Posted on 04/10/2015 8:23:38 AM PDT by Snickering Hound
•NORAD's chief said his command views North Korean ICBMs as "operational today" •The long-range KN-08 missile is not known to have been tested and likely faces significant reliability issues
The US military is operating under the assumption that North Korea is able to miniaturise a nuclear weapon for long-range strike; however, experts believe this is more of a remote and long-term possibility.
"Our assessment is that they have the ability to put a nuclear weapon on a KN-08 and shoot it at the [US] homeland," Admiral William Gortney, head of North American Aerospace Defense Command and US Northern Command, told reporters at the Pentagon on 7 April. "We assess that it's operational today," he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at janes.com ...
IOW our Pacific Ocean is in trouble .....
B52 Targets - Iran and NK. Get’r done.
This is 1960s technology. Only a matter of time before they buy it with our aid money and launch a nuke satellite to threaten the ENTIRE globe.
Seoul needs to be pre-emptively relocated and we have to bomb the bastards to smithereens ASAP. The future pain will make relocating a city seem like nothing
What would they put on them? Their nukes failed to detonate completely and aren't small and light enough to mount on the missile and still have it launch off the pad.
Sheesh, dig a hole here, then move it over there...
5.56mm
In one of my courses I present the following scenario:
“You are POTUS (the President of the United States). You learn that North Korea has succeeded in building a nuclear-tipped missile, which North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-Eun intends to use in the next 24 hours, killing at least 1,000,000 Japanese civilians in Kyoto, the only major Japanese city not bombed during WWII. Since the Japanese don’t have the capacity to take out the missile, the only way to thwart the action is to order our military to blow up the missile at its location, the Tonghae Satellite Launching Ground on the outskirts of Kimch’aek, North Korea’s major port city—but in doing so you will detonate the nuclear warhead, killing at least 1,000,000 North Koreans.
“Do you blow up the missile? If you would, on what basis is killing at least 1,000,000 North Korean civilians ethical? If you would not, on what basis is standing by and allowing the killing of at least 1,000,000 Japanese civilians ethical?”
The students choke on it, because it isn’t like the so-called “Trolley Problem,” where you are asked if you would kill one person to save five; it is more like a Kobayashi-Maru problem, where no matter what you do the result is going to be a mess. I then point out the Midshipman Kirk “solved” the Kobayashi-Maru problem by hacking into the computer and changing the outcome.
The only way to resolve such an issue, is to resolve it before it becomes an issue. We had our chance in Iran in 2009, but our leader, who loves to elevate Iran in the world, chose not to intervene. We have our chance in NK now, but it will take President Cruz, who loves the US more than he loves socialism, to resolve the issue. Let us pray that we can indeed wait two more years.
Everybody say thank you president peanut.
Ping.
O, that's right, the same liberal socialist also negotiated a deal to prevent North Korea from getting a nuclear bomb! This agreement came after Clintoons also gave more than 6.5 Billion dollars in bribe money to the Koreans while they laughed at the American people!
You scenario becomes fantasy at this point. The warhead would not have been armed and cannot go critical just because you bomb the nuclear tipped missile to cinders
I don’t see it happening. I don’t think Kimmy-Un is going to lob one just for jollies. I don’t think he’s going to bomb Seoul or Japan either. I think he’ll use it for blackmail for more free donations to NK. “Gimme some food and fertilizer for free and I’ll put the nuke away.”
Iran, on the other hand, will probably want to nuke Mecca, Riyadh, and Medina, and then proclaim that Karbala is the new qibla (prayer direction) for all Muslims. I think Iran will nuke the Saud before they do anything to us or Israel.
Well maybe they’ll nuke Mexico now since they’ve been harping about them keeping one of their ships. They’ve threatened everyone else, why not Mexico?
Is there a way to set the warhead up so that it would go off upon an impact, whether impacting at the target or being impacted by incoming ordnance? It would be something a sane leader would not allow, but we're talking Kim in NK and/or Rouhani in Iran, both of whom could well relish such a sacrifice on his own soil for PR purposes, and/or a way to make us the supposed aggressor in the inevitable war that would begin there.
Actually, nuclear weapons require precise initiation firing chains... a warhead hit by another warhead would have it’s geometry changed and be subjected to an x-ray and gamma ray flux that would effectively fizzle or deconstruct the targeted missile...thereby it would not add to the yield of the delivery warhead. AND if the attack is not conventional, which it could be and still (likely) achieve the objective, a lower yield nuke would have limited reach beyond the target area.
Just Sayin.
Short answer - no. That’s not the way a nuclear detonation occurs. Even without the safeties, it takes a very precise chain of events.
“The United States and international inspectors will carefully monitor North Korea to make sure it keeps its commitments.”
– Democrat Bill Clinton, October 21, 1994
[Expletive deleted.] I always thought it was a great scenario :-( lucky for me, none of my students are as well versed in nuclear weaponry as you. Thank you for the heads up in any case.
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