Korea Thread: Fumbling to take a bite of kimchi

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Korea Thread: Fumbling to take a bite of kimchi

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Sheng-ji Yang posted:

It seems obvious to me that the military pretty much actually runs the show, and that since Sung got sick they've just been figureheads for a junta.

I agree with B.R. Myers' assertion that if there was some shadowy council or venerable statesman using Jong-un as a puppet, they wouldn't have allowed him to make a fool of himself by palling around with Dennis Rodman and showing off his wife.

A human heart posted:

Haven't there been instances of high ranking North Koreans not being seen for a while before, leading to speculation that they're dead or have been purged, and quite often it turns out that they're fine when they show up again a year or so later?

Namely, Hyon Song-wol.

TheBalor posted:

A big issue with the North Korean system is that it endeavors to make everyone into villains for easier control, but most especially anyone who tries to escape. It might have loosened up in previous years, but in the past the standard punishment for a defector was for their entire family out to three degrees in all directions to be thrown into a labor camp. Thus, anyone who wanted to escape had to do so with the knowledge that they were condemning probably dozens of people they knew and loved to death. Not to mention the whole incentive system for ratting out your neighbors, and how elites at the highest levels were expected to violate laws in other countries to make big donations back home.

Many people who cross the border actually bribe their way back in to North Korea and return to a more-or-less normal life. They're actually encouraging defectors to return, at which point they're used as propaganda for how terrible it is to live away from the Dear Leader's breast.

BigT posted:

If North Korea collapses I think it will be a brutal quick civil war with whichever rear end in a top hat Elite family makes a Sopranos/Hitler coming to power kind of scenario where they just execute all the enemies at once.

It's much, much more likely that the army will fragment into factions who can't even control the stretch of territory they claim. I think it's also possible that much of the army will disintegrate into looting gangs. The average soldier right now is poorly trained, poorly equipped, chronically hungry, and spending most of his time doing menial labor.

quote:

It will also be backed by whoever China endorses similar to how the USA has done it in the past in other countries, only more blatant about it. It may be unstable for a bit, but it will most likely end quickly and end up being even more tightly controlled by China and even more radical because now you have a family who got to power with China's full endorsement and by being a murdering tyrant from the drop.

China doesn't want to be in charge of North Korea.

Auritech posted:

This is probably not a remarkable incident, but it does deserve note:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world...e736_story.html

Sounds like a game of "Does this bother you? I'm not touching you."

I think that they do this mostly as show of strength to their own people and sometimes in the hope of gaining concessions and aid. All the jokes about North Koreans thinking their leader is a demigod are just that, jokes, but one area in which the average North Korean is grossly ignorant is the gap in military technology between North Korea and the rest of the world. Many really do believe that their missile capability is awesome.

# ¿ Oct 14, 2014 15:52

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# ¿ May 2, 2024 22:43

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

icantfindaname posted:

They might? Handing SK a stack of money to reunify would be a pretty neat solution for the US, especially compared to fuckery with making Korea neutral and withdrawing troops or cutting a deal with China or w/e

How big a "stack of money" do you think they need to rehabilitate a country whose people are starving and whose infrastructure has been crumbling since the 80s? South Korea's military is small and continues to shrink. A heap of monetary aid won't give them the personnel to distribute food and medical care and police the country.

There won't be any "neat solution" for any of the nations relevant to collapse and reunification.

WorldsStrongestNerd posted:

It doesn't matter whether or not China wants to be in charge of NK. In the event of a collapse backing the strongest warlord may be China's only option. The alternative may well be to shoot several million starving refugees swarming the border.

Arglebargle III posted:

I don't know about this. North Korea's population is a rounding error compared to China's population. Think about that. North Korea's population is what, 23 million, 24 million? China's population is usually given as 1.3 billion. Even if 20% of North Korea's population fled to China, that would be 5 million people. That's 0.005 billion. A rounding error compared to China's population.

