What would you call the decision of the north to not be bound by the treaties that ended hostilities?
I would still say that killing sailors, soldiers and civilians is beyond provocative, it is reckless.
Wait a minute. Didn’t North korea conduct a surprise invasion to start the korean war? I don’t know how you can wave that away.
WTF are you talking about. Look at how things were going in 200 to 2004. Ever hear of the sunshine policy? Ever hear of Kaesang industrial park? Ever hear of the Korea summits held between Kim Jong Il and two consecutive South Korean presidential administrations? Progress was being made until the conservatives were elected and Soutyh Korea started “getting tough” on North Korea.
If the ONLY measure of progress is whether or not North korea abandons nuclear ambitions then you might as well invade North Korea now, they will not abandon their nuclear ambitions because it is so fucking crystal clear that going nuclear makes them immune from military threats.
I think sending food aid is probably a good idea. A lot of this posturing by North Korea is the result of the growing realization among the North Korean populace that things have gone in the shitter since Kim Jong Il became the dear leader, combine this with Kim’s desire to pass on leadership to his son and you have the recipe for instability. But you can’t dismiss the fact that there have been equally significant changes on the SOuth Korean side with the almost 180 degree turn in diplomatic positions of the prior two South Klorean administrations with the current one.
This might give us a clue about what the hell all of the bellyaching is about. (If it shows up in Greek, use Google translate). But please note the disputed locations of the boundaries.
I would agree with that assessment, Commissar. But the evidence is overwhelming that they have exploded at least one nuclear bomb (the second one is still being argues as a dud or testing out a miniaturized warhead (the latter is my speculation). The seismic signature from the detonation of a nuclear weapon is unique as compared to one from an earthquake. Later, specific radioactive gases that can only be created by a nuclear explosion were detected the USAF. Further supporting this is even the DPRK admitted they’d set on off.
That’s a new one for me. I don’t buy it. We had nuclear tipped Jupiter missiles in Turkey. Nikita Kruschev decided to do likewise with the island of Cuba. Did he really think the US would not go ape poopy by putting nuclear missiles in Cuba? We objected and are willing to go balls to the wall. Kruschev backs down (perhaps you mean this is the “high ground”), but is told the US will quietly pull the missiles out Turkey (they were already deemed obsolete before the crisis, as a result of moving to US based ICBMs) and got the US to agree not to invade Cuba.
There was no “high ground” here–each side failed to understand the other’s intentions, made dangerous assumptions, and we almost lost the store. But thank (insert divinity of choice here), the good decisions on both sides outnumbered the bad. It wasn’t the last time we almost had an accident; but neither side went eye-to-eye after that. Kennedy and Kruschev both get kudos for avoiding the annihilation of The Straight Dope as we know it.
Idiocy with nuclear weapons is not a moral position.
No, it is rocket science. You can’t bolt it together and expect it to work. As said earlier, it requires a miniaturized warhead. It also requires design of a re-entry vehicle, accurate missile guidance, reliable staging, telemetry acquisition, etc. This would require quite a bit of testing of the rocket to ensure that reliability. And so far, the rocket forces of DPRK have only been able to launch imaginary satellites.
Commissar, you seemed to be lacking quite a bit of life experience. You have that cocksure confidence you’ve got it all figured out.
25 years from now you’ll have a whole different view about life.
You have no idea what I’m talking about, I’m sure. But don’t worry, you will someday.
well you see, that is the thing. We have been trying to destabilize an already unstable North korean government and part of the reason for that is because China really doesn’t like it.
Why would relations between a unified Korea and China be any worse tahn relations between Japan and China? Perhaps not all hugs and kisses but I don’t see any natural antagonism there.
It was objectively speaking provocation that the North had not responded to in the past. That doesn’t mean they have lost the right to respond to people shooting artillery into what they consider their territory.
The rub is that the South considers most of the waters off the North Korean shores to be South Korean waters because at the time of the armistice, they (through the US navy) held all the islands in the region. North Korean thinks the 38th parallel means the 38th parallel out to international waters.
Woah you have that very very wrong. There is a lot of distrust and prejudice both ways between China and Japan and also border conflicts over Senkaku Islands. Japan also maintains non government but actually quite strong relations with Taiwan.
