Traded threats ramp up Korea crisis
Trump promises ‘fire and fury’ as Pyongyang talks of Guam attack
In an exchange of threats yesterday, US President Donald Trump warned Pyongyang of “fire and fury like the world has never seen” and the North’s military claimed it was examining plans for attacking Guam.
The high-level tit-for-tat follows reports that North Korea has mastered a crucial technology needed to strike the United States with a nuclear missile.
Despite regular North Korean threats against Guam, a US territory in the Pacific about 3400km from the Korean Peninsula, it is extremely unlikely that Pyongyang would risk the assured annihilation of its revered leadership with a pre-emptive attack on US citizens. It’s also not clear how reliable North Korea’s mid-range missiles would be in an attack against a distant target given the relatively few times they’ve been tested.
Even so, the competing threats and Trump’s use of North Korea-style rhetoric raise already high animosity and heighten worries that a miscalculation might spark conflict between the rivals.
The North Korean army said in a statement that it is studying a plan to create an “enveloping fire” in areas around Guam with medium- to longrange ballistic missiles. The statement described Andersen Air Force Base on Guam as a “beachhead” for a potential US invasion of North Korea it needed to neutralise. It was unlikely the North’s threat was a direct response to Trump’s comments to the camera at his golf course in Bedminster, New Jersey. South Korea’s Unification Ministry, which deals with matters related to North Korea, said the North’s statement hurts efforts to improve inter-Korean relations. Ministry spokesman Baek Tai Hyun said Seoul remains committed to both dialogue and sanctions for solving the North Korean nuclear problem and called for Pyongyang to stop its provocations. Baek did not mention Trump’s comments.
Trump spoke hours after reports indicated North Korea can now wed nuclear warheads with its missiles, including its longest-range missiles that may be able to hit the American mainland. The North has strived for decades to have the ability to strike the US and its Asian allies, and the pace of its breakthroughs is having far-reaching consequences for stability in the Pacific and beyond.
The nuclear advances were detailed in an official Japanese assessment on Tuesday and a later Washington Post story that cited US intelligence officials and a confidential Defence Intelligence Agency report. The US now assesses the North Korean arsenal at up to 60 nuclear weapons, more than double most assessments by independent experts, according to the Post’s reporting.
“North Korea had best not make any more threats to the United States,” said a stern-looking Trump, seated with his arms crossed and with his wife beside him. “They will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen.”
The remarks appeared scripted, with Trump glancing at a paper in front of him.