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Read.
I'm not optimistic about this at all. The international community has effictively called North Korea's bluff. The only card the DPRK has left to play is the War card. Well, or back down... but Kim Jong Il's not good at asking for forgiveness and pleading for food to feed his people.
Seriously, if China is cutting off their aid (i.e. food and oil), then invading South Korea is what will happen next. Winter in North Korea without food and heat will spell death for millions if something isn't done.
Someone else think that there won't be armed conflict in the Korean peninsula before February 1st, 2007?
I'm not optimistic about this at all. The international community has effictively called North Korea's bluff. The only card the DPRK has left to play is the War card. Well, or back down... but Kim Jong Il's not good at asking for forgiveness and pleading for food to feed his people.
Seriously, if China is cutting off their aid (i.e. food and oil), then invading South Korea is what will happen next. Winter in North Korea without food and heat will spell death for millions if something isn't done.
Someone else think that there won't be armed conflict in the Korean peninsula before February 1st, 2007?
With a little luck, a few million dead or dying from hunger and lack of medical aid will cripple the DPRK's ability to effectively mount any kind of conventional ground assault.
There will be only one card left in their hand, and they will, in some hedged sense (South Korea, maybe; not China or a direct U.S. target) play it.
Once they've used a nuke, there will be a paradigm shift away from the concept of appeasement of these regimes. The idea of allowing every little nation around the globe to do whatever it wants while endlessly debating if the wording on a U.N. resolution is too strong will fade into obscurity. As far as advancing the ball on international acceptance of U.S. foreign policy, the second Korean War would rival September 11th in its utility.
Not to mention its horror.
There will be only one card left in their hand, and they will, in some hedged sense (South Korea, maybe; not China or a direct U.S. target) play it.
Once they've used a nuke, there will be a paradigm shift away from the concept of appeasement of these regimes. The idea of allowing every little nation around the globe to do whatever it wants while endlessly debating if the wording on a U.N. resolution is too strong will fade into obscurity. As far as advancing the ball on international acceptance of U.S. foreign policy, the second Korean War would rival September 11th in its utility.
Not to mention its horror.
Heya Leber, howzit?
As far as war in Korea before February? Nope, not gonna happen. The international community will bend over backward to make sure it doesn't. Punitive actions do NOT mean, "We're gonna let millions of Koreans starve because Kim Jong Il is an asshole."
On the other hand... the man is insane... (Napoleanic Complex at least, if not worse) so... maybe.
EDIT: Oh, an interesting little fact. (for those of us living in Hawaii at least)
The Taepodong (hehe... he said dong) 2 missile is said to be capable of hitting Alaska and Hawaii... bout the only way Hawaii would ever be attacked with a nuke is if Kim Jong Il was considering his options. "Hmm... Anchorage or Honolulu?" I think he'd go for Honolulu... much much bigger impact on the world scene. Nobody much cares about Anchorage (cept the residents maybe) but everyone knows Honolulu. Plus, there is Pearl Harbor, so there is an actual military justification for that option.
As far as war in Korea before February? Nope, not gonna happen. The international community will bend over backward to make sure it doesn't. Punitive actions do NOT mean, "We're gonna let millions of Koreans starve because Kim Jong Il is an asshole."
On the other hand... the man is insane... (Napoleanic Complex at least, if not worse) so... maybe.
EDIT: Oh, an interesting little fact. (for those of us living in Hawaii at least)
The Taepodong (hehe... he said dong) 2 missile is said to be capable of hitting Alaska and Hawaii... bout the only way Hawaii would ever be attacked with a nuke is if Kim Jong Il was considering his options. "Hmm... Anchorage or Honolulu?" I think he'd go for Honolulu... much much bigger impact on the world scene. Nobody much cares about Anchorage (cept the residents maybe) but everyone knows Honolulu. Plus, there is Pearl Harbor, so there is an actual military justification for that option.
