North Korea

bignick

Senior Master
MTS Alumni
Joined
Jul 30, 2004
Messages
2,892
Reaction score
38
Location
Twin Cities
Word through the grapevine is that North Korea just tested a nuclear device...

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=564&ncid=564&e=1&u=/nm/20040912/ts_nm/korea_north_explosion_dc_6


there is some speculation as to whether it was an actual nuclear device...but there have been stories flying around for the last few days that North Korea may be ramping up for a weapons test...

time to start teaching our school children how to get under a desk, tuck their head between their legs and kiss their a** goodbye...


seriously...anyone have thoughts on what this means for the global relations now...
 
P

PeachMonkey

Guest
I just struggled out of bed to watch the F1 race, and CNN has a scrolling banner saying "US says strange cloud over North Korea isn't result of nuclear weapon":

http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/asiapcf/09/12/nkorea.blast/index.html

Apparently, the US theory is that this non-nuclear explosion was caused by a forest fire. Near Pyongyang. And a missile test site.

Now, I can't imagine that our government could be wrong, or even lie, about weapons of mass destruction.
 
OP
bignick

bignick

Senior Master
MTS Alumni
Joined
Jul 30, 2004
Messages
2,892
Reaction score
38
Location
Twin Cities
PeachMonkey said:
Now, I can't imagine that our government could be wrong, or even lie, about weapons of mass destruction.
yeah....they've been pretty spot on with that type of info in the past
 

RandomPhantom700

Master of Arts
Joined
May 19, 2004
Messages
1,583
Reaction score
69
Location
Treasure Coast, FL
A forest fire? C'mon, A FOREST FIRE? How often does California make CNN news and show up on satellites because of all of its forest fires?

*heads to the library to get the old "Duck and Cover" civil defense films*
 

Flatlander

Grandmaster
Joined
May 17, 2004
Messages
6,785
Reaction score
70
Location
The Canuckistan Plains
From this article in The Globe and Mail
A UN official said the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization, which monitors nuclear activity, had not detected any signs that the explosion was a nuclear blast.

KCNA reported “blastings at construction sites of hydropower stations in the north of Korea” had taken place.

North Korean Foreign Minister Paek Nam Sun told the same to visiting British Foreign Office Minister Bill Rammell.

“He gave me an explanation that it wasn't an accident, it wasn't a nuclear explosion, but in fact was a deliberate detonation of a mountain as part of a hydroelectricity project,” Mr. Rammell told reporters in Beijing after a four-day visit to the North.
We'll know soon enough what happenned there, as the British investigator will be there to check it out in the very near future.
 
S

Spud

Guest
A small country with a wacked out leader, a starving populace, technically still at war with South Korea and openly pursuing nukes. Not a good recipe.

Our unproven fantasy ICBM interceptors in Alaska and head-in-the-sand foreign policy don't make me feel any better.
 
B

Baytor

Guest
:redeme:

What's to worry about? The leader of NK is only called crazy by our biased ethnocentric standards:rolleyes: , and the leader of the USA is only called a recless twit by almost everyone who didnt't vote for him.
 

someguy

Master Black Belt
Joined
Oct 16, 2003
Messages
1,098
Reaction score
20
Location
Milledgeville Ga
Step one nuke'em.
Step two test the site for radioactivity to prove step one was a good idea
:uhyeah:
What great ideas I have. Right?
 

RandomPhantom700

Master of Arts
Joined
May 19, 2004
Messages
1,583
Reaction score
69
Location
Treasure Coast, FL
Yeah, about as great an idea as the guy who told me "we should nuke 'em" right after 9/11--without yet knowing who exactly it was that had attacked us.
 
P

PeachMonkey

Guest
IamBaytor said:
What's to worry about? The leader of NK is only called crazy by our biased ethnocentric standards:rolleyes: , and the leader of the USA is only called a recless twit by almost everyone who didnt't vote for him.
I was afraid this entire thread would go by without someone combining the classic Conservative one-two punch of anti-intellectualism and ignorance of history. Thanks for reassuring me.
 
