Chris At Home

The US has activated our missile defense systems.

TCS gives details on our capabilities.

Is it a space launch as the Norks claim, or a missile test? The Spook says a missile test is fair game for an intercept.

OpinionJournal says shoot it down.

If so, we hope we'll also learn that the U.S. responded by testing its newly operational missile defense system and blowing the Korean provocation out of the sky. What better way to discourage would-be nuclear proliferators than to demonstrate that the U.S. is able to destroy their missiles before they hit our allies, or the U.S. homeland. Even a miss would be a useful learning experience all around.

Consider what's at stake. We've known for years that North Korea has several nuclear weapons at the very least and is developing the missile technology to threaten America. Pyongyang's test missile is believed to be a Taepodong-2. A two-stage version could reach Alaska, Hawaii or the West Coast, according to a study in March by the Center for Nonproliferation at the Monterey Institute of International Studies, while a three-stage model could reach all of the continental U.S.

North Korea may not yet have the ability to miniaturize a nuclear warhead--but then again it may. In any event, it's small comfort that the Taepodong-2 is probably inaccurate. If it misses Seattle, that's not necessarily good news for Tacoma or Portland.

The Left hopes the missile defense system fails.

Update: Coincidentally, there is a huge wargame taking place in the Pacific.



Update: Pubius Pundit has thoughts:

I am sitting here in the crosshairs of a madman out of North Korea. Incredibly, he’s fuelling up a Taepodong missile and getting ready to launch it in my direction. It can reach 9000 miles. The U.S. has activated its missile defense system a few miles away, up in Vandenberg Air Force base.

Update: the Spook says that attacking the missile on its launch pad would instigate war, and recommends blowing it up in flight if we want to do something significant. He has a good point; the Norks can destroy Seoul with artillery in a few hours or over-run Seoul in a day, and we don't have enough troops there to prevent it. Caution rules the day, for a good reason. Now who decided to put SoKo's captital within artillery range of the border? Sods.

Update: NRO has a [URL= http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=YjJkM2I1ZTMwZTJkMjcxMDZkODMyOTQ2YTVmMTIwZjQ=]symposium on the issue. Gingrich asks what the 6/21 Commission on the Loss of Seattle would say about our inaction.