US ‘Childish’ Missile Interceptor Test Serves to Alarm N Korea – Peace Activist

North KoreaA recent anti-missile test by the US is designed to make North Korea worry further that Washington is planning “significant military action” against it, peace activist Helen Caldicott told Sputnik.

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — The interception of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) over the Pacific Ocean last week was a needless provocation to North Korea by US President Donald Trump’s administration, Caldicott said.

“The Pentagon is exhibiting behavior which is both extraordinarily childish and provocative,” Caldicott, founder of Physicians for Social Responsibility, the organization that was the co-winner of the 1985 Nobel Peace Prize, said.

The $244 million test was a childish display of alleged martial prowess that could only serve to alarm North Korea’s government and make them worry further that the United States was planning significant military action against them, without concern for the possible consequences, Caldicott warned.

“At a time when the world is on tenterhooks worrying about the missile antics of North Korea, America indulges in an antimissile test to make sure that everyone knows that the US maintains its status as ‘King of the Hoop,’” she said.

Washington policymakers should have recognized that the way to defuse tensions and the danger of full-scale war with North Korea was to draw Pyongyang into an ongoing dialogue and slowly but steadily build an atmosphere of trust leaders there, Caldicott explained.

“Even mature people would understand that the way to deal with [North Korean leader] Kim Jong-un is to engage him in dialogue, find out what he wants and to treat him with respect which is clearly what he requires,” she said.

The Pacific test, in which a Ground-based Mid-courser Interceptor (GBI) launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California intercepted an ICBM, instead reflected an immature and teenage mentality by US policymakers, Caldicott observed.

“The men in the Pentagon are like little boys in a sand box boasting… Where will all this lead?” she asked.

Unless such attitudes were recognized and cooler, more responsible and sensible policies were implemented, the reckless reactions of the US civil leadership and military command would inevitably lead to a catastrophic wider war eventually, Caldicott warned.

“It is obvious, somewhere sometime a city will be targeted with a North Korean nuclear armed missile and then all hell will break loose,” she concluded.

Caldicott is the author of many books, including “The New Nuclear Danger: George W. Bush’s Military Industrial Complex” and “War in Heaven: The Arms Race in Outer Space.” The Smithsonian Institution has named her one of the most influential women of the 20th century.

Originally published at https://sputniknews.com/asia/201706061054344089-us-missile-interceptor-test-n-korea/.

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