Yeah, I'm on the Shiloh (CG-67).

I'd have to admit ignorance, I know the designators are SM-2 Bloc 3A for sub-atmospheric engagements and the SM-3 for ballistic intercept.

Are you refering to the targeting system, or the missile itself?

I'm a CT, not an FC or a GM, so most of my involvment with the missile test was with overhead detection systems, not the actual engagement.

The U.S. can't sanction NK. We don't have any relations with them. At all. You can't take away nothing.

NK has done shit like this in the past. Usually it means one of two things: a) they are feeling ignored b) they want something. It's probably a bit of both in this case.

It's not like the U.S. has any military force to spare, we're busy in Iraq. And Japan doesn't really have a military to speak of at the moment. So if you're worried about a global war with nukes flyin', I'd say chill. NK is just clamoring for attention like a whining child.

While troubling, this isn't anything to shit your pants over.

With the Taep'o-dong 2's failure, I bet some heads are going to roll in the DPRK. And I don't necessarily mean that figuratively. It also seems that the KCNA still hasn't issued any statement on the events. Unfortunate, though they might just be taking their time in order to release something truly worth of NK News' hall of fame. I hope.

That aside, it's nice to see that the Taep'o-dong 2 failed that early, as it really limits whatever data they got out of that test. They were nowhere close to deploying the second stage, so even if they find what went wrong this time and fix it, plenty could go wrong and lead to another total failure next time.

What I'm not sure is why they launched those SCUDs and whatever other glorified V2s. Perhaps it wasn't a test, but a full scale attack on Japan and the West Coast, except all their missiles failed, so no one actually noticed. Or Kim really doesn't like the Sea of Japan.

You think he's going to take that aggressive of a posture without some kind of fallback plan? I'd hesitate to call it an attack, but Kim has been reported as a very shrewd and calculating man. It could be this really is a diversion to focus the U.S.'s attention away from some other, truly menacing project still under wraps.

A failure on this scale does a lot to instill a sense of security, which goes in N.K.'s favor if the missle wasn't what they were really worried about.

I was actually joking about the whole "attack-but-no-one-noticing" thing. Still, it is true that everyone is getting pretty relaxed now that he's done with what was essentially the equivalent of flinging feces in the general direction of the US. But I really can't see what sort of truly menacing project he could have under wrap. I mean, missiles with nuclear warheads are essentially the best the DPRK could hope for, and with the missile part failing as it did, then the nuclear part becomes useless. The one thing which could have happened is that they really did destroy the Taep'o-dong 2 in flight, and will launch another one from somewhere else now that people are less worried so it has a greater effect. But they'd have to be fairly sure that their missile will work as expected, not to mention that those missiles likely aren't being mass-produced yet, so each one fired is a very significant expense, mostly of time but perhaps resources depending on how exotic the raw materials, if they're machining and assembling the whole thing by hand.

Still that's pretty far fetched I'd say. Or perhaps Kim is actually an evil genius and has developped an earthquake generator or some other doomsday device so he can ransom the world for "One... Hundred... Billion Dollars!". Or he'll unleash frickin' sharks with frickin' laser beams attached to their frickin' heads.

Yeah, that's pretty much all I had in mind. :tpg:

Hey, who would have thought...

[Link removed]

Seems the link doesn't work anymore. Anyway, it basically said NK was preparing another Taep'o-dong 2 for launch, and though it wasn't on the launch pad yet, it was in final stages of assembly.

NK are starting to piss off even China now with all these shenanigans.

http://www.strategypage.com/qnd/kore.../20060705.aspx

Yeah, I've actually read about the train thing. It's probably intended for a full-size model railway in the basement of one of Kim's mansions.

I can just imagine the conversation between the crews of the trains and their superiors once back to China. "They've kept the train." "What? Who? Bandits?" "Well, I suppose you could call the North Koreans that..."

NK have gotta be careful because if they piss off China then they might as well call it a day.

(still waiting for Japan to produce a huge mech out of somewhere in the Sea of Japan to attack NK if the shit hits the fan)

Actually, train-related matters aside, China doesn't care much for North Korea. It's been that way for some time now, the main reason they don't want to be outright hostile towards North Korea is that it would give North Korea a reason to try the same shit they're doing with South Korea, Japan and the US, namely blackmail. Add the fact that a collapse of North Korea would send boatloads of people crossing the border into China, including a large number of starved, fanatical soldiers, and you can sort of understand why China is trying to keep their relations with North Korea as they are now.

