Please Everyone Just Calm Down

On March 5, in anticipation of the United Nations Security Council approving a new round of economic sanctions on the already sanction-blessed Democratic People's Republic of Korea, the Korean People's Army released a statement on its plans for meeting the UN's challenge.

Since the Korea Central News Agency presents information in a fashion that does not allow linking, I present the KPA statement here in all its superheated glory:

On Dec. 12 last year the DPRK legitimately and successfully launched a satellite for peaceful purposes, ensuring international transparency, going beyond practice, and choosing a comparatively mild situation for it.

Seizing the DPRK's satellite launch as an occasion for stifling it from the outset, the U.S. and its allies deliberately negated the DPRK's sovereignty over its satellite launch. They finally prodded the UN Security Council into adopting a "resolution on sanctions" before opting for high-handed hostile acts against the DPRK.

These hostile acts are still going on.

Under this situation the DPRK was compelled to take practical counteractions to defend the security and sovereignty of the country. On Feb. 12 it admirably and successfully conducted the third underground nuclear test for self-defence at the highest level as part of those counteractions.

However, the U.S. imperialists and their allied forces including south Korea are making more persistent and desperate efforts to slap new tougher "sanctions" against the DPRK, far from drawing a due lesson.

Not content with this, they kicked off again the Key Resolve and Foal Eagle joint military exercises to stifle the DPRK by force of arms by mobilizing huge armed forces of aggression. They will reportedly last for two months from March 1.

Unlike last year the current joint military exercises will be participated in by super-large nuclear-powered carrier task force carrying at least 100 nuclear warheads, B-52H strategic bombers and other means of the U.S. imperialist aggression forces for making ground, sea and air nuclear strikes and its allied forces including south Korea, U.K. and Australia.

From this point of view, the exercises cannot be construed otherwise than the most dangerous nuclear war maneuvers targeted against the DPRK and the most undisguised military provocation to be made by a group of all hues of hostile forces.

This serious situation clearly indicates that the actions of the U.S., south Korea and other hostile forces to infringe upon the sovereignty of the DPRK are now leading to a military offensive for aggression, going beyond the level of outrageous economic "sanctions."

In view of the prevailing situation, the Supreme Command of the KPA which is responsible for the national defence and security of the country and the destiny of the nation sent a meaningful warning message to the U.S. imperialist aggressor forces through the KPA Panmunjom mission on February 23. It warned them that if they ignite a war of aggression in the end, from that moment their fate will be hung by a thread with every hour.

But, the joint military exercises have persisted and the U.S. and the south Korean puppet forces have become all the more undisguised in their base moves to kick up their "sanctions."

Looking back on history, the Korean people have neither shot even a single arrow nor thrown a single stone at the land of the U.S.
The U.S. is, however, working with bloodshot eyes to swallow up the DPRK, not content with having incurred the pent-up grudge of the Korean people which can never be settled.

What matters is that the south Korean puppet forces steeped in worship and sycophancy toward the U.S. are dancing to its tune.
Of late Kim Kwan Jin, puppet minister of Defense, and Jong Sung Jo, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, inspected frontline army corps, fleet command and guided missile units where they blustered that a sort of military provocation is expected from the north and cried out for making "deadly strikes" and "preemptive strikes" at the "bases for provocations."

As far as these guys are concerned, they are a group of traitors who pushed the inter-Korean relations to a collapse together with traitor Lee Myung Bak who knows nothing about politics and military affairs. They are military gangsters who go reckless, unaware of what their master U.S. has in mind, what is the intention of the neighbouring countries and what all fellow countrymen and nation desire.
The puppet authorities, too, are crying out for the dismantlement of nukes and halt to provocation as dictated by their master, without knowing what is precious wealth for the nation. They move like a robot and repeat anything like a parrot.

The sovereignty and dignity of the nation are violated and the supreme interests of the country are seriously threatened by the U.S., the sworn enemy of the Korean people, and maniacs of confrontation with fellow countrymen grouping worst traitors. The army and people of the DPRK can never remain a passive onlooker to this fact.

The spokesman for the KPA Supreme Command is authorized to declare the following important measures:

First, it will take the second and third strong practical counteractions in succession to cope with the high-
handed war acts of the U.S. and all other hostile forces as it had already declared.

The army and people of the DPRK never make an empty talk.

It is the mettle of Songun Korea to do what it is determined to do.

It won victories in the two wars and has advanced along the road of victory despite manifold difficulties.

The army groups on the front, ground forces, the navy, air and anti-air units, strategic rocket units of the KPA, the Worker-Peasant Red Guards and the Young Red Guards have launched an all-out action according to the operational plan finally signed by the dear respected Supreme Commander Kim Jong Un.

Now that the U.S. imperialists seek to attack the DPRK even with nuclear weapons, it will counter them with diversified precision nuclear strike means of Korean style.

Those means are bound to be launched once their buttons are pressed, and the enemies' strongholds be turned into a sea in flames.
This land is neither the Balkans nor Iraq and Libya.

The army and people of the DPRK have everything including lighter and smaller nukes unlike what they had in the past.
Second, the KPA Supreme Command will make the Korean Armistice Agreement totally nullified.

The war maneuvers being staged by the U.S. imperialists and the south Korean puppet forces are a vivid expression of their systematic violation of the AA.

Accordingly, the Supreme Command of the KPA will completely declare invalid the AA, which has existed for form's sake from March 11, the day when the war maneuvers will enter into a full-dress stage.

