North Korea ‘may return to talks’

The six-party talks, which began in 2003, constitute delegates from North and South Korea, China, the US, Russia and Japan and their objective is to find peaceful resolution to security concerns on the Korean Peninsula. The talks started after North Korea withdrew from the Non-Proliferation Treaty and the country walked-out of these negotiations in 2009 after introduction of the sanctions by the UNO.

To read about the possibility of resuming the talks see http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8291882.stm.

Secretary Gates and General Cartwright Transcript

Here is the transcript of the last weeks press conference by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff James Cartwright. I’ll post the video when I find it.

Putin on Obama’s plan for European missile defense

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin released a statement on the President’s decision to scrap the current agreements to place Ground-Based Interceptors in Poland and radars in the Czech Republic. He said:

“I expect that after this correct and brave decision, others will follow, including the complete removal of all restrictions on the transfer of high technology to Russia and activity to widen the membership of the World Trade Organization to (include) Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus,”

Secretary Gates on Iranian Intel Estimates

Russians move missile defense equipment to North Korean border

Russia has said it has deployed its S-400 Triumf missile defense systems to its border with North Korea.  The chief of the Russian general staff said the move is a defensive measure designed only to protect Russia from an errant North Korean missile test.  While in the Mongolian capitol of UIanbatar He said that Russia is, “definitely concerned by the conditions under which tests are being carried out in North Korea, including nuclear devices” and that, “We are currently considering what the most effective measures would be to guarantee no debris would fall if a missile launch failed.”

The s-400 Triumf is a mobile land-based missile defense has a reported range of 400km or about 250 miles. The Russian city of Vladivostok has a population of around 600,000 people and is less than 100 miles from North Korea.

Nuclear weapons across the world

National missile defense isn’t going to stop China. You can see in Han Kristensen’s breakdown of last month’s Air Force Intelligence Report that China, even though they don’t have multiple warheads on their missiles now, they certainly have plenty of them. Maybe not a lot compared to the United States or Russia, but more than we will have ground based interceptors – by a lot. The threat, as Gen. O’Reilly has stated repeatedly, is Iran, North Korea or some non-state actor or rogue nation.

About China Kristensen writes

The report echoes recent statements from other branches of the U.S. intelligence community that the number of warheads on Chinese ICBM capable of reaching the United States could expand to “well over 100 in the next 15 years.” Unfortunately, “well over 100” can mean anything so it is hard to compare this NASIC’s projection with the CIA projection from 2001 of 75-100 warheads “primarily targeted against the United States” by 2015. That projection only included DF-5A and DF-31A capable of targeting all of the United States, with the high number requiring multiple warheads on DF-5A. But the timeline for the anticipated increase has slipped considerably from 2015 to 2024.

Maybe more interesting was this tidbit:

Curiously, even after two nuclear tests and the intelligence community stating for more than a decade that North Korea has nuclear weapons, the NASIC report does not list any of North Korea’s weapons as “nuclear” or “conventional or nuclear.” That is, I think, interesting.

Hmm…

JSanderson