North Korea makes nuclear threat over military drills

Source: Reuters

Sun Aug 16, 2009 12:03am EDT

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea denounced upcoming joint South Korean and U.S. military drills and said it would "wipe out" the countries with nuclear weapons if they threatened the communist state, its KCNA news agency said on Sunday.

South Korean and U.S. forces on Monday start joint computer simulation and communication drills that come in the wake of rare conciliatory moves by Pyongyang, which this month released two U.S. journalists and a South Korean worker it had held captive.

North Korea regularly denounces joint drills as a preparation for invasion and nuclear war.

"Should the U.S. imperialists and the Lee Myung-bak group threaten the DPRK (North Korea) with nukes, it will retaliate against them with nukes," KCNA quoted a military official as saying. Lee Myung-bak is South Korea's president.

"The U.S. imperialists and the Lee Myung-bak group should clearly understand that it is the iron will and resolute stand of the Korean People's Army to go into action anytime to mercilessly wipe out the aggressors," the official said.



Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE57F09T20090816

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Well, that doesn't sound very friendly.

Just when we seem to be making progress with North Korea, we feed the troops baked beans.

...with Kim using the plural "nukes" to describe his retaliation.



He really has to learn that having *A* bomb makes him a regional/terrorist problem. It does not put him on parity with us. Hell, we have one bomb that's selectable, from 0.3 to 170 kilotons. Dial-a-nuke.

The French ones are selectable 3-150. 0.3 can be conventional, so why bother with nuclear ?

Then I doubt he has solid-fuel movable units. He can easily be taken out in a preventive strike on liquid fuel silos. If he dared to launch a single nuke, he would be annihilated and he knows about that. I least I hope for the sake of his population.

MOAB is like, what, 15 tons or something like that?

But yeah, the B61 is dial-a-nuke

because my last words were "Ha Ha and Nyah Nyah. The US has more bombs than you do."

To send us back to the 19th Century.

Imagine an America with no electricity. We are sooooo dependent on electricity we would starve.

No Twitter and no Facebook would drive some people to insanity.

An atomic weapon, and theoretically a non-nuclear EMP (electromagnetic pulse) weapon, launched to the edge of our atmosphere, could wipe out the electric grid to an extent that would take YEARS to repair.

Not that it would be easy, but it is not impossible to imagine NK smuggling in a weapon and launching it with high altitude balloons, or a relatively small rocket to an altitude of 60 miles.

It would be worse for telecommunications than for the physical grid. Besides they don't have the technology.

Therefore, they have the technology.

http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2008/07/116_28088.html

'N. Korea May Develop Electromagnetic Pulse Weapon System'

By Michael Ha
Staff Reporter

A top U.S. scientist warned American lawmakers of a possible catastrophic national security scenario: a possible development of Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) weapons by rogue states, including North Korea, and a potential detonation of such a device on American soil.

William Graham, chairman of the U.S. government-sponsored ``Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States," told U.S. lawmakers that the Stalinist state has the required technologies to develop such weapons.

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``For example, an adversary would not have to have long-range ballistic missiles to conduct an EMP attack against the United States. Such an attack could be launched from a freighter off the U.S. coast using a short- or medium-range missile to loft a nuclear warhead to high altitude."

He said even small nuclear weapons can create massive EMP effects, giving out an intensely fluctuating magnetic field, over wide geographic areas. ``United Nations investigators recently found that the design for an advanced nuclear weapon, miniaturized to fit on ballistic missiles currently in the inventory of Iran, North Korea and other potentially hostile states, was in the possession of Swiss criminals affiliated with the A.Q. Khan nuclear smuggling network."

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http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/cst/bugs_ch12.pdf

< snip >

Nuclear High Altitude Electromagnetic Pulse (HEMP)

Nuclear devices that generate HEMP are the most sophisticated, expensive, and effective electromagnetic weapons. The U.S. military first witnessed their effects after a series of high-altitude nuclear tests on Johnston Atoll in 1962. These tests unexpectedly generated disruptions in electronic systems in Hawaii, over 1000 miles away, due to EMP effects. Electronic systems failed across the island, radio broadcasts were interrupted, streetlights burned out, and burglar alarms sounded. The Soviets had similar experiences, damaging overhead and underground cables at distances of 400 miles from low yield (300 kiloton) high altitude nuclear tests.

HEMP is generated as a side effect of high-altitude nuclear detonation interaction with the atmosphere. Gamma rays released by the explosion interact with air molecules, producing high-energy free electrons through Compton scattering. These electrons are then trapped in the earth’s magnetic field, generating an oscillating electric current, which gives rise to a rapidly radiating coherent electromagnetic pulse. The pulse can span continent-sized areas, due to the vast line of sight provide by its altitude, and affect systems on land, sea, and air.

