Brussels suicide bombers Khalid and Ibrahim El Bakraoui were planning attacks on Belgian nuclear power stations, Dernier Heure newspaper reported. The newspaper exclusively reported that the arrest of Paris attacker Salah Abdeslam accelerated the plans of the terrorists. The brothers planted a hidden camera in front of the home of the director of the Belgian nuclear research program, the paper said. Continue reading
No one has ever dumped radioactive water into the ocean after decontamination. The vaguely “decontaminated” water is planned to be released into the ocean beginning in September, 2015.
The green light was given by Fukushima fishing cooperative and overturns their original decision of “no.” Things are drastic. Scientists are frantically searching for a way to enter the reactor. Reactor 1 core has, most likely, completely melted within its containment vessel.
The leading US negotiator in nuclear diplomacy with Iran has asked US politicians to pause any new sanctions against Tehran. Meanwhile Iranian lawmakers seem adamant to protect the “inalienable right” for nuclear research during the next P5+1 talks.
RT
May 16, 2013
Update: Device is still lost, however more information has surfaced. We now know that it was lost along Interstate 81 between mile markers 17 and 24.
The truck was transporting the device for the Pennsylvania firm Valley Quarries Inc. – a company licensed to possess and use the gauge. The company had been using the instrument in West Virginia at the time it was lost, and is desperately seeking to find it
Department of Environmental Protection officials said Tuesday that after one of its employees was taking a reading with the job, he placed the gauge in his pickup truck to drive to another site.
“Once he arrived, the gauge user realized the truck’s rear gate had opened and the device was missing,” DEP spokeswoman Lisa Kasianowitz told The Times Online. “Further, the gauge was not in its shipping container. The gauge user and a coworker promptly drove back along the route just traveled but were unable to find the device.”
Officials are now warning people to be on the lookout for a device that could pose dangerous health and contamination risks to the public.
“It is critical for anyone who has information about the lost nuclear gauge to contact the Pennsylvania DEP, Nuclear Regulatory Commission or a local law enforcement agency immediately. As long as the device is not tampered with or damaged, it presents no hazard to public safety,” the DEP Bureau of Radiation Protect David Allard said in a press release.
The nuclear density gauge contains radioactive material, which directs particles and counts those that are reflected or passed through material to measure density. In the construction industry, these gauges are used to create suitable soil environments to build roads and structures.
When left intact, the gauges are safe to handle. But anyone who tampers with them risks serious radioactive contamination and exposure.
Police are urging anyone who finds the gauge – which is bright yellow and the size of a shoebox – to call 911 or contact the Pennsylvania DEP. The gauge is a Troxler Model 3430 with serial number 32506. It contains about 8 millicuries of cesium-137 and 40 millicuries of americium-241. Cesium-137 is the principle source of radiation in the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, which was designated for evacuation and placed under military control after the 1986 nuclear accident.
Valley Quarries is offering an unspecified reward for information leading to the return of their device. One of the company’s safety officer’s told the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that he saw someone stop along the road, pick up and drive off with a device that appeared to be a gauge.
Losing a nuclear gauge is no small matter, and generally triggers statewide police searches to find the missing device. In January 2010, Pennsylvania state police reported that a nuclear gauge disappeared from a facility in Coraopolis, and that tampering with it could release dangerous radioactive material. The company that owned the device offered a $1,000 reward to anyone providing information leading to its return. The gauge was recovered about a week later, after a road crew discovered the device on the side of a street.
In December 2010, a nuclear density gauge was stolen from a car in Bloomfield, Conn. The company that lost it offered a $500 reward for the return of the equipment. The device was eventually recovered, but police did not report how the company regained it.
Nuclear density gauges cost around $4,000 each and contain radioactive material that could pose risks to anyone that tampers with them.
Civilian Cancer Deaths Expected to Skyrocket Following Radiological Incidents
The White House has given final approval for dramatically raising permissible radioactive levels in drinking water and soil following “radiological incidents,” such as nuclear power-plant accidents and dirty bombs. The final version, slated for Federal Register publication as soon as today, is a win for the nuclear industry which seeks what its proponents call a “new normal” for radiation exposure among the U.S population, according Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).
Issued by the Environmental Protection Agency, the radiation guides (called Protective Action Guides or PAGs) allow cleanup many times more lax than anything EPA has ever before accepted. These guides govern evacuations, shelter-in-place orders, food restrictions and other actions following a wide range of “radiological emergencies.” The Obama administration blocked a version of these PAGs from going into effect during its first days in office. The version given approval late last Friday is substantially similar to those proposed under Bush but duck some of the most controversial aspects:
In soil, the PAGs allow long-term public exposure to radiation in amounts as high as 2,000 millirems. This would, in effect, increase a longstanding 1 in 10,000 person cancer rate to a rate of 1 in 23 persons exposed over a 30-year period;
“This is a public health policy only Dr. Strangelove could embrace. If this typifies the environmental leadership we can expect from Ms. McCarthy, then EPA is in for a long, dirty slog,” stated PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch, noting that the EPA package lacks a cogent rationale, is largely impenetrable and hinges on a series of euphemistic “weasel words.”
“No compelling justification is offered for increasing the cancer deaths of Americans innocently exposed to corporate miscalculations several hundred-fold.”
Reportedly, the PAGs had been approved last fall but their publication was held until after the presidential election. The rationale for timing their release right before McCarthy’s confirmation hearing is unclear.
Since the PAGs guide agency decision-making and do not formally set standards or repeal statutory requirements, such as the Safe Drinking Water Act and Superfund, they will go into full effect following a short public comment period. Nonetheless, the PAGs will likely determine what actions take place on the ground in the days, weeks, months and, in some cases, years following a radiological emergency.
Source: Global Research
“from that time” becomes “from this time on” and “from this moment“… little change, big difference
As much as our leaders would like them to have taken the bait, North Korea has not declared war on the South or the U.S. in response to our unprecedented provocations. So when all else fails, leave it to yellow journalism like this piece of work from the New York Times or this obviously Photoshopped image that came out this past week.
The much touted “state of war” declaration is not a declaration of war from Kim Jung Un but rather a statement of support for whatever decision he has too make from the “the government, political parties and organizations of the DPRK.” It claims only they will declare themselves in a state of war WHEN their leader makes that decisionshowing they are completely behind him. It is a statement of support from the people and perhaps a warning to the South that the North will not fold under their attack. But not a declaration of war from Kim Jung Un.
There is a campaign of propaganda underway this week in Korea and I will show you that this latest crisis is nothing more than a continuation of that warmongering effort.
