Is it finally time to do something about North Korea

[XT]

@HMS Irruncible

Suicide is an alternative to what exactly? We all agree that kind of countervalue attack would result in the end of NK as we know it. We’ve seen NK go through some extremely dire domestic circumstances without getting suicidal. What would be different this time?

Try this sequence:

1. Due to sanctions, especially from China as well as a poor harvest, North Korea is closer to the edge than anyone realizes.

2. Famine strikes the non-elite, necessitating harsher measures (harsher than usual) to keep control.

3. Due to sanctions, especially from China, the elites are hit as well, as their luxury goods are seriously curtailed.

4. Due to sanctions, especially from China, Kim et al can no longer acquire the parts and systems (either from China itself or using hard currency from Russia or the Ukraine) needed to continue either the missile or nuclear program, which grind to a halt.

5. Kim, however, has talked himself into a corner and promised his people that their sacrifices are for something.

6. Pressure mounts and a serious coup attempt is savagely crushed by the regime.

7. Civil unrest finally boils up and it’s a toss-up whether it will be able to be contained.

8. At the same time, international pressure, especially from the US, South Korea, and Japan, have mounted, and the heated rhetoric from the US especially is cutting. Kim continues to up the ante wrt rhetoric as well, but can’t make good on his own because the sanctions have cut too deeply to enable them.

9. The entire situation started to slide downward with no solution that Kim can see to keep a lid on things. He decides on a crazy strategy that makes sense only to him to launch a war against South Korea in an all or nothing bid to keep power, thinking that China will, in the end, back his play or at least stay neutral, and that Russia, his new buddies will run interference for him at least.

10. Unsurprisingly, the war doesn’t go well, despite North Korean artillery pasting the South Korean capital. His attempts to invade have been destroyed and US and South Korean interdiction strikes have made the famine worse, with the addition of a systemic loss of cohesion and ability to communicate and move forces to stop the riots. Army forces begin to disintegrate and rebel.

11. In a last desperate move, Kim decides to launch the carefully hoarded nuclear-tipped medium-range missiles he has. Most are destroyed or simply blow up or don’t work, but one gets through to hit Tokyo and one hit outside of Seoul, killing hundreds of thousands.

The thing is, once the wheels start to really come off, there is really no telling what Kim might do. It’s entirely plausible that if things are crashing down he might launch a nuclear attack and die on his own terms than just be taken and shot in the back of the head or hung or beaten to death by an angry mob.

We’ve seen Pyongyang survive some dire shit in the past, so I have a hard time seeing the situation progress through all these gateways, unless external forces put the squeeze to accelerate this process.

Except that ‘Pyongyang’ is not lil’ Kimmy v3.0. His grandfather was in a MUCH stronger position as was his father. Even with them it was touch and go several times, and they had a much broader level of support than the current Kim does. The country is much more in the corner than it’s ever been. Recall that the last time things were at the major famine point it was basically the US and South Korea that bailed them out, and that was with Kim’s father at the helm. I don’t see that happening this time with the ramp up in provocative actions this Kim has taken.

This isn’t the same situation…in fact, this situation that North Korea is in today is unprecedented. Always, the Chinese were there, having their back and infusing them with hard currency and necessary materials. That has changed, at least officially, and that means that any Chinese assistance now is going to be under the table, which means it won’t be nearly as much as it was before.

[madsircool]

@iiandyiiii

Saddam Hussein was afraid that the US might invade and try to remove him from power. So was Gadhafi in Libya. They were both monsters, but those fears were entirely reasonable, right? If they had had nuclear weapons, we probably would not have engaged in military action against them. Based on our history of invading countries to try and change the regime, ISTM that Kim Jong Un’s fear that we might invade them and take him out of power is pretty reasonable. And thus seeking weapons that would make that much less likely is reasonable.

I disagree.

The most rational course of action by NK is to be non confrontational and rely on an alliance with China. A non-aligned nuked NK still might be invaded. Its nukes can be neutralized by middle defense shields. A China backed NK will never be invaded.

[XT]

@Ramira

It is 100 per cent rational for this regime to want to bolster and armor itself against the American intervention given the track record of the americans.

And yet, that isn’t the reason why North Korea has been trying to acquire the things.

Very american.

Does this ever get old to you? I mean, I generally agree with a lot of your posts, but every time you do this it just makes me :rolleyes:.