I wish I had time to dig up some sources/examples, but I think China's made it clear that they don't want to absorb large numbers of refugees. (They started cracking down on immigration when when they realized how many North Koreans were defecting in the 90s, and they've maintained a harsh attitude toward illegal immigration ever since, even though there are only about 200,000 North Koreans in China today.) However, I think this notion of "backing the strongest warlord" is dubious at best.

First, like I said, the average DPRK soldier is in pathetic shape. Poorly-equipped, poorly-trained, and chronically hungry. For men entering their compulsive military service, part of the process is their family using any political influence they have to get them an assignment where they will actually be fed. Even worse, NIC estimates that 17-29% of KPA conscripts are rejected due to cognitive impairment stemming from the famine. If a military dictatorship is rejecting a large fraction of its conscripts because they're too mentally handicapped to serve, imagine the state of the soldiers who are conscripted. Speaking of the famine, during that time soldiers often got into armed clashes with the police while foraging for food. For this and other reasons, I'm doubtful that any "warlord" could actually maintain discipline over a large number of troops, keep them fed, and exercise control over any significant amount of territory.

I know that this is an unthinkable suggestion, but is it possible that China will actually try to work with the US and SK to police and rehabilitate the country, rather than arming warlords and engaging us in a pissing contest? Just a thought.

# ¿ Oct 15, 2014 17:12

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

You're right, I was only thinking of the planned reductions and not their current level of support.

# ¿ Oct 15, 2014 19:28

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

I'm not sure what you mean by high-level, but NK certainly still has trade partnerships with China. I had meant to say earlier, in regard to the idea of China seizing NK, that even their mining rights in NK probably wouldn't be worth the cost of unilaterally occupying and securing NK.

# ¿ Oct 15, 2014 21:21

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Fall Sick and Die posted:

I dunno why you all think that having North Korea be a part of South Korea is against the interests of South Korea. Consider turning the entire North into resource extraction and cheap factory laborers.

You're talking about a serious drain on the South Korean economy that will last at least a couple decades. The notion of South Korean businesses making big profits by exploiting cheap labour is as fanciful as it is cynical. Chronic starvation is, quite literally, a severe handicap to the North Korean workforce, and its infrastructure has been crumbling for decades due to a lack of basic maintenance and replacement parts.

The only parts I agree with you on is that there's no feasible plan for reunification that doesn't have North Korea as a special economic zone for a long time to come, and that yes, it will be difficult to convince South Koreans that they should spend an entire generation eating poo poo so that they might benefit from Korean mining operations in two or three decades.

Full Battle Rattle posted:

Is it fair to say this is the worst shape they've been in yet? They're never exactly paragons of stability and I have read about the soldiers barely having enough to eat...god, what a catastrophe.

Echoing Nintendo Kid, the 90s famine was definitely worse. Adding to that, it's difficult to gauge economic development in North Korea because it depends on whether or not you consider the state of their infrastructure. They may be making very slow growth, but their industrial capacity peaked in the 80s before the USSR collapsed, and their infrastructure has been decaying ever since.

# ¿ Oct 16, 2014 03:48

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Fall Sick and Die posted:

You're assuming that they will give the North Koreans a standard of living or services equivalent to their own.

No, I don't think that's required for the endeavour to be incredibly expensive.

# ¿ Oct 16, 2014 04:23

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

RuanGacho posted:

We got onto it because I suggested that America is recently speaking, rather horrible about building or maintaining anything, be it our own infrastructure or foreign states where we literally threw billions at it and said "spend it as usefully as possible I hope everything works out great!" and now half that territory is under the control of a literal fanatical organization bent on world domination, it couldn't have gone more cartoonishly wrong if we had planned for it to play out that way.

You're right about the purpose of the WTC though, to bring this full circle it's rather telling that NK hasn't built it's own giant phallus.

Juche Tower reminds us that we cannot live away from his breast.

# ¿ Oct 18, 2014 22:45

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Actually, Kim Il Sung made that the official policy towards dissidents in 1972. "Factionalists or enemies of class...their seed must be eliminated unto three generations."

