North Korea

[Robert Ryan]

What Super Scout said can't agree more.

[Seascamp]

It is unlikely that the MSM will run with anything that doesn?t yield political traction, regardless of possibility or probability. Of the NK nuke scenarios put up thus far, I haven?t seen the one that suggests NK got the test yields they wanted. In other words, a downsized nuke, perhaps. That possibility trickles down into the things of nightmares, a man or passenger vehicle transportable nuke capable gutting an inter-city area or Government area or shopping mall, or or or. Now an item like that would be a bestseller and small if any risk to the seller.


What is starkly apparent is that we have a long history of ?by guess and by gosh? about NK capability including the 1998 CIA Senate testimony that NK was a decade away from ballistic missile technology. Within a few days of that pronouncement, Kim did an ?up-yours? and smoked a ballistic missile right across Japan. No telling what, besides a nuke reactor, was on Kim?s shopping list that the US coughed-up during our mid-90?s; ?Let?s get physical?, experiment with Kim.

I hope wiser minds are not ruling out anything as yet and letting the MSM n? connected politicos bully, distort history and drive the distinction between possibility and probability.
Alas, all the complex anti-missile systems yet developed can?t guard against what rolls across our southern border in open daylight with an apparent load of ?farm produce?.

Scamp

[Boats]

Scamp that is a very good point. Both Local and National MSM is peddling its own interpretation of the story based on their contacts and whistle blowers - some true and some who knows? The politics are what they've always have been now and in the past. China will have to take out Kim and soon but they will replace him with another hard liner but maybe not one that is so vocal.

The US eye in the sky has to keep watch over this country.

You know Japan has a spy satellite watching all their neighbors as well - but they have a constitutional no nuke clauses in their government laws - this may be enough for them to ratify it allowing them to come out of the closet and state they too are ready to protect their best interest.

This will then excite China and I'm sure Taiwan will want one and on it goes.

[Seascamp]

Boats....

Gut feel, but I doubt the PRC will take Kim Jr. out, more likely a very short choke chain of supervision will be put around his neck or his plastic replica?s neck and he?ll speak and act on command. To the extent Kim Jr. is pushing China into a ?react corner? is a matter of speculation and if n? when there is a threshold trip, I suspect it will be rather invisible. If history is any guide, Communists aren?t big on messy, public, family squabbles, but at the end of the day, someone is once again in the fold n? behaving or is poofed, followed by an elaborate ?State Funeral?, of course.

Last I heard Kim Jr. had a contract out on his Son and successor apparent, but never heard if that actually came down. Seems as how Kim Jr.II snuck off to Japan for some high times without askin Pa, and got the ultimate black flag.

If still alive, I wouldn?t be surprised to see Kim Jr.II back in the DPRK circle of power, but without power other than what Beijing allows him to say he has, which in actuality will nada, for sure.

I?d say that maybe China has had about enough of the bleeding and pitching money down a bottomless pit with the Kim Sr., Kim Jr. and Kim Jr II dynasty and getting the rude finger gesture and a huge liability in return.

Scamp

[Boats]

Scamp - I hope your right.

[Seascamp]

Perhaps, Boats, the best we can do is be looking in the right direction and pass on the flank n? six MSM tent barker?s proffered, ?peep shows?. Then, maybe, there?s a chance some truth will out and that may give us a fighting chance at being right about something once in a while.

In terms of ?gasp?, a former US Pres. has, as of yesterday, blown away and/or revised known and documented US-NK history from 1994 through 2002 and the MSM has picked up the night soil bed pan and is running with it. I fail to see how such blatant revisionism is a ?win? for anyone, especially our Asia friends that live in the eye of the NK crap storm and have put up with the abuse for years. But I suppose protecting a ?Nobel Peace Prize? trumps all reality and known history. Too bad for all of us.

Scamp

[darrels joy]

South Korean scientists have been scrambling for signs of radioactivity that would confirm Monday's underground test. Han Seung-jae, an official at the Korea Institute of Nuclear Safety, said experts were still unsure the North had tested a nuclear device.

"So far, we have not detected any abnormal level of radioactivity" in South Korea, he said.

Japanese military planes have also been monitoring for radioactivity in the atmosphere but have reported no abnormal readings.

North Korea has been demanding direct talks with the United States, but President Bush refused to agree to such a meeting in a news conference Wednesday. He argued that Pyongyang would be more likely to listen to the protests of many nations.

Bush added that the U.S. was ready to defend its allies in the region, but that it would also try to use diplomacy to deal with North Korea.

"I believe the commander in chief must try all diplomatic measures before we commit our military," he said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

[39mto39g]

Extensive search reveled no radiation around blast site. This would indicate that the blast was very small, very deep or a conventional explosion.
The North Koreans don't have the expertise to have a small nuke,and digging a 2,000 foot hole is no small feet either. so that leaves any reasonable person only one conclusion, An conventional explosion, Most likely what the French reported, around the 100 ton verity, not even 1 kiloton.

I see the Russians have reported that North Korea will cease there nuke direction if they are give Aid and assurance of no attack.
To that I would say, YEA RIGHT. First we dismantle , then we verify, then we talk AID.

Ron

[Seascamp]

Rough cut numbers; it would take a fair sized garage to stack 550 tons of HE, but is entirely feasible to deep mine-carve out a cavern that size. Much larger caverns can be found in the Pennsylvania coalmines or South African deep gold mines. In one Johannesburg gold mine I worked on the AC compressors on the 5K ft. down level that were used to cool the mine galley and mine face that was at the 11k ft. down level. I begged off a tour on the mine face area. At the time the Zulu and Hoaxza mine workers were after each other and I had absolutely no desire to get in the middle of that acrimony, especially 11k ft. underground.

Another ancillary fact is that NK is quite accomplished at digging holes, tunnels, bunkers, etc., and the entire place is a huge underground military rabbit warren. So could NK be pulling a scam, doing a tail cranking exercise and looking forward to some opportune buy-off bucks? I?d say that is as good a possibility as any.

Notably, the only country that states for certain that it was a nuke event is Russia and I assume they base that finding on seismic data, not radiation data.

Scamp

[SuperScout]

While certainly not wanting to stand in the middle of the room and yell, "I told you so!" it is becoming more clear by the day that a nuke was not part of the NK game. I do think that have become very adroit at the mind-phuggin' game, and knowing the our MSM is the most gullible, are using them to peddle their poop about what went pop.

Most seismic geologists can readily detect the differences between a nuke blast and a couple of plates being tectonic. Given that there has been a paucity of statements emanating out of earthquake-studying universities, I still opt for the non-nuke big bang.