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28 December 2010

M61A1 20mm Cannon

The current version of the M61, the M61A1, remains relatively unchanged from past models


History


Soon after the end of the Second World War the newly formed United States Air Force identified a need for an improved gun system for its aircraft. While adequate as an air combat / ground attack weapon during World War Two, the Browning M2 .50 caliber machine gun had been rendered obsolete by jet aircraft and needed to be replaced by a weapon with increased range, rate of fire, and projectile lethality. Realizing that singled barreled automatic weapons had essentially reached their design limits, the U.S. Army Ordnance Research and Development Service hit on the idea of re-introducing the multi-barreled rotary weapon invented by Richard J. Gatling in the 1880s. Initial tests proved promising as a vintage Gatling gun, now powered by an electric motor in place of the usual hand crank, was able to achieve rates of fire in excess of 4,000 rounds per minute. 

In 1946 the General Electric company received the contract for this new program, code named "Project Vulcan," and was tasked with producing functional prototypes in a number of calibers for further testing. In 1952 GE produced three different guns; .60 caliber, 20mm, and 27mm. After extensive testing, the 20mm version was selected for further testing to determine its suitability as an aircraft mounted weapon. In 1956 the gun was standardized as the M61 20mm cannon and entered service with both the United States Army and Air Force. 

Description


The current version of the M61, the M61A1, remains relatively unchanged from past models. In its basic form the M61A1 is a six barreled rotary cannon firing a variety of electrically primed 20mm cannon shells. The gun can be mounted either internally in aircraft, or externally in a pod arrangement, and has been mounted on both ground vehicles and trailers for use as an air defense weapon. The M61A1 can be driven hydraulically, electrically, or by ram air and has a variable rate of fire of between 4,000 and 7,200 rounds per minute (depending on individual settings and performance requirements).

M-252 Mortar

Provides field artillery fire support for all Marine Corps Air Ground Task Force organizations.


History


This mortar replaced the previous Marine Corps 81mm mortar in 1986. The M252 is an adaptation of the standard British 81mm mortar developed in the 1970s. It is mostly commonly found in the mortar platoon of an infantry battalion. A Blast Attenuation Device (BAD) is attached to the muzzle of the weapon to reduce the blast effects on the mortar crew. The M252 is ideally suited to support airborne, air assault and light infantry units.

Description


The M252 81mm Medium Extended Range Mortar is a crew-served, medium weight mortar which is highly accurate and provides for a greater range (4,500 meters to 5,650 meters) and lethality than the previous versions. The cannon has a crew-removable breech plug and firing pin. The muzzle end has a short tapered lead-in which acts as a blast attenuator device. The breech end is finned for better cooling. This mortar also uses the standard M64 mortar sight of the 60mm mortar, M224. 

27 December 2010

AN/PVS-5 Goggles


AN/PVS-5 Night Vision Goggles allow the operator to perform tasks at night or under low light level conditions.


History


The AN/PVS-5 individual night vision goggles (NVG) were procured in the early 1980s. A general purpose goggle, they are found in a variety of applications, such as for vehicle drivers, riflemen, and unit leaders. There are differences in each model that require separate model support packages. The bulk of the Marine Corps assets are AN/PVS-5As, although all three models are distributed in the Fleet Marine Force.

Description


AN/PVS-5 Night Vision Goggles are a self-contained, passive, image intensifying, night vision viewing system worn on the head with or without the standard battle helmet or aviator helmet. They are a second generation binocular system capable of providing night vision viewing using available light from the night sky (starlight, moonlight). The built-in infrared light source provides added illumination for close-up work such as map reading. The PVS-5 is equipped with a headstrap to allow "hands-free" operation. Shipping case, soft carrying case, eyepiece and objective lens cap, and arctic adapter assembly are authorized ancillary items. Demist shields are also provided to prevent fogging of the eyepiece.
~Manufacturer: 
IMO, VARO, Garland, Texas; ITT, Roanoke, Virginia; Litton, Tempe, Arizona 