S

Spud

Guest
IamBaytor said:
What's to worry about? The leader of NK is only called crazy by our biased ethnocentric standards:rolleyes: , and the leader of the USA is only called a recless twit by almost everyone who didnt't vote for him.
FWIW I think they are both dangerous whack-jobs.
 

michaeledward

Grandmaster
Joined
Mar 1, 2003
Messages
6,063
Reaction score
82
Regardless of what happened two years ago, according to this news report, the radioactive signature around North Korea now points to a successful test of a nuclear weapon.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/10/14/nkorea.test.sample/index.html

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A preliminary analysis of air samples from North Korea shows "radioactive debris consistent with a North Korea nuclear test," according to a statement from the office of the top U.S. intelligence official.

This should make things interesting.
 

MBuzzy

Grandmaster
MTS Alumni
Joined
Aug 15, 2006
Messages
5,328
Reaction score
107
Location
West Melbourne, FL
Personally, I think that they are just rattling their sword trying to get the US to engage in negotiations. Being in South Korea right now, it is a bit unnerving that they are that careless to be testing nukes with the political situation as it is.

But....there is a HUGE difference between having a nuclear device and being able to weaponize it. NK may have a device, but they could be years down the road from being able to actually deliver that device....especially to the US. They can't even launch an accurate missle with no warhead.
 

Don Roley

Senior Master
MTS Alumni
Joined
Sep 25, 2002
Messages
3,522
Reaction score
71
Location
Japan
Personally, I think that they are just rattling their sword trying to get the US to engage in negotiations.

That is the mistake we all made for years that led to this state of affairs.

I read a good article a few days ago that opened my eyes. The whole start to this state of affairs did not start with Bush jr, not with Clinton, but with the senior Bush and the Gulf war in 1991.

North Korea has a huge army. But its equipment is rather old. The old Soviet model was that a lot of tanks that are old will be able to overcome fewer modern tanks.

But America ripped through Hussein's army like a hot knife through butter.

So much for that idea. So how is a country that is pretty much bent on pissing off the rest of the world to prevent its being taken out? The answer is nuclear weapons.

In case anyone has been asleep I should remind them that North Korea has for decades done things like kidnap people from other nations, blow up building that their leaders are meeting in, conterfeit their currency, put bombs on their planes and a lot of other things like that. And through it all, they sat back behind their army and said, "are you willing to do anything about it?"

So in thinking that we could get them to give up the bomb with some sort of incentives, we ignored the fact that they will never, ever give it up because it is the only thing they think can keep them alive while they continue to do these types of things.

The idea of giving them a reactor was a bad idea because we did not realize this. The agreed to give up their program, but never did. If we merely think that giving them something else will convince them to give up the bomb we will be repeating the same mistake.

And the only security assurances we can give them that will make them give up the bomb is something in writing that says they can do whatever they want to us- like blow up a plane full of innocent people, without us ever using a military option against them.

What is the answer? I don't know. But I know we can't labor under the same mistaken impressions we have been.
 

exile

To him unconquered.
Lifetime Supporting Member
MTS Alumni
Joined
Sep 7, 2006
Messages
10,665
Reaction score
251
Location
Columbus, Ohio
There is a very complex and extremely dangerous three-player chess game going on here, I think. Way back when the U.S. and the Soviety Union were the two superpowers, U.S. strategic planners used to like to talk about playing the `China card'---use the steadily increasing miliitary power of China and its natural rivalry with the USSR over influence in Asia to constitute a kind of second front in the Cold War. What's happened is that when the Soviet empire broke up and Russia, saddled with decades of economic and environmental catastrophe, slid into second-tier status, China started overtaking it economically, based on its gigantic population and increasing industrial modernization, pumped up by foreign investment attracted by so much really cheap labor---and in a way, that made it advantageous for the Russians to forge a rapproachment with China, especially since now the U.S. was the sole superpower and neither the Russians nor the Chinese could `go it alone' (talking here abt. governments, always, not people, most of whom are just trying to stay alive and get by). The loose-cannon Stanlinist regime in North Korea fits perfectly into this strategy, and now Russia and China are playing the `North Korea' card, in an indirect but fairly obvious way---blocking any possibility of strong U.N. sanctions against the North, for example. It's probably the case that neither R. nor C. wants a completely nuclear-stocked N. Korea (or Iran) for that matter, but the dangerous appeal of putting the U.S. in a strategically frustrating and uncertain position makes it likely that they---N. Korea's economic mainstays---will give it a free pass to go on in this direction for a good long time... very risky situation, for everyone.
 

