JED BABBIN: RED LINE FOR KOREA
http://washingtonexaminer.com/jed-babbin-a-red-line-for-north-korea/article/2527109
President Obama should be applying to North Korea now what Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu taught the world about “red lines” and nuclear weapons last year.
After months of threatening South Korea, the United States and Japan — the last with nuclear holocaust — North Korea may launch ballistic missiles on Monday capable of reaching the two Asian allies and American bases in the region.
More importantly, a new intelligence report indicates that the North has been able to reduce the size of its nuclear weapons to a size that is deliverable by missile.
Kerry’s other statements — that we would re-engage in talks with North Korea, even on an unprecedented one-on-one basis, and possibly resume “humanitarian aid” — already give the North most of what it seeks to gain from its continued threats.
Kerry also sought to muddy the effect of the newly leaked Defense Intelligence Agency report that says North Korea has produced nuclear warheads small enough to be launched by missile.
(DIA also questioned the “reliability” of the warheads, which means that the North Koreans may have solved the size problem but not the other enormous challenges in designing a nuclear warhead that can survive launch and re-entry.)
In his answer to DIA, Kerry spewed a pile of weasel words. He said that it is “inaccurate to suggest” that the North Koreans have “fully tested, developed or demonstrated capabilities that are articulated in [the DIA] report.”
Not that they haven’t “tested, developed or demonstrated” the capability, only that they haven’t done so “fully” to Kerry’s satisfaction.
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