Jason Ditz / AntiWar.com – 2017-04-11 23:58:15
Russia Worried US Will Attack North Korea
Jason Ditz / AntiWar.com
(April 11, 2017) — With Secretary of State Rex Tillerson visiting Russia, Russia’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement confirming that they have a lot of problems with US foreign policy that they intend to bring up, and while Syria had long been expected to dominate that list, the statement insisted North Korea was Russia primary concern right now.
The statement said Russia was “extremely worried” that the United States might follow through on recent talk of imposing a unilateral military solution on the Korean Peninsula, saying they want to understand US intentions and how they are reconciled with the UN Security Council’s own statements on denuclearization in Korea.
With US warships heading to the Korean Peninsula, the Trump Administration has been treating North Korea as a bilateral issue between the US and China, insisting that either China will agree to “solve” North Korea for them, or that the US will do so itself.
With North Korea having an active nuclear weapons program, such a war is potentially a hugely transformative one for the world, not just for the Korean Peninsula and its immediate surroundings. Indeed, Russian territory is right across the border at any rate, which means its unsurprising they are also concerned what the fallout of a hasty US military action would be.
Trump: North Korea ‘Looking for Trouble,’
US Will ‘Solve the Problem’
Jason Ditz / AntiWar.com
(April 11, 2017) — In a flurry of Twitter statements this morning, President Trump once again appeared to be threatening unilateral US action against North Korea, accusing the reclusive nation of “looking for trouble,” declaring that the US will “solve the problem” with or without Chinese help.
China, of course, proposed a joint deescalation effort between the US and North Korea as a way to convince Pyongyang to give up their nuclear program not long ago. But the US immediately rejected that suggestion, and has repeatedly attacked the idea of further diplomacy.
President Trump has continued to play up the idea that China could quickly and easily “solve” North Korea by themselves if they wanted to, and insisted in further comments today that the US was willing to give China a better trade deal if they did so.
It’s not nearly so clear, however, that China has as much clout with North Korea as they are believed by the administration to. North Korea has clearly taking multiple actions that have inconvenienced China in recent years, and China has shown little ability to rein them in beyond a very basic level.
North Korea Threatens Nuclear Retaliation If US Attacks
Jason Ditz / AntiWar.com
(April 11, 2017) — With President Trump hyping the deployment of a US carrier strike group to North Korea as a “armada” of “very powerful” ships, North Korea has issued a statement through its official newspaper threatening nuclear retaliation in the event of a US attack.
The statement claimed the North Korean army is “keenly watching” US military movements, with “our nuclear sight focused on the US invasionary bases” both on the Korean Peninsula and across the Pacific, and even to the US mainland in the event fighting breaks out.
The White House was quick to dismiss the North Korean statement, with Sean Spicer insisting “there is no evidence North Korea has that capability at this time.” He went on to say what North Korea said “isn’t really a threat” because they can’t act on it.
Spicer is correct in as much as there remains considerable doubt about North Korea’s ability to take semi-successful underground nuclear tests and turn them into deliverable warheads, though even as a conventional force North Korea retain substantial retaliatory capabilities should the United States attacked.
Mattis: Navy Strike Group Not
Headed to North Korea for Any Reason
Jason Ditz / AntiWar.com
(April 11, 2017) — With a US carrier strike group steaming toward North Korea, and top administration officials talking up the need for the US to “solve” North Korea, Russian officials today echoed a concern shared by a lot of people, that the US is about to unilaterally attack North Korea.
Defense Secretary James Mattis sought to downplay those concerns, however, insisting the carrier strike group is just in the western Pacific in general, and isn’t speeding rapidly toward the Korean Peninsula for any particular reason, and has nothing in mind when it gets there.
It’s hard to imagine that this highly publicized move is just a whim, and even harder to believe that it is just coincidental with President Trump and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson both talking up the idea of unilateral US action against North Korea to end its nuclear weapons program.
That’s doubly true because President Trump told Fox Business that the “armada” was full of “very powerful” US warships, and had been sent there because North Korea is “looking for trouble,” and the US intends to “solve the problem.”
North Korea shrugged off the comments either way, insisting that they have substantial capabilities to retaliate against any US aggression against them, and that US military bases could face nuclear retaliation in the event of such a US attack.
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