It’s being reported across the globe that “North Korea” made these statements in a recent official release via state media Korean Central News Agency :
“From this time on, the North-South relations will be entering the state of war and all issues raised between the North and the South will be handled accordingly,” Ria Novoski
“Now that the revolutionary armed forces of the DPRK have entered into an actual military action, the inter-Korean relations have naturally entered the state of war,” Huffington Post
“From this time on, the North-South relations will be entering the state of war and all issues raised between the North and the South will be handled accordingly,” Reuters via Prison Planet
As you can see, this rhetoric spans quite a wide political divide from the fake alternative left to the equally fake alternative right and very thing in between. CNN, Fox,NBC News all of them are reporting this crucial development as fact.
Trouble is, it may be another lie. It’s hard to say because no one links to the actual original source of this statement. Also important to note, which is not being covered by most outlets, the statement is NOT from the usual official offices of the North Korean government but rather from “the government, political parties and organizations of the DPRK” and what that means is, it’s not so much a declaration of war as it is a statement to show the unified resolve of the North Korean people against the aggressive stance and provocations undertaken by the South Koreans and their masters, the United States.
But with that in mind, it may not even be an accurate translation of the statement.
Ria Novosti, to their credit, caught the “mistake” from the AFP and published a retraction calling it a “faulty translation”. A noncommittal way of saying a “lie” I suppose. “Faulty” is right.
Later on Saturday, however, Russian media reported that a faulty translation might have been to blame for this apparent uptick in bellicose rhetoric.
The North Korean original statement apparently stressed that the country would act “in accordance with wartime laws” if attacked, and that “from that time, North-South relations will enter a state of war.” Ria Novosti
What they are saying is if they are attacked they will be ready to enter “the state of war” with the South and their puppet masters the United States.
Seems quite rational when you consider the fact that the Unites States is running practice drills dropping dud tactical nukes on islands off the shores of North Korea. Were the North Koreans to have done that off our shores, Shock and Awe would have already begun. Hell, we claim the “right” to “pre-emptive warfare” on other countries and millions of people are dead and suffering as a result right now.
This interpretation of their quote also blends seamlessly into what appears to be the North Korean’s official position gleaned from several other quotes released on the official media site.
“He declared the revolutionary armed forces of the DPRK would react to the U.S. nuclear blackmail with a merciless nuclear attack, and war of aggression with an all-out war of justice.”
“The army and people of the DPRK are full of the spirit to defend the countryas was displayed in the 1950s.” KCNA
“The powerful countermeasures of the DPRK to defend the sovereignty are a manifestation of the firm will of its army and people to defend the countryand socialism at the cost of their lives from the hostile forces’ aggression moves.” KCNA
“If the enemies finally ignite a war of aggression, they will turn to ashes without having time to regret themselves over not paying due heed to the significant warning issued by the Supreme Command of KPA that they will have hardest time with their destiny at stake the moment they make a provocation.
The strong countermeasures taken by the DPRK are not to threaten others but to defend the dignity and the sovereignty of the country and the nation.
No one on earth can check the people turned out for just cause.” KCNA
In this article, the leadership of North Korea calls on progressives to stand against the U.S.’s globalist expansion of late and in this article the state run news agency points out the fact that the South Korean leadership is attacking their own progressives who are still trying to push the reunification agenda that came so close to succeeding not that long ago.
“A battle to be fought by the DPRK against the U.S. will become a war for national liberation to defend the sovereignty and dignity of the country and, at the same time, a revolutionary war to defend the human cause of independence and the justice of the international community.” KCNA
As to the mystery of the misquote: The AFP quote about the statements made by the North Korean leadership seem to come from a website called North Korean Leadership Watch. They cite the statement as being published by KCNA, but AGAIN, like all the others, NKLW doesn’t provide a link to that KCNA article.
However, they do make this statement:
“DPRK state media published a statement (tamhwa) on 30 March (Saturday) from “the government, political parties and organizations of the DPRK.” Unlike the recent volley of statements, or indeed most communications published and broadcasted in state media, the 30 March 2013 statement was not issued under the name of any specific organization (s). The statement is not cited as the work of the DPRK National Defense Commission, the KPA Supreme Command or Ministry of the People’s Armed Forces from the DPRK national security community…”NKLeadershipWatch
According to the origin of the quote, the statement isn’t directly from the government of North Korea and I am having a hell of a time finding the original source. You can find the statement here at Rodong and a few other sites as well.
Take a look at how it is written in the context of what is said:
… The government, political parties and organizations of the DPRK solemnly declare as follows reflecting the final decision made by Kim Jong Un at the operation meeting of the KPA Supreme Command and the unanimous will of all service personnel and people of the DPRK who are waiting for a final order from him.
1.From this moment, the north-south relations will be put at the state of war and all the issues arousing between the north and the south will be dealt with according to the wartime regulations.
The state of neither peace nor war has ended on the Korean Peninsula.
They are declaring they are at a state of war BEFORE given the order from Kim Jong Un?
Now substitute what Ria Novosti thinks is the actual translation:
… The government, political parties and organizations of the DPRK solemnly declare as follows reflecting the final decision made by Kim Jong Un at the operation meeting of the KPA Supreme Command and the unanimous will of all service personnel and people of the DPRK who are waiting for a final order from him.
1.from that time, North-South relations will enter a state of war and all the issues arousing between the north and the south will be dealt with according to the wartime regulations.
The state of neither peace nor war has ended on the Korean Peninsula.
If you look at the other statements issued by the official parties of NK you see a certain pattern. They have not declared war on the South though they fully expect the U.S. to instigate the conflict even more.
They also clearly identify their posture as being in “defense” of their nation and not the aggressor, which given the circumstances, is rational.
This statement which appears to say the North has declared war, is nothing of the sort, even if the Reuters translation is accurate. It is merely a statement of solidarity with their president at a difficult time.
But at worst, this deliberate mistranslation is someone’s opportunistic attempt to create a narrative and a history that mistakenly directs the blame for yet another war on the leadership of North Korea. It is in that sense, blackmail, just of the sort the North Koreans have been complaining about.
And given the fact that the leadership of the organizations signed onto the statement would NEVER openly declare war BEFORE given that order by their president, more than likely the Ria Novosti translation make much more sense.
Therefore, given all of this, I conclude (until such time as I can read the KCNA article myself) that the much touted “state of war” declaration being presented to the American people is in fact a “faulty translation”
The probably mistranslated statement reprinted below.
DPRK state media published a statement (tamhwa) on 30 March (Saturday) from “the government, political parties and organizations of the DPRK.”
The moves of the U.S. imperialists to violate the sovereignty of the DPRK and encroach upon its supreme interests have entered an extremely grave phase. Under this situation, the dear respected Marshal Kim Jong Un, brilliant commander of Mt. Paektu, convened an urgent operation meeting on the performance of duty of the Strategic Rocket Force of the Korean People’s Army for firepower strike and finally examined and ratified a plan for firepower strike.
