technology to fit a nuclear warhead capable of fitting on an ICBM.
A week ago, Pyongyang fired a missile over the Japanese island of Hokkiado and then came the test of what North Korea said was an advanced hydrogen bomb.
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said the latest test was "profoundly destabilising for regional security".
The US Ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, confirmed the Security Council would hold an emergency meeting on Monday to discuss the situation at the request of France, Japan, South Korea, the UK, and the US.
MB. wrote:I don't know how the US can solve this problem without invading Korea. The other option, recognizing DPRK as a thermonuclear power, is probably politically impossible.
ThirdTerm wrote:The explosion was five to six times larger than the last test in 2016 and North Korea may have combined a couple of atomic bombs to make it look like a hydrogen bomb. There was another explosion followed up on the initial one with a slight delay, which may have been an error.
ness31 wrote:If North Korea was going to 'attack', it would have done so by now. Same goes for the WWIII scenario in general, if it was gonna happen it would have...by now.
MB. wrote:This was almost certainly not a hydrogen bomb but rather a two stage atomic bomb, the yield was about 100 kilotons. As usual Igor's information is wrong.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/as ... 6da18ca929
Igor Antunov wrote:
5.2 = 10kt, 5.6 earthquake at 0m = 100 kt, 6.3 = 1,000. As usual, fake, incomplete news. I'm going of concrete figures. And it doesn't matter, A boosted 120kt device is the same design as a boosted 500kt or multi-megaton device. It's just a matter of material and composition of material used. They have a good enough design, it's done. The genie is out of the bottle.
The US can't solve this problem, especially alone, and they won't do either of your options. In my opinion the US doesn't really have any options here, Kim's regime could be overthrown by Russia and China only.That's the whole idea, DPRK is the last cold-war flash-point. This fiasco is statecraft and exoteric brinkmanship, North Korea is a bait and stitch operation, psychological decoy, expendable propaganda farm.
It could be either a coup or a rapid, decisive, and overwhelming military invasion, or a combination of the two. In any case they would need some support from within the North Korean military.I'm not sure how deep the finance rabbit hole goes, but North Korea will always be a puppet state
ness31 wrote:If North Korea was going to 'attack', it would have done so by now. Same goes for the WWIII scenario in general, if it was gonna happen it would have...by now.Fear is the name of the game. This will bloat military spending and help finance the 'real' power struggle as world powers compete for full spectrum dominance of Earth.
The Washington Post wrote:Trump’s options on North Korea going from bad to worse
By Josh Lederman | AP September 4 at 8:12 PM
WASHINGTON — Sanctions on North Korea have been tried, and failed. Serious negotiations seem like a pipedream. And any military strike would almost surely bring mass devastation and horrific civilian casualties.
The Trump administration's options are going from bad to worse as Kim Jong Un's military marches ever closer to being able to strike the U.S. mainland with nuclear weapons. Just as President Donald Trump seeks to show global resolve after the North's most powerful nuclear test, his leverage is limited even further by new tensions he's stoked with South Korea, plus continued opposition from China and Russia.
With South Korea, the country most directly threatened, Trump has taken the unusual step of highlighting disagreements between the U.S. and its treaty ally, including by floating the possibility he could pull out of a trade deal with South Korea to protest trade imbalances. He also suggested on Twitter the two countries lacked unanimity on North Korea, faulting new South Korean President Moon Jae-in, who has been more conciliatory to the North, for his government's "talk of appeasement."
It's an inopportune time for grievances to be aired, and on Monday the two leaders sought to show they were confronting North Korea together — and with might. The White House said that in a phone call with Moon, Trump gave approval "in principle" to lifting restrictions on South Korean missile payloads and to approving "many billions" in weapons sales to South Korea. Though no details were released, the idea was to show the countries were collaborating to bolster defenses against Kim's government.
"He is begging for war," U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley said of the North Korean leader Monday at the U.N. Security Council, where diplomats were called into emergency session despite the Labor Day holiday in the U.S.
Haley called for exhausting "all diplomatic means to end this crisis." But to those who tried and failed over a decade-plus to resolve it, there appear to be few such means that haven't already been tried — and tried again.
What has changed is the sense of urgency, and the growing view among national security analysts that it may be time to abandon "denuclearization" and accept North Korea into the nuclear club. The North claimed Sunday's test, its sixth since 2006, was a hydrogen bomb designed to be mounted on its new intercontinental ballistic missiles.
Short of allowing Pyongyang's weapons programs to advance, Trump's options all appear to variations on what's been considered before:
THE MILITARY OPTION
The U.S. military for years has had a full range of contingency plans prepared for potential strikes on the North to try to disrupt its nuclear program or dissuade it from developing further. On Sunday, Trump dispatched Defense Secretary Jim Mattis to warn of a "massive military response if the North keeps threatening the U.S., while Trump hinted in a call with Japan's leader that the U.S. could even deploy its own nuclear arsenal.
But over the years, the military options have consistently been viewed as unworkable, owing to the sheer horror that would ensue if North Korea retaliated — as would be expected — by striking South Korea. The North Koreans have massive military assets stockpiled on what is the world's most heavily fortified border.
The U.S. has roughly 28,000 troops in South Korea, and there are hundreds of thousands more American citizens just in Seoul, the capital, with a metro area population of 25 million. Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has said if war broke out, there would be heavy civilian casualties in the first few days before the U.S. could mitigate the North's ability to strike Seoul.
TRADE SHUTDOWN
Trump on Saturday declared on Twitter that the U.S. was considering "stopping all trade with any country doing business with North Korea." That would be a dramatic escalation of the longstanding U.S. strategy: increasing economic pressure on North Korea by restricting its access to funds needed for its weapons programs.
But many countries do business with North Korea — especially China, a top U.S. trading partner and economic behemoth. Cutting off trade with China, not to mention the others, would devastate the U.S. economy and be incredibly difficult to enforce. Countless American businesses would be shuttered or hard hit, eliminating jobs along with them.
SANCTIONS AND ISOLATION
A total trade shutdown aside, the U.S. has worked for years to squeeze Pyongyang financially and encouraging others to do the same — especially China. In a diplomatic victory for the Trump administration, the U.N. last month approved sweeping new sanctions targeting roughly one-third of the North's economy, with China's support.
But the latest nuclear test and recent missile tests suggest Kim is undeterred by those sanctions. And there's strong reluctance from countries including China and Russia, both permanent Security Council members, to do more sanctioning.
Advocates for more sanctions say there's still room to up the pressure. Anthony Ruggiero, a sanctions expert at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said the next logical step is for the U.S. to impose "secondary sanctions" targeting banks or businesses in China that do business with North Korea, a tactic the U.S. used effectively to push Iran to the table over its nuclear program several years ago.
"The chance for sanctions to work is that playbook," Ruggiero said.
DIPLOMATIC TALKS
China, backed by Russia, has been urging an immediate return to talks, predicated on the U.S. halting joint military exercises with South Korea and the North suspending its weapons development. But few in the U.S. government have advocated direct talks with the North Koreans until their behavior significantly changes. In the past, talks with the North have failed to prevent it from advancing its weapons program for long, and the U.S. has accused Pyongyang of cheating on an earlier agreement.
The Trump administration has left the door open to talks with the North, and has tried to coax Kim into abstaining from provocative tests long enough to justify a U.S. return to the table. So far, that coaxing hasn't worked.
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