12-21-17

Ultimately, and as we have said since early in 2017, the decision to attack North Korea will ultimately come down to whether the generals in Trump’s circle of confidence can and will overpower the diplomats:

Experts also say there is a split in the US administration with Mr Trump and Mr McMaster more willing to consider military action than Rex Tillerson, the secretary of state, and Jim Mattis, the defence secretary. 

In a wide-ranging interview with the BBC’s Yalda Hakim, US National Security Adviser HR McMaster said that the United States has “to be prepared, if necessary, to compel the denuclearisation of North Korea”, with or without their cooperation. Donald Trump’s top security aide also gave his views on Russia’s meddling in the 2016 US election and the challenge of working around Trump’s tweets.

PLUS

The North Korean government has insisted that it does not maintain a biochemical weapons program, despite new reports that Pyongyang’s military has started testing the use of an anthrax-based weapon on the tip of an intercontinental ballistic missile.

On Monday, US President Donald Trump sent his first National Security Strategy report to lawmakers. The 56-page unclassified strategy document states that Pyongyang is “pursuing chemical and biological weapons which could also be delivered by missile.”

North Korea in the Cross Hairs of the US MilitarySource Isreali News Live

US ready to ‘denuclearise’ North Korea – BBC News

Source BBC News

North Korea is Testing New Warheads Loaded With Anthrax for ICBM

Source Jim Yackel

#northKorea #usMilitary #war

Pyongyang Denies Biochemical Weapons Development Charges

On Tuesday, Bloomberg reported that South Korean intelligence officials have warned North Korea is working on a program to prevent anthrax from disintegrating at the kinds of high temperatures that would be experienced during an ICBM’s re-entry of Earth’s atmosphere from space.

Within 48 hours of Trump’s speech, the Institute of American Studies, an affiliate of the North Korean Foreign Ministry, told the Korea Central News Agency, “the DPRK [Democratic People's Republic of Korea], as a state party to the Biological Weapons Convention, maintains its consistent stand to oppose development, manufacture, stockpiling and possession of biological weapons.”

“The more the US clings to the anti-DPRK stifling move,” the institute was quoted as saying, “the more hardened the determination of our entire military personnel and people to take revenge will be.”

The 1972 Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) was the first disarmament treaty prohibiting the “development, production and stockpiling of an entire category of weapons of mass destruction,” according to the United Nations. North Korea became a signatory in 1987. The Korea Institute for Defense Analyses, a South Korean government organization in Seoul, reported in 2016 that Pyongyang has 13 substances that can be used for biological or chemical weapons, including anthrax and clostridium botulinum, the bacteria that causes botulism. Read More Sputnik

America Preparing “Bloody Nose” Military Attack On North Korea:

While North Korea managed to once again drop off the list of immediate geopolitical concerns having kept relative quiet in recent weeks, without any notable provocations or ICBM launches, this may be changing soon, because according to the Telegraph, America is drawing up plans for a “bloody nose” military attack on North Korea to stop its nuclear weapons program. The UK newspaper’s sources claim that the White House has “dramatically” stepped up preparation for a military solution in recent months amid fears diplomacy is not working. As a result, one option currently under consideration is destroying a launch site before it is used by the regime for a new missile test. Stockpiles of weapons could also be targeted.

The explanation for what would be an act of war, is amusing: “The hope is that military force would show Kim Jong-un that America is “serious” about stopping further nuclear development and trigger negotiations.” Well, yes: launching an offensive war does tend to confirm that one is indeed serious. The question is what will China, Russia and the rest of the all too serious world do in response.

“The Pentagon is trying to find options that would allow them to punch the North Koreans in the nose, get their attention and show that we’re serious”, said one former US security official briefed on policy.

Some further details:

Donald Trump’s decision to bomb a Syrian government airfield earlier this year to defend America’s “red line” on chemical weapons use is seen as a blueprint.  Details have emerged after this newspaper talked to around a dozen current and former officials in America and Britain about policy towards North Korea.

 

The conversations show that the Trump administration is more willing to consider military options to end the conflict than widely assumed. 

And while it will hardly come as a major surprise, the Telegraph notes that it can be revealed that senior British diplomats fear America has already begun a “step by step” military build-up in the region that could escalate.

Alastair Morgan, the UK ambassador to North Korea, visited Washington DC for behind-closed-doors talks about forcing the regime to the negotiating table last month.  The UK is also urging Southeast Asian and African countries to expel some North Korean diplomats amid fears they are secretly financing the regime.

Meanwhile, in a continuation of a previous US demand, the Trump administration wants North Korean ships to be stopped and searched amid fears they are being used to get round UN sanctions.

The urgency behind the plan, and the pressure to act comes from the drop in estimated time it will take for North Korea to develop a missile that could hit America with nuclear weapons.

Just a few years ago it was believed the regime was a decade away from that point, but now the figure has dropped to as little as 18 months – though estimates vary.  Senior figures in the Trump administration have made clear in public that it would be unacceptable for North Korea to reach that position.  While Mr Trump has always said a “military option” is on the table, the administration’s focus has been on building economic and diplomatic pressure.  

 

But Mr Kim’s refusal to negotiate has left senior White House figures disillusioned with diplomacy and increasingly considering military avenues.  One British source who recently attended a briefing with H.R. McMaster, Mr Trump’s national security adviser, and other officials left feeling alarmed. 

 

“The Americans said deterrence doesn’t work against North Korea and negotiation doesn’t work,” the source said. 

 

“Those who heard them left with the impression that military action is very much an option they were considering seriously.”

Kori Schake, a former director of defense strategy at the White House’s National Security Council who served under George W Bush, said military action is a real possibility. “The White House very strongly believes that either North Korea will agree to give up its nuclear weapons or we will launch a preventative attack to destroy them,” she said.  “I would put the odds of them actually carrying that out at three in 10. Other policy experts say it is four in ten.”

Still, war is not a guaranteed outcome. On one hand, British officials are continuing to urge their US counterparts to focus on diplomatic solutions and are looking to increase pressure on North Korea.

Separately, while the Trump administration is considering military options, the Telegraph concedes that “it is not a foregone conclusion that the US president will choose to go down that path.  There are major uncertainties about how Mr Kim would react if provoked and the regime already has missiles that could strike nearby countries including Japan and South Korea. “

Ultimately, and as we have said since early in 2017, the decision to attack North Korea will ultimately come down to whether the generals in Trump’s circle of confidence can and will overpower the diplomats:

Experts also say there is a split in the US administration with Mr Trump and Mr McMaster more willing to consider military action than Rex Tillerson, the secretary of state, and Jim Mattis, the defence secretary. 

The good news is that – for now at least – Trump no longer needs a major foreign diversion, especially after his biggest political victory of the year, with the passage of the GOP Tax Cut, which tangentially, may have also bought Kim Jong-Un a few additional quarters reprieve.

SOURCE Zerohedge

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