Strike on Guam vs fire and fury
N. Korea matches Trump warning with missile attack threat
GUAM/SEOUL: North Korea said it was considering plans for a missile strike on the US Pacific territory of Guam, just hours after President Donald Trump told the North that any threat to the United States would be met with “fire and fury”.
The sharp increase in tensions rattled financial markets and prompted warnings from US officials and analysts not to engage in rhetorical slanging matches with North Korea.
Pyongyang said yesterday it was “carefully examining” a plan to strike Guam, which is home to about 163,000 people and a US military base that includes a submarine squadron, an airbase and a Coast Guard group.
A Korean People’s Army spokesman said in a statement carried by state-run KCNA news agency the plan would be put into practice at any moment once leader Kim Jongun makes a decision.
Guam Governor Eddie Calvo dismissed the North’s threat and said the island was prepared for “any eventuality” with strategically placed defences.
He said he had been in touch with the White House and there was no change in the threat level.
“Guam is American soil ... We are not just a military installation,” Calvo said in an online video message.
North Korea also accused the United States of devising a “preventive war” and said in another statement that any plans to execute this would be met with an “all-out war wiping out all the strongholds of enemies, including the US mainland”.
Washington has warned it is ready to use force if needed to stop North Korea’s ballistic missile and nuclear programmes but that it prefers global diplomatic action, including sanctions.
The UN Security Council unanimously imposed new sanctions on North Korea on Saturday.
Trump issued his strongest warning yet for North Korea in comments to reporters in New Jersey on Tuesday.
“North Korea best not make any more threats to the United States. They will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen,” Trump said.
North Korea has made no secret of its plans to develop a nuclear-tipped missile able to strike the United States and has ignored calls to halt its weapons programmes.
Pyongyang says its intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) are a legitimate means of defence against perceived US hostility, including
North Korea always talks about war, war, war, but it never happens.
Yang
joint military drills with South Korea.
The United States has remained technically at war with North Korea since the 1950-53 Korean conflict ended without a peace treaty.
Seoul is home to roughly 10 million people and within range of massed North Korean rockets and artillery, which would be impossible to destroy in a first US strike.
Tens of thousands of US troops remain stationed in South Korea and in nearby Japan, the only country to have been attacked with nuclear weapons.
Yesterday marked the 72nd anniversary of the atomic bombing of the city of Nagasaki by the United States.
“Tension is mounting when it comes to the international situation surrounding nuclear weapons,” Nagasaki mayor Tomihisa Taue told a ceremony marking the attack.
“Strong fears are spreading that nuclear weapons may be used in the not-so-distant future,” he said.
A senior official at South Korea’s presidential Blue House rejected talk of a crisis on the Korean peninsula, saying Seoul saw a high possibility of resolving the issue peacefully.
North Korea needed to realise that its repeated provocations are making the country more isolated and it should respond to the South’s proposal for dialogue, the official said.
In Dandong, a Chinese trading hub across the border from North Korea, residents said they were unperturbed by the escalating rhetoric.
“North Korea always talks about war, war, war, but it never happens,” said a restaurant owner who asked to be identified only by her surname Yang.
“We now live in peaceful times. But if war does break out it will be us ordinary people who suffer.” — Reuters