North Korea vows Nuclear attack on U.S., targets D.C.

[machievelli]

I feel like this is big news, I'm not very plugged in to the news right now so I can't tell how big of an impact this is making but they're basically threatening war right? What's our terror alert right now? I also feel like this is a threat against the west, not just a threat against the US. Like, pushing back basically, against all the Western based globalization.

 

You know, if it were three decades ago, 'Western Globilization' would be a real problem. However both China and India have joined that mix, so it isn't just us horrible Europeans and Americans anymore.

 

As for Korea, it's simple. The US, pushed the non-proliferation pact. The UN ratified it. if you look at this link; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_on_the_Non-Proliferation_of_Nuclear_Weapons you will see that except for five nations world wide, it was accepted. This is not, as that idiot I argued with back in the last century to stop other nations from advancing, it's to stabilize a very volatile issue.

 

Korea is catching flak because up until 2000, They were signatories. Under the treaty you are required to first publicly repudiate it, then after 90 days, you can begin production or design. Korea was, in other words, caught with their hands in the cookie jar, denied, it, whined about how mean those horrible nasty Americans are (It was the UN that caught them, and ordered them to cease and desist, not us) then boasted about what they had, and now, what they will do with it.

 

As I also pointed out in another post above, the reason the UN is standing back like the mother saying 'wait til your father gets home', it's because if Korea launches at anyone, they will expect us to clean up the mess, remove the problem, then get yelled at for over reacting.

[Bob Saget]

Hey guys, this just came in

 

http://www.cnn.com/2013/03/11/world/asia/north-korea-armistice/index.html?eref=mrss_igoogle_cnn

 

so now the lines are being drawn. Ready for another korean war?

[machievelli]

Hey guys, this just came in

 

http://www.cnn.com/2013/03/11/world/asia/north-korea-armistice/index.html?eref=mrss_igoogle_cnn

 

so now the lines are being drawn. Ready for another korean war?

 

This is like watching two kids pushing each other in a school yard even after the teacher has told them to stop.

 

What the news story ignored:

 

Yes, the US and Russia agreed on an independant Korea, but the 38th was supposed to be whee the two armies met, not a nationl border. The problem was the Russians had already groomed Kim Il Sung to be the leader of the new nation,just as we had done the same with Rhee. When they met, the two outside nations refused to back off, so Korea has the distincton of beinjg the only nation not part of the war (Beyond having been subject to the Japanese) that was divided by fiat.

 

As for surprise...

 

In Decembe of 1949, the American Secretary of State, at a press banquet drew a line across the Pacific coast, labeling any nations we considered vital at that time to our nation's interests. These included Singapore, Taiwan, the Phillipines, and Japan. Notice the one nation not lised. This was duly

reported by the Press.

 

At that time, the North Koreans had been armed up to the standards of the Warsaw Pact. South Korea on the other hand, had not. We were too worried about Rhee deciding on his own reunification plans, so they were armed only up to the standards of a defensive force, little artillery, and no tanks larger than the M26 light tank. The US forces there were well armed, but this was a peacetime army under a Secretary of Defense who had cut military spending literally to the bone, so while well armed, training had been cut back due to expense. Picture a US army unit from 1936 when you had trucks marked 'tank' because you didn't have the fuel or ammunition for real live fire exercises.

 

Add to this the fact that few aircraft were assigned to Korea itself, most stationed in Japan instead, and we had no heavy tanks even there because American tanks were too heavy to cross the bridges in Japan. They were in Subic Bay and Manila. So our air force is in the position of Germany during the Blitz; having to waste half their flight time going to and from the front, and any tanks capable of taking on a T34 weeks away.

 

The only reason it took seven months to attack was because it took that long for NK to do the preparations for it.

 

The story also ignores that when the war started and the Air Force was asked what they could do, the answer was 'Nuke 'em into ther stone age'. We were the only country in 1950 with both nukes and a delivery sysem.

 

This time around? NK has two nuclear neighbors. China does not want a possible nuclear war on their border, so they aren't going to back NK, just as they have not tried to stop sanctions.

 

So if Kim wants to slaughter off his entire nation, he has a lot of people ready to beat him to a pulp. That's why I said it won't be just US warheads hitting him.

[VeniVidiVicous]

@Bob Saget

 

Interestingly the European news network did a different piece entirely: http://www.euronews.com/2013/03/11/us-and-south-korea-begin-joint-military-exercises/

 

While not a fan of North Korea I think they'd be suicidal to kick off a war while the US is backing SK.

