North Korea

[Bagelfather]

If I am wrong, please correct me (or clarify the following).

As I understood it we never ended the war with North Korea, we simply have a cease fire agreement. All everyone is talking about is going to war with North Korea, but we are at war, aren't we, that's why we have the DMZ and troops on the border right?

So we wouldn't be entering a war, technically, we'd be renewing one.


So the more real question is, do you think we pushed North Korea into a corner? Yes they had a nuclear weapons program but it was shut down and not being pursued (huge cost when you can't even feed your people). It's my thought that by including them in the "Axis of Evil," taking away fuel oil, and other harsh language and policies we are forcing them into a corner.

I don't see why we can't back off and let things cool down. The people who will really suffer are the citizens of South Korea who are in the line of fire of an array of mortars and similar weaponry aimed southward.

 

[Texas_Tickle]

If I am wrong, please correct me (or clarify the following).

As I understood it we never ended the war with North Korea, we simply have a cease fire agreement. All everyone is talking about is going to war with North Korea, but we are at war, aren't we, that's why we have the DMZ and troops on the border right?

You are so correct. We never officially ended the Korean War. But also, why are we (America) quick to order other nations to disarm their nuclear weapons, while we are not willing to do the same?

Is it so that we would have a way to force our will and polices on others?

(If you don't do what we say and have the policies we tell you to have, we're gonna nuke you).

I mean if we don't disarm ourselves, then what right do we have to order others to do the same?

It's hypocritical.

 

[ticklernyc]

Bagelfather:

You are correct that the Korean [Civil] War was never formally or technically ended. There was only the Armistice Agreement in 1953.

Also, if you read the Agreed Framework of 1994, the DPRK's secret enriched uranium program was not really a violation. The Agreed Framework, only specifically mentioned the plutoniun program. The enriched uranium program only might have violated the parts about good faith efforts to reduce tensions on the Korean Peninsula and moving towards a nuclear weapons free Peninsula.

Leat not forget that it was the USA who first introduced nuclear weapon on to the Korean Peninsula, in 1958, in direct violation of the Armistice Agreement.

There are a few reasons why the DPRK wants nuclear weapons and a couple of reason wahy the USA does not want the DPRK to have them.

The reason, why the USA is not more skillfully dealing with the situation is that the policy makers do not really understand, the DPRK, Korea, East Asia, and Asia, and have short attention spans.

By the way, it only takes an artillery shell 53 second to reach downtown Seoul from the DPRK side of the DMZ.

ticklernyc

 

[kurchatovium]

The problem is right now with nuclear weapons lies not so much with the major powers but with smaller ones and of course terrorist groups. Russia and the provinces that made up the USSR have many nukes and some small yield ones as well. Those nukes in these provinces and even in Russia itself might easily be sold to Iraq, Iran, North Korea, or anyone with the money to make it happen. These areas need money badly as well which does not help the situation. Also Pakistan and India have several nukes and they don't get along very well. If they start a war there is no telling how far it might escalate. In addition there is the advent of what they call briefcase nukes that can be stored in a briefcase and have just enough "oomph" to level a city. Perfect for your average terrorist. The only thing that keeps this hodgepodge of destruction from coming apart is that everyone is scared of us retailiating. If they touch us, Europe, Israel or some other friendly power they know we will blast them to smitherines. Not an ideal situation but the best we have until we find a way to get along with one another and that does not look like its going to happen anytime soon.

 

[Texas_Tickle]

The problem is right now with nuclear weapons lies not so much with the major powers but with smaller ones and of course terrorist groups. Russia and the provinces that made up the USSR have many nukes and some small yield ones as well. Those nukes in these provinces and even in Russia itself might easily be sold to Iraq, Iran, North Korea, or anyone with the money to make it happen. These areas need money badly as well which does not help the situation. Also Pakistan and India have several nukes and they don't get along very well. If they start a war there is no telling how far it might escalate. In addition there is the advent of what they call briefcase nukes that can be stored in a briefcase and have just enough "oomph" to level a city. Perfect for your average terrorist. The only thing that keeps this hodgepodge of destruction from coming apart is that everyone is scared of us retailiating. If they touch us, Europe, Israel or some other friendly power they know we will blast them to smitherines. Not an ideal situation but the best we have until we find a way to get along with one another and that does not look like its going to happen anytime soon.