The regime is in the place it is, and the Arab spring revolutions have already demonstrated that for the nasty family centric dictatorship to move to some other kind of relationship and structure is extremely dangerous, in particular when you are a regime the Americans hate and will take any excuse to topple.

Like we’ve toppled it in the last…oh, what’s it been now? 63 years? Since the cease-fire in Korea that is. And it’s been, what, 26 years since they lost the protection of the Soviet Union now? Still no massive invasion.

Sorry, but this is just horseshit. North Korea has made its own problems, and ironically by not only pursuing nuclear weapons but flaunting that pursuit it’s made things much worse for itself. It’s not just big, bad, evil America that is concerned here. China, for the first time, has voted in the UNSC for sanctions along with Russia. The US didn’t (hell, couldn’t) force those two countries to do that. And it’s because of the nukes, along with its continued flagrant testing of its missiles.

The situation in North Korea is nothing like what happened in the Arab Spring, and there isn’t going to be anything like the demonstrations from below that happened there, nor any sort of uprising either. There is no analogy that works between the two. Nor is North Korea, even today, vulnerable to a US invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan were. Again…there is no analogy there.

It is certain they know that the slightest slip up and they will end up hanging from a lamppost or worse. There is no rational incentive for them to regime members to act otherwise - they would have to be self deceiving to think otherwise.

Well, it would take more than a slight ‘slip up’, but I agree…there is zero incentive for the ruling dynasty or the elites to change. It’s all they have now. That’s why I’ve advocated for continuing the status quo, something the US has been on board with now for decades. Eventually, time is going to run out for the regime. The current Kim is mismanaging badly even by Kim standards, which is epic. He’s managed to alienate his last real ally, an ally who actually fought against the US to protect North Korea. Not only has he alienated the current ruling faction in China but he’s pissed off a lot of regular Chinese as well. In the past, that might not have mattered, but these days social media is huge in China (even if it’s heavily censored), and it does have an impact. The factions that still support North Korea are increasingly under attack by Xi and his faction (not for supporting North Korea but for other stuff), and don’t have the political capital to do more than some covert support under the table.

[Buck_Godot]

The thing is that in the era of MAD, nukes make very poor offensive weapons, since the moment is a matter of hours before the moment you get wiped off the face of the planet. The only time you can use them is if you have nothing left to lose. But this means that it is in everyone else’s best interest to make sure that you never reach the point where you have nothing left to lose. GThey are the ultimate defensive weapon.

Kim’s number on goal is the survival of his regime. He isn’t getting nukes so he can go out in a nuclear blaze of glory. What he want is the ability to say to the US “if my regime goes down, I take L.A. down with me.” Now suddenly it is in the US’s best interest to prop up Kim’s regime and protect it from all enemies foreign and domestic, which is a lasting win of him.

Totally rational.

[Bone]

[moderating]

@Ramira

But perhaps somel flying parachuting motocycle commando can be sent in to solve the regime…

If you feel the need to bring up irrelevant snark from years past to harass other posters, do so in the Pit, not here.

[/moderating]

[Mijin]

@XT

a point you are obviously missing is it would mean they would have to stop their nuclear and missile programs as well. Where do you think they are getting the critical parts for those programs from??

If the answer to this rhetorical is “China is supplying it” I’d like to see a cite for that. Sanctions already cover military tech.

Let me say now: if the claim that China is currently supplying critical parts is true, then China should stop doing that. But where’s the support for this claim?

Now, all three of the Kimmy’s were epic in their ability to mismanage, but Un doesn’t have the base support either of the others did. The only thing keeping him afloat right now is China.

Depends what we mean by keeping him afloat. If you mean food-wise, well we both agree that there have been massive famines in the past and the regime was not wobbled at all.

If you mean military-wise, then I direct you to my previous point.

[iiandyiiii]

@madsircool

I disagree.

The most rational course of action by NK is to be non confrontational and rely on an alliance with China. A non-aligned nuked NK still might be invaded. Its nukes can be neutralized by middle defense shields. A China backed NK will never be invaded.

Nukes can’t be neutralized without military force (a pre-emptive strike), at least not without destroying the strategy of MAD. So I still disagree. Saddam Hussein might have pursued a close relationship with a great power like Russia, or he might have pursued nukes – if he had successfully achieved either one, Iraq probably would not have been invaded.

We have no technology that could provide a very high chance that NK would be unable to strike SK or Japan with a nuclear weapon. Thus, we’re almost certain not to invade. And thus from the point of view of Kim Jong Un, the strategy was rational.

