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North Korea, claims they've successfully tested a Hydrogen bomb


Ser Scot A Ellison

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4 minutes ago, James Arryn said:

Wait. So, the premise is that the US knew all along that there were no WMD's, but falsely cited WMD's as their casus belli, but the North Koreans figured those out and somehow concluded that if the US had actually believed it's lie it would have had the opposite effect?

That's...elaborate.

Of course the United States military and intelligence services knew that Iraq did not have WMDs. Nobody thought they did, because we had the whole country being combed by UN weapons inspectors for a dozen years beforehand. Whether Bush knew that, or he was hoodwinked by Cheney and Rumsfeld, is another question. By all accounts he was genuinely very angry when WMDs were not found within 12-18 months, so maybe he believed it. But Bush (especially in his first term) had the political nous of a small chimpanzee, so that's not saying much.

So you had a country without verifiable WMDs or the capability of producing them being invaded and the two with verifiable WMD stockpiles (both Iran and North Korea had chemical weapons, but not nuclear ones at that time) and programmes in their nascent stages being left alone.

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10 minutes ago, Werthead said:

Of course the United States military and intelligence services knew that Iraq did not have WMDs. Nobody thought they did, because we had the whole country being combed by UN weapons inspectors for a dozen years beforehand. Whether Bush knew that, or he was hoodwinked by Cheney and Rumsfeld, is another question. By all accounts he was genuinely very angry when WMDs were not found within 12-18 months, so maybe he believed it. But Bush (especially in his first term) had the political nous of a small chimpanzee, so that's not saying much.

So you had a country without verifiable WMDs or the capability of producing them being invaded and the two with verifiable WMD stockpiles (both Iran and North Korea had chemical weapons, but not nuclear ones at that time) and programmes in their nascent stages being left alone.

I happen to agree that the NIE report and international community made it pretty clear, though whether Bush et al were listening is another matter, yeah. And, further, I would say that their certainty was not the absence of WMDs, but the absence of proof of WMDs and/or a belief that Saddam would ever use what if any he had (short of invasion). I think even many of those who knew the WH was talking shit were somewhat surprised that there were absolutely none at all.

But, to go from that to where you are going in terms of how NK read it is, I think, a bridge too far. At least. It requires a number of certainties where we only have probabilities, and it flies in the face of obvious risks. Moreover, it would suggest being very quiet about your program until you hit the safety of possession, which has not at all been the case.

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57 minutes ago, James Arryn said:

But, to go from that to where you are going in terms of how NK read it is, I think, a bridge too far. At least. It requires a number of certainties where we only have probabilities, and it flies in the face of obvious risks. Moreover, it would suggest being very quiet about your program until you hit the safety of possession, which has not at all been the case.

I think that North Korea has also benefited from believing it is permanently protected by China, so it can say it is developing WMDs and show it off with some confidence that the US will not attack because of the risk of angering China.

The problem is that Kim Jong-un has pissed off China quite a lot, so although the overall geopolitical situation is that China is still North Korea's only ally, they're not going to be too cut up if he gets offed and they may accept some situation where the balance of power shifts, as long as they are involved in the transition and not left out in the cold or left dealing with millions of refugees swarming over the border.

Remember that the Neocons were very overt in their belief that the United States should bring about regime change to install friendly democracies and that this could be done easily and cheaply to their benefit. Both Iran and North Korea were on their shit list as well (via the Axis of Evil speech) but they chose Iraq first because it was the lowest hanging fruit, they had friendly states in the region to launch the invasion from and the country was already pretty much in ruins from the Gulf War and years of neglect. When it wound up costing far more in money and lives than anyone expected to subdue the country (and also involved taking the eye off the ball in Afghanistan), the Neocons were unable or unwilling to take the next steps, and Bush was certainly less willing to listen to them.

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2 hours ago, Werthead said:

North Korea and Iran both massively stepped up their missile and nuclear programmes after GWB invaded Iraq, because the message seemed to be if you had WMDs you wouldn't be touched whilst if you didn't you were vulnerable. The failure of both Bush and Obama to attack North Korea after its first nuclear test in 2006 seems to confirm that. So Bush really didn't help the situation at all.

No, GWB's foreign policy was a disaster. Sad! 

Also relevant to the topic, apparently even a regular basement constitutes pretty decent protection against both the blast and fallout created by a nuclear weapon, provided you aren't too close to Ground Zero and have sufficient food and water to stay there for up to two weeks (at which point radiation levels should have declined to 1% of their initial values). 

https://www.ready.gov/nuclear-blast

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I can only hope the architects of any N.Korean attack will be willing to station themselves in Seoule during the attacks and counter strikes so they can have some skin in the game for this calculated gamble with the lives on the ground on that peninsula. They should be willing to stake their own lives on their decisions, not just gamble with other peoples lives.

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44 minutes ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

I can only hope the architects of any N.Korean attack will be willing to station themselves in Seoule during the attacks and counter strikes so they can have some skin in the game for this calculated gamble with the lives on the ground on that peninsula. They should be willing to stake their own lives on their decisions, not just gamble with other peoples lives.

You'd hope that any attack would only happen if the South Korean government agree to it, in which case they'll very much be on the ground for it.

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As reunification is the almost certain result of North Korea's collapse, either not having an economically and militarily powerful American ally on its very border, or, depending on how the process goes, not having a failed state on its border. Either option is bad news, especially with China having a Korean province on its side of the border as well.

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Yup. One of the stupid things about Kim Jong-un is that he has decided he doesn't want to be seen as China's puppet, so he hasn't spent a lot of time visiting China or listening to them to show how strong and independent he is. But his country and his regime depend utterly on China for survival. If he pisses China off too much, China might look at the sliding scale of consequences and see some preference in South Korea beggaring itself for 20+ years years by having to absorb North Korea into its high-tech economy instead, or occupying the country themselves (by flooding it with "advisors" in the first instance).

The problem is that North Korea's position is much more precarious than it's bellicosity suggests. The country is dependent on the black market to survive, and it requires food imports from China to keep its population fed. Any major upheaval would likely see people panicking at the lack of food stocks and go fleeing towards the Chinese border, which China very definitely wants to avoid.

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1 hour ago, Werthead said:

Yup. One of the stupid things about Kim Jong-un is that he has decided he doesn't want to be seen as China's puppet, so he hasn't spent a lot of time visiting China or listening to them to show how strong and independent he is. But his country and his regime depend utterly on China for survival. If he pisses China off too much, China might look at the sliding scale of consequences and see some preference in South Korea beggaring itself for 20+ years years by having to absorb North Korea into its high-tech economy instead, or occupying the country themselves (by flooding it with "advisors" in the first instance).

I think the way he sees it either way he'd be handing over the family firm to the neighbouring conglomerate, and he'd ultimately rather take his chances than have his prerogatives gradually and certainly eroded.

North Korea is weak, dependent and vulnerable, but in some ways those are strengths for the Kim dynasty. Near-starvation keeps people too busy for politics and vulnerability means others take on the burden of propping up the regime because they fear the results of its collapse. It's a monstrous way to play a weak hand but it's worked for far longer than most predictions said it would.

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