jazkiljok

Brown Belt
Joined
Jun 30, 2002
Messages
450
Reaction score
5
There is a very complex and extremely dangerous three-player chess game going on here, I think. Way back when the U.S. and the Soviety Union were the two superpowers, U.S. strategic planners used to like to talk about playing the `China card'---use the steadily increasing miliitary power of China and its natural rivalry with the USSR over influence in Asia to constitute a kind of second front in the Cold War. What's happened is that when the Soviet empire broke up and Russia, saddled with decades of economic and environmental catastrophe, slid into second-tier status, China started overtaking it economically, based on its gigantic population and increasing industrial modernization, pumped up by foreign investment attracted by so much really cheap labor---and in a way, that made it advantageous for the Russians to forge a rapproachment with China, especially since now the U.S. was the sole superpower and neither the Russians nor the Chinese could `go it alone' (talking here abt. governments, always, not people, most of whom are just trying to stay alive and get by). The loose-cannon Stanlinist regime in North Korea fits perfectly into this strategy, and now Russia and China are playing the `North Korea' card, in an indirect but fairly obvious way---blocking any possibility of strong U.N. sanctions against the North, for example. It's probably the case that neither R. nor C. wants a completely nuclear-stocked N. Korea (or Iran) for that matter, but the dangerous appeal of putting the U.S. in a strategically frustrating and uncertain position makes it likely that they---N. Korea's economic mainstays---will give it a free pass to go on in this direction for a good long time... very risky situation, for everyone.

or possibly it's North Korea playing the US card against China. they've been despartely seeking one on one talks-- they are trying to give themselves leverage against the chinese who they see as too influential in their world- China seeks stability in the region and is ready to eject little Kim Jung and his ruling class- who they see as fostering instability and against chinese new capitalistic ways. China already has enough defectors ready to replace the current regime and Kim isn't really sure who he can trust in his own circles.

giving himself a Nuke is Kim's way of holding an extra ace in his pocket to preserve himself.
 

exile

To him unconquered.
Lifetime Supporting Member
MTS Alumni
Joined
Sep 7, 2006
Messages
10,665
Reaction score
251
Location
Columbus, Ohio
or possibly it's North Korea playing the US card against China. they've been despartely seeking one on one talks-- they are trying to give themselves leverage against the chinese who they see as too influential in their world- China seeks stability in the region and is ready to eject little Kim Jung and his ruling class- who they see as fostering instability and against chinese new capitalistic ways. China already has enough defectors ready to replace the current regime and Kim isn't really sure who he can trust in his own circles.

giving himself a Nuke is Kim's way of holding an extra ace in his pocket to preserve himself.

That scenario and the Russia+China vs. the U.S. via N. Korea could both be true---N. Korea's interest isn't necessarily the same as China's. Both China and Russia are now economically entangled enough with the West that their inevitable jostling for supremacy is going to be operating more and more through proxies (it's been that way for a long time, in fact; now the danger is that the proxies are in some cases on the verge of becoming nuclear-capable to some degree or other). But N. Korea's relations with China have always been ambivalent---it was the Soviet Union, not the Chinese, who were the principal allies and military suppliers of NK during the Korean War; the Chinese mostly didn't want to have any of it, for various reasons. So yes, there's a history of distance and even tension between China and Russia. The NK govt is still probably relying more on its Russian connnection than the link to Peking.

All these powers are operating in effect in terms of their own interests; their tactics may coincide, but their strategic objectives are probably very different. Makes it very, very hard to understand just what's going on in whose mind.
 

exile

To him unconquered.
Lifetime Supporting Member
MTS Alumni
Joined
Sep 7, 2006
Messages
10,665
Reaction score
251
Location
Columbus, Ohio
meant to say, `a history of tension between NK and China.' Typing too fast...
 

Latest Discussions

Top