The US has stated that it won’t call for an emergency UN Security Council meeting over North Korean missile testing, as there is ‘no value’ to the meeting.
US ambassador Nikki Haley has stated that a meeting with the UN Security Council would only succeed in telling North Korea that the UN is reluctant to seriously challenge it.
Ambassador Haley said in a statement that there would be no point in a meeting as it would “produce nothing of consequence”. As well as this, she said that North Korea is subject to many UN resolutions already that they “violate with impunity”, and subjecting it to another resolution would be “worse than nothing”.
The ambassador closed the statement by saying “the time for talk is over”.
This comes amid North Korean ICBM/Intercontinental Ballistic Missile testing, and Pyongyang has claimed that the missiles are now within range of the US mainland.
So far, the US response to the tests has been shows of strength, by executing joint military tests and flying B-1B bombers over the Korean peninsula. These bombers were joined by Japanese F-2 fighter jets, along with South Korean fighters.
POTUS Donald Trump has slammed China for their lack of action towards North Korea, by tweeting: “I am very disappointed in China… they do NOTHING for us with North Korea… China could easily solve this problem!”
This prompted a Chinese response, and they held an Army Day parade just hours after Trump’s tweets, with Chinese state media portraying 12,000 soldiers, tanks, combat helicopters and nuclear weapons. China’s defence ministry however, stated “military parade planned, not related to surrounding situation”.
China’s President and Military Chief Xi Jinping, has been lauded, saying that China could “defeat all invading enemies”.
Xi Jinping continued, saying that “the world is not peaceful and peace needs to be safeguarded. Today, more than any time in history, we are closer to the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation, and need to build a strong army.”
I would have thought the only solution is a political one. Any action against NK could result in Seoul getting hammered by artillery – unless the US can take out the hundreds of these sites quickly then many thousands of South Korean’s may die.
I hope this announcement is a tactic to put pressure on China to do more.
There is no “solution”.
NK will never give up their nukes and ballistic missiles, why should they?
Having them means they win….. not having them means they don’t.
The “Seoul will be destroyed” meme is not credible anyway.
– The vast majority of NK’s artillery can’t reach Seoul (the most common piece they have resembles the old German Nerbelwerfer).
– Of the couple hundred pieces that can reach Seoul, they have to deploy so close to the border so as to be easily noticeable.
– Of the couple hundred pieces that can reach Seoul, they are almost all of a 1950s & 60s vintage. Who can say how many will actually be able to let off more than 5 rounds before they crack/explode?
– The South & US has numerous counter battery radars covering the border. If so much as a mortar crosses the border the counter batterys will have that location known and a destroyed by a hail of accurate modern artillery from the South.
– As above, the South Korea has around 6,000 artillery pieces of its own. Including nearly 2,000 M109 or K9s, far better than anything the North has.
The North Korean threat mostly resides from unguided rockets, but again, they will be countered.
I don’t get the prevailing “logic” out there that doing nothing while the North perfects their nuclear and ballistic missile programmes is preferable to a short and one-sided conventional war.
The doing nothing policy of the last 20 years has NK on the brink of joining the nuclear weapons club.
When that happens they will have their ace card and will pose a vastly more dangerous threat than they do currently.
Waiting ensures a more dangerous future.
A meeting at the UN is as much use as a meeting with your mates down at the ‘Duck and Pond’.
The problems are these…
1. China is competing with the world on trade and resources. Therefore China doesn’t like the US.
2. US forces are in S.Korea. If long term the N.Korean economy collapses and they reunite with the south then US forces will go north to the Chinese border. Therefore China will not allow N.Korea to collapse. They will only do enough to avoid too much anger from the rest of the world that might affect that world trade.
3. China is putting out trade deals all over the world to keep point 1 above (new silk rail road through Kazakhstan to Europe, new port facilities in Sri Lanka and Pakistan, mineral mines in Africa, Nicaragua canal to Venezuelan oil, etc) which buys support and eliminates global anger about doing nothing about N.Korea.
4. S.Korea does not want a war, especially with a country supported by China. Remember that only 65 years ago 4 million people died in the Korean war. Even a small number of shells and missiles going south before any northbound retaliation will be a price too high.
The solution for the west is to do what we should do with Russia and the middle east. Stop being dependant on oil and gas and use our own renewables so we can tell these countries to not invade Ukraine and so on instead of doing nothing. For China it is stop buying their stuff and make it ourselves like we used to, but that’s not going to happen so China will stay a powerfull competitor to the US and N.Korea will stay as the buffer between them.
And now that they have nukes they will stay as that buffer until China gets invited in to feed them. China actually wants a unified Korea but only if it is aligned with them and the US go home. Along with their claim on Taiwan it helps their claim on the S.China sea and thats another reason for the economic war with the US to break them and make them go home.
There is no easy solution to N Korea. Invading might make them use the nukes they already have, if not on the US then on S Korea and Japan. And that’s not even the biggest issue, the biggest issue is China supporting N Korea. If they did it would turn what would be a short one sided war in to the Korean war all over again and nobody wins.
There is no diplomatic solution either. The US, China, S Korea and N Korea have nothing to gain and everything to lose by accepting their respective rivals demand. The stalemate has continted for so long because it has genuinely been the best option. Now that N Korea is getting more and more violent in its rhetoric and coming closer and closer to the holy grail of a missile good enough to hit the US people realise that something needs to be done and are waking up to what few options we have.
In this particular article I find it much more interesting that the US has basically turned around and said;
‘You know what? You guys are useless, were not going to bother talking to you or asking for your permission’
Obviously this isn’t really new with the US, but it’s a public and direct denouncment of the uselessness of the UN. Maybe were looking at another leugue of nations?