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The US and South Korea on Thursday warned North Korea not to proceed with a planned satellite launch, as Pyongyang threatened a “fiery bolt of retaliatory lightning” if Japan tried to shoot down the rocket.
North Korea says it will launch a satellite between April 4 and 8. The US, South Korea and Japan say the launch – even if the missile carries a satellite – would breach a United Nations resolution passed after North Korea tested a long-range Taepodong-2 without advance warning in 2006.
Barack Obama, US president, and Lee Myung-bak, South Korea’s president, agreed after their G20 meeting in London on the need for a “unified” international response if Pyongyang carried out the launch. South Korea said Mr Lee wanted a “stern response”.
While North Korea says the missile – which satellite imagery shows on the launch pad at Musudan-ri – will carry a communications satellite, the US and its Asian allies see the launch as a pretext to test the Taepodong-2. When North Korea first tested the intercontinental ballistic missile, which has the ability to reach the continental US, in 2006 it failed shortly after launch.
The US has sent navy ships to the region that could be used in any attempt to shoot down the missile. In an interview with the Financial Times, Robert Gates, US defence secretary, said he was “pretty confident that this is a space shot, a satellite shot” .
“If it is a space shot – and we will know that pretty early on after launch – then there would be no need [to shoot it down],” said Mr Gates. “Our concern is principally if it does go astray, or is some kind of a failure, that looks like it is potentially a danger to Japan or to Hawaii, that we would contemplate doing something.”
Tokyo has deployed anti-missile forces created after the 1998 Taepodong “shock” when Pyongyang fired an earlier version of its missile over Japan in what it claimed was an effort to put a satellite into orbit.
Officials say Japan can legally order its military to use its naval Standard Missile 3 or Patriot Pac-3s only in the highly unlikely event that the rocket, or parts of the it, clearly heads for Japanese territory.
Even in the latter case, attempting to destroy a missile fragment would be technically difficult and could even make it more dangerous by widening the area of possible damage – but having invested huge sums on US-led missile defence systems, it would be difficult for the government not to at least try to use it to counter a threat.
South Korea’s armed forces are permanently ready for an attack from the North and are also armed with Patriot missiles in case a ballistic weapon heads south.
However, the navy last week said US and Japanese warships would take primary responsibility for any ballistic threat to Japan.
James Shinn, a former senior Pentagon official for Asia who served as the top CIA intelligence officer for Asia when North Korea first tested the Taepodong-2, said North Korea was “trying to get attention”.
“With the financial crisis, and Iraq, Iran and Afghanistan, nobody has much time for Pyongyang or their antics,” said Mr Shinn. “They would like to get the new Obama team to focus on the six-party talks again. Now that [US nuclear envoy] Chris Hill is gone from that account, Pyongyang may be feeling unloved.”
Mr Shinn said North Korea was also calculating that the US tends to become “flexible” in any nuclear talks after Pyongyang has conducted a missile or nuclear test.
David Wright, co-director of the Global Security Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said US political leaders should be careful not to jump to conclusions if the launch is successful.
”A successful satellite launch would show that North Korea has increased its missile capabilities,” said Mr Wright. “ But it would not necessarily demonstrate that North Korea could launch a nuclear warhead to intercontinental range. North Korea may not yet have the technical ability to modify the launcher to give it long-range capability.”
Despite the relatively minor risk posed by the launch to individual Japanese, it has been given widespread coverage and local media have reported that some fisherman are too worried to put to sea.
Authorities in some prefectures have put emergency services on alert and plan to issue early warnings of any threat, with state broadcaster NHK saying on Thursday that northern Akita would deployed riot police to deal with any problems caused by falling debris.
Some residents have complained that such orders and warning alerts leave unclear what they might practically do to protect themselves if the launch creates real danger.
The Chinese foreign ministry on Thursday said ”We will call on all parties to stay calm...and contribute to peace and stability in the region.”
Additional reporting by Jamil Anderlini in Beijing
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