~Length: 
6.5 inches (16.51 centimeters) 


~Width: 
6.8 inches (17.27 centimeters) 


~Height: 
4.7 inches (11.94 centimeters) 

~Weight: 
30 ounces (.85 kilograms) 

~Magnification: 
1x 

~Range, Man-Sized Target: 
Starlight: 50 meters 
Moonlight: 150 meters 


~Field of View: 
40° (circular) 

~Power Source: 
2.7 volt mercury battery, BA-1567/U, BA-5567/U, BA-3058/U 

~Inventory: 
8,200 

~Unit Replacement Cost: 
$5,111

M-240B Machine Gun General purpose 7.62mm machine gun.



History

Entered Army Service: 1997 

Description

The M240B is a general-purpose machine gun. It can be mounted on a bipod, tripod, aircraft, or vehicle. The M240B is a belt-fed, air-cooled, gas-operated, fully automatic machine gun that fires from the open bolt position. This reliable 7.62mm machine gun delivers more energy to the target than the smaller caliber M-249 SAW. It is being issued to infantry, armor, combat engineer, special force/rangers, and selected field artillery units that require medium support fires and will replace the ground-mounted M-60 series machine guns currently in use. 

Ammunition is fed into the weapon from a 100-round bandoleer containing a disintegrating metallic split-link belt. The gas from firing one round provides the energy for firing the next round. Thus, the gun functions automatically as long as it is supplied with ammunition and the trigger is held to the rear. As the gun is fired, the belt links separate and are ejected from the side. Empty cases are ejected from the bottom of the gun. A spare barrel is issued with each M240B, and barrels can be changed quickly as the weapon has a fixed head space. However, barrels from different weapons should not be interchanged. The bore of the barrel is chromium plated, reducing barrel wear to a minimum. 


21 December 2010

New Russian Uniforms Get Troops Sick

New Russian Uniforms Get Troops Sick


Russia’s sharp new military uniforms, created by a top fashion designer, have landed hundreds in hospital after proving too thin to withstand the ferocious winter cold, a state daily said Wednesday.

Rossiyskaya Gazeta reported that between 60 and 250 servicemen have been laid up with everything from flu to pneumonia as Arctic chills sweep through the country’s northern reaches.

“They literally felt naked outside,” the paper quoted the mother of one soldier as saying. “Many of them ended up in hospital. Ours developed pneumonia,” she said of her son.

The government daily said defense officials have admitted not receiving complaints about the uniforms in time to do anything ahead of the winter season.

“It seems that all this happened because of slovenliness on our part,” Joint Staff General Nikolai Makarov told the daily.

Introduced in 2008, the parade uniforms designed by fashion celebrity Valentin Yudashkin are threaded with gold and more shapely and chic, in a throwback to the uniforms of the imperial Tsarist army.

The field versions, meanwhile, are lighter and come with thinner but more mobile boots.

Russia designed its first post-Soviet uniform in the 1990s, but it was unpopular with officers who complained that it made them look like they were serving in a Third World army.

18 December 2010

Marines Want Tanks for Route Security



In an interview about a week ago with the former commander of RCT-7 in Afghanistan, we got another look at how the Marines plan to use the multi-ton behemoths and how successful they’ve been in the past. According to Col. Randy Newman, the tanks help in blowing up hardened positions.

From a firepower standpoint, we used Danish tanks up in Nawa, or up in Nawzad when we first went up there back in — I think it would have been December of ’09; I think December 14th, if I remember right — that we went into Nawzad and we used Danish tanks to help us reduce some hard bunkers that the Taliban and that the enemy had established up there.

But as security takes hold in the south, Newman admits the bunker-busting capabilities of the Abrams tanks will be less in demand.
I think there’s vast areas of desert in southern Helmand Province that the enemy have rat lines in and that the Afghans utilize for lines of communication. Those areas need to be secured, and they also need to have the enemy’s freedom of movement limited on them. I think the tanks would be great assets to use in that area.