# ¿ Nov 24, 2014 20:39

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

The WWP's raison d'etre is unconditional support for authoritarian Communist regimes, so it should be no surprise.

# ¿ Dec 25, 2014 18:11

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

A quote from a 2011 article in Chosun Ilbo, which was quoted in Bennett's RAND report:

quote:

An increasing number of North Korean military officers and soldiers
are caught watching South Korean films or soap operas in
barracks, sources say. A Beijing-based source who visits the North
often said Monday, �Several Army officers and soldiers have been
caught watching South Korean movies or TV dramas since last
year, and the military has been providing extensive indoctrination
for all officers and soldiers with a view to preventing the cultural
infiltration of imperialism.�

# ¿ Dec 25, 2014 18:43

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

North Korean propaganda has always been unabashedly racist. Calling Kerry a lantern-jawed wolf is completely consistent with the stuff that Myers quotes in The Cleanest Race.

# ¿ Dec 27, 2014 22:56

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

I hate to be That Guy who just brings up Myers again and again, but in his presentations he has said that after living and working in South Korea, he finds them second-most xenophobic people behind their northern neighbours.

# ¿ Dec 29, 2014 01:54

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

After more than a hundred years of that, I think they got tired of it.

# ¿ Jan 30, 2015 15:07

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

white mans burping posted:

It's more that I was reading some defector's accounts of prison camps (in particular the lady in ~2001ish to the US Senate) and it seemed like there's a WW2 Germany level of abuse going on

If you really want to read what a clusterfuck it would be to conquer and rehabilitate North Korea, I suggest Bennett's RAND Corporation report. It's book length, but summarizes the problems with the country and scenarios that would likely happen under an occupation in the first 50 pages.

Best case scenario, it costs a trillion dollars (much of it from the US), depresses the South Korean economy for at least 15 years, and China has to deal with millions of refugees. Worst case scenario, North Korea successfully uses a nuclear weapon and the occupation instigates a conflict between China and the US.

# ¿ May 13, 2015 15:36

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

I have read articles that describe North Korea as becoming a "tributary state" to China because of the mineral and other rights China has there. Aren't they still spending a lot more on North Korea than they're making back?

# ¿ May 13, 2015 17:30

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Main Paineframe posted:

If the North Korean government folds, then it can no longer be a target for aid and deals, and it will no longer keep the population from spilling over into neighboring countries. No more mean old DPRK - just a massive pile of starving refugees with no one to feed them except international agencies and foreign powers, and these refugees will flow over the borders into neighboring countries while the invader is forced by domestic sentiments to stick around and help rebuild. Rolling in and blowing up the military and the government is the easy part - the really tough questions are "what happens after that" and "who will pay for it?"

I agree, but I don't understand how this is apropos to my question. Is China spending more to maintain the DPRK than they're making back? I understand that it's less than they'd pay to deal with millions of refugees, but I question the description of NK as a "tributary state."

JeffersonClay posted:

Does anyone really think that China would have any significant difficulty effectively closing its border to North Korean refugees if it didn't want them?

They don't have an easy time repatriating the 200,000 or so who are already there.

quote:

I'm having trouble imagining how China could simultaneously be terrified of millions of starving unarmed refugees but be totally unconcerned with the hegemonic expansion of the world's foremost military power/ alliance to its doorstep.

The South Koreans don't exactly love the United States. A South Korea that no longer needed the US to protect them from the North would hardly be a puppet government of the US.

Halloween Jack fucked around with this message at 19:54 on May 13, 2015

# ¿ May 13, 2015 19:49

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Cerebral Bore posted:

This might be a point were it not for the fact thet the North Korean armed forces are a bad joke and would be rolled in weeks at most. A buffer zone actually needs to do some damage or present some kind of hindrance in order to be effective, and North Korea isn't exactly the bastion of military might that will stop the Imperialist steamroller.