The DPRK will make a strike of justice at any target anytime as it pleases without limit, not bound to the AA, and achieve the great cause of the country's reunification, the cherished desire of the nation.

Third, the KPA Supreme Command will totally stop the activities of the Panmunjom mission of the KPA which was tentatively established and operated by it as a negotiating body for establishing a peace-keeping mechanism on the Korean Peninsula.

In this regard it will simultaneously make a decision to cut off the Panmunjom DPRK-U.S. military telephone.

Our choice has become clear now that the moves of all hostile forces to encroach upon the sovereignty and dignity of the DPRK are reaching a dangerous phase.

It is the unshakable stand of the army and people of the DPRK and the mode of counteraction of Mt. Paektu style to counter enemies coming in attack with a dagger with a sword, a rifle with an artillery piece and nukes with precision nuclear strike means of Korean style more powerful than them.

The U.S. imperialists and their allies should not forget even a moment that they are standing at the crossroads of their life and death.

A final victory is in store for the army and people of the DPRK who are all out to protect its sovereignty.

The issuance of this statement has led to demands from U.S. (Link), South Korean (Link) and Japanese (Link - J) quarters for a more severe international response.

Question: is there anything so terribly striking, new or frightening about the March 5 statement and its follow up statements?

Here are some of the purportedly torrid lines from the statement and my take on them:

"First, it will take the second and third strong practical counteractions in succession to cope with the high-handed war acts of the U.S. and all other hostile forces as it had already declared."

This seems to be a declaration of at least two more tests will take place that the UN will not like, either of long-range rockets or nuclear devices, sometime in the current calendar year.

"The army and people of the DPRK never make an empty talk."

This is an admission that the Kim regime and KPA have a credibility problem. If they did not have a habit of indulging in empty talk, they would be so determined to explain the seriousness of their threats.

"Now that the U.S. imperialists seek to attack the DPRK even with nuclear weapons, it will counter them with diversified precision nuclear strike means of Korean style."

This seems to only reconfirming that the DPRK rocket and nuclear weapons development programs will not be abandoned or delayed, as "precision nuclear strike means of Korean style" seems to be DPRK-talk for a nuclear weapon-bearing intercontinental ballistic missile.

"This land is neither the Balkans nor Iraq and Libya."

The Kim Dynasty and the KPA have learned lessons from those conflicts and will use all means possible in an attempt to thwart regime change. Duh.

"The army and people of the DPRK have everything including lighter and smaller nukes unlike what they had in the past."

When the KPA is claiming to have these smaller nuclear warheads one should probably assume it in fact does not have them. It would, however, make sense to for the KPA to claim greater capabilities when it is trying to influence the contents of sanctions resolutions.

"Second, the KPA Supreme Command will make the Korean Armistice Agreement totally nullified.

The war maneuvers being staged by the U.S. imperialists and the south Korean puppet forces are a vivid expression of their systematic violation of the AA.

Accordingly, the Supreme Command of the KPA will completely declare invalid the AA, which has existed for form's sake from March 11, the day when the war maneuvers will enter into a full-dress stage.

The DPRK will make a strike of justice at any target anytime as it pleases without limit, not bound to the AA, and achieve the great cause of the country's reunification, the cherished desire of the nation."

This could be a threat warning of an imminent incident.

It might just as just likely be an admission that the leadership itself does not know when the next violation of the Armistice Agreement will take place. By announcing a violation in advance it can take credit for whatever unapproved incident that occurs (note to local commanders: you will not get the credit for your show of initiative).

"It is the unshakable stand of the army and people of the DPRK and the mode of counteraction of Mt. Paektu style to counter enemies coming in attack with a dagger with a sword, a rifle with an artillery piece and nukes with precision nuclear strike means of Korean style more powerful than them."

From the list of comparatives, one can assume that, as noted before, a "precision nuclear strike means of Korean style" is the current operating euphemism for a nuclear-tipped ICBM.

OK, so the Kim regime and the KPA are angry at the world for being angry at them for their pursuit of a credible nuclear threat that they can then wave at the United States.

Considering that the DPRK's guarantor of extended deterrence is China, can one blame the members of the DPRK ruling regime for pursuing an independent deterrent? Given the weakness of the Chinese nuclear response guarantee, is not the current pace of the DPRK's nuclear and rocketry development programs rather desultory?

(Poverty promotes lassitude, folks.)

As for the the DPRK, running as it is looking over its shoulder at the dust broom of history, let us be real: right now is a lousy time to be an anti-capitalist, anti-American dictator -- and an even worse time to be the anti-capitalist, anti-american dictator's default candy store.

El Commandante has just checked out. The Colonel met death in a culvert; the Al-Tikrit Gang have met the rope. Assad Family Syria (the only one of North Korea's customers to shell out for a nuclear reactor) is teetering on the brink. Myanmar seems to have lost the tyranny script entirely.

Authoritarianism and lawlessness both look like they are in for the long haul. Dictatorship...looks ever so 20th century.

With its twin to the south going from strength to strength and its best customers going belly up, can we just keep calm at DPRK Incorporated's desperate releases of implausible declarations that

a) things are going great, and

b) they are only getting better?

Of late, we have been hearing a lot from the Eastern Seaboard of the United States about Japan and China having a need to cool it over the Senkakus. (Link)

Sound advice.

Can those keeping a careful eye on the pathetic, dysfunctional irritant that is North Korea "cool it" too?