U.S. aircraft carrier to return after N Korea fires missile over Japan

No they didn't. That's part of the lies Little Bush and co told. They had even let in the weapons inspectors, with unfettered access, to search for them.

Iraq's use of mustard gas against the Iranian Army, against the Kurds and later against a Shiite uprising in the south is well documented. There is no question Iraq had these. They had active programs to develop VX and Sarin and used Sarin and mustard gas in their attack on the Shiite uprising in the south.

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

Regarding biological weapons, after the 1991 Gulf War UN inspectors identified weaponized strains of biological agents. The Iraqis were supposed to disarm but never cooperated fully with the UN and in 1998 the UN teams were expelled from Iraq. Therefore there was no way to know if Iraq fully disarmed. While the 2005 UN Iraq Survey Group concluded that the Iraq military abandoned their chemical weapons program circa 2006 their intelligence service had clandestine labs and continued to develop biological weapons.

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

The carrier's objective would be to help the NORKs decide not to do an SLBM launch or continue lobbing rockets into the sea where the carrier group might be. If a small cloud of fighters pops up every time the NORKs are about to do a nuclear test, that would be great.

@ Awa no Gaijin

I can probably name a couple countries and failed states that have almost no laws or working government…. Somalia, Yemen, DR Congo, South Sudan come to mind to name a few. Laws are only laws if they are enforced.

Keep lobbing those missiles, tiny Little Rocket Man. See how much patience the USS Ronald Reagan has if your barbaric acts persist.

The US has Japan's back. Period.

Gotta love all the pro-totalitarians on here. Constantly attacking The US, Japan and "The West" - yet choose to live under the US/Japan/West's protection. Gutless is a word that comes to mind.

I feel a bit nauseous when I witness people actually explaining why the US/West is better than China, Russia, Cuba, North Korea.... in 2022!

"counting the days to get my one-way ticket to Caracas/naturalize Russian!" - said no keyboard commie supporter ever

American freedom is just a dream

In comparison to what? The "perfect world or system" or in comparison to China or Russia or Iran or Saudi Arabia or Afghanistan?

I think my country is about as good as it gets (Australia), but if given a choice of the above I would pick America every single time, and it would not even be a hard choice or a close call.

Civilized nations have laws for the protection of citizens and while no nation is perfect, some are definitely more free for individuals than others. The only society that is completely free is those with no laws at all (total anarchy) and they are also the most dangerous to live in.

America is at present the best choice of world police. The US forces maintain freedom for democracies and peace against those who would force themselves on others through war. Not the perfect system but the best on offer. China, Russia or any other single nation thinking it deserves the power to rule the planet by virtue of having weapons of mass destruction would be a worse option. America has not tried to rule the world, just keep it peaceful and trading with each other for the right to prosper for all. Yes it has faults, yes it has a history less than stellar. For now, there is no better option on the horizon until a true world government capable of treating all people with identical equality and personal rights to life and liberty.

The US carrier group returning to the Korean peninsula is still trying to maintain peace through its powerful presence in the face of NK provocations. A criminal will not mug you with a police officer watching, you may get mugged when the police leaves. Same principal in play here.

But if I had to choose, I would live in the US any day over Russia or China.

let's all look at one simple fact - there arent lines of people queuing up to get into russia, china or any other tinpot regime. but the opposite is true, with people escaping to or wanting to live in europe, us and other western/freer countries, japan included.

America is the only deterrent to countries like China, Russia, N Korea, etc.

Not only America, but also NATO, 5 Eyes, etc, without white nations to put the house in order the whole world would instantly fall apart, just watch how great Afghanistan is doing since the "imperialists" pulled out, same for any African nation untouched by the evil colonizers

America is not perfect, But it the lesser of all the evils of authoritarian dictatorships by an enormous margin. People who have never lived or suffered under true repressive regimes are not qualified to bleeting about infringement of freedom and rights while living in any democratic nation.

Anerica's past mistakes or failures do not have anything to do with the threats posed today by North Korea, or China, or Russia.

Iraq had chemical and biological agents

No they didn't. That's part of the lies Little Bush and co told. They had even let in the weapons inspectors, with unfettered access, to search for them. But the far-right in America, as always, thought that their opinion was more important than reality, and started a war unilaterally based on said lies.

It's as big, if not bigger, a screwup than Vietnam was. And in the end it created so much hatred to America, as well as destabilizing the world order, that they terrorists actually won and America lost. Although Iraq lost much more. Much, much MUCH more.

Btw, even after reading Mr. Hamza's book I was still opposed to invading Iraq. I thought then and think now it was a huge strategic blunder, allowing old ethnic tensions to boil over into the wars we see today in Syria and Iraq and across the Muslim world as Shiites and Sunnis battle for supremacy. It also gave Iran much room to maneuver and gain advantages over their regional adversaries leading to even more instability and needless bloodshed.

Dictatorships are always an extremely brittle form of government. They look strong but do not last. Better to wait them out while showing the world the advantages of elected representative government and basic human rights. Those are more powerful than any army ever will be.

@gaijinland

well said - spot on.

just gotta ignore all the anti-west anti-US brigade here

Funny how the Iraqi non existent WMDs 

Iraq had chemical and biological agents and a known history of using them against the Iranians and later the Kurds. Iraq didn't as it turned out have nuclear weapons. So it depends on how you want to define weapons of mass destruction.

