N. Korea threatens nuclear response

Associated Press

HANOI, Vietnam

North Korea threatened today to mount a powerful nuclear response to upcoming joint U.S.-South Korean military drills, calling the exercises an “unpardonable” provocation on top of wrongly blaming Pyongyang for the sinking of a South Korean warship.

North Korea’s powerful National Defense Commission, led by leader Kim Jong Il, warned that its troops would counter the move to conduct military maneuvers involving a nuclear-armed U.S. supercarrier with a “retaliatory sacred war.”

“The army and people of the DPRK will legitimately counter with their powerful nuclear deterrence the largest-ever nuclear war exercises to be staged by the U.S. and the south Korean puppet forces,” North Korea’s official news agency in Pyongyang quoted an unnamed commission spokesman as saying, referring to the country by its official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

Pyongyang routinely threatens war when South Korea and the U.S. have joint military drills, which North Korea sees as a rehearsal for an attack on the North. The U.S. keeps 28,500 troops in the South to deter against aggression but says it has no intention of invading the North.

U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates and South Korean Defense Minister Kim Tae-young announced earlier this week in Seoul that the allies would stage a massive four-day military show of force starting Sunday to send a “clear message” to North Korea to stop its aggressive behavior.

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