Posted on 05/06/2016 7:30:45 PM PDT by reaganaut1
SEOUL, South Korea — After years of trying to separate fact from propaganda about North Korea’s nuclear program, American and South Korean intelligence officials say they have concluded that the country can now mount a small nuclear warhead on short- and medium-range missiles capable of hitting much of Japan and South Korea.
The United States and its allies have sought for nearly a decade to prevent the North from gaining such capabilities, ever since it detonated its first atomic device a decade ago. Their failure is likely to raise new questions about the effectiveness of the policy toward North Korea, while ushering the long-simmering nuclear standoff with the North into a more perilous phase under its combative young leader, Kim Jong-un.
The assessment of the North’s new capabilities is not based on direct evidence from inside its nuclear program, senior officials said, but draws on intelligence gleaned from high-level defectors, analysis of propaganda images and data collected from North Korean missile and nuclear tests, which have accelerated over the past six months.
While some intelligence agencies suggested as early as 2013 that the North had learned enough about rocket engineering and the miniaturization of nuclear warheads to mount one on a shorter-range missile, there is a new consensus and greater confidence in that view in both Washington and Seoul, the officials said.
Given the years of research North Korea has devoted to the program, experts do not consider the conclusion particularly surprising. But the politics of the assessment, which means the North can target American bases in South Korea and Japan, are delicate, both in the region and in the midst of a presidential election in the United States.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
And what strategy would that be?
Exactly.
At the first sign of aggression, Obama plans for an immediate surrender?
Odouchebag, the unstrategy that keeps on giving. Worse than the PNut farmer ...
So why doesn’t S. Korea or Japan obtain nukes? Especially since US policy has been so feckless?
Iran has outsourced its nuclear weapons and materials to North Korea to circumvent sanctions
Whatever WMDs North Korea has, Iran has too
Another sinister harvest from the Clinton Administration.
This means that Iran has the exact same capability and could use nukes on any US ship in the Straits - they have in fact threatened to attack next time US ships enter “their” waters.
And meanwhile our magic mookabooking negro does squat.
Worthless weenie S.O.B.
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