I'm not going to review all the tedious details of the Sakkanmol Missile Base report headline story. I read the CSIS reports, the NY Times Sanger/Broad framing of the Sakkanmol report and then looked for other press reactions from more responsible sources than the NY Times. The website 38North, likes to be described as "Informed analysis on North Korea," and it generally is. Leon Sigal published a commentary there today, November 13, titled the New York Times' Misleading Story on North Korean Missiles. It's definitely worth a read. The knowledgeable commentator on North Korean affairs characterized the NY Times article by David Sanger and William Broad as "tendentious hyperbole." Here's the link:
https://www.38north.org/2018/11/lsigal111318/
In South Korea, Channel A News Top Ten promoted the story again today, November 14, as it's number one discussion for its analysts. The consensus by the South Korean analysts seemed to be that the NY Times' article was a politically motivated hit piece as discussed yesterday in my interpretation of Shin In Kyun's presentation on Defense Daily and Channel A Top Ten. The most conservative Top Ten analyst somehow regarded the "deception" take as accurate citing Kim Jong Un's statements reflecting his intent to denuclearize. Do nations not attempt to keep their military resources secret and keep them in facilities that they regard as secure as they can obtain? Is this some sort of surprise? Were these bases previously unknown to US observers? At what point did the North Koreans promise to unilaterally give up these weapons without tangible acts of consideration or reciprocity from the US? Secretary of State Pompeo said himself not so long ago, without complete verifiable irreversible security (for the North Korean system) you won't get complete verifiable irreversible denuclearization.
So the focus of Top Ten today was away from the Sakkanmol Scud base facilities to the broader picture of ballistic missile threats in North Korea presented by the CSIS Nov 12 report. The information for the Top Ten graphic and their report came from the CSIS November 12, Beyond Parallel assessment, Undeclared North Korea: Missile Operating Bases Revealed.
https://beyondparallel.csis.org/north-koreas-undeclared-missile-operating-bases/
Although there has been a lot of discussion about how medium range missiles could possibly be deployed to the Sakkanmol facilities, one has to wonder at the wisdom of moving more valuable assets to a more vulnerable position. In fact the Top Ten graphic presentation shows what has been the view on ballistic missile positioning for quite some time. The greater the missile's range, the further away its deployment from the DMZ to more remote locations. There will be disputes about facilities that allegedly don't fit the rule, like the purported Kangson missile production facility alleged to be operating just south of Pyongyang. There is also the contention about detection times being reduced by placing medium range ballistic missiles closer to the DMZ and so on. However the graphic above shows this: scuds deploy in the southern belt closest to the DMZ; medium range missile bases in the middle belt, further away; and, icbm's based in the most remote northern zone. The Top Ten graphic based on the CSIS report allows for the possibly deployment of medium range missiles to the "tactical" belt. In the November 12, Sakkanmol report, the CSIS author Joseph Bermudez acknowledges that, "...some of the information used in the preparation of this study may eventually prove to be incomplete or incorrect..."
Who knew? The North Koreans have ballistic missiles.
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