BRACE YOURSELVES; North Korea Preparing for Nuke Test

***Cross posted at News Real Blog***

Talk about North Korea being the most schizophrenic nation on earth.

First we had this:

HONG KONG, Dec. 14 (Yonhap) -- North Korea has agreed to China's proposal to hold emergency discussions among chief envoys to the six-party talks on Pyongyang's nuclear disarmament in a bid to defuse tensions on the Korean Peninsula, China's foreign ministry said Tuesday.

Beijing proposed on Nov. 28 that the lead negotiators from the two Koreas, the U.S., Japan, China and Russia meet at an early date to discuss ways of easing inter-Korean tension sparked by the North's shelling of a South Korean island.



"The agreement was reached when Chinese State Councilor Dai Bingguo met with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il in Pyongyang last week," Jiang Yu, spokesperson for China's foreign ministry, said in a regular press briefing…



And this:

Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) Foreign Minister Pak Ui Chun will visit Moscow on Dec. 12-15 for talks with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov, the Interfax news agency reported Friday.






Lavrov invited Pak to discuss a plan for inter-ministerial exchange for 2011-2012, as well as economic projects.

"We stand for further development of the traditional friendship and cooperation between the two countries, which meet the core interests of our people and facilitate peace and prosperity in the region," Pak was quoted by Interfax as saying.

He stressed that Pyongyang saw economic relations with Russia as a very important part of bilateral cooperation...

Sounds good, right?  I mean, except for the utter absence of any mention of the shelling of Yeonpyeong, which in itself is suspicious.  But what harm could come from NoKo “talking” to fellow Communists?

Think again:

The U.S. urgently sent its Special Representative for North Korea Policy Stephen Bosworth to Seoul after North Korea unveiled a huge facility for uranium enrichment. A senior South Korean government official said Monday the rapid response came because the facility "highly likely" indicates a nuclear connection between the North and Iran.

According to South Korean and U.S. intelligence agencies, the facility the North Koreans showed to nuclear expert Siegfried Hecker "appear similar in design to those used at Natanz, the Iranian nuclear fuel production site," the New York Times said Sunday…In March, Leonard Spector, the deputy director of the Monterey Institute of International Studies' James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, said in a column on the center's website North Korea delivered 45 tons of unenriched uranium concentrate known as "yellowcake" to Syria and subsequently moved the material to Iran via Turkey. A North Korea-Iran nuclear connection could gravely undermine international nonproliferation efforts, he added…

It gets worse:

North Korea has dug a new tunnel more than 500 m deep at a nuclear test site in Punggye-ri, North Hamgyong Province, intelligence sources said Tuesday. The North is also reportedly accelerating massive excavation work and construction of a new building at its main nuclear site in Yongbyon.



"North Korea seems to be busy digging even in winter when the ground is frozen" at Punggye-ri and Yongbyon, a South Korean intelligence officer said.

Based on an estimate of the amount of earth dug up, the intelligence officer speculated that the North has already dug a cave more than 500 m deep in Punggye-ri.

"If progress goes on at the current pace, the North will have dug a cave 1 km deep, the depth where it is possible to conduct a nuclear test, between March and May next year…"

And of course, we snapped into action:

The U.S. Air Force moved a WC-135 Constant Phoenix reconnaissance jet from the U.S. mainland to the Kadena Air Base in Okinawa, in September in preparation for another nuclear test by North Korea, the Sankei Shimbun reported Tuesday.




The WC-135, a modified aircraft, is able to detect nuclear explosions from the air by collecting samples from the atmosphere. It was stationed in Okinawa about a month before North Korea carried out its second nuclear test in May 2009. Apparently the U.S. believes that another nuclear test is imminent after unusual movements were detected at the North's test site…

You don’t have to be a freakin’ genius to know what this is adding up to.  Just don't  ask our leaders, who can’t tell a contrail from an enemy threat.

Brace yourselves, people; cloudy days ahead…



Keep the faith, bros, in all things courage, and no substitute for VICTORY.