Article snippet: North Korea’s yet-to-materialize threat of a “Christmas gift” for the United States is keeping the world on edge. Christmas came and went with no indication of military action or even fiery rhetoric from North Korea. But U.S. officials have said they will be on high alert through New Year’s Day with the possibility the unspecified gift could be delivered at a later date. In a sign of the global anxiety created by Pyongyang, Japanese public broadcaster NHK sent out a false alert Thursday saying North Korea had fired a missile that landed in waters east of Japan’s coastline. Twenty-three minutes later, NHK sent out another alert saying the previous bulletin was “incorrect.” But for many North Korea watchers and those on social media, it was a very long 23 minutes. “At this particular moment, a false alarm like this can start a war,” MIT professor Vipin Narang tweeted Thursday after apologizing for initially sharing the NHK alert. Tensions started building earlier this month when a statement carried by North Korean state media warned it was the United States’s choice what its “Christmas gift” would be. “What is left to be done now is the U.S. option and it is entirely up to the U.S. what Christmas gift it will select to get,” Ri Thae Song, a senior North Korean diplomat, said in the statement. The statement did not specify what the gift might be, nor did it specify whether it would come exactly on Christmas Day or if the phrase “Christmas gift” was more of a rhetori... Link to the full article to read more