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Considering suicide due to imminent WW3

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eric76
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04 Apr 2013, 7:29 am

From http://apnews.myway.com/article/20130404/DA5ELC3G1.html:

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Kim Kwan-jin said that if North Korea were preparing for a full-scale conflict, there would be signs including the mobilization of a number of units, including supply and rear troops, but South Korean military officials have found no such preparations.

"(North Korea's recent threats) are rhetorical threats. I believe the odds of a full-scale provocation are small," he said. But he added that North Korea might mount a small-scale provocation such as its 2010 shelling of a South Korean island, an attack that killed four people.

Pyongyang has been railing against joint U.S. and South Korean military exercises taking place in South Korea and has expressed anger over tightened U.N. sanctions for its February nuclear test. Many of the threats come in the middle of the night in Asia - daytime for the U.S. audience.

Analysts say the threats are probably efforts to provoke softer policies from South Korea, to win diplomatic talks with Washington and to solidify the image of young North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.



pezar
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04 Apr 2013, 11:46 am

eric76 wrote:
From http://apnews.myway.com/article/20130404/DA5ELC3G1.html:

Quote:
Kim Kwan-jin said that if North Korea were preparing for a full-scale conflict, there would be signs including the mobilization of a number of units, including supply and rear troops, but South Korean military officials have found no such preparations.

"(North Korea's recent threats) are rhetorical threats. I believe the odds of a full-scale provocation are small," he said. But he added that North Korea might mount a small-scale provocation such as its 2010 shelling of a South Korean island, an attack that killed four people.

Pyongyang has been railing against joint U.S. and South Korean military exercises taking place in South Korea and has expressed anger over tightened U.N. sanctions for its February nuclear test. Many of the threats come in the middle of the night in Asia - daytime for the U.S. audience.

Analysts say the threats are probably efforts to provoke softer policies from South Korea, to win diplomatic talks with Washington and to solidify the image of young North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.


I was listening to North Korea's official shortwave radio station, and buried deep in a speech was the de facto admission that they can't put a nuke on a missile and hit the US. KJU called for more research into nukes and missiles, including miniaturization. Listen to their stuff for a while and it becomes clear that they see nukes as a defense deterrent against an imaginary US first strike. If the nukes aren't small enough, they can't be mounted in a missile. Compared to some of their recent stuff, yesterday's speech was mild.



thewhitrbbit
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04 Apr 2013, 3:22 pm

North Korea is a s**t hole. They have no economy, no freedom, no trade, the only thing they have to play with is their military.

They know if they attack America or South Korea, the response will be bad for them. I don't think China will stand by North Korea. China has to much to loose. Killing your customers without a way to replace them is bad business.

North Korea can only get attention by saber rattling. If we just ignore them, they'll go away.



mikassyna
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04 Apr 2013, 3:59 pm

History tends to repeat itself and many "predictors of the future" understand these dynamics and garner their success from stirring up people's fears.

So if the world were in fact coming to an end why end your life prematurely? I say, get as much fun as you can in this little time we have and then choose your own way to go as the bomb is coming down. No need to end it before you know what is actually going to happen. Preempting your own strike? Why do that? Why not do Death While Overdosing On Chocolate or something more enjoyable? Sheesh, if I knew that bomb was coming and I had no way out, one thing I'd petition to do would be to go to the nearest supermarket and stuff my face with every bit of high calorie food I could shove in my facehole without remorse LOL



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04 Apr 2013, 4:32 pm

thewhitrbbit wrote:
North Korea can only get attention by saber rattling. If we just ignore them, they'll go away.

No, if we ignore them, they'll rattle their sabre louder. I think they're hoping that the U.S. will eventually throw some money their way, just as "The squeaky wheel gets the grease" - thus the escalation in the degree of threats they've issued to match their need for good old American greenbacks.

It's not as if they have any valuable resources to offer in fair exchange.



pezar
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04 Apr 2013, 4:35 pm

thewhitrbbit wrote:
North Korea is a sh** hole. They have no economy, no freedom, no trade, the only thing they have to play with is their military.

They know if they attack America or South Korea, the response will be bad for them. I don't think China will stand by North Korea. China has to much to loose. Killing your customers without a way to replace them is bad business.