Yeah, and history has been kind to those nations who have launched sneak attacks on Pearl Harbor.
An island state against an entire semi-continent would have no chance in the long run. If I recall correctly, it was mostly due to oil (or, rather, the lack thereof) that forced Japan to surrender.
Anyway, here's hoping this will blow over. Or maybe we could just accept the desire of some states for nuclear weapons?
Anyway, here's hoping this will blow over. Or maybe we could just accept the desire of some states for nuclear weapons?
Yes, if it hadn't been for the lack of oil, they could have kept it up until... well, I suppose until we bombed them further out of existance than we did.
well, there was the british island, and its empire, which lasted several hundred years, ruled over india, china, some of africa, and america, and a few other places.
and then there was vietnam... they didnt need oil to defeat the US.
no more 'rules of history' please
Lecter : Yeah. The rest of the civilized world is wrong, we are right. Why cant they all see it? Its tough being the only people who know what is going on, who are brave enough to stand up to evil. The only country that gives a damn about freedom. The only country with any guts and commitment to defend what is right. Eventually we can maybe change everyone's mind, though. Once Iraq becomes a stable, free, democratic country, with a good economy, we can then go invade North Korea, Iran, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and a few other countries, and do the same thing there. It will be known in the history books as the 'great liberating wars of the 21st century', where one nation, one people, the American people, were brave enough to stand up against the bullies and despots of the world, and get the planet moving in the direction of freedom and democracy for all people. It started in Vietnam, which was a practice run for Iraq. That's why things are going better in Iraq, because we learned the mistakes of Vietnam (well there really weren't any mistakes, the failures in vietnam were really because of communist influences on American soil, a corruption of the political process by leftist nuts in congress and the media). Anyways, Iraq is going better than Vietnam and will end up better than Vietnam. After that, the North Korea liberation will run like clockwork. We will also get the civilized nations on our side this time, like France and Germany, and Japan. Japan can even send troops into Korea, that would be a great start for Japans entry back into the freedom loving liberation minded military community of nations. I think the people of North Korea would welcome the Japanese as liberators, and throw flowers at their feet. When the brave Japanese freedom fighters topple the bronze idols of Kim Jong Il, I think every North Korean will feel a little tingle in their heart.
I look forward to a century of liberating wars fought by the free people against the evil oppressors. Some day the entire world will resemble America - prosperous and free, with 1 out of every 200 people in prison, a large percentage of them for doing drugs, a death penalty system that routinely executes the innocent, a voting system that is run by people who donate money to political parties, a massive bureaucracy that reports to nobody, prison factories that compete directly with free labor, pedophiles, thieves, and con artists running congress, political candidates that never debate each other, a 'free press' that spends most of its time on celebrity gossip, a divorce rate of 50 percent, a government budget that is a bunch of cooked books that would get you fired from any legitimate business job, etc etc etc.
Good luck with that.
and then there was vietnam... they didnt need oil to defeat the US.
no more 'rules of history' please
Lecter : Yeah. The rest of the civilized world is wrong, we are right. Why cant they all see it? Its tough being the only people who know what is going on, who are brave enough to stand up to evil. The only country that gives a damn about freedom. The only country with any guts and commitment to defend what is right. Eventually we can maybe change everyone's mind, though. Once Iraq becomes a stable, free, democratic country, with a good economy, we can then go invade North Korea, Iran, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and a few other countries, and do the same thing there. It will be known in the history books as the 'great liberating wars of the 21st century', where one nation, one people, the American people, were brave enough to stand up against the bullies and despots of the world, and get the planet moving in the direction of freedom and democracy for all people. It started in Vietnam, which was a practice run for Iraq. That's why things are going better in Iraq, because we learned the mistakes of Vietnam (well there really weren't any mistakes, the failures in vietnam were really because of communist influences on American soil, a corruption of the political process by leftist nuts in congress and the media). Anyways, Iraq is going better than Vietnam and will end up better than Vietnam. After that, the North Korea liberation will run like clockwork. We will also get the civilized nations on our side this time, like France and Germany, and Japan. Japan can even send troops into Korea, that would be a great start for Japans entry back into the freedom loving liberation minded military community of nations. I think the people of North Korea would welcome the Japanese as liberators, and throw flowers at their feet. When the brave Japanese freedom fighters topple the bronze idols of Kim Jong Il, I think every North Korean will feel a little tingle in their heart.