The important decision made by him is the declaration of a do-or-die battle to provide an epochal occasion for putting an end to the history of the long-standing showdown with the U.S. and opening a new era. It is also a last warning of justice served to the U.S., south Korean group and other anti-reunification hostile forces. The decision reflects the strong will of the army and people of the DPRK to annihilate the enemies.
Now the heroic service personnel and all other people of the DPRK are full of surging anger at the U.S. imperialists’ reckless war provocation moves, and the strong will to turn out as one in the death-defying battle with the enemies and achieve a final victory of the great war for national reunification true to the important decision made by Kim Jong Un.
The Supreme Command of the KPA in its previous statement solemnly declared at home and abroad the will of the army and people of the DPRK to take decisive military counteraction to defend the sovereignty of the country and the dignity of its supreme leadership as regards the war moves of the U.S. and south Korean puppets that have reached the most extreme phase.
Not content with letting B-52 make sorties into the sky over south Korea in succession despite the repeated warnings of the DPRK, the U.S. made B-2A stealth strategic bomber and other ultra-modern strategic strike means fly from the U.S. mainland to south Korea to stage a bombing drill targeting the DPRK. This is an unpardonable and heinous provocation and an open challenge.
By taking advantage of the U.S. reckless campaign for a nuclear war against the DPRK, the south Korean puppets vociferated about “preemptive attack” and “strong counteraction” and even “strike at the commanding forces”, openly revealing the attempt to destroy monuments symbolic of the dignity of the DPRK’s supreme leadership.
This clearly shows that the U.S. brigandish ambition for aggression and the puppets’ attempt to invade the DPRK have gone beyond the limit and their threats have entered the reckless phase of an actual war from the phase of threat and blackmail.
The prevailing grim situation more clearly proves that the Supreme Command of the KPA was just when it made the judgment and decision to decisively settle accounts with the U.S. imperialists and south Korean puppets by dint of the arms of Military-First politics (So’ngun), because time when words could work has passed.
Now they are openly claiming that the B-2A stealth strategic bombers’ drill of dropping nuclear bombs was “not to irritate the north” but “the defensive one”. The U.S. also says the drill is “to defend the interests of its ally”. However, it is nothing but a lame pretext to cover up its aggressive nature, evade the denunciation at home and abroad and escape from the DPRK’s retaliatory blows.
The era when the U.S. resorted to the policy of strength by brandishing nuclear weapons has gone.
It is the resolute answer of the DPRK and its steadfast stand to counter the nuclear blackmail of the U.S. imperialists with merciless nuclear attack and their war of aggression with just all-out war.
They should clearly know that in the era of Marshal Kim Jong Un, the greatest-ever commander, all things are different from what they used to be in the past.
The hostile forces will clearly realize the iron will, matchless grit and extraordinary mettle of the brilliant commander of Mt. Paektu that the earth cannot exist without Military-First (So’ngun) Korea.
Time has come to stage a do-or-die final battle.
The government, political parties and organizations of the DPRK solemnly declare as follows reflecting the final decision made by Kim Jong Un at the operation meeting of the KPA Supreme Command and the unanimous will of all service personnel and people of the DPRK who are waiting for a final order from him.
1.From this moment, the north-south relations will be put at the state of war and all the issues arousing between the north and the south will be dealt with according to the wartime regulations.
The state of neither peace nor war has ended on the Korean Peninsula.
Now that the revolutionary armed forces of the DPRK have entered into an actual military action, the inter-Korean relations have naturally entered the state of war. Accordingly, the DPRK will immediately punish any slightest provocation hurting its dignity and sovereignty with resolute and merciless physical actions without any prior notice.
2. If the U.S. and the south Korean puppet group perpetrate a military provocation for igniting a war against the DPRK in any area including the five islands in the West Sea of Korea or in the area along the Military Demarcation Line, it will not be limited to a local war, but develop into an all-out war, a nuclear war.
It is self-evident that any military conflict on the Korean Peninsula is bound to lead to an all-out war, a nuclear war now that even U.S. nuclear strategic bombers in its military bases in the Pacific including Hawaii and Guam and in its mainland are flying into the sky above south Korea to participate in the madcap DPRK-targeted nuclear war moves.
The first strike of the revolutionary armed forces of the DPRK will blow up the U.S. bases for aggression in its mainland and in the Pacific operational theatres including Hawaii and Guam and reduce not only its military bases in south Korea but the puppets’ ruling institutions including Chongwadae and puppet army’s bases to ashes at once, to say nothing of the aggressors and the provokers.
3. The DPRK will never miss the golden chance to win a final victory in a great war for national reunification.
This war will not be a three day-war but it will be a blitz war through which the KPA will occupy all areas of south Korea including Jeju Island at one strike, not giving the U.S. and the puppet warmongers time to come to their senses, and a three-dimensional war to be fought in the air, land and seas and on the front line and in the rear.
This sacred war of justice will be a nation-wide, all-people resistance involving all Koreans in the north and the south and overseas in which the traitors to the nation including heinous confrontation maniacs, warmongers and human scum will be mercilessly swept away.
No force on earth can break the will of the service personnel and people of the DPRK all out in the just great war for national reunification and of all other Koreans and overpower their might.
Holding in high esteem the peerlessly great men of Mt. Paektu, the Korean people will give vent to the pent-up grudge and realize their cherished desire and thus bring a bright day of national reunification and build the best power on this land without fail.
National Paranoia is the Irrational Fear that You’re Being Threatened Which is the more paranoid statement?1. AMERICAN MEDIA: “North Korea is threatening to attack us with nuclear weapons,”or:
2. NORTH KOREAN MEDIA: “The United States is threatening to attack us with nuclear weapons.”
Taking recent events in the U.S. and the Korean peninsula as evidence, while mostly ignoring historical context, the drift toward another American war in Asia can be seen as clearly as the ambiguous moves and countermoves of countries with no obvious motive for war might allow, producing headlines like [1]this[1] in the New York Times of April 4:
“North Korea Moves Missile to Coast, but Little Threat is Seen”
According to the Times, “North Korea has been issuing a blistering series of similar threats in recent weeks, citing as targets the American military installations in the Pacific islands of Hawaii and Guam, as well as the United States mainland.”
One reason such threats are not always seen as threatening is that North Korea has no missile that can reach the U.S. mainland, [2]and[2] quite likely not even Alaska, Hawaii, or Guam, never mind whether they have any long range missile that can hit anything with any accuracy.
North Koreans Move Missile Closer to U.S.!
The South Korean defense chief reported April 4 that the North Koreans had moved one longish-range missile to its east coast, maybe 200 miles closer to the U.S., but that missile was still not close enough to come close to the U.S. west coast. Nevertheless, American bases in South Korea and Japan are still presumably reachable targets, as are Korean and Japanese civilians. Most of China and eastern Russia are also within range. [Later reports said the North Koreans had movedtwo mobile missiles to the coast.]
