My brief take on North Korea

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swissaustrian

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North Korea is making the news a lot lately. I lack the time to write up a long post (with links etc.) on it right now, but I wanna throw in a few points to start a discussion:

1. Anybody who has just a tiny bit of military experience knows that you don't tell the enemy what your targets are nor that you are about to attack. Kim is NOT going to attack, he's bluffing.

2. Even if he were to attack, he could not reach the US mainland via ICBMs. He could target US military bases or US allies (SK, Japan, Taiwan) in East Asia, but the US military would likely intercept any missile with ABMs.

3. No major power has any interest in an attack/war on the US: neither China which needs NK as a buffer to SK (which is a quasi US colony), nor Russia which wants at least 10 more years of peace to modernize it's military. The same applies to the Chinese military, too. That's why both of them have tried to calm the situation down. The US has no interest in a war either. Otherwise the Obama admin would already have seized on the opportunity to attack. Had Iran done and said what Kim did, we'd already be at war.

4. Therefore all the threats and symbolic actions by NK have two motivations imho:
a. Rally the domestic population and the inner party power circle behind the new leader. That distracts the poor people of NK from the horrors at home by creating an atmosphere of an imminent apocalypse.
b. Get international attention and bargaining power in upcoming negotiations on the abolishment of UN and other sanctions.

Some points that I need to do more research on to have an opinion:
i. Google CEO Schmidt visited NK lately to speak to Kim. :doodoo:
ii. Dennis Rodman's visit to NK.
iii. Internal opposition in NK.
 
The Norks are doing what they always do, ratcheting shit up so we can talk them down with rice and oil. When they get what they want, they will chill back out and Kim will be seen as a strong leader. In fact, I think he's going long this time because things are so dire in NK that he needs more aid than usual.

Of course, there is always the possibility that the little zip actually does have an EMP weapon and intends to use it. If he does, his entire country will cease to be a threat because we will turn it in to the earths largest crater.
 
...

We have two bearing suppliers in S Korea. Both Lily (our Admin Director in Peru) and I asked one of our guys there about the chubby lil mofo. He wrote back and said that Kim Jong Un is just being typical Nork-belligerent... Albeit more belligerent talk than normal.
 
When I read about North Koreans referred to as 'Norks' I have to laugh! Say it out loud in a sentence, it's hard to keep a straight face.
 
Good topic SA.

The .gov here is more than happy to go along with the script, of course, because just as it distracts the starving "Norks" and gets them to rally around the flag pole, it gets us to do the same exact thing.

Sure, we aren't starving to death, but they still need to distract us from the fact that all aspects of this coutry are getting worse rather than better.

/'murica
 
dontdeBasemebro said:
...
Sure, we aren't starving to death, but they still need to distract us from the fact that all aspects of this coutry are getting worse rather than better.

/'murica
Click to expand...

 
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My take is the same as SA & Ancona. The only thing that concerns me is that the MSM has a similar take & I rarely agree with MSM.

The only thing I can think is that a false flag + internet shutdown could be very useful to US in collapse scenario. (Scapegoat to declare martial law and no internetz for protestors to co-ordinate & only information source would be MSM radio/tv)
 
I read something the other day (no source) that NK has a huge biological weapons capability, with literally hundreds of strains of smallpox alone. It wouldn't matter much WHERE the missile went to set off a world The Stand/Captain Trips scenario.
 
Exclusive: U.S. and North Korea held secret meeting in March
Posted By Josh Rogin Tuesday, April 9, 2013 - 2:08 PM

A top State Department official met with a top representative of the North Korean government in New York in March, The Cable has learned.

Clifford Hart, the State Department's special envoy to the now-defunct six-party talks, met North Korea's deputy ambassador to the United Nations Han Song-ryol in mid-March, just before North Korea began its latest string of provocative statements and actions, diplomatic sources said. The meeting was done through what's known in diplomatic circles as the "New York channel," the most common method of direct communication between Washington and Pyongyang.

No real progress was made during the meeting and no new offers were made by the U.S. officials present, the sources said. The U.S. side simply reiterated the administration's call for North Korea to avoid provocative actions as well as its offer for a return to diplomacy if North Korea recommitted to fulfilling its international obligations and pursuing a path of denuclearization. The North Korean side simply agreed to communicate that information back to Pyongyang.

For outside experts critical of the Obama administration's current approach to North Korea, which is based on the principle of "strategic patience," or waiting for Pyongyang to change its calculus and rejoin multilateral talks, the meeting is only the latest indication that the administration's policy is stagnant.

