The Norks face penalties, says the Nelson Report:

if there’s one thing all analysts of N. Korea agree on, it’s that Dear Leader Kim Jong-il just loves being the center of attention. By that criteria, the so far big non-event of the week...an alleged Taepodong-2 ICMB test...is already a HUGE success, since it’s landed him many days’ of coverage on the front page of every major newspaper in the world.

Even better, it’s obviously thrown the leaders of Japan, South Korea, and to some extent China and the US, into a delicious tizzy, as they vie to leak stories to favored journalists about the “latest intelligence”, and to threaten what they or their government plans to do if the DPRK actually does something.

More after the jump.

Here’s our small contribution while we wait...a delay which may be due to weather (except in wartime, one does not want to fire off a machine as relatively delicate as a multi-stage, liquid fuel rocket in the wind and rain):

IF Kim Jong-il decides that the publicity so far isn’t enough, and he really needs to go through with exploding something, then highly informed Adminstration sources say the US plans a retaliatory scheme along the lines of the international bank sanctions already in place for counterfeiting et al.

“There is a quite well planned out and a very detailed response [ready] if they do this”, says a source. “This will go way past the [Macau bank]. There are other places we can grab ‘em and squeeze ‘em, but not many places they can put their money.”

Japanese officials spent the weekend, starting Friday, threatening various sorts of retaliation, from cutting off direct ferry links, and the remaining personal financial links from Koreans in Japan, all the way up to a complaint to the United Nations.

S. Korean officials had spent the past couple of weeks, since the rumors began, sounding both tougher and more upset at N. Korean behavior than has been their norm. But as the weekend progressed, there began to be news stories indicating doubts that US-supplied intelligence was 100% reliable...that is, that perhaps what is on or close to the launch pad is NOT actually a Taepodong-2 ICBM, but perhaps even just another Nodong.

That’s worth noting, as some non-government but expert US sources, themselves up to speed on the available classified intel, have been warning for more than a week that we should not jump to conclusions about what the DPRK is prepared to launch, and specifically hinting (can one hint specifically? Oh well...) that the rocket may turn out to be less than a Taepodong-2, when all the smoke clears.

Today, there were hints from S. Korea officials they may be starting to doubt the key parts of the story, at least as it has been spun by US “official sources”, specifically challenging “intel” that fueling has been completed. And one Korean “source who asked not to be named” in a Korea Times story went to far as to charge ulterior motive in all the US-based leaks, “Frankly speaking, aren’t the United States and Japan in a position that could enjoy the current situation?”

This anonymous source the specified how a DPRK missile shoot helps boost US and Japanese supporters of national missile defense, but said for S. Korea, the situation is vastly more complicated, since, the Korea Times paraphrased, “the South Korean government, placed in a different position as a ‘directly concerned party’, is forced to deal with the problem not only as a mere military and security issue but also a political and diplomatic one.”

Interesting choice of words, “mere military and security issue”...

US experts not in the Administration also argue that as spectacular as a full ICBM test might be, if it comes AND is judged successful, there is still no hint of intelligence that the DPRK has miniaturized a nuclear war head for a missile.

That being the case, says one, “Frankly, the operational significance of the test of a far shorter range but solid fuel missile by N. Korea last year perturbs me a whole lot more than a ‘political missile’ that, if it truly is of longer range, will be an answer to the prayers of the missile defense crowd.”

An informed source finishes the discussion for tonight with this: “the question remains: what is the appropriate response to such a launch? Unless it's unambiguously a long range missile test, and is justified as such by Pyongyang, NK will assert that it's a satellite launch vehicle, when more than a few states (including, obviously, Japan) are either in this business already or have hopes to be. So will we huff and puff and propose sanctions? For what? Who are we trying to kid, other than ourselves? It's almost comical to hear [White House spokesman] Tony Snow say that we expect the North Koreans to abide by their commitments ( i.e., the 1999 moratorium), as if we take their words seriously all of a sudden.”

This observer continues, “You don't have to be a publicist for the DPRK to recognize that Kim Jong-il made his commitment in a specific context, and with an obvious set of expectations. The Clinton-era US-NK accommodation, however problematic and imperfect it was, effectively came to end in March 2001 during the Kim Daejung visit, with one of Colin Powell's earliest policy humiliations as Secretary of State. If we had wanted to demonstrate to NK that we were seriously committed to a different kind of relationship, we had innumerable opportunities to do so over the past 5+ years, but we didn’t, and all of us know the reasons why. So if a missile test (however defined) is what we get for our reward, we are hardly in a position to complain.”

More soon . . .