Why the North Korean missile launch is different this time and some history of North Korea.

South Korea has sorta morphed into a no-nonsense, no-tolerance sort of way. Things could get real ugly if NK fires their wittle wocket, IMHO.

What do you think the outcome will be if he fires the missile but it immediately blows up on the pad or just a few hundred feet in the air (or better yet, an engine failure and crash scenario)? Specifically, does Kim end up looking weak enough that there's a coup of some sort afterward?

Last Edited by Astromut on 04/13/2013 01:52 AM

Still people seem to be discounting South Korea's current president.

[link to timesofindia.indiatimes.com]

SEOUL: Her mother was shot by an assassin. Her father, a staunchly anti-Communist dictator, was similarly killed. And she survived a vicious razor attack to the face.


Nobody doubts the toughness of South Korea's new president, Park Geun-hye, whose upbringing has made her as steely a leader as they come. Now at the center of an escalating crisis with North Korea, Park, 61, is her country's first-ever female leader, a fact that her rivals in the North have raised to taunt her.

Stories of her mental toughness are legend — on learning that her father had died, her first concern was whether North Korea was preparing to invade. Her first question after awakening from an operation after the razor attack in 2006, which left a scar across her jaw, was how her party's campaign was going.

Park is so tough-minded that even in South Korea, still one of Asia's most patriarchal societies, her gender has mainly been a nonissue after some initial jitters.

SHR, what are your qualifications?

Because of the current president!

[link to en.wikipedia.org]

Yep! Gotta admire a tough woman like that! She's one to be reckoned with, for sure!

Is there any way out of all this mess that doesnt involve military conflict now or in the next few years? Given the completely unstable nature and rhetoric coming out of NK I don't see how the USA could possible allow the north to go on developing their nuclear program and missiles to the point where some day they actually could reach the USA. even if war is averted now, is it only postponing the inevitable?

Nice, well thought out. Saving for when I'm not half asleep.

That scenario was the first thing I thought of when I got to SHR's third best outcome "they fire and something goes wrong..."

What if they accidentally blast themselves? Hmm...does the world just sorta point and giggle and go on about their lives? Does the world punish them further?

I mostly agree, it's why I said I said I didn't think any action taken against North Korea would lead to an "Armeggedeon war, which is war between the super powers would be. I also do not believe that China is going to step back and watch if we/western interests decided to take military action against NK...I'd sooner believe they would take the action themselves if it came down to a choice, if we were dragged in and engaged before they had that opportunity, both China and Russia would pitch a bitch and block every UN security council resolution regarding any action they could.

It's like a "we don't want to, but we sure as hell ain't going to let YOU do it, we'll do it ourselves before that happens" scenerio. China is as wary of South Korea as they are of them...China doesn't want to see the South take over the entire peninsula...and the North is never going to have complete control either...South Korea is very much aware of the Chinese having the "You owe us and we owned you many centuries anyway" Heir apparent to power attitude in the region...they have zero desire to be controled by China in any way at all.

So if the all of Korea goes toward capitolism with SK having dominance?...China will view that as a loss, a pretty big loss...and if there is any military action taken by the west?...that's really the ONLY way things could go. China isn't likely to go to war with us over NK, but they also aren't likely to stand for them just going away either and being absorbed to western influence either.

Washington (CNN) -- North Korea's missile maneuvering has raised the question of how the United States should respond, with some in Congress calling for shooting down anything that goes up.

[link to edition.cnn.com]

It is more likely that China and the US would negiotate over North Korea's future after removal of the current regime than go to war over it. All of this hope over an Armageddon scenario with Superpowers beating each other up over an insignificant country is pretty silly.

There are 2 things that would happen there...either Kim will blame US/SK forces for either sabatoge or having some sort of weapon that blew the missile up as soon as it's engines fired or whenever...if that happens?...he might use it claim an "Act of war" has been committed, then who knows where we go.

The second?...he will just sumarily execute some missile engineers, claim he isn't going to accept any incompatant boobs building shitty missile and more or less blame the tech guys and kill several of them. Probably nobody to vital, but it'll get the point across that he's in charge and he'll likely survive the failure.

Or a combination of the two.

There's some old time bad blood there...I believe her father or granfather was murdered by one of the Kims...see if I can dig that up...but in any case...there's no love lost there.

She does seem to be perhaps a bit extreme in her NK worries...as far as being attacked by them.

Her mother was killed by the North Koreans - Her Father was killed by the North Koreans. I was there when her mother was killed! Trust me, it is different now because of her!

AND,Who Gave North Korea Nukes In The First Place?

and what do you think it might take to "remove" the current regime in NK?...some harsh language?

That won't happen without a large scale military operation that would be war...so who would undertake that?...

[link to news.discovery.com]

Could you expad on that?...I'm sure I could search down the bio information, but I'd rather read it in your own words.

Two words -- plausible deniability.

#3 + #4 = [link to ts3.mm.bing.net]

Interesting theories we have here....

I really hope you are right..

They seem a little too confident right now for my liking.

The elite want world war and they could have Kim in their pocket. Get ready just in case.

There are some lessons to be learnt from world war 2.

Kim Ill Sung (Grandfather) -vs- Park, Chung Hee (Father) - in a nut shell, Grandpa sent killers to take out Father, but, missed and killed mom instead. She was beloved by all in South Korea - some people cut their fingers off in protest, some even set themselves on fire. Some years later, father was taken out by his own security staff (who many believed was linked to NK).

How tragic :(

Yeah.... Koreans are pretty intense people.

I disagree with your analysis, but it's a good read anyway. 5 stars!

Excellent meditation on the subject, OP
FIVE STARS!

(I've tried previously a ultrashort sort of something like this, without much success, LOL Thread: Pekin is tired of Pyongyang )

Last Edited by Inerrancia on 04/13/2013 02:30 AM