North Korean Missile Alerts Are Now the New Normal in Japan

First came the threat, then the warning shot. On Friday morning, people in Japan were yet again sent scurrying for cover after a second North Korean missile in just three weeks was fired over its northern island of Hokkaido, triggering a series of SMS alerts, television broadcasts and loudspeaker announcements advising of an possible attack. The launch is seen as direct retaliation for new U.N. sanctions spearheaded by Tokyo and Washington following Pyongyang’s sixth nuclear test on Sept. 3. Following the sanctions, Pyongyang said, “The four islands of the [Japanese] archipelago should be sunken into the sea by the nuclear bomb of Juche.” (Juche is the state’s ideology, a kind of socialist and ultra-nationalist self-reliance.) The statement, attributed by state media to its ironically named Korea Asia-Pacific peace committee, added that the U.S. should be “beaten to death like a rabid dog.” Such threats are becoming less idle by the day. Friday’s missile likely reached an altitude of about 480 mi. (770 km) and traveled some 2,300 mi. (3,700 km), according to South Korea’s military. The launch was considerably further than the Aug. 29 test and, notably, traveled far enough to reach the U.S. Pacific territory of Guam, which is 2,100 mi. (3,400 km) from Pyongyang. Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga called Friday’s test an “intolerable” act of provocation, though said that there was no evidence o...
Source: TIME.com: Top Science and Health Stories - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized Guam Hokkaido Japan Kim Jong Un missile North Korea Source Type: news