Korea
 

Whaddya' think?

My vote is for the South doing nothing 'cause the North could (and would) wipe them off the face of the earth if they actually do what they SHOULD, which is respond militarily to a flagrant act of war.

The South will try to levy economic sanctions against NK, cause those work so well...

The South has built economic ties w/ the North, which can be cut off, which will hurt the North significantly even if other countries (China) don't join in the sanctioning.

I don't see the South launching airstrikes or anything Hollywood like that. But the South is putting a lot more emphasis on anti-submarine now.

The Chosun Ilbo (English Edition): Daily News from Korea - S.Korea, U.S. Plan Joint Anti-Submarine Drill Next Month

They will do more than we ever will.

I'm surprised NK doesn't do this more often. The worse they behave, the more they are rewarded. Why would they ever stop?

NK is a Chinese PAWN on the chess board of global politics. BO blows the Chinese off everytime they express a concern about something they don't like, and every time the Chinese get Bo attention by the Nk's doing something. Everytime it is Sec Treasury Geithner that talks to China and not Sec of State Clinton...and then ya notice after that all is quiet again with NK until...

I think the worst thing the North could ever do is openly attach the South. We have US troops in the South. How do you think our military would respond if the North invaded?

(On the other hand, NObama is in office, so I guess anything's possible.)

I'm so sick of what Kim Jong Il has been up to the last few years. Why do we cater to this weak-*** nation? They sink a ship, murder South Koreans, then threaten the rest of the world that they better not do anything? WTH?

We'd do nothing. Well, we'd condemn the action, Obama would make a dog and pony show out of it and then invite ding-dong-il to Washington for a beer summit so they could talk about it. And talk, and talk, and talk. Then ding-dong il would go home with a belly full of US-taxpayer-paid food and stir up some schit elsewhere, convinced that the big old dog has no balls.

'zactly.

SK should be militarizing to match the moves of the North. They aren't. They should be trying to move their populations away from the border with the north (where they're much more vulnerable to a larger array of weaponry). They aren't. They should be openly trying to create inroads with China and other powers in order to forcibly disarm the North. They aren't.

Instead they're taking their concerns to the UN (har-har, that'll work) and throwing it on the table for consideration by the US. Like we're going to do anything.

With Seoul being only 40 miles or so from the border, this is pretty hard to do.

http://asbury.smugmug.com/Travel/Asi...94_bqyAQ-L.jpg

this puts China in an interesting position - they do a LOT of biz with SK and the US -- what will they do, now that their supported regime has done this?

NK will go to the UN for sanctions and maybe do some unilateral stuff, but they do NOT want a war with NK

The problem is China doesn't have to worry cuz the US is dependent on their imports and will just roll over.

but China is heavily dependent on exports to the US...

Let me think
 

Damm the torpedoes full steam ahead...

WikiAnswers - Who said 'Damn the torpedoes Full speed ahead''

i think we should covertly take ALL THE COCAINE SEIZED around the world and FLOOD NORTH KOREA with it.


and FLOOD THE COUNTRY from sea/air/ land with VIAGRA!



sooner or later kim ill lil dick dong and his uber entourage will catch the action going on(we know he has a penchant for hookers) and seemingly over night they will be addicted to cocaine and viagra and screw themselves into an early grave! then south korea takes over and makes nice with china.


VIVA LA REVOLUCION!

ODDJOB UNO

That is brilliant!

Don't fall into the trap of thinking that the US depends on China but China does not depend on the US. It is a mutual dependence, and Chinese policy is at least as influenced by US desires as US policy is influenced by Chinese desires.

Nothing seems to change there.

The sinking of the Cheonan was an act of war. Someone needs to grow a pair and do something about it.
But they won't...As always South Korea will protest and some time will pass and that will be it.
SK should have retaliated accordingly. There are ways they could have done this effectively but they chose not to.

From INSIDE JoongAng Daily
"According to one source, Chinese diplomats based in Seoul have been telling diplomats from other countries that taking the
Cheonan case to the Security Council was “not a good idea” because it could “upset” the North."

