RichVR
6462
So he’s not Hitler. But he’s using Hitler’s tools.
Today North Korea threatened a pre-emptive nuclear attack on South Korea and the US. I wonder how Trump will respond?
How will Obama respond, for that matter? What the hell can be done about them?
CraigM
6464
Any plan with a reasonable chance of success has to have China on board. I’d imagine that, given China’s economic situation, there may be a few screws that we can turn there.
At this point the question is how best remove the ruling class from power. Clearly as long as Kim is in power North Korea will sink further into lunacy. But to formulate a response requires answers to questions I’m not sure we have.
How big of a threat are they really to our allies? Their military tech tests don’t inspire a ton of confidence, but I would be hesitant to assume that is a true reflection. Just because they seem totally inept doesn’t mean that they are. Even a poorly designed missile system could be a problem for South Korea and Japan.
What would happen if China cut the Koreans off? I honestly can’t pretend to have an answer. Would it lead to a coup, or would they become more erratic and dangerous.
Is there a ready made group that could assume power?
All these are important questions that I can’t claim enough knowledge on Korean internals to answer. I’d imagine the state department has a better idea, but I doubt it is clear or comprehensive.
EDIT: to be clear I do not think there is anything the US can, or should, do at this point. The only power that can really exert any influence is China. I don’t know if this particular ‘threat’ is any more serious or concerning than the typical unhinged actions from Pyongyang.
They do this every few months and have since their first successful bomb test. To the extent they are noticed people will frown and threaten more sanctions, in case there is anything left that they import or export that somehow hasn’t already been restricted.
Not much. The North Koreans make these sorts of threats regularly, usually around the time of the joint maneuvers the US and ROK perform every year. It’s fairly insane, threatening nuclear war, but beyond either ignoring it or issuing a sort of generic condemnation, what can you do? I suspect even Beijing is getting fed up with Pyongyang’s shenanigans at some level, though their investment in this buffer state is too heavy for them to every truly cut them loose. It sucks, but all you can really do is try to be prepared to ride out any truly insane thing like an actual attack, and then thoroughly eliminate North Korea as a military power. The cost, however, would be much higher than a lot of people think I’m afraid, as necessary as it might be.
One reason why I’m always disturbed by the easy way so many politicians toss around military “solutions” to problems. Most of the time, they are scarily ignorant of–or willfully oblivious to–the costs or real possibilities of the things they speak of so glibly.
Yeah. Seoul is in range of NK artillery of which they have loads of antique pieces even putting aside the possibility of a nuke. The city would be destroyed in the event of war. Shortly thereafter I imagine NK’s military and regime would be destroyed as well, but that’s beside the point if you have any respect for civilians. Unless you want to sacrifice 10,000,000 people there’s not much you can do about NK from the outside.
Oghier
6468
If NK develops a ballistic missile capable of delivering a nuke to Hawaii or even California, we may have to choose between several awful options.
I don’t expect any GOP candidate to even discuss this, because it’s a serious topic and they are all jokes. Cruz would blame it on the gays, Rubio would sweat, Trump would probably order an attack.
The correct answer is probably to ignore them, which is what I think Hillary or Bernie would do.
Menzo
6470
For GOP candidates the answer is super simple: If I were President this wouldn’t be happening.
They have not yet needed to explain how this could be or why.
Oghier
6471
True. It’s part of their “Obama is weak and nobody respects him” narrative. The scariest thing is, they may believe this.
Guys…is this really happening?
I…this can’t…I don’t…
No. Welcome to the echo chamber. Read the story. It’s “Here’s what Romney said last week…”
And then a bunch of unsourced nonsense. There are a couple of left-leaning sites that have been doing this in increasing amounts over the last 3-5 months, hooking folks with clickbait headlines that go nowhere.
Okay. Whew. I was concerned I was missing some satire somewhere.
Ah, we can finally put the controversy to rest. You may compar Trump to Hitler without invoking Godwin’s Law, so says Godwin himself.
First, let me get this Donald Trump issue out of the way: If you’re thoughtful about it and show some real awareness of history, go ahead and refer to Hitler or Nazis when you talk about Trump. Or any other politician.
Whew! carry on, internet!
I can finally post my comparison shots between Hillary Clinton and Wolfenstein’s Frau Engel.
From Nightwatch
The touchstone of all recent statements is the 23 February statement by the Supreme Command that announced the new pre-emptive attack strategy. The paragraph on the limited strategic depth and the acknowledgement of superior US military equipment provides insights into North Korean military thinking that led to the formulation of a pre-emptive attack strategy. It is a reasonable military solution for North Korea.
The DPRK is worried about a decapitating attack on the leadership in Pyongyang.
North Korea lacks confidence that it can defeat Allied special operations forces in an attack to decapitate the North’s leadership. That explains the adoption of a pre-emptive strategy on any “small movement.” The US decapitation scenario has rattled the North Korean leadership, probably because of its effectiveness in the Middle East against terrorist leaders.
While this doctrine may be a sensible response to military realities on the penisula. It’s incredibly dangerous as a matter of policy.
As we have mentioned in previous editions, war avoidance hinges on the ability of North Korean intelligence services to interpret accurately those “small” movements, distinguishing exercise activity from an operation. In as much as exercises deliberately are designed to rehearse in peacetime real war preparations, accurate interpretation of small movements is no small challenge, even for sophisticated modern intelligence agencies. The security culture in the North is such that commanders will be prone to shoot first, rather than guess wrong and face execution for dereliction of duty.
This was always the main risk of nuclear war during the Cold War, though the USSR and USA put a lot of effort into making sure they didn’t misread the tea leaves. The knife-edge balance of assumptions, between “they aren’t serious” and “oh my God they’re launching” makes for sphincter-clenching fun.
Timex
6479
The big advantage that we have now, is that we could probably shoot down anything that the north koreans shoot up there.
Our ABM technology is improving, but I don’t have that kind of confidence.
Oghier
6481
Most of us probably know the story of Lt Col Stanislav Petrov. If anyone does not, reflect on the fact that he may have literally saved the world in 1983.