North Korea can only get attention by saber rattling. If we just ignore them, they'll go away.


China wants us humiliated, not dead. Basic Sun Tzu: To win without fighting is the greatest honor. They already have most of our industry, and have most of Japan's and Taiwan's too. (Japan is a dying society, which makes China extremely happy; the two are ancient enemies.) China is on top of the world, and they don't need NK to crash the party. In fact, China was not happy with the third generation Kim dynasty, and they don't like his performance in office. China doesn't want American troops on the Yalu either. NK serves an important role to them. I think that if Un decided to attack and told China to pound sand, China would get rid of him. Russia got rid of Gadhafi when he decided to use WMD on the rebels.



pezar
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04 Apr 2013, 4:37 pm

I decided not to kill myself for now. I'm convinced that NK can't hit CA (where I live) and that China and Russia wouldn't go to war against America for the sake of Kim Jong Un.



Fnord
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04 Apr 2013, 4:37 pm

pezar wrote:
... If the nukes aren't small enough, they can't be mounted in a missile...

If you can't make a bigger missile, then make a smaller warhead.

(There's something Freudian about that statement... ;) )

I think that the US should call their bluff - park a few missile cruisers off the coast of Japan, and dare the NKs to launch a first strike.



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04 Apr 2013, 9:49 pm

Fnord wrote:
I think that the US should call their bluff - park a few missile cruisers off the coast of Japan, and dare the NKs to launch a first strike.

It would be a very bad idea, both from a practical and a political standpoint, to not give Jong-Un a face-saving way out. For one, face is an extremely important concept in Oriental societies; it might well seem preferable to Kim and his people to die at our hands than to lose face in the confrontation. For another, it's really not in the best interest of the US to come across as a bully here. It's plainly apparent that North Korea cannot do the US any significant harm; we'd come across like an armed man pointing a rifle at a six-year-old and daring him to throw rocks at the house again.


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05 Apr 2013, 2:29 am

Don't do it! It's what the Xipods from Xiron want!



eric76
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05 Apr 2013, 3:40 am

DeaconBlues wrote:
Fnord wrote:
I think that the US should call their bluff - park a few missile cruisers off the coast of Japan, and dare the NKs to launch a first strike.

It would be a very bad idea, both from a practical and a political standpoint, to not give Jong-Un a face-saving way out. For one, face is an extremely important concept in Oriental societies; it might well seem preferable to Kim and his people to die at our hands than to lose face in the confrontation. For another, it's really not in the best interest of the US to come across as a bully here. It's plainly apparent that North Korea cannot do the US any significant harm; we'd come across like an armed man pointing a rifle at a six-year-old and daring him to throw rocks at the house again.


On the other hand, for the US to appease the North Koreans would be sheer madness. If you can't stand up to them, why should anyone respect the strength of the United States?



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05 Apr 2013, 9:38 am

eric76 wrote:
DeaconBlues wrote:
Fnord wrote:
I think that the US should call their bluff - park a few missile cruisers off the coast of Japan, and dare the NKs to launch a first strike.
It would be a very bad idea, both from a practical and a political standpoint, to not give Jong-Un a face-saving way out. For one, face is an extremely important concept in Oriental societies; it might well seem preferable to Kim and his people to die at our hands than to lose face in the confrontation. For another, it's really not in the best interest of the US to come across as a bully here. It's plainly apparent that North Korea cannot do the US any significant harm; we'd come across like an armed man pointing a rifle at a six-year-old and daring him to throw rocks at the house again.
On the other hand, for the US to appease the North Koreans would be sheer madness. If you can't stand up to them, why should anyone respect the strength of the United States?

Imo, the NKs are after foreign aid money, the relief of trade sanctions, and the easier flow of money from foreign investors.

"Give us money now, or we'll find a bigger sabre to rattle!"

:roll:



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05 Apr 2013, 11:12 am

I think any country that threatens another with nuclear weapons deserves to be obliterated by the rest of the world using conventional cluster-bombs.

Yeah, 'Mericuh is the only country to ever use them, but even they didn't know about the lingering torture of wide-spread radiation poisoning. (...Except for maybe one or two top scientists who were quickly ignored in the excitement of generating a BIG BOOM!)