But the point I was making was what makes us (America) think we are in a position to order other soverign nations to dis-arm their nuclear weapons, when it is clear that we are not willing to do the same.

That is because we need our nukes, so we can force the rest of the world to bow down to whatever we say.

I love America and am just as Patriotic as the next person, but we have become nothing more than a common bully, who needs to flex our muscles before the entire world.......do what we say, or we'll nuke you.

Should every nut and threat have access to nuclear weapons? Of course not, but don't order others to dismantle their weapons, when we are not willing to do the same.

 

[kurchatovium]

I don't particularly like the ideal of having weapons that can blow us all to smitherines and turn everything into ash either. In a perfect world they would not exist. Alas our world is not a perfect world. I trust us more than I trust Korea, Iraq, Russia, any former USSR provinces, or even India or Pakistan with these weapons. If that keeps this mess from blowing up in our faces then I can live with that. I don't think its a matter of us forcing anyone to do anything but merely the fear that if they harm us or our allies they will have to pay the same price. The weapons are here and we cannot go back to a time where they do not exist. Trying to force those who would love to see the US nuked from ever getting that chance is just good common sense.

 

[Texas_Tickle]

I don't particularly like the ideal of having weapons that can blow us all to smitherines and turn everything into ash either. In a perfect world they would not exist. Alas our world is not a perfect world. I trust us more than I trust Korea, Iraq, Russia, any former USSR provinces, or even India or Pakistan with these weapons. If that keeps this mess from blowing up in our faces then I can live with that. I don't think its a matter of us forcing anyone to do anything but merely the fear that if they harm us or our allies they will have to pay the same price. The weapons are here and we cannot go back to a time where they do not exist. Trying to force those who would love to see the US nuked from ever getting that chance is just good common sense.

Well I agree to a point. But to say "We're the only people allowed to parade our weapons, to make you fear us and to make you bow down before our policies" is not good either.

With the way the President is acting, is it any wonder they call us "Dirty Americans"?

We expect the entire world to worship our policies, but we are not showing anybody else the same respect. We act like we own the entire world, and everybody else, is only one of our subjects.

 

[kurchatovium]

Well I guess I agree to a point as well. I don't think we should say lower your tariffs to our products or we might nuke you or some other trivial matter. The threat of such a calamity should only be used to prevent such a calamity from happening. That calamity could be nuclear, biological or chemical in scope but I think thats all the threat should be used for.

 

[Texas_Tickle]

Well I guess I agree to a point as well. I don't think we should say lower your tariffs to our products or we might nuke you or some other trivial matter. The threat of such a calamity should only be used to prevent such a calamity from happening. That calamity could be nuclear, biological or chemical in scope but I think thats all the threat should be used for.

But what is going to stop a nut from using it, just to further their own gain and agendas.

The UN has yet to find any "smoking gun" to incriminate Saddam. But I tend to think that Bush has already made up his mind that Saddam is lying and is going to launch an attack, regardless of what the UN Inspectors find or not.

But North Korea has already been **proven** to have a number of weapons, ready for deployment, so why is Bush not beating the war drums against them?

Is it because billions of Arab oil is at stake?

Is it to finish an old "family war" that began with his dad?

 

[kurchatovium]

North Korea and us have better diplomatic relations I believe. Also there is a much better world consenus for pressuring North Korea than Iraq. Therefore it is likely we can get what we want without the use of force and without spreading our military too thin. Iraq also has ties to Al Quaida and I don't think North Korea does or at least not nearly as many. Currently the UN inspectors believe Iraq to have more than 6000 gallons of anthrax stored and as far as I know North Korea does not have an extensive biological or chemical weapons program. There is also the matter of intent North Korea is probably at best only interested at getting South Korea and not expanding any further. The intent of Iraq seems much more expansionist or at the very least antagonistic. He has already gassed many of his own people with chemical weapons and already tried to invade Kuwait and so his intent makes Iraq a more dangerous place I think than Korea. Also if we do go to war with Iraq it will definitely put pressure on North Korea to comply and we won't have to have our troops spread out in two distant areas which I've sort of mentioned before. It may also just be a matter of wanting to send the Arab world a clear message of don't mess with us which would get them hopefully to stem their support of terrorism. I don't know if that last one will work or if it is what the actually strategy is but there are some reasons for choosing one over the other.