 

Keep in mind that you are talking about a government that brutalizes its people on the slightest hint of political dissidence; that has *labor camps* with the most horrible conditions; that is suspected of having some of the highest counts of human rights violations in recent history.

 

Disregarding all that, within the context of morality, they signed their rights to be undisturbed in their evil dickery away when they joined the UN.

 

The point i'm trying to make I suppose is that when these sanctions are imposed on countries (like Iraq in the 90's for example), it's never the political elite but the poorer people there that feel the squeeze.

I suppose i'm saying two wrongs don't make it right.

[Tommycat]

@Bob Saget

 

Interestingly the European news network did a different piece entirely: http://www.euronews.com/2013/03/11/us-and-south-korea-begin-joint-military-exercises/

 

While not a fan of North Korea I think they'd be suicidal to kick off a war while the US is backing SK.

 

 

 

The point i'm trying to make I suppose is that when these sanctions are imposed on countries (like Iraq in the 90's for example), it's never the political elite but the poorer people there that feel the squeeze.

I suppose i'm saying two wrongs don't make it right.

 

Um... okay. Soo the story you posted left off the fact that the US and South Korean military do this every year, and informed the North Koreans that they were performing these exercises. It also had hardly ANY detail at all, and seemed more about the PACIFIST DEMONSTRATION than the situation. Sooo if you want to be less informed I guess Euronews should be your source.

[VeniVidiVicous]

@Tommycat

 

Well it was more informative about the "pacifist demonstration" then the Fox News piece was seeing as it wasn't mentioned. Pure speculation on whether they could nuke Washington is much more eye-catching.

Kim Jong-un's comment about these military drills being rehearsals for invasion isn't discredited just because they do these drills annually, you could argue that adds credence to his statement.

[Tommycat]

Actually it doesn't. They are doing nothing different than normal, and haven't attacked yet. It's a practice defensive drill designed to retaliate should NK attack. Same drill as always.

 

And honestly, Fox at least had info and quotes from the AP.

 

My guess is the reason none of the others mentioned the pacifist demonstration is that it also happens EVERY YEAR.

[urluckyday]

Now we have Kim Jong Un, raised to believe his word is law in NK, and believes it should be with the world. Again, as I mentioned, all of NK's problems are caused by the US. Starvation in his own country, caused by sellling food overseas to 'prove' his nations productivity, is explained to his people by us not allowing them to buy their needs. The UN would not be warning about sanctions if the US did not demand them.

 

I fail to see how all the problems in NK are caused by the US. It's a well-known fact that even with our sanctions, the US sends (or up until recently they did) food, medicine, etc. as aid to the people of North Korea quite regularly. It's also known that the government/military (whatever you want to call it) steals the aid and sells it on the black market to its people.

 

As oppressed and isolated as the general population of NK is, they're still human, and they're not stupid. The US sends their aid with clearly marked packaging and when they finally get their hands on the food/medicine, they probably ask themselves why they are getting this stuff from the US when all their lives they've been told that the US is absolute evil. Regardless, it's the fact that they have families to feed, and they know that they can't do anything about it.

 

The US isn't the one who put into place a tyrannical dictator who rules with an iron fist (I think it's safe to say that he's up there with someone like Stalin or worse). People blame the United States for things like this for one reason or another...but when will people realize that the US, for so many years, had the right idea in challenging the idea of Communism (I'm not saying the ways in which it was challenged were always acceptable). People get sucked into an idea that cannot exist in the real world, and they give power to people like Kim Jong-Un.

 

North Korea is in the situation that it's in because the dynasty that continues to rule over the people truly believe that they are gods among men. The oppression of the people is not the result of the United States imposing its will upon what you paint as a helpless country.

[machievelli]

I fail to see how all the problems in NK are caused by the US. It's a well-known fact that even with our sanctions, the US sends (or up until recently they did) food, medicine, etc. as aid to the people of North Korea quite regularly. It's also known that the government/military (whatever you want to call it) steals the aid and sells it on the black market to its people.

 

As oppressed and isolated as the general population of NK is, they're still human, and they're not stupid. The US sends their aid with clearly marked packaging and when they finally get their hands on the food/medicine, they probably ask themselves why they are getting this stuff from the US when all their lives they've been told that the US is absolute evil. Regardless, it's the fact that they have families to feed, and they know that they can't do anything about it.