So let me get this straight — you want tanks for a mission that’s going away, then you come up with a new mission of route security after you’ve spent the time and money getting 14 of the 70 ton tanks thousands of miles across Pakistan and Afghanistan. Not to call into question the combat tactics of the leathernecks fighting in Helmand, but aren’t there several other options available to reducing a Taliban bunker than an Abrams?

I have the sneaking suspicion that this tank deployment may have the makings of a PR stunt. There’s been some talk about whether the Marine Corps really needs its tank battalions — being as how it says its a lightweight, expeditionary force and all. Could this latest deployment to Afghanistan be a way of demonstrating some kind of relevance?

Seems overkill to me to be perching a  $4.3 million tank to kill IED emplacers along the ring road.

– Christian


source: 
http://defensetech.org 
 

US Missiles Kill 54 Militants in Pakistan


PESHAWAR, Pakistan - Three American missile attacks killed 54 alleged militants Friday close to the Afghan border, an unusually high number of victims that included commanders of a Taliban-allied group that were holding a meeting, Pakistani officials said.
The attacks took place in the Khyber tribal region, which has been rarely struck by American missiles before over the last three years. That could indicate a possible expansion of the CIA-led covert campaign of drone strikes inside Pakistani territory.
The Obama administration has intensified missile attacks in northwest Pakistan since taking office, desperate to weaken insurgent networks there that U.S. officials say are behind much of the violence against U.S. troops just across the frontier in Afghanistan.
The first strike targeted two vehicles in the Sandana area of the Tirah Valley, killing seven militants and wounding another nine. The men were believed to belong to the Pakistani Taliban, one of the country's largest and deadliest insurgent groups.
Later, missiles hit a compound in Speen Darang village where the Lashkar-e-Islam, a Taliban affiliate known to be strong in Khyber, were meeting, killing 32 people, among them commanders. The third strike took place in Narai Baba village and killed 15 militants, the officials said.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.
U.S. officials do not acknowledge firing the missiles, much less comment on who they are targeting. It is impossible to independently report on the aftermath of the attacks because outsiders are not allowed to visit the tribal regions. Human rights groups say there are significant numbers of civilian casualties in the attacks.
Most of the more than 100 missile attacks this year inside Pakistan have taken place in North Waziristan, which is effectively under the control of a mix of Taliban, al-Qaida and related groups. The region, seen as the major militant sanctuary in Pakistan, has yet to see an offensive by the Pakistani military.
On Thursday, President Obama urged Pakistan to do more in tackling extremists in the border lands. Pakistan's army has moved into several tribal regions over the last two years, but says it lacks the troops to launch a North Waziristan operation anytime soon and hold gains it has made elsewhere.
U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan Cameron Munter said the United States would like the Pakistani army to move into North Waziristan "tomorrow" but that he believed Islamabad's stated reasons for not attacking the region immediately.
"I think there is a capacity issue," Munter told reporters Friday. "There is a great amount of capacity being used in holding the ground the Pakistani army has won at great cost."
Pakistani officials protest the missile strikes, but are believed to secretly authorize and provide intelligence on at least some of them. Analysts also say targeting information for many of the attacks is likely to be provided by Pakistani intelligence officials.
Also Friday, police said nine people were killed by mortar rounds fired by suspected Sunni extremists in two attacks in the northwest. The presumed targets in Hangu district and the nearby tribal area of Kurram were Shiite Muslims, said Hangu police chief Abdur Rasheed.
In Hangu, three mortars missed a Shiite mosque, hitting a house, killing six and wounding eight. In Kurram, a mortar hit a house, killing three, he said.
Anti-Shiite militants in Pakistan predate al-Qaida and the Taliban, which are also Sunni. These days, the groups are firmly allied and have overlapping memberships. They generally believe it is acceptable, even meritorious, to kill Pakistan's minority Shiites because they consider them heretics.
source: http://www.military.com/

12 December 2010

Meet Sal Giunta, the first living Medal of Honor winner since Vietnam


On Oct. 25, 2007, on a remote hilltop in Afghanistan's Korengal Valley, Army Staff Sgt. Salvatore Giunta repeatedly ran directly into fire from Taliban insurgents to save the lives of some of his fellow soldiers. In recognition of Giunta's bravery, President Obama on Tuesdays is presenting him with the country's highest military award, the Medal of Honor, making Giunta the first living soldier since the Vietnam War to receive the award given for acts of extreme bravery in the face of almost certain death.