 

[Texas_Tickle]

North Korea and us have better diplomatic relations I believe. Also there is a much better world consenus for pressuring North Korea than Iraq. Therefore it is likely we can get what we want without the use of force and without spreading our military too thin. Iraq also has ties to Al Quaida and I don't think North Korea does or at least not nearly as many. Currently the UN inspectors believe Iraq to have more than 6000 gallons of anthrax stored and as far as I know North Korea does not have an extensive biological or chemical weapons program. There is also the matter of intent North Korea is probably at best only interested at getting South Korea and not expanding any further. The intent of Iraq seems much more expansionist or at the very least antagonistic. He has already gassed many of his own people with chemical weapons and already tried to invade Kuwait and so his intent makes Iraq a more dangerous place I think than Korea. Also if we do go to war with Iraq it will definitely put pressure on North Korea to comply and we won't have to have our troops spread out in two distant areas which I've sort of mentioned before. It may also just be a matter of wanting to send the Arab world a clear message of don't mess with us which would get them hopefully to stem their support of terrorism. I don't know if that last one will work or if it is what the actually strategy is but there are some reasons for choosing one over the other.

You're points are well taken. But then what about the gross persecution at the hands of China? They send millions of innocent people to "education camps (concentration camps). They kill people who preach about Christ. Churches are looted and the preists/pastors are often shot, on the spot.

Why do we have no out-cry against them? Is it because of the huge amounts of trade that we do with China and we do not wish to de-rail the "money train", even at the expense of millions of innocent Chinese whos only "crime" is not believeing what the Chinese Government orders them to believe?

 

[kurchatovium]

I agree with you completely on China. There should be a much louder outcry against them. They are also a much bigger threat and have many more weapons than either North Korea or even Iraq I believe. Thats the problem its going to be a nasty fight with much more loss of life if we took that on than either Iraq or North Korea. So we try to push them diplomatically without much effect. I personally think we should push a lot harder for they are one of the biggest abusers of human rights in the world right now if not the biggest.

 

[Biggles of 266]

sick of this argument being used

He has already gassed many of his own people with chemical weapons

Try this one

and this one

 

[Texas_Tickle]

I agree with you completely on China. There should be a much louder outcry against them. They are also a much bigger threat and have many more weapons than either North Korea or even Iraq I believe. Thats the problem its going to be a nasty fight with much more loss of life if we took that on than either Iraq or North Korea. So we try to push them diplomatically without much effect. I personally think we should push a lot harder for they are one of the biggest abusers of human rights in the world right now if not the biggest.

There is no nation in the world that has a more gross human right violation, that China. Political critics are jailed. Peaceful protesters and demonstrators are shot and run over by tanks. Christians are thrown in jail and tortured.

But because the US enjoys such a lucrative trade agreement with China, the US Officials choose not to say anything about it, for fear of de-railing the "money train".

About 35% of Chinese imports are made at so-called "education camps" where they use innocent prisioners as slave labor. The rest are made at sweat-shops, where the people earn, on average, about 50 cents a day.

If anybody else did what the Chinese officials are doing, we would be leading a "lynch mob".

But with China, everybody turns a blind eye.

Talk about hypocrisy at it's finest.

 

[asutickler]

I think we're holding back on the Korean situation because it has a better chance for a diplomatic solution. Also, Korea is China's nextdoor neighbor... and I highly doubt China is any too pleased at the prospect of having a nuclear-armed madman directly to the South. Korea can also be dealt with in a simpler fashion: We can cut off food aid.

