Hundreds of North Korea missiles threaten Asia

[VALKRYIE]

NK should stop purchasing nuke missiles & military upgrades they can't even afford to feed its own people now one of the poorest countries in asia.

 

[Cossack25A1]

A way for Kim Jong-Un to say "hello" and "good bye"

 

[Tshering22]

it would be only fair if we give South Korea the means to build to ballistic missile and nuclear warheads. or China can step in and take away NK missiles and warheads which it rightfully can do. NK is it's step child after all.

You really want to provoke the Fat Kims? The moment their intel knows that ROK has the capability to make nukes, it will launch artillery strike on the ROK to ensure destruction of Seoul leadership.

Not to mention, Non-proliferation will go for a toss.

 

[Hindustani78]

U.S. defense chief warns against militarization of territorial rows in Asia| Reuters
Wed Apr 8, 2015 2:57am EDT


(Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of Defense Ash Carter kicked off his first Asian tour on Wednesday with a stern warning against the militarization of territorial rows in a region where China is at odds with several nations in the East and South China Seas.

Carter's visit to Japan coincides with growing U.S. concern over China's land reclamation in the Spratly archipelago of the disputed South China Sea, where Beijing has rival claims with several countries including the Philippines and Vietnam.

Tokyo and Beijing have a separate row over Japanese-controlled islets in the East China Sea.

U.S. and Philippine troops will take part in annual military exercises this month near the Spratlys in the largest such drills since the allies resumed joint activities in 2000.

Asked whether the beefed up U.S.-Philippine exercises were a response to China's moves, Carter said Washington and Manila had shared interests in the region, including a desire to ensure there were no changes in the status quo by force or that territorial rows were militarized.

"We take a strong stance against the militarization of these disputes," Carter told a news conference after talks with his Japanese counterpart, Defense Minister Gen Nakatani.

Chinese reclamation work is well advanced on six reefs in the Spratlys, according to recently published satellite photographs and Philippine officials. In addition, Manila has said Chinese dredgers had started reclaiming a seventh.

While the new islands won't overturn U.S. military superiority in the region, Chinese workers are building ports and fuel storage depots as well as possibly two airstrips that experts have said would allow Beijing to project power deep into the maritime heart of Southeast Asia.

The commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, Harry Harris, told an Australian think tank last week that China was using dredges and bulldozers to create a "great wall of sand" in the South China Sea.

China claims most of the potentially energy rich waterway, through which $5 trillion in ship-borne trade passes every year. The Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan also have overlapping claims.

TIGHTER ALLIANCE TIES

Carter also welcomed progress toward the first update in U.S.-Japan defense cooperation guidelines since 1997, a revision that will expand the scope for interaction between the allies in line with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's push to ease the constraints of Japan's pacifist constitution on the nation's military.

"It's going to give first of all Japan, but also our alliance, much greater scope to provide security in the region, and for that matter elsewhere outside of the region," Carter said as the talks began.

Abe's move to allow Tokyo to come to the aid of an ally under attack would pave the way for closer cooperation between U.S. and Japanese forces across Asia, Admiral Robert Thomas, commander of the U.S. Seventh Fleet, said last month.

In January, Thomas said the United States would also welcome Japanese air patrols in the South China Sea

Nakatani told the news conference with Carter, however, that the new guidelines did not target any particular region including the South China Sea.

Neither Tokyo nor Washington have territorial claims in the South China Sea, but the U.S. Seventh Fleet operates in the area and any Japanese presence would irritate Beijing.

In a written interview with Japan's Yomiuri newspaper published on Wednesday, Carter expressed concern about China's land reclamation in the South China Sea.

"We are especially concerned at the prospect of militarization of these outposts. These activities seriously increase tensions and reduce prospects for diplomatic solutions," the newspaper quoted him as saying.

"We urge China to limit its activities and exercise restraint to improve regional trust."

Carter also repeated Washington's opposition to any "coercive unilateral" actions by China to undermine Japan's administrative control of disputed islands in the East China Sea, known as the Senkaku in Japan and the Diaoyu in China.

Abe's government plans to submit bills to parliament in the coming months to ratify his cabinet's decision last year to allow Japan to exercise its right of collective self-defense, the biggest shift in Japanese security policy in decades.

Carter, Nakatani and the two countries' foreign ministers are expected to unveil the new defense guidelines in late April, before Abe meets U.S. President Barack Obama on April 28 for a summit in Washington.

(Writing by Linda Sieg; Editing by Dean Yates)

 

[Hindustani78]

Maybe so, but their targets are Japan and South Korea. You can say US, Russian and Chinese missiles threaten the whole world?

Here its more about military blocks.

Russian Federation and its allies, China and its allies and United States and its allies.