Born and raised in Iowa to parents of Italian descent, the humble Giunta -- who was shot twice during the incident in the valley that day, though neither bullet pierced the body armor he was wearing -- is a reluctant hero. In an interview with Lara Logan that aired on CBS's "60 Minutes" over the weekend, Giunta expressed uneasiness with all the attention he's getting.

"I'm not at peace with that at all," Giunta said. "And coming and talking about it and people wanting to shake my hand because of it, it hurts me, because it's not what I want. And to be with so many people doing so much stuff and then to be singled out--and put forward. I mean, everyone did something."

When Logan asked him to evaluate himself as a soldier, Giunta said, "I'm average. I'm mediocre," adding, "This is only one moment. I don't think I did anything that anyone else I was with wouldn't have done. I was in a position to do it. That was what needed to be done. So that's what I did."

So who is Sal Giunta?
In a short film by war journalist Sebastian Junger called "The Sal Giunta Story," Giunta said that he was still in school and working as a "sandwich artist" at a Subway in Iowa when he joined the Army. Giunta, the son of a teacher and a medical equipment technician, enlisted in November 2003, spurred mainly by the memory of the 9/11 attacks. After attending basic training and infantry school at Fort Benning, Ga., Giunta was deployed to Afghanistan from March 2005 until March 2006 and again from May 2007 until July 2008.

"When I was first deployed, I was excited, I was ready," Giunta told Junger. "'Let's do this.' I got my gun. I jumped out of the planes. 'We're going to war. This is what I came here to do. Let's do this.'"

But as Giunta recounts his initial tour, his gung-ho enthusiasm to fight was soon tempered by the harsh realities of war. Assigned to the Army's 173rd Airborne Brigade, Giunta and his unit spent 15 months in the Korengal Valley, a hotly contested 6-mile-by-1-mile stretch of terrain near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border that became known to American soldiers as the "Valley of Death."

In a 2008 New York Times story on the fighting in the valley, reporter Elizabeth Rubin starkly depicted the conflict, and particularly the opposition: "The Korengal fighters are fierce, know the terrain and watch the Americans' every move. On their hand-held radios, the old jihadis call the Americans 'monkeys,' infidels,' 'bastards' and 'the kids.' It's psychological warfare; they know the Americans monitor their radio chatter."

According to Sgt. Brett Perry, one of the soldiers interviewed in the "60 Minutes" profile of Giunta, it wasn't uncommon for American soldiers stationed in the valley to hold off going to the bathroom until nighttime. Otherwise, he said, they ran too great a risk of drawing enemy fire by moving around in the daylight. "That 15 months in the Korengal Valley, it was hell on Earth," Perry said.

Logan asked Giunta whether he ever woke up wondering "What the hell am I doing here?" That was his first thought every single morning, he told Logan: "We know what we're doing there, but: What the hell are we doing here?"

In another New York Times story about the valley's events, Giunta said of the local insurgents: "These people won't leave this valley. They have been here far before I could fathom an Afghanistan."

On the day his heroics earned him the Medal of Honor, Giunta and his unit were ambushed on a plateau some 8,000 feet up in the mountains on the last day of a six-day offensive to try to take control of the area. Cold and exhausted, they'd slept in ditches the five previous nights. Here's how the White House describes what happened next:

When an insurgent force ambush split Specialist Giunta's squad into two groups, he exposed himself to enemy fire to pull a comrade back to cover. Later, while engaging the enemy and attempting to link up with the rest of his squad, Specialist Giunta noticed two insurgents carrying away a fellow soldier. He immediately engaged the enemy, killing one and wounding the other, and provided medical aid to his wounded comrade while the rest of his squad caught up and provided security. His courage and leadership while under extreme enemy fire were integral to his platoon's ability defeat an enemy ambush and recover a fellow American paratrooper from enemy hands.

