Anybody here live on the west cost?

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/06/1...reut/index.html (http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/06/18/nkorea.missile.reut/index.html)


WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- North Korea is believed to have completed fueling a long-range ballistic missile capable of hitting the United States, raising the likelihood that it will soon conduct a test launch, U.S. officials said on Sunday.

The United States plans to join Japan in a sharp response if the test goes forward. Washington warned Pyongyang against the test in a message passed on Friday through North Korean diplomats at the United Nations, but there was no response, U.S. officials said.

The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject, said Pyongyang could decide to scrap the launch. But they said that was increasingly unlikely given the complexity of siphoning fuel out of a missile once it has been fueled.

The launch is expected to involve a Taepodong-2 intercontinental ballistic missile with an estimated range of 2,175 to 2670 miles (3,500 to 4,300 kilometers) that could hit the United States.

Pyongyang stunned the world in August 1998 by firing a Taepodong-1 over Japan and into the Pacific Ocean.

White House spokesman Tony Snow, speaking on CBS' "Face the Nation," said that in 1999 North Korea declared a moratorium on missile testing and had signed a memorandum in September 2005, which committed it to pursuing peace and security within the region.

"We certainly hope they're going to continue to abide by their agreement," Snow said.

Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso said in a television interview his country would seek an immediate meeting of the U.N. Security Council if Pyongyang went ahead with a test.

He voiced concern about the possibility of a missile landing on Japan, but toned down a remark made in an earlier interview that Japan would automatically regard this as an attack.

"We will not right away view it as a military act," he said.

Aso stopped short of saying what Japan and the United States would do in the event of a launch.

But he said: "The responses will be rather harsh".

Reports of test preparations come as six-country talks on Pyongyang's nuclear programs are locked in a stalemate and attention has shifted to concerns about Iran's atomic ambitions.

Damn. And here we are bogged down in the middle east when this much greater threat to world security keeps manifesting into something really scary. I hope the rest of the world powers jump on board with us and Japan real quick.

Dangerous games played by madmen possibly affecting everyone.

Those weapons will actually keep North Korea from being attacked. Without them a country is much more likely to be attacked. Risk vs. Reward.

They also said that Saddam had missiles that could hit the UK.
Intelligence has proved to be at best shite in the past 5 years, so I will call bullshit on this one. For now.

dont worry. only thing you have to fo is duck & cover

Umm we had reasons to claim that Saddam had those missiles...I'm not surprised North Korea has them and I expect them to test launch one in the near future cause they know we wont mess with them or china might have somethin to say

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(loren Brown @ Jun 20 2006, 11:18 AM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>
Umm we had reasons to claim that Saddam had those missiles...I'm not surprised North Korea has them and I expect them to test launch one in the near future cause they know we wont mess with them or china might have somethin to say
[/b][/quote]

Yes there were reasons. The Bush Administration was dead set on going to war against Iraq and desperatly needed a reason to go there. Intelligence from both sides of the atlantic was ambiguous at best and there was a clear politicalisation of the British civil service.

Hans Blix and the UN inspectors were satisfied with Iraqi compliance, and in hindsight rightly so, but the Bush Admin attempted to discredit him and his team in numerous different ways.

The matter to the fact is that we were grossly mistaken and mislead prior to the war in Iraq and I don't see anything differnt now. It is all hear say and based on assumptions. The only lead is that N Korea fueled a missile, and no one is even sure they fueled it!!

I think it's far too early to cry wolf.

I agree on the Chinese equation, but a missile test by N Korea will be more harmful for China than anyone else. In the case a missile is effectively launched, I am fairly certain Japan will respond by investing in their own missile/anti-missle program. Which will piss the Chinese off. Big time. A cooling of Sino/Japense relations will negatively affect Chinese economic growth and I doubt Beijing will allow an old psycho to cost them so much politicaly and economicaly.

If indeed N Korea intends to test this said missile, we will either see an unhappy China about the actions of its traditional ally, or a China that will take its regional responsibility and stop the Koreans from being silly.

gives North Korea some assurance we won't invade them next...political move on their part...pretty good one actually...gotta get rid of kim jung il and all the other ppl under him...North Korea's people are really oppressed...1000x more then the Iraqi ppl were under Saddam

another war yet to arise.

good thing i live in MI also WAR AMERICA!!!!!!!!! if they drop bombs on us they better hope we dont drop nukes on them

also if they attack us it will give us a good reason to pull out of iraq

and another thing if they attack us it willl be like ww2 were the hole country comes together to fight.









