Sleeping a little better.

I was interested in seeing in the news today that South Korea have added their own version of the cruise missile into their military arsenal. The Hyunmu-3C missile has a range of 1,500 kilometres and a payload of 450 kilograms, which I’m sure is enough explosive force to knock a North Korean solider off his bike (and probably a lot more).  It is the longest range missile the South Korea military possess, though far short of the North Korean’s Taepodong-2 missile, which has a range of 6,700 kilometres, and based loosely on a Scud rocket design (so I’m guessing a rocket aimed at South Korea would most likely ended up hitting my apartment block here in Beijing).

Keeping in mind that North Korea, as well as China and Russia, both lie within 1,500 kilometres of South Korea, one has to argue do they need a missile to travel any further? No one really has any qualms with South Korea, except of course the North, but I’m sure a few Hyunmu-3C missiles would be much more effective than the North Korean equivalent.

I do wonder, however, how well protected I am here in Beijing. Being so close to both North and South Korea, as well as the always dodgy Russian’s, it’s not that incomprehensible to think that China may get hit with a stray missile. So how would China react? Well in the worst case scenario, I can see China rolling out some of it’s ‘Dong-Feng 5‘ missiles, all carrying 3,000 kT nuclear warheads with a range of 13,000 kilometres. Probably a little extreme, but a good enough deterrent to ensure one accurately spends the time pointing their own missiles in the right direction.

Combined with an army over 2.5 million people, and a defensive budget of $700 million US dollars this year alone, I’m actually starting to feel rather safe here in the good old People’s Republic!