As uncomfortable as he appears to be in the spotlight, the 25-year-old Giunta had better get used to it: Now part of an elite fraternity, for the rest of his life he'll be seated in a prominent spot at presidential inaugurations and be honored countless times at military events. He is currently stationed in Italy with his wife, Jennifer, whom he married recently after dating for several years.

03 December 2010

N. Korea Touts Nuclear Clout as China Urges Talks



SEOUL - North Korea boasted Nov. 20 of running "thousands" of nuclear centrifuges, a week after launching a deadly artillery attack on South Korea, as China pressed for six-nation crisis talks.
State media in the North, which has already tested two atomic bombs made from plutonium, said "many thousands of centrifuges" are operating to enrich uranium at a new plant that it claims is for peaceful energy purposes.
The country first disclosed the new plant to U.S. experts less than two weeks before its artillery assault, which killed two civilians and two marines on South Korea's Yeonpyeong island near the disputed Yellow Sea border.
Experts and senior U.S. officials fear the plant could easily be configured to make weapons-grade uranium.
Analysts say the nuclear revelation and artillery attack appeared coordinated to pressure Washington and Seoul into resuming dialogue and aid, and possibly to bolster the credentials of leader-in-waiting Kim Jong-Un.
For a third day, the U.S. and South Korean navies staged war games far south of the border involving 11 ships, air power and 7,300 personnel.
South Korea is separately strengthening artillery and troop numbers on front-line islands near the tense frontier. It will hold more drills next week close to the border, though not near Yeonpyeong, the Yonhap news agency said.
The North's state media blasted the naval drill, calling it provocative and war-mongering. "We have full deterrence to destroy our enemies at once," said cabinet newspaper Minju Chosun. "If the U.S. and South Korean enemies dare to fire one shell in our territory and sea territory, they will have to pay for it."
Citing a statement from the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Yonhap said more live-fire exercises would take place from December 6-12, including near Daechong island close to the frontier.
China has refused publicly to condemn its ally for the shelling, instead suggesting emergency consultations among envoys to the stalled six-nation talks on the North's nuclear disarmament.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said Nov. 30 it was imperative "to bring the issue back to the track of dialogue and consultation" as soon as possible.
The White House, which had already dismissed such talks as a "PR activity" unless Pyongyang moderates its activities, said that China had an "obligation" to press North Korea to end its "belligerent behavior".
"The Chinese have a duty and obligation" to impress "on the North Koreans that their belligerent behavior has to come to an end," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs told reporters.
Japan's foreign minister has also faulted China's proposal.
South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak, in a toughly worded speech Nov. 29, did not mention China's suggestion in what some saw as an implicit rejection.
"We should recognize that [South Korea] is confronting the world's most belligerent group," he told a cabinet meeting Nov. 30.
Almost 100 South Korean marine veterans landed on Yeonpyeong island on Nov. 30, vowing to defend it, ferret out spies - and feed abandoned dogs.
"Execute Kim Jong-Il, Jong-Un," read a banner they erected after arriving by ferry, in reference to the North's leader and heir apparent.
Elsewhere, activists sent balloons with anti-Pyongyang leaflets, DVDs and one-dollar bills floating into the North across the heavily fortified frontier, urging people to rise up against the hard-line regime.
With the nuclear disclosure and the bombardment, the North's leaders "demonstrated their ability to create trouble more or less with impunity", North Korea expert Andrei Lankov wrote in a commentary.
Diplomatic efforts were continuing, however. Seoul's Foreign Ministry said its minister Kim Sung-Hwan would attend a Kazakhstan summit of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe on Dec. 1-2 where he was expected to meet U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.
And two top North Korean officials arrived in Beijing on Nov. 30, South Korean and Japanese media said.