The U.S. recently deployed a land-based anti-missile missile system to Guam, which is beyond the range of North Korea’s operational missiles. The U.S. has also moved at least two Aegis-class missile-cruisers to patrol waters close to North Korea. While the Aegis system [3]has[3] the capability of attacking targets on land, in the air, and under water, its most notable exploit to date was the 1988 downing of an Iranian passenger plane, killing 290 civilians.
On March 29, CNN reported somewhat breathlessly that “North Korea has entered a ‘state of war’ with neighboring South Korea,” which ignores the reality that the state of war between the two countries has existed since 1950, although an armistice [4]was[4] agreed to in 1953. Fitful efforts to negotiate a formal peace treaty have continued for 60 years, leaving the United Nations Command in place to the present. North Korea has previously rejected the armistice at least five other times, in 1994, 1996, 2003, 2006, and 2009.
Exaggerating the CNN story, the Newsweek/Daily Beast editors gave [5]it[5] this scary headline —“North Korea Prepares Strike on U.S.’ – that had no meaningful basis in reality. Amplifying the fear the next day, NBC News [6]ran[6] a disappointingly low-key story under the ramped-up headline:
North Korea puts rockets on standby asUS official warns regime is no ‘paper tiger’
Peter Hart of FAIR [7]has[7] explored the one-sidedness of American media coverage and its reality-distorting effect in detail.
One reason the North Koreans moved their missile was in response to the March 28 U.S. fly-bys along the South Korean border with B-2 bombers quite capable of carrying enough nuclear weapons to obliterate North Korea and set off nuclear winter around the world. Just because these fly-bys with B-2s, B-52s and other potentially nuclear-armed aircraft were part of military exercises the U.S. and South Koreans put on every year (sometimes using a pretend scenario of invading the North), the U.S. maintains the North shouldn’t think of them as in the least provocative. The B-2s flew from a base in Missouri.
Another North Korean reason for moving their missile might have been the American plans to conduct missile defense drills with Japan and South Korea on an on-going basis. This plan follows the “signal” sent earlier in the winter when the U.S. announced plans to increase its anti-missile missile deployment in Alaska and along the Pacific west coast.
China Votes for Sanctions, but Remains Wild Card
On March 7, the United Nations Security Council unanimously (15-0) approved a resolution brokered by the U.S. and Chine, imposing new economic sanctions on North Korea as punishment for its announcement on February 12, confirming [8]its[8] third nuclear weapons test. While many nations detected seismic activity that they interpreted to be an underground nuclear explosion, and while the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty monitors said the tremor had “clear explosionlike characteristics,” there was no detection of radiation sufficient to confirm that the explosion was nuclear.
North Korea’s admission that it had used a “miniaturized nuclear device with greater explosive force than previously” was seen by some as defiance of Chinese advice against such a test. The Chinese had promised that North Korea would “pay a heavy price” if it went ahead with the test. That price apparently includes China’s cooperation with the U.S. on setting sanctions.
Complicating the response to the test announcement, there are few sanctions left to apply to North Korea, perhaps the world’s second most-sanctioned country after Israel [the U.N. has voted 66 sanctions against Israel, all or most of which Israel ignores with little consequence]. The new North Korea sanctions [9]bar[9] all nations from selling the North expensive jewelry, yachts, luxury automobiles, and racing cars.
U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice said that, “taken together, these sanctions will bite, and bite hard.”
That will depend on China, which has previously helped North Korea get around sanctions, seeming to have less concern for the country across the border having nuclear weapons than having it devolve into instability and chaos. So the current round of sanctions, like earlier ones, will have limited impact unless China should decide to limit its oil shipments, banking services, and other ongoing aid to North Korea.
Anyone Ready for an Act of War, like a Naval Blockade?
Another factor limiting the effectiveness of sanctions has been the unwillingness of the U.S. and other nations to enforce sanctions with a naval blockade, which would be an act of war. And it would be an act of war against a Chinese ally, enforced in the waters off the Chinese mainland.
The announced nuclear test in February came a few weeks after the Security Council had voted unanimously for a resolution in favor of tightening sanctions on North Korea for launching a three-stage rocket in December.
At this point, no one is claiming that North Korea actually has any nuclear warheads, or any actual capacity to deliver one anywhere.
But North Korean [DPRK] bristling continued on April 4, as an unnamed army official suggested [10]that[10]:
“…the moment of explosion is approaching fast. No one can say a war will break out in Korea or not and whether it will break out today or tomorrow…. The responsibility for this grave situation entirely rests with the U.S. administration and military warmongers keen to encroach upon the DPRK’s sovereignty and bring down its dignified social system with brigandish logic.”
Anonymous U.S. Official Wonders About U.S. Over-reacting
The same day, at the Pentagon, an unnamed Defense Department official, took a look in the mirror and referred to U.S. bellicosity about its own military actions, saying:
“We accused the North Koreans of amping things up, now we are worried we did the same thing…. We are trying to turn the volume down. We are absolutely trying to ratchet back the rhetoric. We become part of the cycle. We allowed that to happen.”
In South Korea, which would likely suffer most from an outbreak of hostilities, one observer there considered the North Korea news reporting “all hype.” Adam Hogue graduated from Keene State College in New Hampshire in 2011 and has been living and working in South Korea ever since. On April 2, [11]he[11] wrote:
“There is a need to create a culture of panic in the United States and, arguably, everywhere else where the major media conglomerates have established news outlets….
“As I have heard from my mother, father, sister, friends, the New York Times, CNN and NPR, North Korea is suddenly big news. They are now something to fear. They are something threatening, mysterious and suddenly worthy of all the news headlines in the western-world. There is an urgent message being told that now is a time to panic and react….
“But, that message is not coming from my co-workers at school or from the Korean news or from my neighbors; it is a message from the media.”
American Paranoid Policy Heightened since 9-11
So it seems, in answer to the paranoia question at the beginning of this piece: the U.S. appears to have a comfortable lead in maintaining delusions of being threatened.
While the threats to North Korea are real and existential, that doesn’t preclude some paranoia at the same time: consider the suggestion [13]that[13] the 2010 torpedo-sinking of a South Korean ship – blamed on North Korea and raising war fears – was actually a false flag operation by the Israeli navy using a state-of-the-art German submarine [Israel [12]has[12] a small fleet, armed with nuclear-warhead missiles].
On January 29, 2002, in his first State of the Union address, President George Bush declared that North Korea was part of “an axis of evil” along with Iraq and Iran – nations that, while not an axis in the usual sense, got grouped by President Bush’s belief that they were all developing weapons of mass destruction with which “to threaten the peace of the world.”
Still searching for those weapons of mass destruction, the U.S. has [14]now[14] offered to sell South Korea 60 F-35 Joint Strike Fighter stealth bombers at a discount price of $180 million per plane. If the North Koreans are paying attention, they will not feel immediately threatened by this possible sale of a plane that is at least five years from being operational and still struggling in its test phase.