China has no reason to improve those relations either. They've got nothing to gain from a stalinist hellhole with less than 30 million people. As for ideology, let's be frank here: China doesn't give a fuck about that anymore. The fact that China is essentially capitalist aside, China is much more interested in actually making tangible gains in industrial and financial power than to spread any kind of ideology, let alone one they're not even following anymore.

That's probably why China and Russia vetoed the sanctions on NK in the UN then. >_>

Russia, I'm not exactly too sure why. But in China's case, it's essentially what I've said, they don't want to appear outright hostile to North Korea.

EDIT: The KCNA finally released a statement about the tests! Sadly it's nowhere as hilarious as I'd expect, just the typical half-coherent stuff they usually publish. They didn't even speak of the Taep'o-dong 2 failure.

Here's the link for anyone interested: http://www.kcna.co.jp/item/2006/200607/news07/07.htm#1

I have to confess, American confused me at times. People have the right to self defence, but nations do not?

The idea being that responsible nations, ones capable of acting in the best interestsof their people rather than their dictator-for-life, quite possibly can use nuclear weapons responsibly.

But whether for self-motivated reasons or selfless ones, Kim Il Jong seems like one of the persons who least needs a nucelar arsenal. If we were still talking about India/Pakistani relations I think you might be onto something, but as it is, N.K. is being completely subdued by a completely egotistical and overly ambitious man.

Still the hypocrisy shows through.

So the nut has The Bomb. And now he's got everybody's attention. Which is what his country needs.

I don't really see how there is any hypocrisy with the current situation. North Korea agreed to not pursue and kind of ballistic missile and or nuclear weapons in return for help from other countries. They fell back on their agreement and now they are going to be, ( or we hope ) will be punished for their mistakes. They are trying to blackmail the world into giving them stuff and I don't think that saying we have nukes and lots of guns pointed at the south is the best way to go about getting what you want.

What's hippocritical about American nuclear policy is how we turned a blind eye to India's nuclear tests and how it very blatantly violated the agreements involved in the Nuclear Club.

Hippocritical or not, though, there's no reason we shouldn't be up in arms over North Korea going nuclear. Give me one good reason why a ruthless dictator who is perfectly willing to sacrifice the lives of his own people to perpetuate his power should be allowed to develop both the most powerful implement of destruction, and it's delivery system.

Unless you can come up with a damn good one, all you're doing is blowing hot air.

Stop missile launching, stop bad stuff, stop war. :( Why do N. Korea have to go launching missiles? (some were pathetic and landed in the Sea of Japan!)

Don't go firing at my country, damn northeners! the southies are cool tho ^^

Are you, uh, South Korean?

I'm guessing Japan, since he's sore about some missiles going into the Sea of Japan =(

Or he's from south of the Mason-Dixon. Damn yankees indeed! >8U

They said that the Taepodong was aimed in the general vicinity of Hawaii based on the angle of the nose cone and its height before it fell the fuck apart. So with a targeted distance of over 6,000 kilometers, it couldn't even stretch the 1,000 required to jump Japan.

Yeah, but one launch failure doesn't really mean that much. I mean, the Vanguard rocket which put the first US satellite in orbit exploded on the launch pad the first time it was used. The second time didn't work either, but eventually they did manage to put a satellite in orbit with that same rocket. North Korea just being unlucky this time shouldn't be discarded.

Of course that doesn't necessarily mean that their missile isn't a piece of shit either. But waiting for, at the very least, the second test is probably a good idea before laughing at them.

From what I've read, the Taepodong2 failed within a minute of being launched. And the folks afraid of seeing this used to launch nukes should realize that it would have to be a petite-sized nuke that NK lacks the technology to create. A nuke would weigh several thousand kilograms but the Taepo2's payload would need to weigh half a thousand kilos to reach its maximum range. You can't just scale up a few figures proportionally with weight. Lots of things change as you alter the size of these missiles. Plus, NK has yet to even get close to sustaining a reliable re-entry of their missiles.