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US heavy bombers, jets in show of force against North Korea
by Staff Writers
Seoul (AFP) Aug 31, 2017


Mattis says he and Trump on same page on N. Korea
Washington (AFP) Aug 31, 2017 - US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis on Thursday denied any divergence of views with Donald Trump over the response to North Korea's recent missile launch, after he appeared to undercut the president's tough rhetoric.

Mattis had argued Wednesday that there was still room for diplomacy in dealing with Pyongyang's provocative ballistic missile launches, shortly after Trump said negotiations were "not the answer."

"'Diplomatic' can include economic sanctions, United Nations sanctions, it's not just talking. I didn't contradict anything the president said. We're not talking to the North Koreans right now," Mattis told reporters at the Pentagon.

"I agree with the president... We should not be talking right now to a nation that's firing missiles over the top of Japan, an ally," he added.

"We're working diplomatically with Secretary (of State Rex) Tillerson in the lead, and I maintain behind that military options for the president, to back up the diplomacy. But we're not done with diplomacy."

Mattis called Pyongyang's test launch of an intermediate range ballistic missile over Hokkaido on Tuesday a "reckless and provocative act," but suggested that US and Japanese forces almost immediately knew the missile, which landed far out into the Pacific Ocean, was not targeted at anyone.

"We knew within minutes where it was going," he said.

The Pentagon chief declined to confirm reports that North Korea could be preparing a new nuclear test, which would be widely seen as another provocative and dangerous move by the Pyongyang regime.

However, he added, "they could do something like that on relatively short notice."

US heavy bombers and stealth jet fighters took part in a joint live-fire drill in South Korea on Thursday, intended as a show of force against the North after its latest missile launch.

"South Korean and US air forces conducted an air interdiction exercise in order to strongly cope with North Korea's repeated firing of ballistic missiles and development of nuclear weapons," the South's air force said in a statement.

Two B-1B "Lancer" bombers from Guam and four F-35B stealth jet fighters from the Marine Corps' Iwakuni airbase in Japan conducted the drill, with four South Korean jet fighters also taking part.

B-1B overflights of the peninsula from Guam, a US territory in the Pacific Ocean, infuriate the North, which condemned the drill on Thursday, the South's Yonhap news agency reported.

"The wild military acts of the enemies are nothing but the rash act of those taken aback" by Pyongyang's latest missile launch, Yonhap cited the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) as saying.

Pyongyang had previously announced a plan to fire a salvo of missiles towards Guam.

It was one of the moves that saw tensions spiral this month, along with a new set of UN Security Council sanctions and US President Donald Trump's apocalyptic warning to rain "fire and fury" on Pyongyang, and culminating with the North firing a missile over Japan on Tuesday.

A frustrated Trump took to Twitter to condemn Pyongyang, saying "the US has been talking to North Korea, and paying them extortion money, for 25 years. Talking is not the answer!"

With tensions surging, Moscow urged Washington not to use force against North Korea and also said attempts to toughen sanctions would be counterproductive.

In a phone call late Wednesday with US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov "underscored... the need to refrain from any military steps that could have unpredictable consequences," the foreign ministry in Moscow said.

China on Thursday also condemned "destructive" calls for further sanctions, warning Japan, the US and Britain that diplomacy was needed to avert a crisis.

Foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said sanctions alone "cannot fundamentally resolve the issue", amid reports the three countries were pushing for new restrictions on North Korean oil imports and foreign workers.

"The current situation on the Korean peninsula is not a screenplay, it's not a computer game. It is a real situation that directly bears on the security of the people on the peninsula and the whole regional peace and tranquility," she said.

- May calls to up pressure -

On a visit to Japan on Thursday, British Prime Minister Theresa May said London and Tokyo would work together to pressure North Korea "including by increasing the pace of sanctions" against Pyongyang".

The UN Security Council has already imposed seven sets of sanctions on Pyongyang, the most recent of which were passed this month, but the measures have done little to quell Kim Jong-Un's nuclear missile ambitions.

Thursday's live-fire drill took place at the Pilseung shooting range in Gangwon province, some 150 kilometres (94 miles) south of the Demilitarized Zone dividing the two Koreas.

A South Korean air force spokesman said it was separate from the annual Ulchi Freedom Guardian (UFG) joint exercises, which wrapped up on Thursday.

Tens of thousands of South Korean and US troops took part in the largely computer-simulated exercise that ran for two weeks in the South.

The annual drills are viewed by nuclear-armed Pyongyang as a highly provocative rehearsal for invasion, and it always meets them with threats of strong military counteraction.

A US Forces Korea official told the Yonhap news agency that Washington had avoided sending bombers to the peninsula during the UFG exercises "in hopes that the reduced scale would send a positive signal to North Korea and the region", but Pyongyang had responded with a series of provocations.

The North's state media called Tuesday's Hwasong-12 intermediate range missile flight over northern Japan "a part of the muscle-flexing" against the war games.

Kim Jong-Un called for more launches into the Pacific, the KCNA news agency said.

North Korea says it needs nuclear weapons to protect itself against the US, and analysts say Pyongyang has made rapid strides in its ballistic technology in defiance of seven sets of United Nations resolutions.

In July it conducted two successful ICBM launches which appeared to bring most of the US mainland into range.

NUKEWARS
UK, Japan to hike pace of sanctions against N. Korea: May
Tokyo (AFP) Aug 31, 2017
Britain and Japan will step up the pace of sanctions against nuclear-armed North Korea after its "outrageous" firing of a missile over Japan, British Prime Minister Theresa May said Thursday. "We condemn North Korea in the strongest words possible for a reckless act which was a clear violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions," May told a press briefing during an official visit ... read more

Related Links
Learn about nuclear weapons doctrine and defense at SpaceWar.com
Learn about missile defense at SpaceWar.com
All about missiles at SpaceWar.com
Learn about the Superpowers of the 21st Century at SpaceWar.com


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