WAR AMERICA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(eckopimpin @ Jun 23 2006, 10:01 PM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>
and another thing if they attack us it willl be like ww2 were the hole country comes together to fight.
WAR AMERICA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
[/b][/quote]

Which is why they will not attack you.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Fantouz @ Jun 20 2006, 07:33 PM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>
If indeed N Korea intends to test this said missile, we will either see an unhappy China about the actions of its traditional ally, or a China that will take its regional responsibility and stop the Koreans from being silly.
[/b][/quote]


I would love to see China take "regional responsibility" and us not have to play Team America - World Police for once.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(The Fire Zouave @ Jun 25 2006, 06:27 PM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>
I would love to see China take "regional responsibility" and us not have to play Team America - World Police for once.
[/b][/quote]

They actual do assume regional responsability, but it's not as mediatiac as Western methods. They have kept the lid on N Korea for a long time and they will keep doing it. They are the only power that is able to contain them, not the US. And I think the US is aware of that and they must be working with their chinese coutnerparts to find a solution to this problem.

Now don't you just wish we had the same opportunity with Iran? a powerful neighbour with whom you can negotiate and tell them to chill?

ps. You guys love to play Team America - World Police!! style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/rolleyes.gif

No matter where they aim that thing we should blow it out of the sky just because we can... assuming we can.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(loren Brown @ Jun 20 2006, 03:18 AM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>
Umm we had reasons to claim that Saddam had those missiles...I'm not surprised North Korea has them and I expect them to test launch one in the near future cause they know we wont mess with them or china might have somethin to say
[/b][/quote]
and they finally found 500 missles with sarin and mustard gas a couple weeks ago. not necessarily big time WMD's but they could do some damage and fuck up israel if used.

http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=50746
http://www.enterstageright.com/archive/art...606/0606wmd.htm (http://www.enterstageright.com/archive/articles/0606/0606wmd.htm)
http://www.nysun.com/article/34929
http://www.cnsnews.com/specialreports.asp

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(The Fire Zouave @ Jun 25 2006, 10:27 AM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>
I would love to see China take "regional responsibility" and us not have to play Team America - World Police for once.
[/b][/quote]
china and russia dont give a damn, they are to busy covering up their own misdealing, i.e russia helpin iraq move their WMD's to syria, and also china's hate of us is clouding their judgement as NK being a reginal threat. They need to quit being two-faced grow some balls for a change.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Fantouz @ Jun 26 2006, 11:16 AM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>
They actual do assume regional responsability, but it's not as mediatiac as Western methods. They have kept the lid on N Korea for a long time and they will keep doing it. They are the only power that is able to contain them, not the US. And I think the US is aware of that and they must be working with their chinese coutnerparts to find a solution to this problem.

Now don't you just wish we had the same opportunity with Iran? a powerful neighbour with whom you can negotiate and tell them to chill?

ps. You guys love to play Team America - World Police!! style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/rolleyes.gif
[/b][/quote]
iran has russia and china in their back pocket because they supply them with loads of oil.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(El Che @ Jun 27 2006, 11:43 PM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>
iran has russia and china in their back pocket because they supply them with loads of oil.
[/b][/quote]

Russia has plenty of supplies of oil inland and they also have one of the biggest suppliers in their back yard, and former Soviet state, Kazakhstan.

China has a very strong presence in Sudan, where the West is not present due to the humanitarian disaster in Darfour. Sudan is one of the largest unexploited oil producers in the world. Actually you could even say that the Chinese have a near monopoly in oil investments in Sudan; a very machiavelic move because as soon as Khartoum sorts itself out the West will be too late to come in and share its wealth.

Basically, China and Russia are far too smart and big to be in the back pocket of as reckless a government as Iran.

