Comments on: Satellite Images of North Korea’s Nuclear Facilities http://freekorea.us/2008/01/27/satellite-images-of-north-koreas-nuclear-facilities/ Tue, 22 May 2012 21:47:26 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.2 By: Hoyt http://freekorea.us/2008/01/27/satellite-images-of-north-koreas-nuclear-facilities/comment-page-1/#comment-69395 Hoyt Fri, 23 Oct 2009 03:22:38 +0000 http://freekorea.us/2008/01/27/satellite-images-of-north-koreas-nuclear-facilities/#comment-69395 usinkorea said, January 27, 2008 @ 10:24 am I would give it a 50/50 to 60% chance we’ll see another nuke test within a year. --- Wow. Could you please predict a company to invest in that will make me rich? usinkorea said,

January 27, 2008 @ 10:24 am

I would give it a 50/50 to 60% chance we’ll see another nuke test within a year.

—

Wow.

Could you please predict a company to invest in that will make me rich?

]]> By: State Department to Delist North Korea from Terrorism List? http://freekorea.us/2008/01/27/satellite-images-of-north-koreas-nuclear-facilities/comment-page-1/#comment-58702 State Department to Delist North Korea from Terrorism List? Fri, 10 Oct 2008 14:03:43 +0000 http://freekorea.us/2008/01/27/satellite-images-of-north-koreas-nuclear-facilities/#comment-58702 [...] One Free Korea does have a question that maybe someone much smarter then me can answer: All I want to know is this: what “gains” is Condi so desperate to salvage?  More succinctly:  in what way is North Korea even arguably disarming?  North Korea isn’t giving up its existing nukes, its fissile material, its uranium program, or even its most threatening plutonium reactor, the big new 50-MW model recently reported to be near completion.  Recent information from credible sources tells us that the North is still developing long range missiles and still working hard on nuclear warheads to put on them, both in flagrant violation of U.N. resolutions 1695 and 1718.  As far as we know, they’re still proliferating nuclear technology, since we opted to overlook that back in April.  North Korea just evicted the monitors from Yongbyon yesterday, and to the extent it matters, it’s begun putting its older, smaller 5-MW reactor and fuel fabrication plant back together.  It tells anyone who bothers to ask — including Condi Rice herself – that it’s keeping its nuclear weapons, period. [...] [...] One Free Korea does have a question that maybe someone much smarter then me can answer: All I want to know is this: what “gains” is Condi so desperate to salvage?  More succinctly:  in what way is North Korea even arguably disarming?  North Korea isn’t giving up its existing nukes, its fissile material, its uranium program, or even its most threatening plutonium reactor, the big new 50-MW model recently reported to be near completion.  Recent information from credible sources tells us that the North is still developing long range missiles and still working hard on nuclear warheads to put on them, both in flagrant violation of U.N. resolutions 1695 and 1718.  As far as we know, they’re still proliferating nuclear technology, since we opted to overlook that back in April.  North Korea just evicted the monitors from Yongbyon yesterday, and to the extent it matters, it’s begun putting its older, smaller 5-MW reactor and fuel fabrication plant back together.  It tells anyone who bothers to ask — including Condi Rice herself – that it’s keeping its nuclear weapons, period. [...]

]]> By: OneFreeKorea » All Quid, No Quo: How Agreed Framework 2.0 may soon become immeasurably worse http://freekorea.us/2008/01/27/satellite-images-of-north-koreas-nuclear-facilities/comment-page-1/#comment-57353 OneFreeKorea » All Quid, No Quo: How Agreed Framework 2.0 may soon become immeasurably worse Fri, 11 Apr 2008 11:44:32 +0000 http://freekorea.us/2008/01/27/satellite-images-of-north-koreas-nuclear-facilities/#comment-57353 [...] North Korea fully disables, then dismantles, its nuclear program.  They partially dismantled one worn-out 5-MW reactor.  In the unlikely event they actually need more nuclear weapons, they’ll fire up the nearly complete 50-MW reactor next door or finish up the 200-MW reactor a few miles to the north. [...] [...] North Korea fully disables, then dismantles, its nuclear program.  They partially dismantled one worn-out 5-MW reactor.  In the unlikely event they actually need more nuclear weapons, they’ll fire up the nearly complete 50-MW reactor next door or finish up the 200-MW reactor a few miles to the north. [...]

