Tabnak - As tensions between the US and North Korea has been in the rise during the last weeks, North Korean leaders are trying to show strength by conducting a military parade, showcasing their long-range ballistic missiles. At the same time, they have warned the US that any act of aggression could lead to a harsh response.
International news outlets, including the Washington Post report that North Korea put on a huge military spectacle Saturday to celebrate its founder’s birthday, parading its series of new and technologically advanced missiles in front of Kim Jong Un, and in a defiant show of force in front of the world.
North Korea did not, however, carry out another nuclear test or ballistic missile launch, against widespread speculation that it would seek to celebrate Kim Il Sung’s 105th birthday with a bang.
North Korea presented two of its newest missiles at the parade in Kim Il Sung Square on Saturday, including the submarine-launched ballistic missile it successfully fired last year and the land-based version it launched last month.
At the same time North Korea has warned the United States to end its "military hysteria” or face retaliation as a US aircraft carrier group steamed towards the region and the reclusive state marked the "Day of the Sun”.
"All the brigandish provocative moves of the US in the political, economic and military fields pursuant to its hostile policy toward the DPRK will thoroughly be foiled through the toughest counteraction of the army and people of the DPRK,” the KCNA state news agency said, citing a spokesman for the General Staff of the Korean People’s Army.
This is while the US is prepared to launch a preemptive strike with conventional weapons against North Korea should officials become convinced that North Korea is about to follow through with a nuclear weapons test, multiple senior US intelligence officials told NBC News.
The intelligence officials told NBC News that the US has positioned two destroyers capable of shooting Tomahawk cruise missiles in the region, one just 300 miles from the North Korean nuclear test site.
American heavy bombers are also positioned in Guam to attack North Korea should it be necessary, and earlier this week, the Pentagon announced that the USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier strike group was being diverted to the area.
Meanwhile, South Korea's top diplomat said today that the US would consult with Seoul before taking any serious measures. "U.S. officials… repeatedly reaffirmed that (the US) will closely discuss with South Korea its North Korea-related measures," Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se told a special parliamentary meeting. "In fact, the U.S. is working to reassure us that it will not, just in case that we might hold such concerns."
However, all the developments indicate that the crisis over the Korean Peninsula is entering one of its most serious periods under the new US administration and such a fact, increases the chances of a real confrontation in the region, the results of which will be totally out of control of anyone involved.