[XT]

@Mijin

If the answer to this rhetorical is “China is supplying it” I’d like to see a cite for that. Sanctions already cover military tech.

Let me say now: if the claim that China is currently supplying critical parts is true, then China should stop doing that. But where’s the support for this claim?

I can give you a bunch of links to articles discussing this. What would you accept as ‘proof’ of this? It’s fairly well known, honestly, but it’s complicated by the fact that ‘China’ isn’t a monolithic entity…even the CCP is riddled, in China, with factions. The official position of the CCP and China is as you say. Unofficially, however, many factions in the CCP support North Korea, and some support North Korea merely to give Xi and his faction headaches. I linked to some articles in the other Chinese thread on the board…if you have a sec, look at some of those. If you remain unconvinced then I’m not sure what proof I can find to satisfy you on this one.

Depends what we mean by keeping him afloat. If you mean food-wise, well we both agree that there have been massive famines in the past and the regime was not wobbled at all.

If you mean military-wise, then I direct you to my previous point.

Actually, it’s been the US and South Korea more than China that has prevented famine in North Korea, ironically enough. I’d say, economically and wrt the transfer of technology and of course wrt hard currency, China has been the real key for North Korea. Military-wise, certainly China trades military hardware and software with North Korea. That should be pretty easy for me to get cites for if you really didn’t know that…sort of along the lines of water is wet. I’m unsure what you are having trouble with believing on this one, to be honest. Is it back to you don’t know about the high-tech transfers or just don’t believe that North Korea buys weapons and weapons systems from China?

[Lucas_Jackson]

@Ramira

Very american.

The regime is in the place it is, and the Arab spring revolutions have already demonstrated that for the nasty family centric dictatorship to move to some other kind of relationship and structure is extremely dangerous, in particular when you are a regime the Americans hate and will take any excuse to topple.

It is 100 per cent rational for this regime to want to bolster and armor itself against the American intervention given the track record of the americans.

It is certain they know that the slightest slip up and they will end up hanging from a lamppost or worse. There is no rational incentive for them to regime members to act otherwise - they would have to be self deceiving to think otherwise.

Disagree with most of your post but I will say this, if he wasn’t a dangerous maniacal lunatic who flagrantly disregards human rights and threatens the world there wouldn’t be a reason to overthrow his regime. As I suggested if he was a humanitarian who cared for his people we wouldn’t “hate” him.

[Mijin]

@XT

I can give you a bunch of links to articles discussing this. What would you accept as ‘proof’ of this? […] If you remain unconvinced then I’m not sure what proof I can find to satisfy you on this one.

What we’re talking about is anything to support the notion that China is still giving critical support to NK’s nuclear program.

Nobody doubts that China and Russia gave NK vital assistance earlier on. I said as much upthread (or in the parallel thread).

However your contention is that China could end the problem with NK, with the implication that they could do so easily. And you’ve said that they “are getting”, implying the present tense, materials for their nuclear program from China.

Do you have any support for that?

[XT]

@Mijin

What we’re talking about is anything to support the notion that China is still giving critical support to NK’s nuclear program.

Nobody doubts that China and Russia gave NK vital assistance earlier on. I said as much upthread (or in the parallel thread).

However your contention is that China could end the problem with NK, with the implication that they could do so easily. And you’ve said that they “are getting”, implying the present tense, materials for their nuclear program from China.

Do you have any support for that?

I never said it would be easy, I said they could do it. I also went over in some detail what the cost would be in terms of humanitarian crisis, and also noted that China won’t do this for its own reasons. As for help, I assume you didn’t read my post in the other thread so I’ll start there and requote it here. It’s got links to articles talking about China’s more recent aid wrt bomb and missile technology.

@XT

You can do a search on this and get a ton of links, but I’ll link to few that jumped out at me (actually, in all honesty, the first few links since I’m just a lazy bastard):

In addition to the above and in the other links (and, full disclosure, I didn’t read through them all), you also have the fact that China is responsible for most of the hard currency in North Korea (well, the legal hard currency I suppose), which is what allows North Korea the ability to buy any of the stuff they can’t get from China. All this said, though, understand I’m using ‘China’ very broadly here…a lot of this, especially the technology transfers being speculated on aren’t coming officially from the current faction in control of the CCP…they are coming from several other factions within China. But this is something that’s been happening for a LONG time. It’s what enabled North Korea to initial build the first weapons they tested, and what’s enabled them to build more and more sophisticated bombs and missiles.