The F-35 may be more of an economic threat to South Korea.
Notes
[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/05/world/asia/north-korean-missile-moved-to-coast.html?hp&_r=1&
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aegis_Combat_System
[4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_Armistice_Agreement
[10] http://www.cnn.com/2013/04/04/politics/koreas-u-s-/index.html
[11] http://www.policymic.com/articles/32263/north-korea-news-is-all-hype
[13] http://abundanthope.net/pages/Political_Information_43/ISRAEL-S-SECRET-WAR-AGAINST-NORTH-KOREA.shtml
http://www.globalresearch.ca/u-s-to-america-be-afraid-the-north-koreans-are-coming/5330817
NATO head Anders Fogh Rasmussen has been dispatched to Seoul for high level consultations.
The official disclaimer is that this has nothing to do with the ongoing US-DPRK confrontation. “The trip was long-planned and not connected with North Korean threats of nuclear war”.
Rasmussen is slated to meet the newly-elected President Park Geun-hye, Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se and Defence Minister Kim Kwan Jin.
Although unconfirmed, Rasmussen will likely also meet up with military brass of the South Korea-US Combined Forces Command.
When asked if the trip was in any way linked with rising tensions on the Korean peninsula, a NATO official candidly responded that
“Rather than the current crisis, it would instead cover Afghanistan where non-member South Korea has contributed some 350 troops to NATO-led forces fighting the Taliban” (NATO official statement quoted by AFP, April 9, 2013)
It is worth noting that Rasmussen’s presence in Seoul coincides with the visit by US Secretary of State John Kerry.
What is at stake are high level discussions.
The presence of Rasmussen also confirms that NATO has taken on a global military mandate well beyond the confines of the so-called “Atlantic region”.
It also points to the possible military involvement at some future date of NATO member states in the Korean Peninsula.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/head-of-nato-dispatched-to-south-korea/5330767
With tensions on the Korean peninsula soaring to include threats of nuclear war, frustration is mounting at what US policy experts see as the failure of all efforts to rein in North Korea.
Decades of threats have waxed and waned despite myriad attempts to reach out for talks or punish the regime, as seen recently in the tightening of UN sanctions.
North Korea watchers see a familiar pattern in which the communist state ramps up threats or takes actions such as missile launches or nuclear tests in a bid to show anger and force concessions from the United States.
Observers saw parallels between the latest crisis and 1994 when Pyongyang took on a bellicose tone as it faced pressure over its nuclear program at a time of political transitions in both North and South Korea.
The 1994 crisis ended when former US president Jimmy Carter flew to Pyongyang, setting the stage for a joint energy project that has been the inspiration for several initiatives since.
“I still don’t find any of the latest North Korean rhetoric that shocking. It’s perfectly predictable,” said Joel Wit, a former State Department official who was in charge of implementing the 1994 energy agreement.
“The difference this time is that they have nuclear weapons,” said Wit, now a scholar at Columbia University.
North Korea has threatened to attack the United States with nuclear weapons, although experts doubt it is able to. The United States, in turn, carried out runs by its nuclear-capable B-2 bomber as part of exercises with South Korea.
Other new factors in the latest crisis include question marks over North Korea’s young leader Kim Jong-Un and growing unhappiness from China over its smaller ally’s insolence.
Bruce Cumings, chairman of the history department at the University of Chicago and the author of several books on North Korea, said the 24-hour news environment had also changed the dynamics behind Pyongyang’s threats.
“You get instant attention on the World Wide Web which is so different than when I used to read their Central News Agency reports in the early ‘90s that would come a week late through Tokyo and you never knew if anyone would pay attention,” he said.
But Cumings said that North Korea’s tactics followed a pattern dating to even before the 1950-53 Korean War, when the communist leadership would threaten to destroy the South’s army.
“It is always the case with North Korea that when its back is put to the wall, it lashes out and it creates problems. It says: ‘If you want to sanction us, this is what you’re going to get’,” he said.
Cumings warned that tensions “are inevitable as long as the United States and South Korea are not willing to engage with North Korea.” “The North Koreans go about things in the worst way — they are their own worst enemy — but they keep saying that they want to talk to the United States in particular,” he said. But President Barack Obama’s administration has ruled out what is widely considered North Korea’s main aim — its symbolic recognition as a nuclear weapons state, seen by the regime as critical to ensure its survival.
The Obama administration, after long hesitation, last year sealed an aid-for-disarmament agreement with North Korea that fell apart in a matter of weeks after Pyongyang attempted to test a rocket.
The previous administration of George W. Bush similarly swung widely in its approach to North Korea. Bush famously grouped North Korea as part of an “axis of evil” and under his watch Pyongyang tested its first nuclear device.
But Bush, like Bill Clinton before him, tried late in his term to seal a historic far-reaching agreement with North Korea.
Some US conservatives criticized the Bush outreach and have called for an entirely new approach. Representative Ed Royce, the Republican chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, has called on the United States to avoid any future deals with North Korea and instead aim at toppling the regime.
An analyst says China recognizes that the US is using North Korea’s belligerence to build up its military presence as a direct nuclear threat against China.
In the background of this there has been frightening escalation of rhetoric and threats from both North Korea and the US in the Korean peninsula. The US military build up in the area includes a chemical weapons battalion sent to South Korea and B-2 nuclear capable bombers as well as F-22 stealth fighter jets that have participated in drills in the area. North Korea has reacted to this provocation saying a nuclear war with the United States could start at any time. The US is also undertaking military drills with the Philippines and Japan has openly condemned North Korea’s threats without saying anything about the provocative escalation of US actions.
Press TV has interviewed Mike Billington, Executive Intelligence review, Leesburg about this issue.
(Times of Israel) Israel’s leaders, in private exchanges with senior US officials in 1975, flatly denied that Israel possessed nuclear weapons, and foreign minister Yigal Allon also claimed Israel had no intention to build such weapons, according to diplomatic cables published this week by whistle-blower website WikiLeaks.
This despite the fact that, according to foreign reports, Israel is now believed to have begun full-scale production of nuclear weapons soon after the 1967 war, and to have stockpiled a number of nuclear weapons by the early 1970s.
The cables are part of a trove of more than 1.7 million US diplomatic cables sent between 1973 and 1976. Among the 5,000-plus documents that deal with Israel are messages that shine light on the development of Israel’s nuclear program, as well as on Israel’s relationship with pre-revolutionary Iran and a 1973 plan by then-defense minister Moshe Dayan to extend Israeli citizenship to Palestinian residents of Ramallah and Bethlehem.
In May 1975, senator Howard Baker asked prime minister Yitzhak Rabin and defense minister (today President) Shimon Peres about speculation that Israel had acquired nuclear weapons.