It's no accident that millions of Koreans have literally starved to death over the past several years, during the same time their government was illicitly developing nukes. Nuclear weapons are MASSIVELY expensive to produce, and Kim Jong Il apparently decided that posessing them was more important than attempting to alleviate the suffering of his own people. Do we want this sort of man to have nuclear capabilities? I don't think anyone does. However, since the world's two "2nd-tier" superpowers are both relatively close to the situation, we may well just sit back and let them take out their own garbage, so to speak.

The United States, along with the majority of the rest of the world, supports a policy of nuclear non-proliferation. That said, however, the only nations we have thus far threatened to forcibly disarm are those whose posession of WMD makes them an immediate and dire threat to the rest of the world, due to the previous behavior of their individual ruling regimes. Although the USA expressed displeasure at the announcement, there was never talk of disarming India or Pakistan when those two nations announced that they posessed nuclear weapons- even though it was rumored that, in the beginning, Pakistan's missile fire-control systems are all but non-exsistant, and that a weapon could be launched from a truck, by an enlisted-rank soldier. Further, there has never been talk of disarming Israel, even though their nuclear weapons program is practically common knowledge.

Iraq and Korea have been ordered to disarm because the rulers of both nations are highly unstable individuals with a "nothing to lose" mentality. In other words, they might well launch their weapons, even knowing full well that it would mean both their death and the deaths of millions of their own citizens from retaliatory strikes. The main reason for the nuclear stockpile of the United States is deterrance, and the same holds true for other "acceptable" nuclear-armed nations. The theory is that no sane nation will start a nuclear war knowing that it would bring nuclear retaliation. Iraq and North Korea simply don't care.

Our "friendly" relationship with China is absolutely disgusting, given the actions of their government... But China hardly holds a monopoly on human rights atrocities. A classmate of mine from Iran once showed everyone the scars he had recieved from a whipping at an Iranian police station. He said that his entire family had gotten the same- all for the "crime" of holding a small gathering after dark. Hopefully ALL such nations will get what's coming to them, eventually.

 

[RichardAuc]

Correction on Korean "war"

Congress never declared war on North Korea. Per the Constitution, only Congress has the power to declare war. Ergo, there is no war to "renew". Call the events occurred in North Korea during the 50s tragedies, which they were, but not a war.

This is a little historical detail, often overlooked, that recent presidents have ignored. Our current president, for example, uses hostile rhetoric such as "axis of evil" to provoke North Korea into committing atrocities commonly committed during wars. He does this in hopes that Congress will declare war, since Americans usually reelect their presidents during a war, and he wants what every first-term president wants: a second term.

I'm not afraid: while the Republican party does have a majority in both houses, there are not enough representatives willing to risk the political fallout that would result from a declaration of war.

Another reason why I'm not afraid of war against North Korea is that there's nothing that either North Korea or the U.S. would gain from it. North Korea's lost face from the president's comments, and they're looking for an apology/concession to protect their image. Our ambassadors and secretary of state know this, so North Korea will probably get all they really want anyway.

Side note: the South Korean government doesn't want us patrolling the DMZ anyway. We should consider pulling out, as we'll probably need those troops elsewhere soon.

 

[asutickler]

Re: Correction on Korean "war"

Side note: the South Korean government doesn't want us patrolling the DMZ anyway. We should consider pulling out, as we'll probably need those troops elsewhere soon.

Agreed. By most strategic estimates, South Korea is strong enough to repulse a full-fledged invasion from the North for a month or two. Let them see how much "respect" they get from their unruly neighbor without our protective presence. It's not like China would let them invade, anyway. In virtually ANY Korean Peninsula war scenario, Seoul is toast. It's close enough for the NKs to hit with an artillery barrage: they don't even NEED missiles. A war between the two nations would plunge the Asian economic sector into chaos... which is something China cannot afford. Even if the PRC didn't step in, we'd still have plenty of time to show up and save the day. A single American carrier group is easily capable of wrecking the NK's Navy AND Air Force...

I say we let the South Koreans "protect" themselves.