07 January 2016•Update: 07 January 2016
SEOUL
South Korea will respond to North Korea's claimed hydrogen bomb test with psychological warfare, according to Seoul's presidential office Thursday.
Loudspeakers placed at the border are set to resume blaring anti-North propaganda from noon Friday -- such broadcasts have provoked great displeasure in Pyongyang in the past.
Deputy chief of national security Cho Tae-yong told reporters that North Korea's nuclear test blast this week was "a grave violation" of August's bilateral cooperation deal.
It could spell a repeat of the high tensions seen in 2013 following the North's previous test, though relations have never been easy in the years since the 1950-53 Korean War.
A defense ministry representative also revealed at a briefing Thursday that South Korea is discussing with the United States which military "assets" to deploy.
The U.S. already has nearly 30,000 military personnel stationed in the South, but additional deployment options could range from nuclear-powered submarines to B-52 bombers.
While experts across the world have been questioning whether the size of Wednesday's blast matched North Korea's hydrogen bomb claim, political pressure was building in Seoul over the best way to deter future provocations.
Ruling Saenuri Party officials suggested that South Korea should develop its own nuclear arsenal, despite U.S. opposition to anything other than peaceful atomic energy use in the country, which is committed to the Non-Proliferation Treaty.
"It is time for us to peacefully arm ourselves with nukes from the perspective of self-defense to fight against North Korea's terror and destruction," floor leader Won Yoo-cheol was quoted by local news agency Yonhap as telling senior party members.
Saenuri chief policymaker Kim Jung-hoon agreed with the need to pursue alternatives to the current pattern of stop-start dialogue with Pyongyang, pointing out that "China, Russia and North Korea are in fact armed with nuclear devices, and Japan is enriching uranium."
The widely expected scenario beyond the loudspeaker broadcasts was for South Korea to join the international community in adding to a growing list of sanctions against the North.