I look forward to a century of liberating wars fought by the free people against the evil oppressors. Some day the entire world will resemble America - prosperous and free, with 1 out of every 200 people in prison, a large percentage of them for doing drugs, a death penalty system that routinely executes the innocent, a voting system that is run by people who donate money to political parties, a massive bureaucracy that reports to nobody, prison factories that compete directly with free labor, pedophiles, thieves, and con artists running congress, political candidates that never debate each other, a 'free press' that spends most of its time on celebrity gossip, a divorce rate of 50 percent, a government budget that is a bunch of cooked books that would get you fired from any legitimate business job, etc etc etc.
Good luck with that.
Unlikely that war will happen. Dictators are only interested in staying in power, and good ole' Kim, as crazy as he is, knows the moment he attacks is the moment he can say goodbye to his loonie bin "paradise". Of late, he's overreached his hand, with two out of three ploys not working his way; the nuclear test was successful, but his Taepodong test failed miserably, and his loon idea to keep the trains China used to send aid packages only resulted in China no longer sending anything.
His bluffs are being called, and he will soon have to back away, specially once aid resumes because, like Baba says, the international community is not about to let millions of people starve on account of a bunch of madmen.
What I am worried about is the future of these people under him; I'm sure pretty much all of us have seen pics of how life is over there, and read about how escapees find it virtually impossible to adjust to life outside Kimland. No other place in the planet is as disconnected from reality as North Korea, and some "experts" say making them switch over in bulk (as in, after toppling Kim and his cronies) might prove impossible and catastrophic for these people. They won't adapt quickly like the Iron Curtain countries did or like we expect Cuba to; the dismantling of the Kim dictatorship is going to be one of the hardest tasks outside war the global community has to face one day.
His bluffs are being called, and he will soon have to back away, specially once aid resumes because, like Baba says, the international community is not about to let millions of people starve on account of a bunch of madmen.
What I am worried about is the future of these people under him; I'm sure pretty much all of us have seen pics of how life is over there, and read about how escapees find it virtually impossible to adjust to life outside Kimland. No other place in the planet is as disconnected from reality as North Korea, and some "experts" say making them switch over in bulk (as in, after toppling Kim and his cronies) might prove impossible and catastrophic for these people. They won't adapt quickly like the Iron Curtain countries did or like we expect Cuba to; the dismantling of the Kim dictatorship is going to be one of the hardest tasks outside war the global community has to face one day.
Nope, they just needed a fifth column of damn dirty hippies. Amusingly, as far as the VC and NVA's military capabilities were concerned, Tet was a last gasp.
But noooo! it was a quagmire!! We had to run away, run away!
Edit: Jex, why bother? It would be simpler and far more just to simply allow their chosen system to run its course, no?
But noooo! it was a quagmire!! We had to run away, run away!
Edit: Jex, why bother? It would be simpler and far more just to simply allow their chosen system to run its course, no?
yeah. tet was nothing. like i said above, that damn liberal media, influenced by the communists, is what got us kicked out of vietnam. that is happening less in iraq. we have fox news now. but the media is still a problem. i think the military needs to keep investing in ways to counter the threat that the liberal media poses to american interests. embedding is a good start, but they need to go farther. there need to be more commercials, something like the 'ad council' does... but more. we need to get into hollywood, into pop music, into video games (americas army, another good start). we need to have representation at concerts, concert tours, venues, t-shirt shops, toy stores, all the places where kids hang out. how about this? camoflague ben and jerrys ice cream. a US army warcraft guild. US army bicycles. US army chocolate bars.