02 December 2010

Top Chinese Leader Meets With N. Korea Official


BEIJING - China's top legislator held talks with his North Korean counterpart on Dec. 1 and said Beijing would maintain friendly ties with Pyongyang, state media said, amid high tensions in the region.
The meeting, broadcast on China's state television, is the first reported contact between senior Chinese and North Korean leaders since Pyongyang stunned the world last week with a deadly artillery strike on a South Korean island.
"To continuously consolidate and develop friendly and cooperative Sino-North Korean ties is the unswerving strategic policy of the Chinese party and government," Wu Bangguo told his North Korean counterpart Choe Thae-Bok.
Choe, chairman of North Korea's Supreme People's Assembly, is on an official visit to China that will end Dec. 4. Wu and Choe made no mention of the current tense situation in the comments broadcast on state television.
North Korea's shelling on Nov. 23 left four people dead and led to increased tensions in the region.
The U.S. and South Korea responded to the incident by staging a major joint show of naval strength intended to deter Pyongyang from repeating last week's artillery bombardment.
China, meanwhile, has come under growing international pressure to step in forcefully to restrain the unpredictable regime in Pyongyang but has so far refrained from joining world criticism of its ally.
Media reports have said that Kim Yong-Il, the head of the international department of North Korea's ruling Workers' Party, is also in Beijing but there has been no official confirmation of the visit.
According to other unconfirmed reports, China's top foreign policymaker Dai Bingguo is due to visit North Korea this week.

01 December 2010

Obama Pledges to Defend South Korea


Associated Press

WASHINGTON -- President Obama on Tuesday pledged the United States would stand "shoulder to shoulder" with South Korea after what the White House branded a provocative, outrageous attack by North Korea on its neighbor. Its options limited, the U.S. sought a diplomatic rather a military response to one of the most ominous clashes between the Koreas in decades.

South Korea found the burned bodies Wednesday of two islanders killed in a North Korean artillery attack, marking the first civilian deaths in the incident and dramatically escalating the tensions in the region's latest crisis.
The South Korean Coast Guard pulled the bodies of two men, believed in their 60s, from a destroyed construction site on the tiny island of Yeonpyeong near the disputed maritime border with North Korea.

"South Korea is our ally. It has been since the Korean war," Obama said in his first comments about the North Korean shelling of a South Korean island early Tuesday. "And we strongly affirm our commitment to defend South Korea as part of that alliance."

Working to head off any escalation, the U.S. did not reposition any of its 29,000 troops in the South or make other military moves after North Korea fired salvos of shells into the island, setting off an artillery duel between the two sides.

The president, speaking to ABC News, would not speculate when asked about military options.

Obama called South Korean President Lee Myung-bak later Tuesday night, saying the U.S. would work with the international community to strongly condemn the attack that killed the two South Koreans and injured many more, the White House said.

The White House said the two presidents agreed to hold combined military exercises and enhanced training in the days ahead to continue the close security cooperation between the two countries.

Obama assured Lee that "the United States stands shoulder to shoulder with our close friend and ally, the Republic of Korea," the White House statement said.

"President Obama said that North Korea must stop its provocative actions, which will only lead to further isolation, and fully abide by the terms of the armistice agreement and its obligations under international law," the statement said.

The U.S. has relatively few options when dealing with the Pyongyang government. Military action is particularly unappealing, since the unpredictable North possesses crude nuclear weapons as well as a huge standing army. North Korea exists largely outside the system of international financial and diplomatic institutions that the U.S. has used as leverage in dealing with other hostile countries, including Iran.

North Korea has also resisted pressure from its major ally, China, which appears to be nervous about the signs of instability in its neighbor.
"We strongly condemn the attack and we are rallying the international community to put pressure on North Korea," Obama said in the ABC interview, specifically citing the need for China's help. Obama said every nation in the region must know "this is a serious and ongoing threat."