I hope our NMD is ready to shoot it down.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(El Che @ Jun 27 2006, 11:40 PM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>
and they finally found 500 missles with sarin and mustard gas a couple weeks ago. not necessarily big time WMD's but they could do some damage and fuck up israel if used.

http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=50746
http://www.enterstageright.com/archive/art...606/0606wmd.htm (http://www.enterstageright.com/archive/articles/0606/0606wmd.htm)
http://www.nysun.com/article/34929
http://www.cnsnews.com/specialreports.asp
[/b][/quote]

Interesting but it says nothing about missiles, but rather about projectiles. From the articles above, there is no way of telling whether these projectiles had the ability to reach Israel. I personally doubt it, because the only missiles that the Iraqi regime posessed that were able to hit israel were El Sammoud 2 which were destroyed under the supervision of the UNMOVIC team led by Hans Blix.

They didn't need missiles to pose a danger... they could hide it in a car or put the gas in someones suicide vest.... Or sell them to Al Queada

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(EVIL @ Jun 28 2006, 11:20 PM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>
They didn't need missiles to pose a danger... they could hide it in a car or put the gas in someones suicide vest.... Or sell them to Al Queada
[/b][/quote]

Very true, but the reason for going to war was to remove the threat posed by Saddam Hussein's Baath regime which never used suicide bombers or any other terrorist means such as booby trapped cars, but used convential weapons and military means to cause damage and devestation. The terrorist methods in Iraq only began after Operaiton Iraqi Freedom.

ALso, I don't see how a suicide bomber or car could drive all the way to Israel to be detonated. There are two to three countries to cross depending on the route you choose; that;s a long way to drive in hot countries with chemical explosives in the boot. I can assure you that none of these countries would collaborate with such a scheme and provide safe passage to the explosives; the repurcussions would be just too big.

The Baath regime never had any links with Al Qaeda; they actually despised each other. One was an Arab nationalist secular regime and the other has predominantly religious goals along the Islamic world.

Saddam gave huge amounts of money to terrorist organizations... thats a good enough reason to take him out.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(EVIL @ Jun 29 2006, 10:53 PM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>
Saddam gave huge amounts of money to terrorist organizations... thats a good enough reason to take him out.
[/b][/quote]

I never heard that before. The pre-war allegations were that Iraqi diplomats met with Al Qaeda operatives in Prague; which proved to be bullshit.

If we want to look for terrorist supporting nations in teh region then you should look at Syria, Iran and the main one Saudi Arabia. Of course the US wouldn't touch Saudi Arabia, a real oppressive regime, because they are their buddies. Quite an interesting friendship no?

Saddam gave 10 grand to the families of suicide bombers that were attacking Isreal... and there are proven links between Saddams top guys and Al Queada leadership befor the war even started. There are some things the Media don't want you to know.

I agree there are other countries that support terrorism, they also need to be overthrown.

saddam didnt need missles to use his chemical weapons, liek they are doing now, they can easily smuggle checmicals throughout the middle east because of all the pro-terrorist states there.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(EVIL @ Jun 30 2006, 01:48 PM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>
Saddam gave 10 grand to the families of suicide bombers that were attacking Isreal... and there are proven links between Saddams top guys and Al Queada leadership befor the war even started. There are some things the Media don't want you to know.

I agree there are other countries that support terrorism, they also need to be overthrown.
[/b][/quote]

Aha good one, I do not want to to seem like I am defending Saddam or condoning suicide bombers anywhere; I live in London and our tubes were attacked by these cunts less than a year ago. In the Arab mind and point of view, the Palestinian suicide bomber is not considered a terrorist but a martyr, a resistance fighter. This way of thinking is detached from our western school of thought and rightly so.

Sure Saddam probably supported these actions to cause mayhem in Israel and not because he believed that it was a legitimate struggle by the Palestinians to obtain more autonomy/independence. Either way it is not right, but it really depends on our definition of terrorist and until recently there wasn't a universally agreed defininition of what consitituted a terrorist (actually not sure if it has been accepted in the UN), just what amounted to terrorist acts. Some consider teh Tamil Tigers to be resistance fighters other that they are terrorists for example. Same applies to Chechen rebels, before the Beslan massacre anyway.

Basically I agree with you that Saddam probably was providing 10 grand to families of suicide bombers and so giving them more incentive to blow themselves up; but also this was not one of the arguments used to go to war.

Now for Al Qaeda, I will disagree with you. There were and are no links between Baath and Al Qaeda. The two despised each other and stood for two conflicting ideologies. If these llinks were known they would have been in the media because it would have served as a perfect vehicle for teh Coalition to gain support in taking Baath regime out. The Bush Administration and Blair Cabinet would have made sure that this information is publicly available; Blair would have avoided a popular manifestation with 2 million people in Hyde Park and Bush would've actually had a legitimate and legal reason to go to war, which there weren't any.
El Che, I hope you are not serious with your last post.