Freekin pathetic if you ask me but the older I get the more I realise the world is full of Kaka.
The only thing that seems to matter is economics. Peoples lives or dignity counts for nothing.

Round and round we go...

Easy to talk tough when your capital city isn't 45 miles from the border.

The South won't do anything.

If they were serious about ever responding it would be telegraphed like a neon sign, because the very first thing the ROK would do before any pre-emptive strike is evacuate Seoul completely.

Why shouldn't SK just take out a similarly-sized NK vessel? "Eye for an eye" for ol' KJI... he would have no justification for overreacting to that.

Because DPRK has over 10,000 artillery pieces pointed at Seoul, which would kill 10's if not 100's of thousands within a matter of a few minutes of the opening of hostilities.

The DPRK is able to act as outrageously as it does because it literally has millions of innocent civilians within easy striking distance, and the means to create truly horrific mass causualties in a matter of minutes.

Any time, day or night.

I know what they can do because of the proximity... I just wonder if they would do that if one of their ships was taken out in response. One ship.

Assume a 99% chance of no response, would you risk a 1% chance of losing your capital city?

This thread should be moved to PARF and we can "war game" the scenario.

Here's my $0.02:-
(Remember the Korean war never ended, there's just a ceasefire)
South sinks DPRK vessel.
DPRK declares open naval war, losses on both sides, including Southern civilian.
America and China urge restraint. America makes it clear that it will not support any "disproportionate" response by the South. China mobilises along the DPRK border (to prevent 23 million refugees flooding into China).
South Korean navy cannot keep sealanes safe enough that maritime insurers will allow commercial shipping to serve the South. Southern economic crisis, exacerbated by refugees flooding South from Seoul. Martial law. DPRK openly threatens American naval vessels, so American naval vessels withdrawn.
Southern economic collapse.
South re-establishes truce with DPRK.
Post script: Unnerved by lack of American military support, South Korea develops its own nuclear deterrent. Japan watches events on the Korean Peninsula and concludes that American bases do not guarentee security. Popular uprising against the bases, bases closed. New Japanese constitution, Japanese nuclear deterrent.

I agree that this really will need to move to PARF. Do you seriously feel that we would run from a direct threat that that? We have the means to wipe them off the earth and Obama is just as likely as any other president to threaten or even use that force. We have troops in SK for a reason and such a reason is starting to present itself. I would not overstate the power of NK's abilities. The current military has a large number of troops who were greatly weakened by the last big famine.

I would not go out of my way to start something, but we won't run from a provocation like that.

BO will do ANYTHING including getting down on his knees to make sure that NK & SK don't go to war. It is a war he CAN NOT AFFORD. He has 2 already going, a nation in debt up to its eyeballs with a good chunk going to Chunking..

BO has no choice but tosupport SK militarily...he is in a box...He has guarntees to the worlds 2ND largest economy and most stalwart ally....Japan. Japn would take a very dim view of America chickening out in SK, as their security is directly affected. . Japan and China are neck and neck as to who is holding more US debt.

Wow, how the eff did I get transported to the PARF sewer?

Well, the response to an act of war IS a political decision. Anyway, this is still a civil discussion compared to most PARF threads.

But this isn't PARF.

This administration's foreign policy is fairly conventional. Who escalated the Afghanistan war?

The US has 30K troops in SK and pre-positioned equipment for many more. They will be among the first casualties. And the mutual defense commitment in SK is almost as old as NATO, breach that and there goes your military influence globally. No president other than a radical isolationist would fail to respond, and Obama is not that.

I actually think a war in Korea would escalate to nuclear when NK starts losing. Once NK fires the first nuclear missile, even if just a medium range one aimed at a purely military target in SK (how likely is that?) the game theory says that the US has to strike NK with nuclear weapons, massively (no eye for an eye stuff). Neither China nor Russia would get involved.

John, I think your analysis of war in the Korean peninsula is spot on.