An administration official said Tuesday evening that U.S. officials in Washington and in Beijing were appealing strongly to China to condemn the attack by arguing that it was an act that threatened the stability of the entire region, not just the Korean peninsula. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates phoned South Korea's defense minister to express sympathy for the deaths of two of the South's marines in the artillery shelling of a small South Korean island and to express appreciation "for the restraint shown to date" by the South's government, a Pentagon spokesman said.

Obama called North Korea's action "just one more provocative incident" and said he would consult with Lee on an appropriate response.

In his phone call to South Korea's defense minister, Gates said the U.S. viewed recent attacks as a violation of the armistice agreement that ended the Korea War in 1953, and he reiterated the U.S. commitment to South Korea's defense, said Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell.
Obama was awakened at 4 a.m. Tuesday with the news. He went ahead with an Indiana trip focused on the economy before returning to the White House after dark.

State Department spokesman Mark Toner said the U.S. would take a "deliberate approach" in response to what he also called provocative North Korean behavior. At the same time, other administration officials, speaking on condition of anonymity to describe the emerging strategy, said the White House was determined to end a diplomatic cycle that officials said rewards North Korean brinksmanship.

In the past, the U.S. and other nations have sweetened offers to North Korea as it has developed new missiles and prototype nuclear weapons. North Korea is now demanding new one-on-one talks with the United States, which rejects that model in favor of group diplomacy that includes North Korea's protector, China.

"We're not going to respond willy-nilly," Toner said. "We believe that it's important that we keep a unified and measured approach going forward."

Both Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill accused North Korea of starting the skirmish.
The violence comes as the North prepares for a dynastic change in leadership and faces a winter of food and electricity shortages. It is the latest in a series of confrontations that have aggravated tensions on the divided peninsula.

The incident also follows the North's decision last week to give visiting Western scientists a tour of a secret uranium enrichment facility, which may signal an expansion of the North's nuclear weapons program. Six weeks ago, North Korean leader Kim Jong Il anointed his youngest son, Kim Jong Un, as his heir apparent.

The administration official said the U.S. did not interpret North Korea's aggression as a desire to go to war, but as yet another effort to extract concessions from the international community.
Pentagon spokesman Col. Dave Lapan said no new equipment or personnel have been relocated to South Korea, while Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz seemed to shrug off the latest incident as something that Seoul can handle on its own.

"The North Koreans have undertaken over time a number of provocations that have manifested themselves in different ways," Schwartz said.

The USS George Washington carrier strike group will join South Korean naval forces in the waters west of the Korean peninsula Nov. 28-Dec. 1 to conduct air defense and surface warfare readiness training that had been planned well before Tuesday's attack, the White House said.
The artillery exchange was only the latest serious incident between the two nations. In March, a South Korean naval ship, the Cheonan, exploded and sank in the Yellow Sea, killing 46 sailors. South Korea accused the North of torpedoing the vessel; the North denied the allegation.

In August, the South Korean military reported that the North had fired 110 artillery rounds into the Yellow Sea near the disputed sea border but said the shells fell harmlessly into North Korean waters.

South Korean officials said Tuesday's clash came after Pyongyang warned the South to halt military drills near the small South Korean island of Yeonpyeong.
When Seoul refused and began firing artillery into the water near the disputed sea border, the North bombarded Yeonpyeong, which houses South Korean military installations and a small civilian population.

Recent joint U.S.-Korean naval exercises and strenuous denunciations of the North may only have provoked the regime in Pyongyang. Some experts say the secretive regime may be trying to promote Kim Jong Un as a worthy successor who, like his father, is capable of standing up to the U.S.

"I think it may be all wrapped in this succession planning, in the way the North is looking at it," said Robert RisCassi, a retired Army general who commanded U.S. forces in Korea from 1990-93.
The U.S.-South Korea exercises also angered China. Beijing is regarded as the key to any long-term diplomatic bargain to end North Korea's nuclear program and reduce tensions on the peninsula.

But U.S. officials say the North's motives and internal politics are opaque and sometimes appear inconsistent.

"I don't know the answer to any question about North Korea that begins with the word 'why,' " Gates told reporters Monday.

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