Frankly that is probably where things will end up.
Oddly enough, these incidents are causing a great deal of disastisfaction with thye current South Korean regime among the South Korean populace. They blame the current administration’s “tough talk” for souring relations with NHorth Korea and provoking them. Add to that the economy and the failure to reach an agreement opn the Korean American Free Trade Agreement (largely because of a disagreement over whether free trade should include cars (the Korean auto market is pretty well closed (as is almost every other auto market in the world but ours) and the ruling party will lose power in the next election unless something dramatic changes.
I am pretty sure that the dismissal of the defense secretary was appropriate. The response was late and lame despite plenty of advance notice that something might happen.
The attack by North Korea was well advertised, they have made this sort of threat before and not acted on it but its pretty irresponsible to dismiss the possibility that they would act on their threat.
So if Lebanon shot shells into Israeli waters showing that they could reach inhabited Israeli cities with those shells, and the Israeli navy said cut it out or we’re going to do something about it and the Lebanese navy keeps firing those shells, you don’t think Israel would be justified in firing on the Lebanese artillery?
The South Korean exercise was provocative, it was INTENDED to be provocative and it in fact provoked the North Koreans. I don’t think it was wise or responsible and I think the North Korean regime is among the worst regimes in the world but this was at least partly South Korea’s fault.
Yes, I have heard of the Sunshine Policy - it was a policy that began in large part due to a bribe of several hundred million dollars to North Korea by South Korea. It also did not stop a naval skirmish in 2002 from happening, nor did it stop North Korea from continuing to work on nuclear weapons the whole time. Despite the North making the 1992 denuclearization agreement with the South. The original intent of the policy seemed to be about both Koreas treating each other as equals instead of rivals and working together. It was ultimately a failure because the North will never view the South’s government as legitimate or friendly so long as their very governmental system (anything but a dictatorship) demonstrates a more free and economically sustainable system than the North’s.
No I think you are misunderstanding, IIRC one report said that the commander made a lame response because he did not want to start a new Korean war.
And that still does not make the North to be on the right or to be justified for what they are doing now.
So NK can hold SK hostage and threaten murderous violence if dreadful attacks upon innocent H[sub]2[/sub]O are carried out. How reasonable. Reminds me of a guy I knew I high school who would threaten to punch people if they did things like hum songs he didn’t like, and then if he hit them he’d say he wasn’t to blame since, after all, he’d warned them.
At the time I thought he was a petulant asshole, but it turns out that he was just using the North Korean School of Diplomacy.
Indeed. Just like when that guy I knew in high school would punch someone, they were partially to blame, too. I mean, what would the world be coming to when civilized nations of the world no longer hold to the belief that killing human beings is a reasonable response to splashy-splashy in disputed waters?
This ignores that before rockets actually fell in Israeli territory and civilians died (real history). Had they had fallen only in the water (imaginary history) then if the Israeli army attacked Lebanon and kill Lebanese just for that, Israel would had been the party that was rightfully condemned.
And just to follow up on that, at virtually every joint US-S. Korean exercises that take place, North Korea issues threats and promises of retaliation or full-scale war. I doubt the previous defense minister dismissed the possibility that on the occasion of South Korea’s own artillery exercise that North Korea would act on their threats, but like the boy who cried wolf, Pyongyang has a habit of routinely communicating in threats that ultimately are not followed up on.
There are plenty of Americans who are not chomping at the bit to launch a full-scale retaliatory strike that could lead to war - all of the service members currently stationed in Korea, and to a lesser extent Japan. I have a few friends serving in Camp Casey, a US base fairly close to the DMZ, as well as in Yongsan Garrison, a US base located in the middle of Seoul. Those two locations in particular, among various other targets, would be some of the first hit by a massive wave of North Korean artillery strikes. Korean civilians would be hit hardest of course, but US civilians employed on the military bases as well as the family members of US service members who live on the bases would also be killed.
I know I’m always suspicious about these things, but do you recall the “I Am a Communist” thread a short while back? He sounds awfully familiar.
Dude…where the hell have you been?
So your self-imposed hiatus is over?
Rumors of my demise…
You really need to tell Mossad that your contributions here far outweigh their security concerns…