North Korea puts troops on alert, warns of war

SEOUL, South Korea -  North Korea put its troops on alert and cut the last hot line to Seoul on Monday as the American and South Korean militaries began joint maneuvers. The communist regime warned that even the slightest provocation could trigger war.

The North stressed that provocation would include any attempt to interfere with its impending launch of a satellite into orbit. U.S. and Japanese officials suspect the launch is a cover for a test of a long-range attack missile and have suggested they might move to intercept the rocket.

“Shooting our satellite for peaceful purposes will precisely mean a war,” North Korea’s military threatened in a statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency. Any interception attempt will draw “a just, retaliatory strike,” it said.

The North has been on a steady retreat from reconciliation since President Lee Myung-bak took office in the South a year ago. After Lee said the North must continue dismantling its nuclear program if it wants aid, Pyongyang cut ties, suspended joint projects and stepped up its belligerence rhetoric.

“The danger of a military conflict is further increasing than ever before on the Korean Peninsula because of the saber rattling which involves armed forces huge enough to fight a war,” the North’s news agency warned as Pyongyang put its armed forces on standby for combat.