"Unfortunately, the New York channel, which in the past was an important communications link between Pyongyang and Washington, appears to have become a place where boilerplate talking points are exchanged," former nuclear negotiator Joel Wit told The Cable. "It's especially disappointing given the ongoing crisis which puts a premium on candid communication to avoid misunderstanding and to find a diplomatic off-ramp from the current tense situation."

Most recently, the New York channel was used to warn the State Department just before North Korea tested a nuclear bomb for the third time in February. North Korea is expected to test a medium-range ballistic missile as early as Wednesday and another warning could come to the Obama administration via North Korea's representative office at the U.N.

A former U.S. official who worked on North Korea in past administrations described how the New York channel works in an interview with The Cable just after the last nuclear test.

"It's been the main channel of communication between the North Korean government and the U.S. government. We don't have any other channels we use," the official said.

Han, the main official who runs the New York channel, also represented North Korea at two unofficial meetings with U.S. interlocutors in 2012 that were reported by The Cable, one in Singapore and one in Dalian, China. Hart attended both of those meetings.

The State Department declined to comment on the March New York meeting, in keeping with its past reticence to discuss the New York channel.

"They're afraid of their shadows," the former official said. "It's like ‘No one can know we are actually communicating with these people because they are bad.'"

Secretary of State John Kerry will visit China, South Korea, and Japan later this week. A senior administration told CNN that Kerry will try to present a diplomatic path out of the crisis during his trip.

At Tuesday's State Department briefing, Spokesperson Patrick Ventrell declined to say whether there have been any communications with Pyongyang through the New York channel since March.

"Well, you know we have a channel of communications. I don't have anything specifically to read out about that. But the channel remains open as necessary," he said.
Click to expand...
http://thecable.foreignpolicy.com/p..._and_north_korea_held_secret_meeting_in_march


I found a top secret drawing of the meeting ;)
clip_image0071.jpg
 
ancona said:
The Norks are doing what they always do, ratcheting shit up so we can talk them down with rice and oil. When they get what they want, they will chill back out and Kim will be seen as a strong leader.
Click to expand...

I'll take it one step further and say all of the posturing and threats from N Korea are scripted by the American government. America needs a distraction, and N Korea needs food. They're cooperating.
 
I honestly don't even pay any attention to the N Korea crap. I cannot understand how it is even strategic from western point of view - it is important for China, obviously S Korea and Japan, but AFAIK, they have ZERO capabilities to reach mainlands of their "arch enemies", ie USA, and they would not DARE to challenge CHina (they would walk over them in no time, without that pesky public watching over government atrocities). They are poor as dirt, and have ZERO chance to do anything else, but go guerilla on their own land, thus they have everything to lose, nothing to win if they started the war. Most certainly they will suffer greater loses than any of their potential adversaries (I don't know about S Korean military, are they any good?). I suppose the only place that would make any sense to attack for them, would be S Korea? Well, too bad for S Koreans & multinationals invested there, but why should I care that much - I don't know. They cannot even disturb ANYTHING significantly, bar above mentioned S Korean multinationals.

I for one would pay FAR greater attention to Iran, as it can (potentially) disturb oil shipments from the Persian Gulf, and even temporary disruptin there is a very serious issue globally, but some backwater shithole country?

EDIT:
interesting article on Cato institute, saying in much more depth and details, the historical reasons of US involvement on the Korean peninsula, and it's irrelevance in today world power shifts (TL,DR version of my humble piece above ;)) :
http://www.cato.org/publications/co...as-problem-0?gclid=CKqbybjzv7YCFQrqnAodTmEAXg
 
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Bushi, it's important to the government to keep the sheeple very afraid all the time. If there isn't a boogeyman under every rock, they cannot justify a military budget greater than the combined military budgets of the rest of the world.
 
Well, I have to wonder. I know the nork patterns in the past, but we now have an insecure little dick who only knows war from video games with a reset button, who has a fragile hold on power, who has generals that are afraid to tell the truth to him, and who just might do something other than back down, especially if the usual blackmail for aid doesn't work this time. I did like this link I saw on ZH the other day, wish this guy was really president.

http://youtu.be/Cbgq4i-Hxo0



(I'll edit this to embed as soon as I remember how - gotta go search this site again for the directions)

Oops, did do the search and the directions don't seem to work...but this one's worth watching for a laugh.
 
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I think new NK leader loves the West.
In order to keep power and save face some attack might be in order.
Could be good for US too, could be great distraction, especially if US shows restraint in their response. It would be great for their PR image, 'they are actually the world's peace keepers, who don't over-react.'
The North Korean guys would love their leader who unknowingly has actually defected to the west. Wow look at our guy, going nuclear on allies of the west, this guy is no joke, fearless. 'You one crazy Mother*%cker Kim!'
 
They eat a lot of fried cabbage.
 
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