War Drums: North Korea edition

[DireWolfSpirit]

I dont know if anyones posted this earlier or not? But a good illustration of how dire life must be in N. Korea can be seen by the night image of the Korean Peninsula.

https://goo.gl/images/nNjdYy

That vast, massive black void betwwen brightly lit S. Korea and brightly lit China, thats not the seas or a Himalayan mountain range, thats primitive N.Korea. Barely consisting of any modern infrastructure. 

[Horza]

3 hours ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

I dont know if anyones posted this earlier or not? But a good illustration of how dire life must be in N. Korea can be seen by the night image of the Korean Peninsula.

https://goo.gl/images/nNjdYy

That vast, massive black void betwwen brightly lit S. Korea and brightly lit China, thats not the seas or a Himalayan mountain range, thats primitive N.Korea. Barely consisting of any modern infrastructure. 

For context, that blackness is produced by post-90s famine policies of concentrating economic activity into the main urban centres, particularly Pyongyang, in addition to the DPRK's longstanding policy of of diverting resources to military uses over civilian. North Korea is poor, corrupt and ruthless towards its citizens, but it isn't primitive.

[Free Northman Reborn]

Why the need for spending massive amounts of foreign money on rebuilding the country? Will the citizens of North Korea really be that much worse off if you take out their military and political elite, and then leave them to their own devices? It's not like they live in a paradise right now.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

27 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Why the need for spending massive amounts of foreign money on rebuilding the country? Will the citizens of North Korea really be that much worse off if you take out their military and political elite, and then leave them to their own devices? It's not like they live in a paradise right now.

FNR,

Do you really think we could decapitate NK's military and political elite without massive civilian casualties in NK and a collosal humanitarian crisis in thw wake of NK's defeat or collapse?

[Free Northman Reborn]

3 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

FNR,

Do you really think we could decapitate NK's military and political elite without massive civilian casualties in NK and a collosal humanitarian crisis in thw wake of NK's defeat or collapse?

That's not what I said. I accept the military action itself will have major casualties involved. And may well not be quick and clean by any means.

My point is that after it is concluded, would the North Koreans really be worse off than they are now? The humanitarian crisis you refer to in the wake of such a war, do you just mean the humanitarian crisis that already exists in terms of millions at risk of famine on an ongoing basis? And if so, why is it the responsibility of the outside world to solve it, if it already existed before any potential military action?

 

[GAROVORKIN]

30 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

That's not what I said. I accept the military action itself will have major casualties involved. And may well not be quick and clean by any means.

My point is that after it is concluded, would the North Koreans really be worse off than they are now? The humanitarian crisis you refer to in the wake of such a war, do you just mean the humanitarian crisis that already exists in terms of millions at risk of famine on an ongoing basis? And if so, why is it the responsibility of the outside world to solve it, if it already existed before any potential military action?

 

Kim's a menace to everyone including China  , he needs to be dealt with before he does something impulsive with his new toys.  

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

43 minutes ago, GAROVORKIN said:

Kim's a menace to everyone including China  , he needs to be dealt with before he does something impulsive with his new toys.  

Yeah, having someone with poor impulse control in charge of a large nuclear arsenal seems pretty terrifying... 

[The guy from the Vale]

14 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Yeah, having someone with poor impulse control in charge of a large nuclear arsenal seems pretty terrifying... 

How do we know anything about Kim Jong-Un's impulse control? 

Apart from that, I agree.

[Red Tiger]

2 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

That's not what I said. I accept the military action itself will have major casualties involved. And may well not be quick and clean by any means.

My point is that after it is concluded, would the North Koreans really be worse off than they are now? The humanitarian crisis you refer to in the wake of such a war, do you just mean the humanitarian crisis that already exists in terms of millions at risk of famine on an ongoing basis? And if so, why is it the responsibility of the outside world to solve it, if it already existed before any potential military action?

That is a good question. I can already see Europe and my government taking in refugees. That's not gonna do wonders for our economy.

[Red Tiger]

1 hour ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

Yeah, cut the head off and then leave them to their own devices. Let's see what the North Korean ISIS looks like. Good idea.

North Korea's ideology is different from the one in the Middle East. You're gonna have 2 generations mourning the dictator, but comparing it to ISIS is a bad example.

[GAROVORKIN]

6 minutes ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

Fair enough, but you get my point. We can't just topple a regime and not have a plan in place on how to rebuild. That's only ever bitten us in the ass.