 

The US isn't the one who put into place a tyrannical dictator who rules with an iron fist (I think it's safe to say that he's up there with someone like Stalin or worse). People blame the United States for things like this for one reason or another...but when will people realize that the US, for so many years, had the right idea in challenging the idea of Communism (I'm not saying the ways in which it was challenged were always acceptable). People get sucked into an idea that cannot exist in the real world, and they give power to people like Kim Jong-Un.

 

North Korea is in the situation that it's in because the dynasty that continues to rule over the people truly believe that they are gods among men. The oppression of the people is not the result of the United States imposing its will upon what you paint as a helpless country.

 

You obviously didn't read the comment I had made earlier. I was not saying we caused their problems, I said that the regime in charge has blamed us for all their problems, and has for sixty years. The Great Patriotic War was lost because we stuck our noses into it and convinced the UN to assist. This is actually close to accurate because the troops were supplied mainly by US dollars, guns and equipment. They also claim we have threatened them constantly since then, refused them their needs, which you pointed out is so much BS, and that the UN would not be sanctioning them now without American demands.

 

@Tommycat

 

Well it was more informative about the "pacifist demonstration" then the Fox News piece was seeing as it wasn't mentioned. Pure speculation on whether they could nuke Washington is much more eye-catching.

Kim Jong-un's comment about these military drills being rehearsals for invasion isn't discredited just because they do these drills annually, you could argue that adds credence to his statement.

 

The US practiced Operation Reforger; a massive deployment of US troops from the US to Europe every year from 1965 until the Wall came down, and the Russians never 'assumed' it meant we were preparing to attack. As with the exercises in Korea, we did notify the Russians that the exercises were scheduled, so accusing the US and SK of 'preparing for invasion' is ridiculous. It was like the claim that the Korean Airliner Voskaya PVO shot down was really an RC135.

 

The primary reason it's BS is because for the US and SK to have a reasonable chance of success, the SK would have to do a full mobilization, and there is no way SK could do that without it being noticed. You're talking about 8 million troops, and that is about 15% of their population, and forty percent of their workforce.

 

Editing, Checked the CIA factbook:

 

NK Manpower available for military service without major dislocation of the economy:

males age 16-49: 4,836,567

females age 16-49: 5,230,137 (2010 est.)

 

Full

Males 6,515,279

females 6,418,693

 

SK

Manpower available for military service without major dislocation of the economy:

 

males age 16-49: 13,185,794

females age 16-49: 12,423,496 (2010 est.)

Manpower fit for military service:

Full

males age 16-49: 10,864,566

females age 16-49: 10,168,709 (2010 est.)

 

But neither country has enough equipment for a full call up except for just handing everyone a rifle and saying 'go forth'.

[greggomonkey]

keeping in mind that north korea has an alliance with china that wouljd render The US and China effectively at war. unless they defied the truce china would be at war as well. I have a feeling that given The debt China is owed that NK probably gets a silent slap from china telling them to grow up

[machievelli]

keeping in mind that north korea has an alliance with china that wouljd render The US and China effectively at war. unless they defied the truce china would be at war as well. I have a feeling that given The debt China is owed that NK probably gets a silent slap from china telling them to grow up

 

If you have the chance, read Red Phoenix by Larry Bond where he portrays a second Korean War, both China and Russia (Still communist) assisted as they had before. However when Kin Jong Il (Still not the Dear Leader as he was called) refused to admit defeat, his allies abandoned them.

 

Now look at the modern day. Korea has probably already tried the quiet slap both with Jong Il and his son, and it slowed them down but didn't stop them.

 

Neither China nor Russia wants a a nuclear war on their border. If Korea pushes enough that one occurs, they will have as I pointed out, three nuclear powers ready to settle their hash.

 

China may have a mutual defense treaty, but as Tom Clancy commented about the constitution; 'that is not a suicide pact

[greggomonkey]

agreed, I just think that even as stupid as they are they will eventually come into the 'issue' that the US and Russia had during the cold war. If they press that button then they start a war where they risk all of humanity, not just their country.

[machievelli]

agreed, I just think that even as stupid as they are they will eventually come into the 'issue' that the US and Russia had during the cold war. If they press that button then they start a war where they risk all of humanity, not just their country.