“Rabin told senator Baker that GOI [the government of Israel] had made a commitment not to be the first state to introduce nuclear weapons into the area. Israel had kept its word,” states the document, which was quietly declassified in 2006 but only published now by WikiLeaks.
In the document, which the US Embassy in Tel Aviv sent to the embassy in Turkey, Peres is quoted as saying that Israel’s introduction of nuclear weapons into the Middle East would lead to a conflict with Washington and would encourage the Soviet Union to give similar devices to the Arab nations in the region, which “would bring [the] Middle East to [the] point of no return.
“Peres, in reply to [a] direct question, states that Israel has not constructed a military nuclear device,” the document continued. Baker asked whether that meant Jerusalem had not constructed an explosive device, and Peres answered affirmatively.
Israel has always pursued a policy of nuclear ambiguity, neither denying nor confirming the possession of atomic weapons. Yet the existence of an Israeli nuclear-weapons program has been widely reported in the foreign media, and it is widely believed that Jerusalem has had such devices since at least 1973.
In one of the cables from the summer of 1975, Rabin said that Israel has not signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty “because it regarded this as part of [an] arms race issue in [the] area and of an eventual overall political settlement” of the Middle East conflict.
The Israeli prime minister also commented on repeated American requests to inspect the nuclear facilities in Dimona, telling Baker that Jerusalem and Washington had in 1969 — “and rightly so” — agreed that such visits had been “terminated.”
“The Dimona facility was not open for inspection,” the document states.
A few months earlier, in January 1975, a cable that the US Embassy in Tel Aviv sent to Washington quotes US senator Charles Mathias asking foreign minister Yigal Allon about Israel’s nuclear capabilities.
“Allon replied that Israel had the capability to manufacture nuclear weapons. However, he said that [the government of Israel] did not currently possess nuclear weapons, nor did it intend to manufacture them.”
The senator then remarked that the secrecy surrounding the Dimona reactor and Jerusalem’s refusal to allow inspection “were a public relations problem for Israel in the US.” Allon agreed in principle, but offered no immediate remedies.
In November 1976, a dozen American senators visited Israel, with “one of their principal interests” being an inspection of the Dimona nuclear reactor, according to another US Embassy cable. Jerusalem denied the senators’ requests. “When asked regarding the reason for this decision,” the document states, “we were simply told that adequate attention would be given to Israel’s energy situation in briefings and a visit to Dimona would not be considered useful.”
The US Government suspected Israel of having nuclear weapons since 1970 and, according to foreign media reports, Israel assembled more than a dozen nuclear warheads during the 1973 Yom Kippur War. In 1986, former Dimona nuclear technician Mordechai Vanunu gave detailed information about the country’s “secret nuclear arsenal” to the London Sunday Times. In 2008, former US president Jimmy Carter saidthat Israel had at least 150 nuclear weapons.
The diplomatic documents, which WikiLeaks dubbed the “Kissinger Cables,” also reveal that, in the 1970s, military legend Dayan — serving as defense minister — planned to grant Israeli citizenship to Palestinian residents of Bethlehem and Ramallah, while retaining full control over the West Bank.
A cable from May 1973 quotes former minister Gad Yaacobi, who was a close ally of Dayan, saying that Dayan was preparing to expand the degree of autonomy for Arab municipalities in the West Bank, which Israel had captured in the Six-Day War.
Yaacobi said Dayan encouraged Israeli settlements everywhere in the West Bank except in “Arab metropolitan areas.” The two exceptions to that rule were Ramallah and Bethlehem, which Dayan considered parts of the “greater Jerusalem area.”
“As for Dayan’s thinking on [an] ultimate peace settlement with Jordan, Yaacobi said Dayan would only return one or two small enclaves of the West Bank,” the cable states. “But Dayan, according to Yaacobi, envisages [the] rest of [the] West Bank population though living under Israeli sovereignty as being full-fledged Jordanian citizens, with [the] exception [of] inhabitants of Ramallah and Bethlehem, who would become Israeli citizens.”
‘What the Iranians and Israelis are specifically cooking up in the arms field remains to be ascertained, but the Shah has a complex game going’
The Kissinger Cables, named after former US secretary of state Henry Kissinger, also shed light on Israel’s close military ties with Iran prior to the 1979 Islamic Revolution, which turned the two countries into bitter enemies.
In 1976, several top Israeli government officials, including Rabin, Peres and Allon, secretly visited the Shah in Tehran, writes then-US ambassador to Iran and former director of the Central Intelligence Agency Richard Helms in acable.
Rabin’s visit, in July of that year, was clouded in particular secrecy, Helms writes. It was followed by a trip to Israel by Iranian vice minister of war Hassan Toufanian, ostensibly to discuss several joint military projects, such as the 1977 Project Flower.
“What the Iranians and Israelis are specifically cooking up in the arms field remains to be ascertained, but the Shah has a complex game going with both the Israelis and the Egyptians, the obvious purpose of which is to exchange or at least have available certain kinds of ammunition and weapons which are not subject to US Congressional control or veto,” Helms writes.
In a separate cable, Helms reports to the State Department in Washington that the Shah complained to Peres during a visit to Tehran about Jerusalem’s efforts to dissuade the US from selling arms to Iran.
In a third cable, Helms says that Toufanian told him that his trip to Israel and Peres’s visit to Tehran “were basically get-acquainted sessions.” The Iranian official said that “ways will be explored to expand military cooperation between the two countries, but that it is important [for] the prime personalities to get to know each other first and to come to understand each other’s particular problems.”
North Korea warns foreigners to leave South
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/04/09/us-korea-north-idUSBRE93408020130409
‘On verge of nuclear war’
PYONGYANG, North Korea — North Korea on Tuesday urged all foreign companies and tourists in South Korea to evacuate, saying the two countries are on the verge of nuclear war. The new threat appeared to be an attempt to keep the region on tenterhooks over its intentions.
Japan Deploys Patriot Missiles to Defend Tokyo
Japan has deployed Patriot
missiles in and around central Tokyo as a defensive measure should North Korea decide to launch an attack amid rising tensions in the Korean Peninsula.
Tokyo has moved three Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) surface-to-air missile launchers, according to the defence ministry. Two more batteries are likely to be stationed at other places.
Pyongyang warns foreigners to evacuate S. Korea, Japan deploys Patriot missiles
Yonhap: Kim Jong-un orders mass artillery production for “rapid pre-emptive attack”
SEOUL, April 6 (Yonhap) — North Korean leader Kim Jong-un recently ordered the country’s arms industry workers to increase their production of artillery, a television report out of Pyongyang showed Saturday.