How do we target potentially liberal kids? College kids? We give them free stuff. Army sponsored parties. But also alot of these Gen Y kids are philanthropy types. We need to have the Army do a lot of social service projects, like help the poor, help orphans, fight breast cancer, build playgrounds, etc. There are about 60,000 medium sized towns in America - imagine if 1 out of every 10 had an US DOD playground, where you could play around on tanks, ships, helicopters, etc. And we need to advertise that we are doing it. Big corporations all do this stuff, we need to get in on that action.
we also need to go into the churches. there is too much emphasis on the pacifist view of jesus, which is not exactly the only view. the bible has a lot of good information about the necessity of standing up for what is right, what you believe in, etc etc etc. that can include guns and ammo. we need to get some of our people into seminary so they can get the message out.
we need to promote a positive view of the military and US policy. this is how you build morale. this is how you fight the liberal media. there are lots of good folks in the PR world who would be happy to help us with this mission.
also we need to get some of the conservative friends in big business to continue to get involved in the media business. fox news is not enough. it would be better if we owned a global network, like CNN. and another US network like CBS. it shouldnt be too hard with all the money we have. we also need to get on internet news sites. google news, youtube, slashdot, fark, etc. and what about newspapers? they are desperate for money, and losing readership. we have money, and we want an audience for our message. it is a good opportunity.
we should be able to buy a lot more fairness and balance from the media, pop culture, everything that goes to make up the 'morale' of the troops and the psychological underpinnings of how a war is going.
also on the 'stick' side, i think that a lot of this media misreporting is a 'material aid' to the terrorists, and some of these media people might have links to al qaeda. just like a lot of media people in the vietnam era had ties to the communist party. we should try to investigate these links and prosecute people who are helping the other side. also with non-american journalists, you have a greater opportunity because the same laws dont apply to them as to americans, stuff like detention, interrogation, etc.
i think vendetta online would be a good place to start. there is not enough pro-military representation here. but it would be good to try to get Guild to put in something like 'insurgents' that you have to battle against, and get rewarded with positive feedback for fighting against them.
How do we target potentially liberal kids? College kids? We give them free stuff. Army sponsored parties. But also alot of these Gen Y kids are philanthropy types. We need to have the Army do a lot of social service projects, like help the poor, help orphans, fight breast cancer, build playgrounds, etc. There are about 60,000 medium sized towns in America - imagine if 1 out of every 10 had an US DOD playground, where you could play around on tanks, ships, helicopters, etc. And we need to advertise that we are doing it. Big corporations all do this stuff, we need to get in on that action.
we also need to go into the churches. there is too much emphasis on the pacifist view of jesus, which is not exactly the only view. the bible has a lot of good information about the necessity of standing up for what is right, what you believe in, etc etc etc. that can include guns and ammo. we need to get some of our people into seminary so they can get the message out.
we need to promote a positive view of the military and US policy. this is how you build morale. this is how you fight the liberal media. there are lots of good folks in the PR world who would be happy to help us with this mission.
also we need to get some of the conservative friends in big business to continue to get involved in the media business. fox news is not enough. it would be better if we owned a global network, like CNN. and another US network like CBS. it shouldnt be too hard with all the money we have. we also need to get on internet news sites. google news, youtube, slashdot, fark, etc. and what about newspapers? they are desperate for money, and losing readership. we have money, and we want an audience for our message. it is a good opportunity.
we should be able to buy a lot more fairness and balance from the media, pop culture, everything that goes to make up the 'morale' of the troops and the psychological underpinnings of how a war is going.
also on the 'stick' side, i think that a lot of this media misreporting is a 'material aid' to the terrorists, and some of these media people might have links to al qaeda. just like a lot of media people in the vietnam era had ties to the communist party. we should try to investigate these links and prosecute people who are helping the other side. also with non-american journalists, you have a greater opportunity because the same laws dont apply to them as to americans, stuff like detention, interrogation, etc.
i think vendetta online would be a good place to start. there is not enough pro-military representation here. but it would be good to try to get Guild to put in something like 'insurgents' that you have to battle against, and get rewarded with positive feedback for fighting against them.