What if by doing nothing Mr Kim Caesar  Salad  on a whim ,  decides to go for broke? 

[GAROVORKIN]

3 minutes ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

What does "go for broke" mean?

 

He decides  to fulfill his pipe dream of unifying the Korean peninsula  un his rule  ? 

[The guy from the Vale]

10 minutes ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

So, in order to ameliorate the potential negative consequences of a nuclear state doing something impulsive and crazy, we should impulsively launch a massive, surprise preemptive strike, and then take no responsibility in rebuilding the region to ensure that a stable regime takes the place of the one we dismantled?

Well, at least then we're sure a nuclear state led by an unstable narcissist did something impulsive and crazy. They'd sure deserve to be bombed into oblivion.

Spoiler

A shame that that state would be the USA.

 

[Altherion]

11 hours ago, polishgenius said:

You don't think that was a massive enterprise? Really?

My point was that was a truly massive enterprise -- but even it did not take multiple generations. The situation in the two Koreas is on a significantly smaller scale so I don't think they'd have trouble rebuilding.

[Rippounet]

4 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Why the need for spending massive amounts of foreign money on rebuilding the country? Will the citizens of North Korea really be that much worse off if you take out their military and political elite, and then leave them to their own devices? It's not like they live in a paradise right now.

So you destroy infrastructure and/or kill/remove leaders and then let the people deal with the aftermath... Just because you figured their ideology, combined with their capabilities, were a threat to you.

That's dangerously close to the definition of terrorism.

Quote

And if so, why is it the responsibility of the outside world to solve it, if it already existed before any potential military action?

Because it's up to the outside world, which happens to have massive economic and military superiority, to deal with what they view as a threat to their interests (the nuclear forces of the regime) without further harming the victims of the regime.
Of course, the point is moot if you can figure out a way to remove Kim without harming the infrastructure and the civilians.
But if we're talking about "standard" military intervention (which has so far always been pretty damn destructive) then, if you're not taking any responsibility for the destruction waged, you're pretty much considering that the North Koreans share some kind of collective responsibility for their regime's doings.

Which is an interesting direction to take, intellectually speaking. That would basically be condoning terrorism.

[Werthead]

Quote

 

Why the need for spending massive amounts of foreign money on rebuilding the country? Will the citizens of North Korea really be that much worse off if you take out their military and political elite, and then leave them to their own devices? It's not like they live in a paradise right now.

 

They'll be starving to death, so the answer to that question is overwhelmingly yes, they will be massively worse off in the short to medium term.

I don't think it's quite appreciated how close to the brink that North Korea lies. Almost its entire economic power is concentrated in its weapons programme and everything else is left to go hang. The country is only fed by the goodwill of China (and, to a lesser extent, a few other countries).

[Red Tiger]

9 hours ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

Fair enough, but you get my point. We can't just topple a regime and not have a plan in place on how to rebuild. That's only ever bitten us in the ass.

That's true and China will not like seeing their little brother get pounded, but at this point we have to prepare for the possibility of war.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

21 minutes ago, Red Tiger said:

That's true and China will not like seeing their little brother get pounded, but at this point we have to prepare for the possibility of war.

I believe China has told NK that if they provoke an attack by the US by doing something stupid like launching at Guam, NK is on its own.

[Altherion]

1 hour ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

I believe China has told NK that if they provoke an attack by the US by doing something stupid like launching at Guam, NK is on its own.

If North Korea actually attacks any ally of the US in a flagrant manner, the US will have no choice but to retaliate along the lines Mathis described and China understands this. The trickier part is what happens if there is some more subtle provocation such as the attack on a South Korean ship that happened a while back.

[DMC]

4 hours ago, Werthead said:

The country is only fed by the goodwill of China (and, to a lesser extent, a few other countries).

Which is why it's incumbent upon us, or the US, to "persuade" the Chinese position from maintaining the status quo in the Korean peninsula to applying true pressure on the DPRK to cease, desist, and legitimately come to the table (and accept international checks on any potential agreements).  This will not be achieved by threatened China wholesale as Trump is doing, because we are now at a form of economic MAD with them.  

However, that does not mean we don't have employable tactics to try and leverage China to this point (some of which are detailed upthread in a link I posted a month ago).  Such an effort is immeasurably more desirable than the Dr. Strangelove insanity of preemptively nuking North Korea, let alone leaving their citizens to their own devices in the fallout.  Such a position is so odious, impetuous, and morally bereft I will not respond to it directly.  Cuz my mom always said if you don't have anything nice to say...