Well, although the army proper would effectively disintegrate, it's unlikely they'd be wiped out; NK would then be a wasteland full of not only starving people foraging for food, but squabbling warlords. This all serves your point, though, because China probably wouldn't want to fight the US in NK rather than its own territory.

# ¿ May 13, 2015 20:31

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

If China could/would actually fence off North Korea and let nobody in or out, that would have a disastrous effect on the black market which is, at this point, integral to North Korea's economy.

# ¿ May 13, 2015 20:50

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

JeffersonClay posted:

And there's no way China would support its ally in this hypothetical conflict with, say, food aid.

In any hypothetical conflict worth considering, North Korea has collapsed into civil war and the US and China are intervening. I don't want to dogpile on you, but this idea where the US has to play through the North Korea stage before fighting the final boss in China is a silly Tom Clancy scenario.

Main Paineframe posted:

If, on the other hand, we decided not to wait for that to happen and decided to instead carry out a grand land invasion expecting North Korean resistance to crumple like paper, I think we'd take more casualties than would be politically convenient. North Korean troops may not be up to the same quality as US soldiers, and they may have outdated tech, but they've had sixty-plus years to fortify against an expected American invasion and build enough guns and ammo to press massive numbers of people into service. North Korea can't fight for long, and their ability to project power beyond their border is barely north of nil, but I can't think of many times that being foolish enough to charge head-on into a prepared enemy's territory assuming that they can't possibly put up any real resistance against advanced Western troops has ever worked out without spending a lot more lives than necessary.

I agree that invading North Korea would be a quagmire far beyond what your average technology-obsessed chickenhawk is willing to believe, but not for the same reasons. They have to turn a significant portion of the population away from military service because the famine left many children mentally handicapped, the army spends more time doing manual labour than training, and even their small arms are decrepit. I understand that they have a lot of anti-aircraft artillery, but Idunno how "prepared" they really are.

Halloween Jack fucked around with this message at 00:46 on May 14, 2015

# ¿ May 14, 2015 00:30

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

In addition to that, KJU has done a number of things that don't look good to Koreans or to the outside world, like fawning over Dennis Rodman and showing off his pretty young wife at public functions. (The latter is considered poor taste in Korean culture as a whole, even having a particular slang word to describe it, and is especially problematic in NK where most men can't get married until age 30 and have a hard time finding a mate.) Myers opined that he appears to have spent enough time abroad to lose touch with Korea, but not enough to understand the West.

# ¿ Aug 15, 2015 15:06

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

I assume the DPRK media will inflate this story and use it to shore up KJU's credentials as a brave young general.

# ¿ Aug 20, 2015 14:22

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

I was going to make a joke about them rolling it downhill into South Korea.

# ¿ Aug 21, 2015 16:14

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Actually, what do we know about their ability to deploy nuclear devices or chemical/biological weapons beyond their borders? Bennett considered the absolute worst-case scenario to be if North Korea successfully attacked another country (possibly even the United States) with a nuclear weapon.

# ¿ Aug 21, 2015 16:37

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Main Paineframe posted:

if they wanted to hurt South Korean civilians or damage South Korean industry for absolutely no reason at all, it'd be much simpler to just close off Kaesong and imprison/murder the South Korean supervisors there.

That would be a pretty blunt and direct method for the economic suicide they'd be committing anyway, that's for sure!

# ¿ Aug 21, 2015 22:39

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

He also squeezed every communist country he could for foreign aid, even Cuba and Bulgaria.

# ¿ Aug 23, 2015 23:21

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

In addition to the villas, I'm not sure, but I assume the massive hotels in Pyongyang were a bigger waste of resources than Kim statues. But moreover I was under the impression that the economy suffers from an approach where the Kims reject foreign aid and investment if it would mean any loosening of absolute control.

Possibly related, but I believe that what economic good news there is regarding NK in the past 5 years or so still doesn't account for the slow, but steady crumbling of their infrastructure, for lack of the most basic maintenance for farms, factories, mines, etc.

