Random Politics & Religion #26

It's best to not make assumptions. It's not your strong suit.

You were measuring success based on carbon emissions alone. If you really think that I would put that as the be all and end all of the stated measures then you clearly haven't been paying attention.

Because the rest of the world's approach has worked so much better.

What he really needs is a stern finger-wagging while he amasses a greater arsenal. Good plan.

Meanwhile, in Canada:
Stop, please, don't make more nukes... /yawn. Alright guys, back to moose-watching.

Facts always elude nausi with every topic.

I don't think that's what he's doing, but since you seem so aware of what The Better Plan should be, I'll give you a chance to provide the answer. A maple cookie meet & greet plan was already provided by a fellow Canadian, so you'll have to dig deep and think of something new.

To clarify I don't mean to free Obama of any blame, just that the situation is a cumulative failure of decades of US foreign policy. It's a moot point now, instead of playing the blame game the question is what to do now, as Rav said, while they amass a greater arsenal.

We've kind of backed ourselves into a corner with imposed sanctions and displays of military strength without accomplishing anything. If we resolve it diplomatically, we'll have to give them something in return, like easing sanctions and/or getting rid of them completely, which in turn grants North Korea and the Kim regime more global recognition and credibility. This also sets a precedent for other countries and undermines the USA's power on a global scale.

I wish Trump would handle it with more delicacy and tact but that doesn't change the fact that the situation itself is FUBAR.

Well-said. And likewise, I'm not trying to say that Trump's approach is the best either. I'm mostly just annoyed at armchair diplomats who can't see past their own hatred of the sitting president to notice the, as you say, decades of cumulative failures of all parties that led up to this.

This is Trump's red line, he just said today if NK doesn't stop threatening us he is gonna wipe them out. Pretty much bank on waking up tomorrow and seeing more NK threats followed by mockery. NK has been threatening everyone for forever, nothing ever happens. But now, according to Trump, the threats must stop. Continue the nuclear program, by all means, but no more threats.

That's literally all that matter right now. The 2 degree mark is a *** pipe dream so what's left is simply mitigation. If you want an actual conversation, stop playing coy and say what you actually mean.

Except the fact that those threats become creditable by the day.

But I guess facts aren't your strong suit. You are a liberal after all....

And now ***gets real fun.

NK has acquired big boy toys which in turn admits them into the big boy pond, filled with sharks while they are a small fish. Those toys aren't very accurate nor particularly effective but it does signal they would have strategic nuclear capacity. This has two effects.

Firstly, a combined US and South Korean military can't invade and implement regime change as an outcome to a restart of the Korean War. Don't laugh, I was intimately involved with the planning and execution of this exact scenario twice a year for the past thirteen years. USFK's plan in the event of a restart of hostilities is to assist South Korea as they invade North Korea and remove the Kim Regime. North Korea just changed that plan.

Now I'm no longer involved in that process yet I believe their new game plan would be to enact a preemptive or immediate strike on all NK nuclear assets with the potential of the US using nuclear weapons first. The key difference would be the removal of the previous "no US forces past the DMZ" rule that was used before. So the combined firepower of 7th Fleet and 7th Air force would be available for offensive operations where previously they were only used for defensive. That's more then enough to level medium sized countries.

So yeah, ***just got interesting.

You don't know how North Korea thinks. They don't give a rats *** what anyone in the world thinks about them and they haven't since before I ever went to the peninsula. The Sunshine policy has failed, using soft power to influence and pressure them has failed, the only language they speak is that of violence. China supports North Korea because they provide a nice buffer between them and a very wealthy Democratic US Friendly South Korea. China doesn't want to share a border with South Korea, just like the US wouldn't like to share a border with Iran, Iraq, Syria or Russia.

And just so you know how utterly incorrect your thoughts were.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ROKS_Cheonan_sinking

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombardment_of_Yeonpyeong

Isn't this kinda a big no-no or can we use them if threatened with a nuclear attack?

Huge no-no.

For one, North Korea isn't the US's only enemy. They aren't even the only enemy who has nukes. A strike, even preemptive, against NK, nukes or no, would lead to a 3rd World War.

Not "if", will.

The thing is, everyone knows it. North Korea knows that if they make the first strike, there wouldn't be a WWIII as in more like an asskicking from the world (China included, possibly, but at the very least they wouldn't defend NK). However, if SK or US were to strike first, not only would that give China the excuse to join in the fray, but so would Russia, Iran (especially if the US strikes first), and many other countries to strike against SK, and possibly/probably against other nations (Israel would be next, along with Germany/France/UK and any of the other nations that borders Russia, most likely Poland).

Therefor, the stalemate will ensue unless Un goes flowerhead.

Fact: Obama enabled this mess.