“Once the war breaks out, we have to destroy the enemies’ key military locations and government institutions with a quick and sudden strike,” Kim was quoted as saying. “We must absolutely guarantee the quality of our artillery and shells to ensure a rapid pre-emptive attack on our enemies.”
http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/northkorea/2013/04/06/34/0401000000AEN20130406001800315F.HTML
North Korea urges foreigners in South to evacuate
https://twitter.com/timesofindia
John McCain warns of ‘accidental war’ with North Korea
North Korea, Russia Putin’ Warn’s About Grave Danger of Nuclear War
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-22065348
BEIJING – China called Tuesday for the protection of citizens from all countries and warned against “chaos” on the Korean peninsula after North Korea urged foreigners in South Korea to evacuate.
Beijing, a key backer of its defiant neighbor, has repeatedly urged calm and restraint despite spiraling tensions since Pyongyang tested a third nuclear bomb in February and reacted angrily to resulting UN sanctions.
The isolated regime said Tuesday the peninsula was headed for “thermo-nuclear” war and advised foreigners in South Korea to consider evacuation.
“North Korea says it will fire missiles into the Pacific Ocean on April 10 & that these missiles will pass over Japan.”- Sankei Shimbun
https://twitter.com/PrinceofSydney
Japan vows to shoot down North Korean missiles “even if it is just a test”
South Korea Believes North Could Launch Missile Test As Soon As Tomorrow
Read more:
Japan deploys Patriot antimissile system in downtown Tokyo
http://stratrisks.com/geostrat/11746
Read more at http://investmentwatchblog.com
(www.dailypaul.com) The more things change, the more they stay the same. My first “political activism” as an adult was to try to get Hanford shut down. Here I am decades later, back where I started. This plant was a bad design 30 years ago, and guess what? It is STILL a bad design. And, it is still utterly immoral to dump radioactive waste on our descendants.
3 days ago: King 5 News: Nuclear board warns of Hanford tank explosion risk
“State and federal officials have long known that hydrogen gas could build up inside the tanks at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation, leading to an explosion that would release radioactive material. The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board recommended additional monitoring and ventilation of the tanks last fall, and federal officials were working to develop a plan to implement the recommendation.”
Got that? LAST FALL the Fed starting “working on a plan.”
Yesterday: “Unexpected gas releases”
KING 5 News has learned there’s been a series of unexpected hydrogen gas releases from a tank holding radioactive waste at Hanford Nuclear Reservation.
Confidential sources say it began on March 16 and lasted for several days, much longer than usual, and they worry a single spark could have set off an explosive release of radioactivity.
The North
(globalpost.com) Korean army said it has final approval to launch “merciless” military strikes against the United States, including the use of nuclear weapons.
In a statement published by the North’s official KCNA news agency, the General Staff of the Korean People’s Army said the United States had been formally informed that its “reckless nuclear threat” would be “smashed by strong will of all the united service personnel… and cutting-edge smaller, lighter and diversified nuclear strike means,” according to Reuters.
More from GlobalPost: Pentagon: Missile defense system deployed to Guam in response to North Korea
“The moment of explosion is approaching fast,” the statement reads, warning that war could break out “today or tomorrow.”
“The merciless operation of our revolutionary armed forces in this regard has been finally examined and ratified,” it read.
According to South Korean news agency Yonhap, the statement also said the North would “take a series of strong, actual military countermeasures as the Supreme Command solemnly declared at home and abroad.”
US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said on Wednesday that the hermit kingdom’s threats presented a “real and clear danger” to the United States and its allies, South Korea and Japan.
“They have nuclear capacity now, they have missile delivery capacity now,” said Hagel. “We take those threats seriously, we have to take those threats seriously.”
The Pentagon confirmed earlier on Wednesday that an advanced ballistic missile defense system was being sent to Guam to protect US interests as a precaution against North Korea’s threats.
Also on Wednesday, the North barred South Korean workers from the joint Kaesong industrial park. Earlier in the week, Pyongyang said it was restarting the Yongbyon nuclear reactor to step up production of nuclear weapons materials.
The North has condemned the US deployment of advanced weapons such as B-52 and B-2 bombers, F-22 fighters, and a nuclear-powered submarine and destroyer to the Korean Peninsula for annual joint military drills with the South, Yonhap noted.
North Korea threatened a “pre-emptive” nuclear strike against the United States last month, and last week its supreme army command ordered rocket units to be combat ready, according to Agence France-Presse.
China’s foreign ministry said, “All sides must remain calm and exercise restraint and not take actions which are mutually provocative and must certainly not take actions which will worsen the situation,” according to The Daily Telegraph.
More from GlobalPost: North Korea bars entrance to Kaesong industrial park
(Jerusalem Post) -Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu told a group of visiting US Senators on Friday that if reelected he will work to stop Iran’s illicit nuclear march.
“My priority, if I’m elected for a next term as prime minister, will be first to stop Iran from getting nuclear weapons,” he told the group, which included Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY). “I think that was and remains the highest priority for both our countries. I appreciate the American support and your support for that end.”
Even as Netanyahu refocused on the Iranian threat, the UN nuclear agency chief said Friday he was not optimistic about talks with Iran next week on getting access to a military base Western powers suspect has been used for atomic-weapons related work.
“The outlook is not bright,” Yukiya Amano, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said in Tokyo.
Western powers say Iran is trying to develop the capability to make atomic weapons, a charge the Islamic Republic denies.
Amano said in Japanese comments translated into English: “Talks with Iran don’t proceed in a linear way. It’s one step forward, two or three steps back … So we can’t say we have an optimistic outlook” for the January 16 meeting.
At the meeting with Netanyahu, Senator McConnell touted strong bipartisan support for Israel in the United States, even while the Republican and Democrat parties face off on other issues.
“As everybody in Israel knows, there are a lot of things we disagree on in America, we’ve had big battles over deficit and debt, but there’s broad bipartisan support for Israel, and our agenda in this part of the world is the same as your agenda,” he said. “You’re one of our best friends and we’re happy to continue that relationship.”
US President Barack Obama’s nomination of Chuck Hagel to the defense secretary position raised eyebrows in Jerusalem and among pro-Israel politicians in the US, concerned over the former Senator’s Israel record. Critics accuse Hagel of opposing sanctions and being satisfied with containing Tehran, as opposed to preventing it from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
(ZeroHedge) -It was only a matter of time before Japan’s criminal lying about the radioactive exposure in the aftermath of the Fukushima catastrophe caught up with it. What is surprising is that those holding Japan accountable are not its citizens but eight US sailors who have just filed a suit against semi-nationalized energy operator TEPCO - the company which repeatedly ignored internal warnings about the ability of the Fukushima NPP to withstand an earthquake/tsunami - seeking $110 million in damages.
As Kyodo reports:
“Eight U.S. sailors have filed a damages suit against Tokyo Electric Power Co., claiming they were exposed to radiation and face health threats as the utility did not provide appropriate information about the Fukushima nuclear disaster while they engaged in rescue operations on board an aircraft carrier, U.S. media reported.