# ¿ Aug 25, 2015 07:23

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Cliff Racer posted:

There's been any good news, at all? In the past five years its been solely bad, I can't think of a single good thing. There were no positive aspects in the currency re-denomination, the building spree has resulted in a bunch of time-bomb buildings that are going to fall over en masse (one already has,) there's been no expansion at Kaesong due to the typical bullshit associated with doing business with North Korea, no real development under tenders to Chinese companies (once again North Korea's penchant for fuckery undermined all of its natural advantages here to the point that no work has been done) and if anything they've moved backwards with Jang's network of cronies taking their money and running rather than return to North Korea and face possible imprisonment or execution.

Well they did build that one bridge over the Yalu, right? The one which replaced the ancient railroad bridge, not the one that looks really neat but hasn't actually been connected up to the grid on the NK side because of absurd demands being placed on the Chinese groups financing the actual work.

Mediadave posted some stuff earlier, but bear in my that by "good news" I mean "partial recovery since the late 90s."

# ¿ Aug 26, 2015 17:47

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Are you proposing a solution where Japan acknowledges guilt for atrocities they have ample opportunity to deny responsibility for? That will never happen.

# ¿ Aug 27, 2015 17:47

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Cliff Racer posted:

My take, based on you taking this article seriously, is that you probably know almost nothing about North Korea. As to their capabilities, we'll have to wait for the mil nerds to analyze pictures of the missile launchers to see how advanced (or even how fake) they are.

No man this dude is legit.

Grouchio posted:

If tensions don't fall by Sunday, we could see the real thing.

And nukes.

Grouchio posted:

What shall the US do about this then?

Grouchio posted:

I wonder if Bernie would be potentially more active than Obama Ficklespine at dealing with bullshit like this...

Grouchio, please tell us what you would like Barry Osama bin Ficklespine to do about the North Korean threat.

# ¿ Oct 10, 2015 23:20

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

LORD OF BUTT posted:

The funny thing is, that article's technically true. If the USA went to war with North Korea (whether via an attack on US soil, President Trump getting a wild hair up his rear end, or whatever the hell) it would not be a particularly easy fight; they wouldn't be able to wage offensive war, but they'd be able to defend well enough to make it a big ol' pain in the dick for us, probably moreso than it'd be worth.

WarpedNaba posted:

Pretty much. Developed First World countries can be ranked according to how long (In terms of raw supplies, due to the assumption that production will be targeted by the opponent) a country could wage total war for. I can't find the study, but the USA was placed at about 10 years, North Korea barely managed a month. They'll run out of fuel first, then water, then food. Then, if they try for a protracted defense, we'll see some pretty massive starvation.

LOB, I believe you're right but for the wrong reasons. In the event of invasion, the DPRK military is supposedly trained to fight to the last man, waging guerrilla warfare from the mountains. That's a lot more relevant to the mythology built around Kim Il Sung's resistance to the Japanese than it is to reality. The army is not only poorly-equipped, but doesn't even eat well during peacetime. When a young man enters mandatory military service, his family uses whatever political connections they can muster to try to get him into a unit that actually gets fed. Their military has actually rejected many young men from military service because childhood malnutrition rendered them unfit for service. Even on their own soil, their leadership and lines of communication would collapse almost instantly, and they'd run out of food long before they run out of bullets.

Conquering NK would be a nightmare because it would very quickly become a process of managing and feeding the population and protecting them from armed, hungry gangs of soldiers. The biggest threat on a military level would be their someone accessed and used whatever stockpiles of chemical/biological weapons they might have. And their anti-aircraft capability; can someone go into detail on that?

# ¿ Oct 12, 2015 17:24

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Republicans posted:

So has North Korea completely alienated China by this point? Who's left for them to do business with that would be sad to see their regime go?

