3. South Korea up in arms



The Blue House wasted no time hitting back at the Times, with spokesperson Kim Eui-kyeom talking to the press at length on Tuesday. (via Hankyoreh) On whether Seoul and Washington had known: “The CSIS report is based on commercial satellite [photos], but South Korean and US intelligence agencies are already in possession of far more detailed [information] from military satellites.”



“The CSIS report is based on commercial satellite [photos], but South Korean and US intelligence agencies are already in possession of far more detailed [information] from military satellites.” On whether Pyongyang broke any deal: “North Korea never made a promise to discard short-range missiles, so this [base] cannot be called an example of deception.”

According to newspaper Segye Ilbo, the National Intelligence Service told the National Assembly’s intelligence committee on Wednesday: “We were already aware of the situation at the Sakkanmol base.” “A normal level of activity is continuing at North Korea’s Sakkanmol base.” Kim Dong-yub, a prominent North Korea expert at the Institute for Far Eastern Studies who is sympathetic to the government’s North Korea policy, minced no words, calling the NYT report “fake news” in a radio interview with South Korean broadcaster CBS: In the case of Sakkanmol in this article, it is known to be a short-range missile base that has nothing to do with long-range missiles.



In that regard, the headline of the article speaks of “deception,” but can this really be called deception? North Korea has not made any promise yet to dismantle all missile bases such as these, has it? A widely read opinion piece in the left-leaning publication Pressian accused the paper of peddling “bullshit”: The New York Times report is a typical example of confirmation bias. To support their biased view that North Korea’s Kim Jong-un regime is engaging in deception and the US’s Trump administration is falling for it, they are fully exposing their subjective bias. And on the flawed credibility of Victor Cha, the CSIS report’s co-author, who is liberally cited in the Times article: [Cha] wrote in the NYT, just after the death of Kim Jong-il in December 2011, “North Korea as we know it is over.” He predicted, “Whether it comes apart in the next few weeks or over several months, the regime will not be able to hold together after the untimely death of its leader, Kim Jong-il.” But when the Kim Jong-un regime remained unscathed, Cha lied in a piece published by Joongang Ilbo, “I never made any quick judgment concerning North Korea’s collapse.” By contrast, South Korea’s conservatives have seized upon and amplified the Times report. For example, the conservative opposition Liberty Korea Party attacked Moon in a statement on Tuesday: “North Korea’s denuclearization must include complete dismantlement of North Korea’s nuclear arms, nuclear materials and nuclear facilities as well as dismantlement of transport means such as missiles. We cannot understand why the Blue House is offering excuses for a North Korean missile base.”