Btw, I invite you to read a book titled "Saddam's Bombmaker" by Khidhir Hamza and Jeff Stein. Mr. Hamza was the lead scientist on the Iraqi nuclear weapons program and was privy to their chemical and biological weapons programs. He was a US educated physicist (MIT) anticipating a life of teaching in the US when he was ordered back to Iraq, where he ended up leading their nuclear weapons program. As it turned out he was the only member of the Iraqi nuclear program to successfully defect to the west circa 1994. His book was published in 2000 and based on his telling as their program stood in 1994 when he left and Yugoslav nuclear physicists were coming aboard the program, it seemed entirely possible that Iraq had a crude but workable nuclear weapon. I read the book right after it was published at the end of the Clinton administration and it had me convinced of the possibility.

ail back to your country and stop wasting taxpayers' money playing the little international warfare..

The reason there was a Korean War was the US went back to their country. After WWII the US was tired of fighting. They wanted peace. They demobilized much of their army, mothballed hundreds upon hundreds of their combat ships and closed military airfields all across the US and other nations. The US had about 500 military instructors in ROK in 1950 training up the then tiny ROK military. They had no tanks or combat aircraft. Meanwhile the Soviets armed the DPRK to the teeth and apparently they were not tired of fighting after WWII. The US learned a very hard less from that experience and decided they needed to re-arm and instead of withdrawing back to the US so that emergencies required a mobilization and weeks to move forces to a theater, then fight their way back to recover lost ground the US decided it was wiser to keep their forces forward deployed on the borders with their potential enemies to deter future aggression. So far it has worked in Korea and in Europe. Deployments to ROK are not fun tours of duty. For the Army and Air Force it is something a member has to do to be promotable. It is not a desirable duty station. For most it is a one year unaccompanied hardship tour, like Okinawa is. It's not a three or four year tour where you bring the family and live in town like most postings in Germany and Italy are. But we do it because we know it is better to fight your enemies on their territory than fight them on yours.

That one boatload of men and machines is enough to wipe out lil Kim and Co, bring it on, the sooner the better.

It's not that simple. DPRK has a lot of artillery rockets and heavy guns just north of the DMZ and fully half the South Korean population is within range of that artillery. Thousands of guns and thousands more missile and rocket launchers. Plus nukes. Estimates of casualties on the first day of a resumption of the Korean War are on the order of 100,000 dead per hour. Per hour. A resumption of that war is going to result in literally millions dead. That is why nobody on the Allied side is anxious to start the war up. The whole reason for the military forces the US keeps in South Korea and in Japan is to prevent that sort of bloodshed. Yeah, maybe in the long run, assuming the PRC didn't enter the war again, a very big if, the Allies could defeat the DPRK but at what cost? Dictatorships are brittle by nature and hereditary dictatorships historically haven't survived past the third generation. Kim Jong Un is that third generation. The CCP isn't guaranteed to survive into the extended future either and the borders of Russia are probably going to look different in ten years as dormant independence movements in Chechnya and Dagestan show signs of reviving. Better to just be patient. Resuming a war to defeat what is doomed to failure anyway isn't worth getting millions killed. It just isn't. Patience is hard but that is what is required.

They need Kim otherwise how can they justify the trillions spent on arms manufacturing...

Funny how the Iraqi non existent WMDs caused a war but Kimmy 's actual progress to nukes didn't, maybe has something to do with oil as well....

To all the America bashers saying go back home, you people are either delusional, ignorant of geo-politics or both. Do you people really think the Americans want to be all over the world? All these countries are paying for the Americans to stay. They want them here. America is the only deterrent to countries like China, Russia, N Korea, etc. I’d rather live in a world order with the US on top any day. It is tax money well spent. Lesser of the evils people. The only abuse I’ve ever received from the US government has been at the DMV.

Sail back to your country and stop wasting taxpayers' money playing the little international warfare..

Speaking as an American tax payer, It’s money well spent!!!

We can sail where we want to in International waters..

That one boatload of men and machines is enough to wipe out lil Kim and Co, bring it on, the sooner the better.

Thanks to America, we must clean up the mess others won't dare do. Again...

Sail back to your country

I wish the US military could call all its troops home, but in a world where realpolitik prevails, it's either allow the Putin/Xi Jinping/Kim/Ayatollah plus who knows which other autocrat's axis to prevail, or try to limit the growth of that axis by showing you do not want them to prevail. I'll take showing them you do not want them to prevail, especially after looking at how many individuals living under the jackboots of the autocrats, an example of living under jackboots is having to apply for a passport to travel within their own country. Making many individuals want to leave their homelands and shift to a democratic nation, which would require them to get an international passport from their autocracy. But I am aware many people everywhere, even many living in democracies want big brother to make all decisions for them, they are afraid of freedom, sheeple wanting a shepherd in the form of autocrat to tell them where they can and cannot go.

Still I do not want a war, but if the autocrat's axis start one like Putin has in Ukraine, then I think there will be a war, and hope like in WW2 gain the fascistic autocrats lose. I have enjoyed traveling fairly freely these last few decades, and recall the days when the USSR made traveling, especially around Europe more of a hassle then it should have been. Recall the anti-west's idol li'l 'Lord' Putin was a Stasi/KGB goon working to maintain a wall dividing Germans, and those goons used machine guns to keep people apart. And yes, what-abouters, I am well aware of Vietnam, Iraq, etc. But I'm talking about today a time when Putin is trying to undo the losses of the USSR and has his own crews of goons out slaughtering, raping and robbing people living across the border.

I found the base on Google Maps and am surprised how small it was. I was expecting something more along the lines of Eglin AFB or Yuma Proving Grounds with a big firing range but this base in South Korea isn't much wider than the runway and ramp / hangar areas and endwise the base boundary ends close to the ends of the runway, which is the ocean to the east. They must have been shooting the missiles down the length of the runway and out into the ocean.

Sail back to your country and stop wasting taxpayers' money playing the little international warfare..

"Such a return by an aircraft carrier is very unusual" and underscores the South Korea-U.S. alliance's "strong willingness to take determined measures against any provocations from North Korea," the statement said.

Also, S. Koera's response didn't exactly go as planned.