I'm not aware that NK has successfully tested a nuclear weapon yet - just a fizzled "bust" of an attempt that had pitifully low yield and amounted to little more than a big conventional explosion and a bunch of radioactive mess over a few hundred yards.

I don't know that NK would retaliate if SK took out one of their naval vessels. NK's sole mission in life is regime survival. That's the highest goal they could ever achieve. They know they cannot win a real war with SK, probably not even if the US stayed out of it. So it's in their best interests to keep a real war from breaking out.

Until now their bad behavior has only ever been rewarded, so we should expect more of it. But I don't think they're ready to start a war they have no chance of winning.

we will do nothing...
we can't even speak to harshly..
other than..
bad boy,bad boy sit...sit..sit PLEASE..
and Iran will soon start this sort of stuff..
and we will do nothing..
truly a case of the little dogs telling the Rott. of the world..
go home & stay there..

Rika

They have fizzled 2. While a 6% yield on a Pu bomb is bad, 6% of 20 kt is still 1.2kt, or 2,400,000 lbs of TNT.

Still enough to kill a lotta people I guess, so yes the threat is real.

I concur with the above then - yes, they have nukes (bad nukes, but nukes) and if they use them, it will require a full retaliatory strike probably within minutes of U.S. nuclear cruise missiles.

Yes, I do think they're that reckless/crazy/stupid.

They know we have SLBM's within a few minutes flight time from their capital. I don't want to sound like I suffer from the rational man syndrome, but I don't think Kim is crazy at all. He has been conditioned by many years of appeasement and has no reason not to think more bad behavior won't bring him more rewards. But nukes? No, that spells instant end of regime and that's the only thing that matters to him.

It's an enormous risk to take, risking 100,000 dead (at least) just to sink one ship.

Me? I would evacuate Seoul entirely, and raze the North from stem to stern.

We have been running from direct DPRK provocations for decades.

Ever heard of the USS Pueblo?

DPRK does not need nukes at all to kill hundreds of thousands of civvies in Seoul. They have 10,000 artillery pieces in dug in dispersed positions well within range of the city for that.

Dunno but I thought SK is the little brother to NK... as in doesn't NK have way more money and troops than SK?

And even if they don't isn't NK backed by China? Can you say deep pockets?

DPRK is utterly broke because their entire economy goes into supporting the regime and the military.

We would thrash them in an all out war, but it would take us -weeks- to silence all the guns within range of Seoul.

I will leave it to your imagination to decide how much damage 10,000 artillery pieces can do to a populated city in even an hours time.

China helps NK because their influence over NK gives them additional chips to play in the diplomatic game w/ the US and others. I suspect the prospect of refugees crossing the river is secondary.

If NK starts hostilities, NK will immediately become a liability for China, and China will apply all the pressure it can bear on NK to stand down. If hostilities escalate to war, with artillery shells landing in Seoul and US/ROK troops in combat, China will back away from NK as fast as it can run, because NK will then be an enormous liability for China.

China is remarkably rational and logical in its foreign policy, and its primary goal is economic growth. A major war on the Korean peninsula which crashes the Asian economy, sends commodity prices soaring and trade tumbling, and triggers re-arming across Asia as well as a renewed desire for the US military umbrella, will damage the Chinese economy to the tune of trillions of dollars. Far more than NK is worth to China.

There won't be PLA divisions pouring across the border this time. Geopolitical stability and mutually profitable trade with the West is China's lifeblood.

Incidentally, don't overlook the SK military. It is one of the world's largest and they have been preparing for a war with NK for decades. Some people say the current generation of South Koreans have gone soft, but some say that about the current generation of Americans too, and our soldiers are not softies. In Vietnam the ROK's reputation was fearsome. You can imagine how they would fight knowing that their families were being bombarded in Seoul.

Isn't Seoul about the same size as NYC? There's no way to evacuate that place. It's the only card NK has. Hold that city hostage by artillery fire.

I've been to a few press conferences by NK defectors, one a high ranking officer and the others by regular folks. If 1% of the stories they tell are true, then NK is just an unimagineable penal colony hell hole.