Now that it's fairly well known, it should be seen as the incredible atrocity that it is - and nobody should ever even threaten to do so without the whole world turning on them!


...but we ARE talking about humans, inventors of other atrocities like poison gas, who have a thirst for blood that's hard to fathom... :roll:



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05 Apr 2013, 11:33 am

eric76 wrote:
DeaconBlues wrote:
Fnord wrote:
I think that the US should call their bluff - park a few missile cruisers off the coast of Japan, and dare the NKs to launch a first strike.

It would be a very bad idea, both from a practical and a political standpoint, to not give Jong-Un a face-saving way out. For one, face is an extremely important concept in Oriental societies; it might well seem preferable to Kim and his people to die at our hands than to lose face in the confrontation. For another, it's really not in the best interest of the US to come across as a bully here. It's plainly apparent that North Korea cannot do the US any significant harm; we'd come across like an armed man pointing a rifle at a six-year-old and daring him to throw rocks at the house again.


On the other hand, for the US to appease the North Koreans would be sheer madness. If you can't stand up to them, why should anyone respect the strength of the United States?

You know, there's a broad spectrum of possible responses between "utter surrender" and "daring them to do anything". The optimal solution generally lies somewhere in that spectrum.

In this particular instance, I think the path we're walking probably gives us the best options - Kim can still back down, and if he accedes to the requests made by the United Nations (note: NOT the US - if he accedes to our demands, he loses face), the sanctions can be eased. If he insists on war, at least it's made plain that we didn't choose it, it was forced on us. We just prosecuted it. (I wouldn't anticipate it taking very long; the longest part will probably be negotiating with China on where exactly the northern boundary gets drawn, because as has been pointed out before the Chinese are not terribly enthusiastic about having a Western presence on the Yalu.)


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eric76
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05 Apr 2013, 12:28 pm

DeaconBlues wrote:
eric76 wrote:
DeaconBlues wrote:
Fnord wrote:
I think that the US should call their bluff - park a few missile cruisers off the coast of Japan, and dare the NKs to launch a first strike.

It would be a very bad idea, both from a practical and a political standpoint, to not give Jong-Un a face-saving way out. For one, face is an extremely important concept in Oriental societies; it might well seem preferable to Kim and his people to die at our hands than to lose face in the confrontation. For another, it's really not in the best interest of the US to come across as a bully here. It's plainly apparent that North Korea cannot do the US any significant harm; we'd come across like an armed man pointing a rifle at a six-year-old and daring him to throw rocks at the house again.


On the other hand, for the US to appease the North Koreans would be sheer madness. If you can't stand up to them, why should anyone respect the strength of the United States?

You know, there's a broad spectrum of possible responses between "utter surrender" and "daring them to do anything". The optimal solution generally lies somewhere in that spectrum.

In this particular instance, I think the path we're walking probably gives us the best options - Kim can still back down, and if he accedes to the requests made by the United Nations (note: NOT the US - if he accedes to our demands, he loses face), the sanctions can be eased. If he insists on war, at least it's made plain that we didn't choose it, it was forced on us. We just prosecuted it. (I wouldn't anticipate it taking very long; the longest part will probably be negotiating with China on where exactly the northern boundary gets drawn, because as has been pointed out before the Chinese are not terribly enthusiastic about having a Western presence on the Yalu.)


I would assume that if there is a war, unless it ends in another mutli-year truce, the two Koreas will be rejoined into a single Korea.



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05 Apr 2013, 10:34 pm

Just look at it this way.
NK:24,000,000 people live here
USA: Over 300,000,000 inhabit this country

NK: 46,000 sq miles
USA: 3,800,000 sq miles

NK: Most likely have a nuke or two
USA: Largest stockpile of nuclear weapons on the planet

NK: A third world country, with little to no new military hardware
USA: I think you know how powerful our military is

Also the rules of nuclear war have changed since the cold war. We need to get this notion out of our head that a nuclear armed country can destroy the world all it's own, North Korea doesn't have satellite states or nuclear weapons placed in other countries. Also our (and I don't mean the US but the UN) policy for when a country uses nuclear weapons is total retaliation, so WWIII wont be so much of a full scale war, more us just wiping a country off a map... instantly.