Palestinian suicide bombers not terrorists, you got to be kidding.


Iraq had links to Al Queada and many other terrorist organizations and they had WMD.

Iraq al qaeda links (http://www.aim.org/media_monitor/A4198_0_2_0_C/)

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(EVIL @ Jun 30 2006, 04:03 PM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>
Palestinian suicide bombers not terrorists, you got to be kidding.
Iraq had links to Al Queada and many other terrorist organizations and they had WMD.

Iraq al qaeda links (http://www.aim.org/media_monitor/A4198_0_2_0_C/)
[/b][/quote]

No man, that's not what I mean. In my opinion they are terrorists, what I was trying to say is that in the Arab popular opinion they are regarded as resistance fighters and Saddam was hoping that by supporting them he would actaully gain support from other Arabs for defending the Arab nation against the "evil zionist".
This difference in opinion leads to a lot of controversy when we are branding certain groups as terrorists. Imo anyone who attacks innocent civilians for a political/ideological purpose is a terrorist.

Thanks for the link, I will check it tomorrow, no time today.

Oh sorry I misunderstood you. Check out that link, I have some more on the same subject if you want them.

I am starting to like this thread. You guys sound like grown ups.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(EVIL @ Jun 30 2006, 07:28 PM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>
Oh sorry I misunderstood you. Check out that link, I have some more on the same subject if you want them.
[/b][/quote]

Finally read that article, I am in a real bad mood because England lost against Potugal in the World Cup. On penalties, on fucking penalties again.

That was a good article and it did criticised mainly the approach, but it did not offer anything conclusive about Al Qaeda and Baath links. I would not be surprised if they did meet in Afghanistan as was stated in the last paragraph and that Bin Laden was told he was welcome in Baghdad. It is an Arab custom to be overly hospitable.

But does that mean that there was strategic and actual cooperation between both parties? maybe, not certainly.

As for the Prague meeting (7th paragraph) I mentioned in a previous reply that this proved to be unsubstantiated and circumstancial evidence, Bob Woodgate and Hans Blix both tackled this meeting in their books; plan of attack and shite, forgot the name of Hans Blix's book, must be the beer.

My main soruce of information was www.iraqwatch.org and I wouldn't mind if you post a few more good links.


Cheers

Does anyone else think it's funny that we (americans) are so ready to condemn other countries for pursuing nuclear ambitions, yet we have the world's largest nuclear arsenal *and* are the only country to ever actually use nukes on an enemy? Civilians no less!

And the pot met the kettle, and said...

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Cosmic Osmo @ Jul 1 2006, 08:32 PM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>
Does anyone else think it's funny that we (americans) are so ready to condemn other countries for pursuing nuclear ambitions, yet we have the world's largest nuclear arsenal *and* are the only country to ever actually use nukes on an enemy? Civilians no less!

And the pot met the kettle, and said...
[/b][/quote]

The US, the EU and pretty much everyone gets pissed off when another country develops nuclear weapons because it is in contravention with the Non-Nuclear Proliferation treaty; and rightly so if you ask me my opinion. We don't need more nuclear technology and more importantly we don't want more nuclear technology that may not be contained and fall in the wrong hands.
No one would want to wake up to a nuclear winter and the best solution is to stop everyone from developing it.

Also the US develloped their arsenal to that extent to counter the Soviet threat during the Cold War and guarantee the protection of Western Europe. Maybe the great powers ought to consider decomissioning some of their weapons but not get rid of them. Like it or not, the nuclear deterrent is a strong incentive for peace.

The Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs, as horrible as they were, showed the world a new force that nobody wanted to incur and thus gave us peace; but at a high price.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Fantouz @ Jun 26 2006, 02:16 PM) Quoted post</div><div class='quotemain'>

ps. You guys love to play Team America - World Police!! style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/rolleyes.gif
[/b][/quote]


Our govt does anyway - thank goodness the UK always has our backs!

thats some crazy shit, I just heard about this yesterday on the news.

its pretty f*cked up, but then other countried have tested too ie france and no one said shit

America... F*uck Yeah