U.S. to intercept N Korean missile if allies at risk

The senator and other lawmakers expressed frustration over China’s role, saying it needed to use its influence with North Korea to defuse the crisis.

That was totally doesnt made sense when the US is hostile at China as well! The PRC is NOT a US ally and she has NO obligation to bow from pressure!

It will NEVER happen.

The headline for this article is misleading. Admiral Locklear said he would recommend it, not that he would do it. (Presumably he does have authorization to do it but that's not what he said.)

Any medium range missile launched from the east coast of NK doesn't have a lot of real estate where it can avoid going over Japan. Since NK is threatening nuclear war it would seem that we're looking at a shoot-down. It's just not worth the risk.

Xeno, I guess we're going to find out.

Good. This, along with the recent cancellation of the Minuteman 3 ICBM test shows there are still some grown ups in the mix. If an NK test launch enters Japanese territory, I'm guessing the USA would defer to Japan to intercept, where feasible, but would provide plenty of intel and support.

I wonder though, if an NK test missile enters / crosses Japanese territory, and the trajectory indicates a splashdown in international waters safely distant from any land, would Japan still attempt to intercept? Given this, perhaps the USA would recommend not?

As they should, especially given that their bases would probably be amongst the primary targets.

What about a bully missile fly over Japan and landed somewhere between Japan and U.S? Are we letting the mafia flashing their weapons of continuing the vicious cycle of blackmailing without being checked? It seems let's play the game as usual.

Japan has already deployed PAC-3, praying for no friendly fire incident in the region.

Well that pretty much leaves North Korea the options of making sure the missiles land in their territorial waters or in international waters with little risk of hitting another country.