The plaintiffs who filed the suit at the U.S. federal court in San Diego — seeking a total of $110 million, or 9.4 billion yen, in damages — were aboard the aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan when it was involved in “Operation Tomodachi,” a disaster relief effort shortly after a big earthquake and tsunami triggered the worst nuclear accident in decades, the reports said.”
What is sad is that while everyone in the alternative media was repeatedly warning about the radiation exposure being misrepresented by both TEPCO and various Japanese ministries, it was the mainstream media that was constantly complicit in disseminating official and unofficial lies that there is nothing to fear. Which begs the question: shouldn’t the lawsuit stretch to everyone who - without inquiring deeper and merely serving as a mouthpiece to a lying government and utility - gave the “all clear” even as radiation levels were approaching, and in many occasions, passing critical levels?
But hey: they were merely following orders, and were worried about keeping their jobs if they stepped out of line and questioned the line of propaganda command. Luckily, this will be the first time in world history this excuse will have been used.
(RT) -Nuclear engineers have warned the Senate of the threats facing two US nuclear power facilities, which could result in enormous explosions or a Fukushima-like meltdown if natural phenomena or weather conditions cause the facilities to fail.
Senator Joe Lieberman is the current chairman of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security & Government Affairs, but will retire in 2013. Two nuclear engineers have asked him to spend his last days in Congress investigating the threats posed by two nuclear power facilities.
Paul Blanch, a retired nuclear engineer who used to work at the Indian Point nuclear facility in Buchanan, N.Y., and Lawrence Criscione, a risk engineer at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) headquarters, sent a letter to the senator, warning that a Fukushima-like meltdown is in America’s future if no action is taken to improve the facilities at Indian Point and Oconee.
The engineers claim that the gas lines leading to the facilities, as well as nearby dams, are vulnerable to sabotage. Engineering failures or natural phenomena like earthquakes or floods can also cause a meltdown.
“The potential energy released in a gas line rupture at Indian Point is equivalent to that from a massive conventional bomb; the 2010 explosion and fire in San Bruno, Calif., is an example of the destructive force, which a pipeline rupture can unless,” the letter states.
“The flooding resulting from a failure of Jocassee Dam at Oconee would be similar to that experienced at Fukushima following the tsunami,” it describes.
While the facilities themselves are well-guarded, their support systems meant to prevent meltdowns can be easily damaged. A meltdown of their reactors could result in “severe radiological and economic consequences to areas surrounding these plants,” the engineers wrote. Areas within and possibly beyond 50 miles of the facilities “could be rendered uninhabitable for generations,” which would include New York City if the Indian Point facility’s gas pipeline explodes, Blanch and Criscione warned.
Although the conditions are dire, the issues have been ignored for years. Two nuclear whistleblowers publicly accused the NRC of taking steps to cover up the dangerous shortcomings of America’s power plants. Earlier this month, Richard H. Perkins and Criscione compromised their jobs by speaking out about their concerns to the Huffington Post. The men claimed that the NRC repeatedly refused to acknowledge that there was any sort of risk involved in keeping the plants open and tried to keep the flaws secret.
The NRC has “allowed a very dangerous scenario to continue unaddressed for years,” Perkins said. Nuclear power plants are required by US law to able to withstand all types of weather conditions that could occur in the region they are located, but many of their flood walls are inadequate and don’t consider the floodwaters that could result from nearby dams.
The Oconee Nuclear Station in South Caroline is protected by a 5-foot wall, but is located near a dam that could result in floodwaters as high as 16.8 feet and cause a meltdown that resembled what happened in Fukushima.
Blanch has been petitioning the NRC about gas line issues since 2010, and Criscione has raised the issue with Congress, the media, and high-ranking officials at the NRC.
Regardless of the efforts of both engineers and employees of the NRC, the commission has repeatedly claimed that no problems exist.
“The NRC has reviewed and evaluated the gas pipeline issue. Our review of the petition found the plant continues to comply with NRC requirements,” Burnell described the NRC response to a complaint he made about Indian Point.
In yet another effort to bring attention to the dangers facing Americans living near these power plants, Blanch and Criscione are lobbying the Senate for support.
“We respectfully request that your staff review the enclosures and determine if the nuclear reactor plants involved are adequately secure from attack,” they wrote in the letter, asking the Senate to request that the NRC temporarily shut down the plants if they are not secure.
(TheIntelHubs) - The Santa Susana Field Laboratory is a complex of industrial research and development facilities located on a 2,668-acre (1,080 ha) portion of the Southern California Simi Hills in Simi Valley, California, used mainly for the testing and development of liquid-propellant rocket engines for the United States space program from 1949 to 2006, nuclear reactors from 1953 to 1980 and the operation of a U.S. government-sponsored liquid metals research center from 1966 to 1998.
The site is located approximately 7 miles (11 km) northwest from the community of Canoga Park and approximately 30 miles (48 km) northwest of Downtown Los Angeles. Sage Ranch Park is adjacent on part of the northern boundary and the community of Bell Canyon along the entire southern boundary. — Wikipedia
By Shepard Ambellas
In 2009, the Department of Energy and governmental stimulus funds brought $41.5 million dollars to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to conduct an investigation into claims that the Santa Susana Field Laboratory and surrounding area is contaminated with radiation.
As a result of that investigation, the EPA has now deemed that the land toxic and contaminated with high levels of radiation.
Teresa Rochester writes;
The survey, which includes test results of samples of groundwater, sediment and subsurface soil in the Northern Buffer Zone and Area IV, which was once home to 10 small nuclear reactors, found about 10 percent of them exceeded background levels established by two laboratories.
Those background levels were going to be used to plot the cleanup of radiological contamination at the site, which will be overseen by California’s Department of Toxic Substances Control….
…. Radionuclides such as strontium-90, cesium-137 and tritium were found in some samples that exceeded EPA’s background limits.
EPA officials collected 3,735 soil and sediment samples and 215 groundwater and surface samples from the site. Of the 34 surface water samples collected, two instances of maximum contamination levels being exceeded, while four areas had high levels of contamination in sediment. There were nearly 300 instances of Cesium-137 in soil samples exceeding maximum levels, while 153 samples had levels of Strontium-90 that far exceeded the background level.
Local residents and nuclear watchdog activists just want to see the site cleaned as promised.
Radiation levels have recently been a major topic of concern after the Fukushima Nuclear Disaster that took place in Japan causing the spread of harmful radiation throughout the atmosphere.
Still yet, as of 2012, many former nuclear testing sites like the Santa Susana Field Laboratory remain contaminated.
Diabolic individuals and governments seem to want to continue the use of nuclear technology despite major breakthroughs in clean, green, efficient energy technologies.
In fact, in most cases, nuclear power companies have suppressed clean energy technology in order to continue to line their pockets at the possible health expense of the American people.