 

At the moment, Korea is at the same point as the Russians When we fought the last Korean war, except for one point:

 

At that time, there were only two nuclear powers; the US and the Soviets. The Soviets had finally developed their delivery system; the Tupolev 4. Like Korea, they had help from of all people, us.Truman was trying to maintain our industrial presence, and one way we did was start selling things like airliners overseas, starting with the Model 377 later named the Stratocruiser. The Russians, who were desperately reverse engineering the B29s that had been interned in their country bought several sets of landing gear, the one portion of the plane they had the most problems with, and had revealed it just the previous year.

 

Hower in 1948, while Russia was boasting about having the atom bomb, we quiet;ly announced the development of the Hydrogen bomb, and they knew we were already developing tactical nukes that could be carried by light bombers and fighters.

 

As I jokingly told a friend when his daddy made the same threats; this is like a street gang deciding to take on the local police of a major city. Kim doesn't have the warheads or delivery systems needed to deal a knockout blow(That is the one point I mentioned above). He'll get his few licks in, and we'll remove his country from the map. We won't reach the Mutually Assured Destruction level with them for twenty years. Before that, it will be a losing proposition. So threatening us doesn't help the situation.

 

This is exactly what the Nonproliferation treaty was written and passed to stop, because every new nuclear power (By estimates made by analysts, if it had not been passed there would be 40 nuclear powers now instead of eight) throws the balance of power and threat off even more. You don't have to worry much about the ones who have had them the longest; we've been there and done that already, and know it's a great deterrent, but little else. It's the new ones who want to threaten.

[Scorge]

Is this a hoax?

[machievelli]

Is this a hoax?

 

On whose part? We have two Generations of the Kim family threatening the US with Nuclear annihilation, even if they can't pull it off beyond some casualties. The latest (More logical) threat is that they will attack US Bases.

 

The problem with that is not US casualties, but the fact that the 'bases' are in countries that are technically neutral, the Philippines, Japan and Okinawa, as well as South Korea. One Military Airlift command base happens to be Yokota, just outside of Tokyo, so they are threatening about 10,000 Americans, and several millions whose only crime is they can't demand that we leave.

[JesusIsGonnaOwnSatan]

It's in these kinds of situations you need some Jedi to go sort things out..

 

Either help negotiate some peace, or help take down the rogue government.

Maybe even infiltrate + document some concentration camps...

 

[scramjetbooster]

It's in these kinds of situations you need some Jedi to go sort things out..

 

Either help negotiate some peace...

That won't go well.

 

...or help take down the rogue government.

That's more like it.

[machievelli]

It's in these kinds of situations you need some Jedi to go sort things out..

 

Either help negotiate some peace, or help take down the rogue government.

Maybe even infiltrate + document some concentration camps...

 

 

Two things:first, according the the UN Charter, going to war with another nation because you do not like their regime and intend to replace it is defined as an aggressive, or illegal war.That is why I shook my head when the Shrub stated that we fought the war with Iraq to remove Saddam. The UN can declare North Korea a rogue nation, and that still doesn't give us a legal right to take them down unless the Security Council votes to do so.

 

Second, while the very term 'concentration camp' summons up visions of Auschwitz and Dachau, the fact that Korea might have them is incidental; Under the same Charter, it is defined as an internal police matter, and the UN will not condemn them for that.

[JesusIsGonnaOwnSatan]

Two things:first, according the the UN Charter, going to war with another nation because you do not like their regime and intend to replace it is defined as an aggressive, or illegal war.That is why I shook my head when the Shrub stated that we fought the war with Iraq to remove Saddam. The UN can declare North Korea a rogue nation, and that still doesn't give us a legal right to take them down unless the Security Council votes to do so.

 

Second, while the very term 'concentration camp' summons up visions of Auschwitz and Dachau, the fact that Korea might have them is incidental; Under the same Charter, it is defined as an internal police matter, and the UN will not condemn them for that.

 

AFAIK while Jedi report to the Republic, they primarily operate on a greater moral-principle directive (they are after all, a religious order). I can't place the exact situations, but I'm pretty sure there have been incidents in SW fiction where Jedi have foregone legalities to act on their moral judgements, such as freeing enslaved peoples.

 

Thus the joke about them taking down the government.

 

But notice i said that they document concentration camps, as opposed to freeing the people inside. The idea is that they take recordings of what goes on inside the camps, and then make them available to the wider body of political units (in this case, the nations of our planet) in order to spur action - perhaps even from parts of the Republic (as much interest that can be generated for a backwater planet like ours. ).

