North Korea fires missles

[piercehawkeye45]

Originally Posted by Perry Winkle

If the powers are afraid of North Korea and Iran selling nukes, why don't they simply become the highest bidder?

That would give North Korea and Iran too much power. NK and Iran would actually have more incentive to create more nuclear weapons since they know they will get a lot of money from it and then NK and Iran would also have influence over our decisions.

Another reason is that we want to have power over NK and Iran. Once those countries get nuclear weapons, they will instantly become regional powers and the United States won't mess with them.

[classicman]

Originally Posted by piercehawkeye45

Once those countries get nuclear weapons, they will instantly become regional powers and the United States won't mess with them.

Its really too late for that. Thoughts need to now focus on how to deal with them WHEN, not if...

[tw]

Originally Posted by classicman

Its really too late for that. Thoughts need to now focus on how to deal with them WHEN, not if...

You give them too much credit. NK has numerous problems. Apparently their fissile material is low grade. Their experiment was not anywhere near as powerful as the Hiroshima bomb. And that means any bomb is also too large for deployment.

They launched a missile. To the naive and to those who always see enemies hiding everywhere, which means those missiles can be nuclear tipped. Nonsense. Facts say otherwise.

N Korea also does not have enough fissile material to market the stuff. Their nuclear program is for image - as if weapons alone make one powerful. Extremist military leaders worry about image. Implies military leaders, so worried about appearing weak, are in control. Did you not learn anything from Saddam and his WMDs?

UT cites a serious problem. The world's only hope is that they are rational actors. So the important question remains - who really is in charge?

[xoxoxoBruce]

They haven't been rational for the last 60 years, so I doubt they are now.

[tw]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

They haven't been rational for the last 60 years, so I doubt they are now.

Which *they*? Too many want to view in terms of a monolithic company, party, demonstrators, or country. Which they are not rational?

Clearly when Kim was offered an opportunity to open his nation to the world without losing his head to extremists, then he took it. Since his (rumored) stroke, even the hotline between the Koreas goes unanswered on the North side. So who now is *they*?

[xoxoxoBruce]

"They" are the succession of people running NK into the ground for the last 60 years. They have seen the Soviet Union and China demonstrate their system doesn't work, but continue to follow the same path.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by tw

Which *they*? Too many want to view in terms of a monolithic company, party, demonstrators, or country. Which they are not rational?

Even in view of your second para from this 2009 post, not quoted here, I am very surprised you found it necessary to ask -- unless you intended an expository question.

In which case I suggest your treating it as a rhetorical question and going on to make some sort of answer to it.

The DPRK's domestic policy (not changed much since 2009 either) shows that non-monolithism is not allowed and will get you a shortish life sentence in a "corrective" labor camp. This is amply well known. Can you somehow not know it, or even remain the least bit fuzzy on the concept? Working for General Motors didn't leave you time to read any papers or newsmagazines?

Honestly, tw. That kind of not-thinking is why I despise the Left so. There are documentary segments on North Korea put up on epphin' YouTube, FerFuxacheS. And in their dispassionate way, they are creepy as hell.