]]> By: usinkorea http://freekorea.us/2008/01/27/satellite-images-of-north-koreas-nuclear-facilities/comment-page-1/#comment-56210 usinkorea Sun, 27 Jan 2008 15:24:10 +0000 http://freekorea.us/2008/01/27/satellite-images-of-north-koreas-nuclear-facilities/#comment-56210 I would give it a 50/50 to 60% chance we'll see another nuke test within a year. There are several reasons NK does such things, but there are a couple of bigger ones that lead me to believe they will do it in the near term: the biggest of which is that the last test was that the last test was a failure or only partially successful. Strategic ambiguity can and has worked for the North. We've been guessing whether they really had nukes or not since the early 1990s. But, having a failed or only partially successful test kind of puts the North in a no-man's-land. It harms the ambiguity factor but does not do what a successful test would: put the world on notice. Pyongyang has probably started to worry that the failed test has caused war-hawks in the US to start thinking an attack on the North is even more of good idea because we now know they don't have an effective bomb design. The need to address that problem will only increase much as conflict with the North increases, and it is sure to increase over the next 12 months - no matter what. Agreed Framework 2.0 is going to continue to take heat with pressure on both the US and NK to shit or get off the pot and admit it is now a worthless piece of paper. All indications, and they are very strong at that, is the President Lee in South Korea is going to shake things up. Even if he maintains the significant amounts of material aid to the North, which he will, he has shown a boldness so early on things like axing the <strike>anti</strike> Unification Ministry that I underestimated what impact his victory would have on SK-NK relations. As Agreed Framework 2.0 gets mortar attacked throughout this year, and Lee goes about the process of reshaping what is really just an internal South Korean political landscape, the North will not be able to sit back and be satisfied with the material aid it will continue to get no matter what. North Korea will view the axing of the Unification Ministry and other moves by Lee as a direct attack on Pyongyang itself, and it will feel the need to respond. Ditto for pressure on Agreed Framework 2.0. If NK is also really hurting as much as Jane's and others think, pressure to act boldly will also increase as that pain increases. A logical state would consider changing its ways if it feared collapse of a dysfunctional system, but that's not Pyongyang. They react to internal and external pressure with bold, ultimately self-defeating measures ----- like the last ICBM and nuke tests. And finally, even things like Beijing hosting the Olympics will irritate the North and that irritation will be felt more or less strongly in direct proportion to others pressures they feel - particularly internal economic and social turmoil. Expect the North to ratchet up the effort to prevent information from leaking into the North from China, but the paranoid regime will start worrying more and more that the Olympics will possibly inspire North Koreans to understand how screwed up their own lives are compared to even their communist cousins to the North. This is not going to be a good year for the North, no matter what. Bush lacks status in his final year to give North Korea a lot more goodies that it has been hoping to get. This isn't even considering the likely more worse case scenerios in which Bush cuts some aid by buckling to pressure on admitting the failure of AF 2.0. And Lee is going to make things worse for the North or at least seem worse from Pyongyang's point of view. The North will feel the need to respond with bold measures, and a 2nd nuke test would accomplish a lot for them, from their point of view: scare the world, demonstrate it has a working nuclear bomb, and scare North Koreans while making the elites there feel more secure. I would give it a 50/50 to 60% chance we’ll see another nuke test within a year. There are several reasons NK does such things, but there are a couple of bigger ones that lead me to believe they will do it in the near term: the biggest of which is that the last test was that the last test was a failure or only partially successful.

Strategic ambiguity can and has worked for the North. We’ve been guessing whether they really had nukes or not since the early 1990s. But, having a failed or only partially successful test kind of puts the North in a no-man’s-land. It harms the ambiguity factor but does not do what a successful test would: put the world on notice.

Pyongyang has probably started to worry that the failed test has caused war-hawks in the US to start thinking an attack on the North is even more of good idea because we now know they don’t have an effective bomb design.

The need to address that problem will only increase much as conflict with the North increases, and it is sure to increase over the next 12 months – no matter what.

Agreed Framework 2.0 is going to continue to take heat with pressure on both the US and NK to shit or get off the pot and admit it is now a worthless piece of paper.

All indications, and they are very strong at that, is the President Lee in South Korea is going to shake things up. Even if he maintains the significant amounts of material aid to the North, which he will, he has shown a boldness so early on things like axing the anti Unification Ministry that I underestimated what impact his victory would have on SK-NK relations.

As Agreed Framework 2.0 gets mortar attacked throughout this year, and Lee goes about the process of reshaping what is really just an internal South Korean political landscape, the North will not be able to sit back and be satisfied with the material aid it will continue to get no matter what. North Korea will view the axing of the Unification Ministry and other moves by Lee as a direct attack on Pyongyang itself, and it will feel the need to respond. Ditto for pressure on Agreed Framework 2.0.

If NK is also really hurting as much as Jane’s and others think, pressure to act boldly will also increase as that pain increases. A logical state would consider changing its ways if it feared collapse of a dysfunctional system, but that’s not Pyongyang. They react to internal and external pressure with bold, ultimately self-defeating measures —– like the last ICBM and nuke tests.

And finally, even things like Beijing hosting the Olympics will irritate the North and that irritation will be felt more or less strongly in direct proportion to others pressures they feel – particularly internal economic and social turmoil. Expect the North to ratchet up the effort to prevent information from leaking into the North from China, but the paranoid regime will start worrying more and more that the Olympics will possibly inspire North Koreans to understand how screwed up their own lives are compared to even their communist cousins to the North.

This is not going to be a good year for the North, no matter what.

Bush lacks status in his final year to give North Korea a lot more goodies that it has been hoping to get. This isn’t even considering the likely more worse case scenerios in which Bush cuts some aid by buckling to pressure on admitting the failure of AF 2.0.

And Lee is going to make things worse for the North or at least seem worse from Pyongyang’s point of view.

The North will feel the need to respond with bold measures, and a 2nd nuke test would accomplish a lot for them, from their point of view: scare the world, demonstrate it has a working nuclear bomb, and scare North Koreans while making the elites there feel more secure.

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