North Korea Warns Intercepting Satellite Will Prompt Retaliation

UPDATE: North Korea put its troops on alert and cut the last hot line to Seoul on Monday as the American and South Korean militaries began joint maneuvers. The communist regime warned that even the slightest provocation could trigger war.

———-

North Korea warned Monday that any move to intercept what it calls a satellite launch and what other countries suspect may be a missile test-firing would result in a counterstrike against the countries trying to stop it.

“We will retaliate (over) any act of intercepting our satellite for peaceful purposes with prompt counterstrikes by the most powerful military means,” the official Korean Central News Agency quoted a spokesman of the General Staff of the Korean People’s Army as saying.

If countries such as the United States, Japan or South Korea try to intercept the launch, the North Korean military will carry out “a just retaliatory strike operation not only against all the interceptor means involved but against the strongholds” of the countries, it said.

“Shooting our satellite for peaceful purposes will precisely mean a war,” it added.

North Korea earlier announced it is preparing to put a communications satellite into space, but outside observers suspect it may in fact be a test-firing of a long-range ballistic missile.

The United States, Japan and South Korea have said that even if Pyongyang calls the launch a missile test, it would violate existing U.N. Security Council resolutions.

The same North Korean statement said the country’s military will cut off communications with its South Korean counterparts during the U.S.- South Korean exercises for the duration of the exercises beginning Monday.

A separate, more rare statement by the KPA’s Supreme Command was quoted by the KCNA as saying that its soldiers are under orders to be “fully combat-ready” during U.S.-South Korean military exercises beginning Monday.

The North’s armed forces have been ordered to “deal merciless retaliatory blows” should there be any intrusion “into the sky and land and seas of the DPRK even an inch.”

Source

North Korea May Be Ready To Test-fire Missile

North Korea could be ready to test-fire a missile within days as satellite imagery has shown increased activity at a missile site over the past 48 hours, a defense weekly said.

A significant increase in launch preparations has occurred at the Musudan-ni missile site on the communist country’s northeastern coast, said Joseph S. Bermudez Jr., a senior analyst at Jane’s Information Group who specializes in North Korean defense and intelligence matters.

“The latest satellite images … indicate that North Korea is preparing to launch either a prototype Taepodong 2 intermediate range ballistic missile or a Paektusan 2 space launch vehicle within a matter of days,” Jane’s Defence Weekly said in a report issued Friday in London.

The report comes amid growing international pressure on the North to drop its apparent plans to fire a long-range missile believed capable of reaching U.S. territory. Washington, Seoul and Tokyo have repeatedly warned Pyongyang against firing a missile, saying the move would trigger international sanctions.

Bermudez said satellite images show the activation of launch equipment and radars, and the arrival of numerous trucks and support vehicles. Support facilities for the engine test stand were undergoing expansion, the report said.

North Korea launched a failed long-range Taepodong 2 missile in 2006. That test alarmed the world and gave new energy to the stop-and-start diplomacy over North Korea’s nuclear program. The North is believed to possess up to a dozen nuclear warheads.

Pyongyang also conducted a surprise launch of a Taepodong 1 missile over Japan in 1998.

via Report: NKorea may be ready to test-fire missile.

Syria Building Chemical Weapons Plant

Syria has been conducting extensive construction work on a chemical weapons facility in the country’s northwest, satellite images obtained by the defense analyst group Jane’s reveal.

‘Syria building chemical weapons plant’

The images of a chemical weapons facility identified as al-Safir were taken by several commercial sources from 2005 to 2008, the analyst group said.

Imagery obtained by DigitalGlobe’s WorldView-1 satellite shows that extensive construction has taken place at the facility, as well as at an adjacent missile base, the group wrote. In addition, the images showed that the site contained a number of the “defining features of a chemical weapons facility.”

Al-Safir is home to a chemical weapons production facility and a missile base that holds a significant part of Syria’s long-range Scud D ballistic missiles, according to foreign reports. The Scud D has a range of 700 kilometers and al-Safir is reported to have several dozen underground fortified bunkers where the launchers and the missiles are stored.

Source

33 Minutes – Protecting America In The New Missile Age

A ballistic missile from a foreign enemy would take 33 minutes to reach the United States. With each passing day, this becomes a growing danger to America, yet our government has failed to build the missile defense systems capable of defending us against such attacks.

Our enemies are attempting to stockpile arsenals that threaten our freedom and prosperity. North Korea and Iran are the most prominent, but this also includes Russia, China and other nations that have missiles capable of killing Americans in very large numbers and threatening our allies.

The proliferation of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles to rogue states such as Iran and North Korea pose a grave danger to the lives of all Americans.

North Korea is currently developing a long-range ballistic missile that could soon carry a nuclear warhead all the way to Alaska or California. Iran already has missiles that can reach Europe, and could soon acquire nuclear weapons. These countries could share their missile and nuclear technologies with terrorists, who would in turn be able to directly threaten New York City and other American cities with short-range missiles.

Once terrorist-supporting states get their hands on a nuclear missile, they would be free to attack us and our allies with impunity, knowing full well we would think twice before sending our armed forces into a country that could retaliate with nuclear missiles. They would be emboldened to threaten their neighbors, assert dominance in their region, and further destabilize dangerous situations. Thus, they would gain sanctuary from which to export more terrorism.

via Missile Defense – 33 Minutes Overview.