Pentagon Plans for Attack on N Korea

We all know how the right-wing fear-o-sphere has a meltdown whenever a so-called librul newspaper like the New York Times reveals classified information. Let's see how they react to this little piece in Friday's Washington Times. (Don't hold your breath waiting for them to scream treason. The Times, after all, is one of their papers).

U.S. speeds attack plans for North Korea

The Pentagon has stepped up planning for attacks against North Korea's nuclear program and is bolstering nuclear forces in Asia, said defense officials familiar with the highly secret process.

The officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the accelerated military planning includes detailed programs for striking a North Korean plutonium-reprocessing facility at Yongbyon with special operations commando raids or strikes with Tomahawk cruise missiles or other precision-guided weapons.

The effort, which had been under way for several months, was given new impetus by Pyongyang's underground nuclear test Oct. 9 and growing opposition to the nuclear program of Kim Jong-il's communist regime, especially by China and South Korea.

A Pentagon official said the Department of Defense is considering "various military options" to remove the program.

"Other than nuclear strikes, which are considered excessive, there are several options now in place. Planning has been accelerated," the official said.

A second, senior defense official privy to the effort said the Bush administration recently affirmed its commitment to both South Korea and Japan that it would use U.S. nuclear weapons to deter North Korea, now considered an unofficial nuclear weapon state.

"We will resort to whatever force levels we need to have, to defend the Republic of Korea. That nuclear deterrence is in place," said the senior official, who declined to reveal what nuclear forces are deployed in Asia.

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This, of course, flies in the face of what Condi and Bush have been saying for months: that the US has no plans to attack N Korea (not that I ever believed that one), but the message coming clearly from Pyongpang has been a call for assurances that the US would not use military force against it. So, one has to wonder what the Washington Times thinks it can gain by publishing these 'highly secret' details at a time when N Korea has returned to the table for talks following the passage of UN Resolution 1718. Then again, the only way the Bush administration knows how to deal with conflict is to flex its military muscle because 'talking' is just so damn difficult. So, if this really is a Pentagon-sanctioned leak, it's meant to intimidate N Korea into compliance and that could be a very dangerous tactic indeed.