Posted on 09/22/2017 7:23:39 AM PDT by mandaladon
SEOUL/TOKYO (Reuters) - Detonating a nuclear-tipped missile over the Pacific Ocean would be a logical final step by North Korea to prove the success of its weapons program but would be extremely provocative and carry huge risks, arms control experts said on Friday.
North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho suggested leader Kim Jong Un was considering testing an unprecedented scale hydrogen bomb over the Pacific in response to U.S. President Donald Trumps threat at the United Nations to totally destroy the country.
It may mean North Korea will fire a warhead-tipped (intermediate range) Hwasong-12 or Hwasong-14 intercontinental ballistic missile and blow it up a few hundred kilometers above the Pacific Ocean, said Yang Uk, a senior researcher at the Korea Defence and Security Forum in Seoul.
They may be bluffing, but there is a need for them to test their combined missile-bomb capability. They could have already prepared the plan and are now trying to use Trumps remarks as an excuse to make it happen, said Yang.
Such an atmospheric test would be the first globally since China detonated a device in 1980, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Tests of nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles are rarer still. The United States only test of an operational ballistic missile with a live warhead was fired from submarine far out in the Pacific Ocean in 1962.
China was widely condemned for a similar test with a missile that exploded over its Lop Nur test site in the countrys west in 1966.
North Koreas six nuclear tests to date have all been underground, the most recent earlier this month by far its largest.
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
Long known, so no immediate link.
It’s like watching a dark room and seeing a bright light turn on. You’re quite aware of it, if looking.
What's next? One over the central USA?
I think somebody needs to set up an organisation which effectively eliminates dictators and usurpers without a trace. I would be happy to run it.
P.S.
better me than Hillary...
Foggy Bottom used to be pdg at that game until Carter turned in the Shah, and Bubba and Madame Cankles got a serious hold of it.
Kimmy Don't Surf.
Has Kimmy ever pondered the difference between...
A:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nkhpGC10OVw
And
B:
Doesn't option A look like a lot more fun?
Maybe POTUS Trump could send Kimmy a gift package:
Surfing Bat Ping!
Oh my. For a second I thought that was Hillary Rodham Clinton, in a bikini, surfing.
The horror.
Haven’t been that scared since Angela Merkel danced.....
Just sayin’ - If I was dictator over a country “serving up a new surf destination with undiscovered breaks” - I know which option I would choose!
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