the nice thing is if they do nuke Guam, it will get rid of all the invasive snakes

If they nuke Guam, I'm gonna be pissed. That place is beautiful (or AWESOME, to piss some people off), and I fully intend on going back for a nice long vacation sometime soonish.

if they can launch even an accurate missile, it is unlikely to survive the boost phase

I concur. But if they try, they DO need to be spanked for their misbehavior. All of these "test launches" that we allow them to get away with will inevitably mask a true launch. Think "Boy who cried wolf" but in reverse.

"cut the head off the snake"

Just to broaden the conversation a bit. And to try to understand the point of view of our adversaries. We, the country with the largest nuclear arsenal are telling them that they are being punished with sanctions for developing nukes. We, the country that is running a very active missile and missile defense development programs and frequently shooting missiles from the west coast in their general direction to a splash down in Micronesia. Which I'm sure would be considered unacceptably close if the situation were reversed.
We, the worlds largest arms manufacturer and distributer, call their arms shipments to their allies illegal, even though we have arms shipments going out across the world constantly.
We also have a large military presents right on their border in a land that was not that long ago part of their own country, that was split off with a lot our help.
Since being named part of the Axis of Evil they have understandably stepped up their commitment to their military and weapon development, wouldn't you?

I don't know if the double standard that we expect to enforce is as acceptable to others as it is to us.
Whatcha think?

Cheers Richard

I think its gonna get PARFY around here PRETTY QUICK!!!!!;)

You may be right. I hope not, But if we can't look at the POV of our adversary we will fail to understand what motivates them and will be destine to react to events rather than shape them.

Are there factual errors in my post?

Cheers Richard

Why the references to glass? I thought that was the popular catch-phrase for the middle eastern countries that don't play nice on the assumption the heat of the blast would turn the silica in the desert sand to glass but I did not think North Korea is a desert state?

In it for the luls

Well, we are the good guys, and they are not, so common sense doesn't come into the equation ;)

Because they're nuts.

[QUOTE=kiwiokie;7383440]Why the references to glass? I thought that was the popular catch-phrase for the middle eastern countries that don't play nice on the assumption the heat of the blast would turn the silica in the desert sand to glass but I did not think North Korea is a desert state?[/QUOTE

In this case "glass' is used like "spoons" are used to describe something on this forum. With enough heat I believe that anything will be turned into glass or a carbon shadow.

With the past 4 year cycle of floods and drought in NK maybe I should have said "turn in to really hard brick"

While the US Navy doesn't usually tell the public where their submarines are at any time, they published that the USS Fitzgerald and the USS John S. McCain (part of the 7th fleet) were deployed to track and intercept any missile launches. The Navy destroyers are armed with sophisticated missile defense systems and between them they have 180 cruise missile launch tubes. I don't know how many spare cruise missiles they carry but I do know that they are not at sea alone. Of the 43 Los Angeles-class submarines (hunter killer subs) on active duty, I'm betting that there are 3-4 of them along with a couple of Ohio-class submarines (154 Tomahawk missiles each) as backup to the destroyers.

So if NK launches it's one ICBM and it gets past the destroyers, then the intercepts in Japan, Midway, Hawaii, or the ones by Kodiak, Alaska there is enough cruise missiles in the Sea of Japan right now to hit every dot in the North Korea map 10X over.

If their ICBM is nuclear and it lands on a populated area I'm pretty sure that the response would be to reduce the number of the 9,000,000 troops in NK starting with Kim.

Problem is our C-in-C would never give the order to strike - not even in retaliation. He's a pushover and I think NK is betting we're bluffing and would /will do nothing. They're probably right, unfortunately.

bin Laden thought the same as you

there's an ex-wife joke in there somewhere...

Facts don't support your opinion!

I'm thinking that screwing up would be the end of junior. He should know that.

And hopefully his family too. It would be best for everyone to get some leadership from a different gene pool.

I believe I understand your point. But with respect, we had a justifiable MO for getting OBL. Junior hasn't attacked us. And I'm not in favor of the US taking a leading role in any retaliation or pre-emptive strike. Support yes, lead no.