I present exhibit "A".

Ok now we're going to enter into a realm of 3D chess.

So currently the US's supposedly secret, though not really secret, war plans involve the USA supporting the South Korea military as they invade North Korea and remove the Kim regime. Another not-so-secret agreement is that US forces will not enter into NK territory nor directly engage in offensive operations on NK military assets, and in return China doesn't do the same either. These two conditions shape the planning and execution of any military engagement on the Korean peninsula, NK only has to worry about fighting off SK in a conventional war. The best way to win a conventional war is to have nuclear weapons.

This isn't some secret knowledge that only westerners know.

Now the US will reshape it's battle plans and those plans must take into account NK having nuclear weapons, and the only way to counter nuclear weapons is to ensure they never get a chance to use them in the first place. The best way to ensure this is to use high altitude precision bombing or a medium range nuclear strike on the missile sites and nuclear production facilities.

Counter to what Hollywood movies teaches you guys, nukes do not destroy cities. There is no huge fireball that erases everything in a 10+ mile radius. Nukes are used because with a single hit you can erase a military asset with 100% success. Strike an airfield and that airfield will never be used. Strike a weapons factory and that weapons factory is off the board. Strike a naval port and the enemy will never use that port again. Striking a population center doesn't really accomplish anything other then ensure your own demise. Both Hiroshima and Nagasaki had military targets that were the actual targets, what wasn't counted on was the Japanese using straw and bamboo as their primary construction material for the city and when the bomb went off the millisecond long infrared burst set all the straw on fire which resulting in the extensive damage. Concrete, Steel and glass isn't nearly as flammable as straw and bamboo. It's one of those cases of physics getting in the way of a good movie plot.

Now after the US Military comes up with a new not-so-secret secret battle plan involving the combined firepower of both 7th Fleet and 7th Air Force, both of which have modern nuclear assets, NK will learn of this plan and then base their own posture and actions on it. Which was the point of making the plan not-so-secret in the first place.


That's not how this works. Nuclear strikes on non-nuclear powers engaging in conventional warfare is a huge *** no-no. Nuclear strikes on the nuclear assets of a nuclear power threatening nuclear warfare as a precursor to invading and removing that nuclear power completely acceptable, even expected. This is another point where Hollywood and reality are drastically different. The US preemptively striking NK's nuclear assets will not start WWIII for several reasons, the biggest being that the Korean War never ended. We are still at war with North Korea. There was merely an armistice signed, an armistice that North Korea has frequently violated. The other reasons basically fall into the "don't poke the bear" system that all the nuclear armed powers follow. That system is what ensures all the big modern nuclear nations don't descend into a giant missile slinging fight. North Korea, being the newest member of the nuclear club will need to follow this system or be removed from that club, using any means necessary.

Hollywood has taught me that nukes can't even destroy a refrigerator.

You are assuming a zero-sum scenario, where the action of one nation only receives the response of the second nation, while ignoring the geopolitical plays made by any 3rd nation.

This isn't a game of 3D chess you referred to. This is a game of battle royale where it's everyone against everyone and the people who make alliances with the other players the fastest and strongest wins.

You are looking at least 3 fronts here: Northeast Asia, Middle East, and Russia. Possibly Southeast Asia could be included, and just for shits/giggles, Northern to Central Africa could be included in all this mess.

Again, you forget that the US doesn't have just one enemy. Any excuse to go to war with the US/Israel, Iran will jump on that in a heartbeat. And given an opportunity to seize more countries/territories during any political unrest (aka war), Russia will jump on that in a heartbeat.

Southeast Asia, while not widely known (mainly because it's not close to a boiling point between nations, therefor not reported by MSM), is having trade wars with each other to compete with not only China, but Japan in terms of economic power. Some of these nations may use the NK conflict as an excuse to silently invade each other while the rest of the world is paying attention to NK/China/Russia/US/Israel/Iran orgy-fest. The same scenario can also play out in Northern and Central Africa too. The only geopolitical sphere where nations aren't jumping to go to war with each other is North America (because America, *** Yeah!) and South America (Venezuela is too busy with itself to care, and the other nations just want to survive from their own political problems, including Brazil).

Don't think that what happens between 2 countries will result in a vacuum war, especially in regards to the US/NK issue.

Anyhow the point of all that is that North Korea will quickly come to realize the same thing that every other Nuclear armed nation did, that they must play by the same rules as the other nuclear armed nations or be destroyed. Not defeated, not sanctioned, but destroyed because having nuclear weapons raises the stakes so high that nobody can take chances at failure. Nobody is going to run the risk of some convention war ending with North Korea launching some nukes at cities as a giant middle finger before losing.

I'll agree with you on that. Question is, do they know that yet?