Characteristics

The HEMP is composed of three components. The first (E1) is a high frequency (1 MHz-1 GHz) free-field energy pulse with a rise time of a few billionths of a second. This component disrupts or damages electronics-based control systems, sensors, communications systems, computers, and similar devices. The second component (E2) is a medium frequency pulse, similar to lightning, that follows E1 by a few millionths of a second. The E2 component is not particularly dangerous to electronics, especially those hardened against lightning, except when the E1 pulse damages surge protection circuitry first. The third component is relatively low frequency (3-30 Hz) slower rising pulse that follows E2 by a couple thousandths of a second and creates disruptive currents in long transmission lines. The sequence of E1, E2, and E3 is important, because each causes damage building on the preceding pulse.

The strength of HEMP depends on the design and yield of the nuclear device. However, relatively low-yield weapons can have devastating effects. For example, a 1-2 megaton device detonated at an altitude of 250 miles would produce a field strength of 10-50 kV/m, enough to produce extensive damage to electronics over the entire continental U.S. This illustrates the most significant characteristic of HEMP: one or a few high-altitude nuclear detonations can cause widespread damage due to its high power, wide coverage, and broad bandwidth.


Proliferation

Generating HEMP is very difficult and expensive because it requires the ability to field both a nuclear weapon and a delivery system to get it to altitude. It is critical to note that HEMP occurs for nuclear detonations above 25 miles and is most effective above approximately 70 miles. The higher the burst is, the more widespread the effects due to line of sight. Currently, the United States, Russia, United Kingdom, France, China, India, Pakistan, and Israel have the capability to produce HEMP, and 11 other countries are not far behind, either due to indigenous weapons programs or arms trading. More than 128,000 nuclear warheads have been built worldwide since 1945, and many are unaccounted for. In addition, over 10,000 missiles owned by 30 countries are capable of lifting a nuclear weapon over U.S. expeditionary forces. Of particular concern is North Korea, which recently declared ownership of nuclear weapons and has a robust short and intermediate range ballistic missile program with many fielded systems.

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n/t

We would look like Cuba, with only antique cars on the roads.

...that the loss of our power grid would turn most fuel pumps into decorations.

No fuel = no trucks bringing us food.

And then there are water pumps. People who have their own wells might be good for a while, until the fuel for their generators runs out.

Above and beyond an EMP attack is a "solar attack". A major flare, of the correct magnetic polarity, can do the same as an EMP.

What this country needs is the ability to go back to the 19th Century. We need to harden as much of the grid as we can, and beyond that we need the ability to survive for extended periods without electricity.

We need hand operated water and fuel pumps. We need to assure that as many gas stations and municipal water systems as possible have generators. We need to assure a healthy population of horses and oxen. And we need to have a "guide" to survival without electricity available to the widest number of people possible.

I hope we never see it, but wishful thinking alone will not save us.

Why are you here? Don't you think that most of your scenarios have crossed our minds??? I prefer not to dwell on it. My parents didn't build bombshelters, hoard, and arm themselves during the cold war either. I must get it from them. It's not in your or my contol, so I prefer HOPE for a better day. P.S. my "fundie" son and his wife are hoarding food away for the apocolypse!! My father should be spinning in his grave about now. He never did like that boy!!

...to minimize the impact of such a terrible potential disaster.

I don't know. Maybe we deserve it. Perhaps the military and economic destruction of the United States is justice for our imperialism and arrogance.

I suppose it WOULD help the greenhouse gas problem to rid the world of millions of people while essentially shutting down the distribution (and consequently use) of CO2 emmiting fuels.

But still, seeing the starvation and freezing deaths of huge numbers of people, when relatively simple and not excessively costly steps could be taken to protect them, is just not something that I can wrap my head and heart around. I'm not saying there are many people here who do (but yes, there ARE some who would love that very scenario) - I'm just saying it is one thing on the laundry list of human concerns that deserves awareness and discussion.

Still, Kim the kook/dictator is as delusional as Baghdad Bob or George W Bush.

North Korea would be nothing but a greasy spot after a nuclear exchange, but ruthless dictators are into scorched earth politics so who knows. It's already a sure thing the guy don't give a damn about the people in North Korea. The North Korean population are starving, suffering and dying because they have hardly nothing in the way of HEALTH CARE, public education, decent personal living conditions, infrastructure or hope of any better life to come, but their leader can fund a nuclear program and a delivery system.

Their leader, from the comfort of his palace or ranch, can thumb his nose and threaten those people abroad who might otherwise help his people out.


Ever notice those "RUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUthless DIIIIIIIctators" and their power crazed henchmen, always shortchange the people in their countries and fund their greed based attacks on others and their well oiled killing machines?

I'd say that Kim probably thinks, It's "a heck of a lot easier being a dictator," than being a rank and file North Korean.

that is a b61 I think and the yield is adjusted by changing the amount of tritium available.

A true evil madman should really make their swan song more interesting than idle threats.

we want something only they have.

We want the gray, the bleak, the hunger and the hopelessness.

We, the capitalist-imperialist running dogs, want to be just like them.