Smilin Joe Fission posted:

If tensions heat up between the US and China over the South China Sea islands or other issues, and the US becomes a lot more interested in that part of the world for whatever reason there's a decent chance of a US-sponsored coup, assassination, or other destabilizing event to take out the current North Korean regime. I'm fairly surprised that it hasn't already happened, but I would guess it's more that the time just hasn't been right than any lack of interest or ability on the part of the US and South Korea. It's also possible that the US may genuinely fear that the situation could spiral out of control into a major war although when has that ever stopped them before. Or as a comedy option- the US has humanitarian concerns about what would happen to the North Korean people in the chaos. (They actually do care on some level, it's just waaaay down the list compared with geopolitical and economic concerns)

All the reasons that China has for keeping the regime in place are reasons that the US would like to see the regime go. A united Korea modeled after the current South Korea would presumably be a strong US ally and a significant regional military power in it's own right. Of course there would be an extremely chaotic transitional period after the regime falls in the North. The really interesting question would be whether China would sweep in and try to install an allied government in the North or even straight up annex all or part of the North during the chaos. US or allied troops right on China's border in a united Korea would be quite a powerful lever for the US and a thorn in China's side. A united Korea coupled with a rebuilt Japanese military would be a powerful counterweight to Chinese ambitions. Of course this assumes the US can stop the Koreans and Japanese from using their fancy new weapons against each other first.

Wow, there's a lot to unpack here.

Here are some things China and the U.S. have in common: They don't want to occupy and police a North Korea that's collapsed into violent anarchy. They don't want the extreme tension between their countries that this situation would create. And they don't want to pay the billions and billions of dollars it will take to rehabilitate North Korea.

A reunited Korea is under South Korean administration is not necessarily a staunch U.S. ally, and certainly not an ally against China. Koreans feel positively about the U.S. right now, but the same is true for China, and China is their largest trading partner. as WarpedNaba pointed out, China is amenable to a reunited Korea under South Korean administration. They don't want any more North Korean immigrants coming into China, making it doubtful that they'd annex any part of North Korea unless they thought it was strategically necessary; they would probably continue to enjoy favourable trading agreements for minerals in North Korean territory (since they already have mining agreements with South Korea as well).

If you poll South Koreans about reunification, they'll tell you that of course they want it to happen...eventually, someday. Which is the same as not wanting it at all. They don't want to pay for it, and they don't really want to assimilate millions of destitute, diseased refugees who have been raised on Kim propaganda for generations.

# ¿ Jan 6, 2016 16:20

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

This is me going out on a limb: Since China seems to prefer South Korea to North Korea as a trading partner, the best prospect for a peaceful end to the Kim regime might be China presenting a phase-out to them as a fait accompli.

# ¿ Jan 6, 2016 16:59

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

LeoMarr posted:

Wouldn't North Korea's very large mineral deposits make up for this cost?

Like the rest of its industry, North Korea's mining is pretty backward, which is part of why, If I'm not mistaken, China actually prefers South Korea to North Korea as a trading partner for minerals. (I don't even want to think about how horrible it must be to be a North Korean coal miner.)

So you're looking at huge startup costs to bring the state of their mining operations up to "not provoking an international scandal over treatment of workers" standards. And you're doing this after quelling a state of violent anarchy and while administering North Korea as a special economic zone.

# ¿ Jan 7, 2016 01:58

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

zimboe posted:

That in the long run, we're probably hosed.
And your gold earrings were forged in the heart of an exploding star like Thor's hammer.

Weapons get used. ALWAYS. Sooner or later.
...
E:
Especially by psycho putzim like Kim.
Can't we just torch this guy from the air with that new 150 kW fiber laser we got now? He's gotta leave the house at some point.

What is it about North Korea discussion that makes it a magnet for waterheads jerking off over retarded Tom Clancy scenarios? We get one of these each and every time a significant news story is released.

# ¿ Jan 7, 2016 04:56

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

sparatuvs posted:

Vox told me the NK is actually a hold out of Japanese fascism. Thoughts?

You might enjoy BR Myers' presentation on Kim's personality cult (video).

