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 Kim Jong-nam Says N.Korean Regime Won't Last Long Kim Jong-nam Former North Korean Leader Kim Jong-il's eldest son Jong-nam has said the isolated regime will eventually fail with or without reforms. The comment appears in e-mail conversations exchanged over seven years between Kim Jong-nam and a Japanese journalist and obtained by the Monthly Chosun. The nearly 100 e-mails were sent from 2004 until December last year to Yoji Komi, an editor at the Tokyo Shimbun daily. The two also spoke in person in January and May last year. ◆ Oppostion to Dynastic Succession Kim Jong-nam, who was passed over...

CIA chief visits island near inter-Korean border SEOUL, May 2 (Yonhap) -- Mike Pompeo, director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), visited an island near the tense inter-Korean border during his visit to the peninsula this week, the U.S. Forces Korea (USFK) announced Tuesday. He traveled to Yeonpyeong Island to view the contested waters between the two Koreas and "gain a first-hand appreciation of the North Korean threat to South Korea at this past and potential flashpoint," it said. The island came under an artillery attack from North Korea in 2010, in which two South Korean marines and two civilians...

Old Hardliner Returns to N.Korean General Staff Kim Kyok-sik (file photo) Kim Kyok-sik (file photo) The septuagenarian hardliner Gen. Kim Kyok-sik, who is believed to have supervised the North Korean military's deadly shelling of Yeonpyeong Island in November last year, appears to have regained the favor of the regime. Kim (71) was fired as chief of General Staff in 2009 and since headed the Fourth Army Corps. It has been some two months since he disappeared from view in the area covered by the Fourth Corps. "But he's suddenly showing up at high-level military events in Pyongyang recently," a senior...

The South Korean government and military are considering developing stealth aircraft by 2015 as part of the country's fighter development program. Citing an unnamed military source, Yonhap News Agency reported on Monday that North Korea's deadly shelling of Yeonpyeong Island last month has bolstered support among officials in Seoul for pursuing stealth aircraft technology. The possession of stealth aircraft beyond the North's detection capabilities could apply great psychological pressure on the regime, the source said, and allow the South to match the military technology of advanced nations

"(URGENT) Explosion sounds of artillery fire heard on Yeonpyeong Island, official says"

Here is video of the USS George Washington getting under way and heading to waters off South Korea as part of the U.S. response to North Korea’s artillery attack on South Korea’s Yeonpyeong Island yesterday. The attack killed two South Korean Marines and at least two civilians as well. Dozens more were injured in the unprovoked attack. President Obama has condemned the attack, and ordered the USS George Washington to head to region where it will join more than 28,000 U.S. Troops stationed in South Korea. The USS George Washington leads a carrier strike group that will take part in...

South Korea's military is considering positioning a weapon-locating radar system on islands near the Yellow Sea border, in a bid to better monitor artillery firing by North Korea, a lawmaker who was briefed on the plan said Friday. In a meeting with lawmakers of the National Assembly defense committee, Defense Minister Kim Tae-young said that the military will push to deploy artillery hunting radars, called TPQ, on Baengnyeong Island and Yeonpyeong Island just south of the western inter-Korean sea border, Rep. Kim Hak-song who chairs the committee said.The radar system is capable of detecting hostile artillery by tracking projectiles in...