[machievelli]

AFAIK while Jedi report to the Republic, they primarily operate on a greater moral-principle directive (they are after all, a religious order). I can't place the exact situations, but I'm pretty sure there have been incidents in SW fiction where Jedi have foregone legalities to act on their moral judgements, such as freeing enslaved peoples.

 

Thus the joke about them taking down the government.

 

But notice i said that they document concentration camps, as opposed to freeing the people inside. The idea is that they take recordings of what goes on inside the camps, and then make them available to the wider body of political units (in this case, the nations of our planet) in order to spur action - perhaps even from parts of the Republic (as much interest that can be generated for a backwater planet like ours. ).

 

What I mean is that a concentration camp, for whatever reason, including

'ethnic cleansing', is defined as an internal police matter, and therefore not covered by international law.

 

Put it this way; if the Nazis were running a nation today, and slaughtering Jews with gay abandon, yet we were not at war with them, we could not stop them by declaring war, because the camps are not a valid reason to do so.

[JesusIsGonnaOwnSatan]

What I mean is that a concentration camp, for whatever reason, including

'ethnic cleansing', is defined as an internal police matter, and therefore not covered by international law.

 

Put it this way; if the Nazis were running a nation today, and slaughtering Jews with gay abandon, yet we were not at war with them, we could not stop them by declaring war, because the camps are not a valid reason to do so.

 

By 'action' I mean political pressure, as opposed to military aggression.

As in, sanction the crap out of them in every economical context, while simultaneously appealing to the moral judgements of individual populations across the planet (with the hypothetical documentations of the camps) in order to increase the likelihood of the sanctions being enacted by participating countries, governmental departments, and relevant individual people.

Basically the same idea as tree-huggers breaking into a factory farm, taking videos of animal cruelty, and urging people not to buy products from that farm.

 

Could also just have the Jedi destroy the camps, free people, and start a revolution - all the while acting own their own personal mandates as opposed to that of any political entity.

[machievelli]

By 'action' I mean political pressure, as opposed to military aggression.

As in, sanction the crap out of them in every economical context, while simultaneously appealing to the moral judgements of individual populations across the planet (with the hypothetical documentations of the camps) in order to increase the likelihood of the sanctions being enacted by participating countries, governmental departments, and relevant individual people.

Basically the same idea as tree-huggers breaking into a factory farm, taking videos of animal cruelty, and urging people not to buy products from that farm.

 

Could also just have the Jedi destroy the camps, free people, and start a revolution - all the while acting own their own personal mandates as opposed to that of any political entity.

 

To use the old sarcastic line people like to use, but in an international context; Been there, done that, got the T Shirt. Sanctions did not stop Pol Pot or Milosevic. For that matter, Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe forcibly relocated the indigent poor from the cities and dumped them in the jungle with the warning that he'd execute them in they returned, and sanctions have not slowed him in the slightest.

 

Milosevic was finally arrested for his genocidal actions in Bosnia only after he resigned, but died before the trial in the World Court in the Hague reached a verdict.

[Totenkopf]

In addition to the above, I would ad that for most people, these things are either so far away as to not excite interest or that some govts often have other ulterior motives for ignoring or actively subverting sanctions. Have mostly found sanctions to be an impotent tool when dealing with determined thugs who still have other options open to them (ie supplied by another country....say the PRC, Russia or Iran as examples).

[machievelli]

In addition to the above, I would ad that for most people, these things are either so far away as to not excite interest or that some govts often have other ulterior motives for ignoring or actively subverting sanctions. Have mostly found sanctions to be an impotent tool when dealing with determined thugs who still have other options open to them (ie supplied by another country....say the PRC, Russia or Iran as examples).

 

Sadly that is true. The 'Oil For Food' program which allowed Saddam to sell 3 billion dollars worth of oil a year to buy food and medicine was used instead to re-equip the air force and army that was shattered during the Gulf war.

[Tommycat]

Problem for lil Kim is that he called off the armistice. Technically we were always at war with NK just in a cease fire. We already HAVE the authority to go in, should we deem it worth the effort. We won't until baby Kim actually makes a real move, but should he tick us off enough, we're already in a(legally) declared war with North Korea and have authorization to beat them to a bloody pulp... The only question is if China would step in and defend them. I think so long as it stays conventional, China would turn their backs...