Here everyone wants Republic of India to join them as ally

 

[Borr]

Those don't threat anything other than external inference ego.

Such `journalism' sounds like crying babes.

 

[Hindustani78]

Those don't threat anything other than external inference ego.

Such `journalism' sounds like crying babes.

Here its about the lives of millions of people.

 

[Hindustani78]

North Korea fires missiles ahead of Pentagon chief's visit | Zee News
Last Updated: Thursday, April 9, 2015 - 13:51

Seoul: North Korea fired two surface-to-air missiles into the sea this week as US Defence Secretary Ashton Carter visited the region for talks in Tokyo and Seoul, South Korea's defence ministry said today.


The North launched the missiles from a west coast base into the Yellow Sea on Tuesday in what appeared to be a routine test-firing, ministry spokesman Kim Min-Seok said.

It coincided with Carter's arrival in Japan for a two-leg Asia trip. The Pentagon chief flew on to South Korea today for talks that will focus on the threat posed by the North.

"North Korea regularly test-fires such surface-to-air missiles," Kim said, adding that the ministry did not view them as a serious security threat.

Although explicitly banned from doing so by UN resolutions, North Korea repeatedly carries out ballistic missile tests often as a means of voicing its displeasure.

It fired a series of short-range missiles into the Sea of Japan (East Sea) last week and in March to protest annual US-South Korea military drills that Pyongyang views as rehearsals for invasion.
One of the joint drills, Key Resolve, wound up last month, but the other, Foal Eagle, is set to continue until April 24.

The annual exercises always trigger a surge in military tensions between the two Koreas, who remain technically at war because the 1950-53 Korean conflict ended with a ceasefire rather than a peace treaty.

AFP

 

[Hindustani78]

U.S. defence chief Ash Carter visits Japan - The Hindu

The first revision of the U.S.-Japan Defence Guidelines in 17 years will "transform" the bilateral alliance, Ash Carter said.
The first revision of the U.S.-Japan Defence Guidelines in 17 years will “transform” the bilateral alliance, U.S. Defence Secretary Ash Carter said on Wednesday.

The guidelines, expected to be formally approved in about three weeks, “will help us respond flexibly to the full scope to the challenges we face, both in the Asia-Pacific and around the globe,” he said at a news conference after meeting his Japanese counterpart in Tokyo.

Mr. Carter, who travels to South Korea later this week, is on his first trip to Asia since becoming Defence Secretary in February.

Japanese Defence Minister Gen Nakatani said that he and Mr. Carter also agreed that relocating a U.S. Marines base in Okinawa to another part of the island is the “only solution” to closing the existing base, which lies in a heavily populated area.

Many in Okinawa, and their current governor, oppose the construction of the replacement base in a less populated area, arguing that the facility should be moved off Okinawa entirely.

 

[Hindustani78]

US general: North Korea has nuclear-capable missile that can hit US - Business Insider
Apr. 10, 2015, 11:11 AM

North Korea has developed the ability to miniaturize nuclear warheads and launch them at the US, the general in charge of the North American Aerospace Defense Command (Norad) said at a Pentagon news conference on Tuesday.

Adm. Bill Gortney told reporters that, according to the Pentagon's assessment, North Korea now has the capability to place miniaturized nuclear warheads on its latest KN-08 intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).

Pyongyang has "the ability to put a nuclear weapon on a KN-08 and shoot it at the homeland," Gortney said.

This union of highly advanced military capabilities places an additional strain on US missile defense. The KN-08 is a road-mobile ICBM, meaning Pyongyang can move the launch system throughout the country.

"It's the relocatable target set that really impedes our ability to find, fix, and finish the threat," Gortney said. "And as the targets move around and we if don't have the persistent stare and persistent [intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance] that we do not have over North Korea at this time, that relocatable nature makes it very difficult for us to counter it."

North Korea experts John Schilling and Henry Kan estimate that the KN-08 would have a maximum range of 5,600 miles, making the missile capable of hitting the West Coast of the continental US. The weapon, however, is unlikely to have the accuracy required for precision targeting on large US cities.

The missile also has yet to be flight-tested, raising questions, most prominently from South Korea's Ministry of Defense, as to whether the missile can even be outfitted with a nuclear warhead.

Gortney, however, said the Pentagon continued to believe that Pyongyang had a miniaturized nuclear weapon and a delivery system capable of reaching the US.

Gortney did qualify his statement by noting that it was better to be prepared for a North Korean nuclear capability even if there is uncertainty as to the actual state of the country's technology. And he believes the US could easily deflect a North Korean nuclear strike.

"Should one get airborne and come at us, I'm confident we would be able to knock it down," Gortney told reporters.