Good call. Post it up there in Suggestions, please.
Oh, yes...
Good luck with that.
We're already well on our way, Ananzi =) But instead of trying to save places like Sudan, DPRK, et al., I look forward to our being able to just say "No." No to undeserved food and medical aid; No to tolerating their development of technologies that their own system could never produce and which the rest of the world has already politely said that they may not pursue. No, in short, to saving them from the nasty side effects of the system of government that they tolerate.
While we have all of the parade of horrible you rattle off, we're still better off than any other nation on the globe. And I know that just rankles you, sweetie <3
Oh, yes...
Good luck with that.
We're already well on our way, Ananzi =) But instead of trying to save places like Sudan, DPRK, et al., I look forward to our being able to just say "No." No to undeserved food and medical aid; No to tolerating their development of technologies that their own system could never produce and which the rest of the world has already politely said that they may not pursue. No, in short, to saving them from the nasty side effects of the system of government that they tolerate.
While we have all of the parade of horrible you rattle off, we're still better off than any other nation on the globe. And I know that just rankles you, sweetie <3
"the international community is not about to let millions of people starve on account of a bunch of madmen."
what makes you think that? cambodia? china in the 50s? sudan?
"They won't adapt quickly like the Iron Curtain countries did"
which iron curtain countries adapted quickly? because i was watching this documentary about sex trafficking in central asia, and this lady from odessa ukraine had a young brother who was dying of some disease, she tried to make money by whoring herself in turkey, but it wasnt enough, and he died.
what makes you think that? cambodia? china in the 50s? sudan?
"They won't adapt quickly like the Iron Curtain countries did"
which iron curtain countries adapted quickly? because i was watching this documentary about sex trafficking in central asia, and this lady from odessa ukraine had a young brother who was dying of some disease, she tried to make money by whoring herself in turkey, but it wasnt enough, and he died.
Indeed: we can only hope the international community does what is right, and makes it clear that those who live by the bunch of madmen, will have to live (or not) with their bunch of madmen.
[edit] on second thought, I don't actually want in on this one.... I'll call Lecter a pompous psychopath some other time....
exactly lecter. except the USA. i mean, its not fair to blow up all of us when only some of us voted for bush.
Nah, we deserve all the flack we get for ole Shrub. Thankfully, he's sane compared to Chavez, Kim, Ahmadinejad, Putin... et al. ;)
Yeah. Sane but stupid.
Brighter than the other choices on the menu, excepting McCain in the '00 Republican Primary.
You got to be kidding me.
(btw, 3 of the 4 you listed out in your "insane" list are completely sane. In fact, they are so sane it's scary. Have you ever heard a Putin conference, *live*, on NPR, taking calls from belligerent listeners and dispatching them with ease?)
/me is beginning to regret getting into this argument in the first place.
(btw, 3 of the 4 you listed out in your "insane" list are completely sane. In fact, they are so sane it's scary. Have you ever heard a Putin conference, *live*, on NPR, taking calls from belligerent listeners and dispatching them with ease?)
/me is beginning to regret getting into this argument in the first place.
Indeed, Putin is far from being insane.
Anyway, ananzi's posts, though acidic, are thoughts I can agree with.
And please, don't say that Bush is a good president. He just isn't. He's not the problem as such, but he's part of it.
Anyway, ananzi's posts, though acidic, are thoughts I can agree with.
And please, don't say that Bush is a good president. He just isn't. He's not the problem as such, but he's part of it.