Hawaii, Guam and the U.S. mainland are in North Korea’s sights for possible attack from weapons that have been placed on "the highest alert from this moment," the reclusive country warned Tuesday in its escalating war of words with the United States and South Korea.
"They should be mindful that everything will be reduced to ashes and flames the moment the first attack is unleashed," the latest statement from the North threatened.
So how worried should we be in Hawaii?
"Not," said Brad Glosserman, executive director of the Pacific Forum Center for Strategic and International Studies in Honolulu.
"There’s no indication that North Korea has the capability to load a missile with a long-range warhead and deliver it against us," Glosserman said.
In a first, North Korea apparently did put a satellite into orbit in December using a three-stage rocket.
"And if memory serves, they don’t know what sort of orbit it was in," Glosserman said.
The website Gizmodo said the satellite "quickly, hilariously and dangerously spun out of control."
"Getting them (ballistic missiles) up is tough, but getting them to go exactly where you want them to, the way you want them to, is much exponentially harder," Glosserman said.
North Korea said its strategic rocket and long-range artillery units are "assigned to strike bases of the U.S. imperialist aggressor troops in the U.S. mainland and on Hawaii and Guam and other operational zones in the Pacific as well as all the enemy targets in South Korea and its vicinity."
Dae-Sook Suh, who used to be at the Center for Korean Studies at the University of Hawaii and now teaches Korean politics at the University of California at Los Angeles, said, "I don’t think there’s anything that we have to worry about (with the North Korean statement)."
"It’s a vague, empty threat," Suh said.
North Korea has no intention of hitting the United States militarily, he said.
"Even if they are capable of hitting any one place in Hawaii or Guam, what can they do?" Suh asked. "What are they going to do as the next step? I mean, the North Koreans are smart people. There’s no second step."
Glosserman said that if there is a "Step 1" attack on the United States, then for America, "Step 2 is we turn them into a parking lot."
The bombast out of North Korea has reached such a shrill tone that the website Foreign Policy mockingly likened it to the guitar amplifier with a volume knob marked "11" instead of the usual "10" in the 1984 film "This Is Spinal Tap."
The North’s latest threats come after the United Nations hit the country with new sanctions over nuclear testing, the North declared the 1953 armistice with South Korea invalid, and U.S. nuclear-capable B-52 bombers flew training missions over South Korea.
The latest statements "follow a well-worn pattern designed to raise tensions and intimidate others," the Pentagon said.
"North Korea has nuclear capabilities, so the full range of their arsenal is of concern to the United States and to our South Korean allies," Pentagon spokesman George Little said.
The decision earlier this month to place 14 additional ground-based ballistic missile interceptors in Alaska and California was based in large part on growing threats from North Korea, the Pentagon said.
An early 2012 National Intelligence report to Congress said, "North Korea continues to pursue the development, production and deployment of ballistic missiles with increasing range and sophistication."
North Korea’s new KN-08 mobile intercontinental ballistic missile, now in development, is the latest concern. A Pentagon official said the KN-08 probably has the range to reach the United States.
Interceptors in California and Alaska are designed to protect Hawaii. The U.S. can also shoot down ballistic missiles with Aegis destroyers and cruisers at Pearl Harbor and Terminal High Altitude Area Defense missiles on Kauai.
Glosserman said North Korea always wants to appear to be acting defensively.
"The North Koreans are acutely sensitive to the question of perception," he said. "And so by threatening Guam and threatening Hawaii, what they are reminding the audience is that they are striking out at the military forces that are in fact aimed at North Korea."
Bill Wieninger, an associate professor at the Asia Pacific Center for Security Studies in Honolulu who has expertise in weapons of mass destruction, said North Korea’s ability to threaten the U.S. is completely overshadowed by the ability of the United States to threaten North Korea.
"They must also be concerned that we have previously intervened in countries when we felt the need to, such as the former Yugoslavia, Somalia, Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya," said Wieninger, who stressed his opinions were his and not that of the U.S. government.
The United States is seen as a threatening power to the leadership of North Korea, he said.
Wieninger added that "it seems a logical objective for (North Korea) to seek a ballistic missile capable of deterring the U.S. It is very likely we are in a classic security dilemma, wherein our efforts to enhance our security are seen as offensively threatening to them, and vice versa."
