¹ P. Baker, “Trump Says Military Is ‘Locked and Loaded’ and North Korea Will ‘Regret’ Threats,” New York Times, August 11, 2017.

² P. Baker, S.H. Choe, “Trump Threatens ‘Fire and Fury’ Against North Korea if It Endangers U.S.,” New York Times, August 8, 2017

³ S. Holland, P. Stewart, “Trump praises Chinese efforts on North Korea ‘menace,‘ Pyongyang warns of strike,” Reuters, April 19, 2017.

⁴ US Department of Defense, “Secretary Mattis Statement at the White House,” News Transcript, September 3, 2017.

⁵ “Full text: Trump's 2017 U.N. speech transcript,” Politico, September 19, 2017.

⁶ The transcript published in English by KCNA is found at the ROK Ministry of Foreign Affairs website, and here. For a summary, see H.S. Choe, “North Korea Hits New Level of Brinkmanship in Reacting to Trump,” New York Times, September 22, 2017.

⁷ B. Bennett, “Aides urged Trump not to ridicule Kim, Intelligence officials warned that personal attacks against North Korean leader at the U.N. could backfire,” Los Angeles Times, September 23, 2017.

⁸ Ri stated: “The ICBM marked with sacred name of the DPRK flew over the universe above the endless blue sky, the warhead of our rocket left its trace on the blue waves of the Pacific Ocean and the tremendous explosion and vibration of the hydrogen bomb were recorded by this planet.” This statement hints at but does not specifically state that a DPRK live fire action is on the cards—but it connects various dots in a suggestive manner.

⁹ C. Morello, “North Korea's top diplomat says strike against U.S. mainland is ‘inevitable,‘” Washington Post, September 23, 2017.

¹⁰ R. Kheel, “Dunford: North Korea has not changed military posture despite rhetoric,” The Hill, September 26, 2017.

¹¹ Roger Cavazos, “Mind the Gap Between Rhetoric and Reality”, NAPSNet Special Reports, June 26, 2012.

¹² How far south depends on how far north they are deployed to reduce US-ROK ability to destroy these systems. Nautilus is conducting a technical analysis of possible casualty rates that this new system might inflict on the ROK in a war that will be published in December 2017. However, preliminary analysis indicates that it is unlikely to change the basic conclusion of the 2012 analysis cited above. The new system nevertheless reinforces an already robust conventional deterrent force wielded by Kim Jong Un.

¹³ B. Demick, “Escalating tension has experts simulating a new Korean War, and the scenarios are sobering,” Los Angeles Times, September 25, 2017.

¹⁴ There are no accurate numbers for civilian casualties and only broad estimates for North Korean and Chinese military casualties from historical sources. The rough breakdown is about 615,000 Chinese and North Korean military deaths; about 284,000 US-ROK-UNC allied military deaths; about 1 million South Korean civilian deaths; and about 2 million North Korean civilian deaths, which sums to 3.89 million deaths (not including injuries). The Korean War lasted about 97.5 million seconds. Readers can do the math for the killing rate per minute. See World Peace Foundation, “Korea: the Korean War,” Fatalities tab, August 7, 2015, here.

¹⁵ For a detailed account of that near war, see P. Hayes, Pacific Powderkeg, American Nuclear Dilemmas in Korea, Lexington Books, 1990, pp. 131 et passim.

¹⁶ The DPRK stopped issuing such notices in 2006, but its justification based on national security to ICAO was rejected by its membership, and it remains non-compliant. See “Embrace Tiger, Retreat To Mountain, Test Nuke”, NAPSNet Policy Forum, July 21, 2006.

¹⁷ As did Russia in 1956 and the early sixties, the United States in 1962, and China in 1966 (but over Lop Nor, not the ocean). See Brumfel, “How North Korea's Nuclear Tests Could Get Even More Terrifying,” transcript, September 6, 2017.

¹⁸ Peter Hayes, David von Hippel, and Roger Cavazos, “Rapid Relief and Reconstruction in a DPRK Humanitarian Energy Crisis”, NAPSNet Special Reports, December 23, 2014.