N Korean missile advances expose Japan in two-decade arms race

RE: “Their progress has been faster than anticipated,” a senior Japanese military commander said,:

Hmmm, time to get out that denial and rock this official was because NK did not at any time hide any such information that they were not going pursue or stop their programs and have kept going. Of course one has to thank the US CLINTON administration for giving them the technology and no how, then wrap that up with allowing that China was assured a vote in the UN, and this official is surprised? Please wake up or step out of the way and do Japan a favor "retire" let the younger leaders take the role and lead Japan into the future not backwards.

Wouldn't want to be in Tokyo - you people are toast if L'il Kim throws a tantrum. Move out to the country while you still can.

It gives cover for the j-hawks to re-militarize, something China should think about.

Wow. There is a lot of crappy news on JT today.

Offence is the best defence. Japan just needs to ensure that it has the capability to wipe Pyongyang off the face of the map. Then if the fat boy starts the party, Japan can end it. This means Japan becoming a nuclear state, but WTF, Israel are.

The only ones who win an "Arms Race" are the arms manufacturers.

There is no problem with NK that couldn't be handled with two way communication.

If the "democratic international society" would stop one way pressure on those countries and instead, at least, just left them alone, there would be no threat. You can not keep pushing the string and not expect that it will hit you back after it builds enough momentum, not unless you are civilized.

A pretty silly headline for this article. OF COURSE Japan is way behind North Korea. Japan can't have offensive weapons and they won't go nuclear, so they have their hands tied. The Japanese can rightfully be proud of their "peace constitution" except that it only works when the other players respect that and leave you alone. Either China can be turned around to shut North Korea down (which I seriously doubt) or Japan needs to wake the hell up. Japan probably has the technological and economic knowhow, as well as access to allied information and assistance to surpass North Korea in the blink of an eye. But their people and constitution won't allow it.

I am LMFAO if NK shoot off nukes they will have to get permission from China, and also they will also spray themselves and other neighboring countries the fall out would cover many areas, and if its a windy day it will blow right back into NK!!!

after trump wins than japan better quickly make friends with russia and china.... very quick...

This type of tension between countries are maintained by the major arm producing countries to keep their business running.

I strongly believe that Kim Jong-Un's nuclear programs have been secretly supported by Zhongnanhai, and the Chinese military strength have been an accumulation of stolen technics from Russia, the USA and European powers. Japan has the potentials to surpass both China and North Korea. The main point is whether or not the Japanese people will properly support the Abe government. The Democratic Alliance hasn't been as weakened as one may assume. The present situation in the Middle East is an unavoidable consequence of the 9/11 Infamy

ChinhDao: I strongly believe that Kim Jong-Un's nuclear programs have been secretly supported by Zhongnanhai

I think it's unlikely Beijing would give nuclear arms technology to a rogue nation that's 274 km / 170 mi from Dalian and 682 km / 481 miles from Beijing (as measured from Sinuiju, DPRK). China had/has no need for an adjoining nuclear buffer state it doesn't control. China could provide a nuclear umbrella for the DPRK without giving up any nuclear arms tech. It's not to say someone in the past didn't consider it, but how idiotic would they have to be to actually provide nukes to Kim Jong Un's ancestors?

People and goods are smuggled into China so easily, how could they exclude truck-borne nukes smuggled into major cities for a permanent hostage situation?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Korea_and_weapons_of_mass_destruction

Prime minister Benazir Bhutto of Pakistan allegedly, through Pakistan's former top scientist, Abdul Qadeer Khan, supplied key data, stored on CDs, on uranium enrichment and information to North Korea in exchange for missile technology around 1990–1996, according to U.S. intelligence officials. President Pervez Musharraf and Prime minister Shaukat Aziz acknowledged in 2005 that Khan had provided centrifuges and their designs to North Korea.

http://apjjf.org/-Lee-Jae-Bong/3053/article.html

... North Korea asked the Soviet Union in 1963 and China in 1964 for help in developing nuclear weapons of its own, but was rebuffed. ... Fourth, shortly after China detonated its first atomic blast in 1964, Kim Il-Sung headed a delegation to Beijing asking for assistance to develop nuclear weapons. In a letter to Mao Zedong, he declared that China and North Korea, as brother countries who shared fighting and dying on the battlefield, should share the atomic secret. But Mao turned down the North Korean request on the grounds that a small country like North Korea did not need nuclear weapons. ...

Keep going turbostat: In addition the Clinton administration, who in 1994 agreed to replace North Korea’s domestically built nuclear reactors with light water nuclear reactors. Clinton policy wonks claimed that light water reactors couldn’t be used to make bombs. Not so according to Henry Sokolski, head of the Non-proliferation Policy Education Center in Washington, who stated, “LWRs could be used to produce dozens of bombs’ worth of weapons-grade plutonium in both North Korea and Iran. Today it is Iran who helps NK. with scientific methodology.

All this talk about NK testing this and having that is just that... TALK. Everyone will just keep flapping their gums and one day NK will go too far. Unless these gum flappers are secretly, behind closed doors, having their meetings on what they are going to do and have been building up a missile defense net, the time has long past for preparation. This JT article is closer to reality if that is the case. A sad and sobering case of reality in this ever growing unstable world.

one day NK will go too far.

Fear mongering ala 'weapons of mass destruction' aside, this scenario is pretty much unlikely. There's simply too little to be gained. To pull it off they'd need overwhelming support from their one ally. However seeing as China is fixated on the economy, atleast in the short term, highly unlikely.

Fear mongering ala 'weapons of mass destruction' aside, this scenario is pretty much unlikely. There's simply too little to be gained. To pull it off they'd need overwhelming support from their one ally. However seeing as China is fixated on the economy, atleast in the short term, highly unlikely.

Exactly. NK is just sabre rattling. Only a fool would think that deserves invasion. Suck it up. They are sabre rattling because they aren't strong enough to do anything else that wouldn't destroy them. It makes them feel better about themselves. So let them do it, and don't rise/lower to NKs level of stupidity.

Well, NK's sabre rattling fulfils a function. It makes arms budgets much easier to push through. And if arms sales are up, the US economy escapes bankruptcy for another few months, those very, very few struggling to get by on a couple of million a month are laughing and everybody is happy.

Except the guys that're getting shot at, that is.

Re the 'unlikely scenario' of DPRK unleashing its nukes, it's headed by the mentally ill Kim Jong Un, who has at his disposal a fanatical military and populace. If they get the wrong idea about anything (cross-DMZ rhetoric a little too potent, KJU wakes up on the wrong side of the bed, little green aliens pop out of saucers at the cenotaph in Pyongyang, whatever), they could head for the tunnels and press the red button and tell themselves they'll come out when it's safe.

Japan's complacent attitude doesn't cut it anymore whether it's security, finance, education, you name it......

I am afraid that lil'Kim Jong Un will wake up one day and find out that Japan is also a covert nuclear state like Israel.

You never know North Korea might wake up one day and find America attempting to bomb it! (It happened before) Maybe North Korea needs nukes after all?