His thesis is that when the Japanese occupied Korea, while they brutally oppressed most of the populace, they essentially invited the middle/upper classes to participate in their cult of racial purity. When Kim took over the North, he essentially crafted his state ideology in the same format, but with Korea and Koreans as the center of the universe instead of the Japanese. The Kim Il Sung personality cult, on the other hand, is an imitation of Mao's. Plus, like WarpedNaba said, standard fascism with constant aggression and an ideal of "final victory."

# ¿ Jan 7, 2016 22:24

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Hammy posted:

edit: I get that the geology of Vietnam is particularly suitable to tunnel building but I don't think the chunnel is a good comparison either.

I think it's not so much an issue of geology as a difference between the scope of the Cu Chi tunnels and the scope of a tunnel that could be used to launch an invasion.

# ¿ Jan 8, 2016 18:27

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Guys, I have a plan for North Korea to sneak through the DMZ. First, they need some hot air balloons and those arrows with suction cups on the end...

# ¿ Jan 9, 2016 05:30

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Huh. Classes are canceled and the University is practically closed today, but I'm surprised President Sullivan hasn't already sent out an email about this.

What do you have to do to get arrested as a tourist in North Korea? My impression is that while tourists are minded at all times, they're given a lot of leeway.

# ¿ Jan 22, 2016 18:35

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Cliff Racer posted:

Why? Is that a funny or annoying thing he does? If someone had been arrested by North Korea while a student at the school I went to I wouldn't have expected an e-mail from the president.

Since she came on, it's become normal for her to send out emails if, for example, a current student dies, and there was a lot of communication when the Rolling Stone sexual assault allegations came out. I can't think of a comparable situation, but I was surprised that there was no official comment, though I would agree that it's not necessary.

DeathSandwich posted:

From what I can gather based on interviews I've seen of people who have been there: The really aren't given that much leeway. Generally a tour group will take any cell phones or GPS devices you have when entering the country. The tours are guided in a very heavy-handed manner, you see what they want you to see and they get mad if you try to go off the beaten path, off message, or generally be a pest.

I spoke too hastily; it's pretty silly to say that a nation that has its tourists under observation at all times and confiscates their electronics is giving them a lot of leeway, but I've read several tourists' stories where they mention "wandering off the beaten path" in a variety of ways and not suffering any consequences besides admonishment from a guide who seemed more concerned for their own sake than for the tourist's.

Cliff Racer posted:

I disagree, based on past cases its more than likely that he did something. And while I'm in no way saying that North Korea's laws are just, they are laws and its not him being a victim if he voluntarily goes there and breaks them.

DeathSandwich posted:

That being said, I can see several scenarios being true:

1) He wandered away from a tour group and got caught, leading to calls of espionage.
2) As above, he started arguing politics or the blessings of capitalism either too loudly or too close to someone important.
3) He snuck a GPS active device in with his stuff and got caught.
4) He got really loving unlucky and they grabbed him just so they could have a political bargaining chip.

I see some of the news blurbs about him mention that he's an "intellectual risk-taker," but they're only saying that because he's part of the Echols Scholar program, which has "intellectual risk-taker" as part of their mission statement. So I'm not jumping to the conclusion that he was a missionary or some other sort of naive activist. Since there's no information available besides the standard DPRK propaganda that he must have been a secret agent for the federal government :rolleyes:

, I can only give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he did something innocuous if he did anything at all. Given the capriciousness of the Jong-un regime, I wouldn't be surprised if he's being used as a bargaining chip on a very flimsy pretext.

# ¿ Jan 23, 2016 02:37

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# ¿ May 2, 2024 22:43

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Grouchio posted:

So North Korea may launch it's *Secret Nuclear Missile Test* as early as tomorrow. What are the chances that NK wants to start a war with this missile? Can we strike it down?

Grouchio, every time North Korea does anything you come here and ask if it's the prelude to war.

North Korea's entire foreign policy is based on hoping that world leaders are as dumb and panicky as you are, and trying to manipulate them. Now stop asking.

# ¿ Feb 6, 2016 21:25

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Korea Thread: Fumbling to take a bite of kimchi

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