Sounds like they have a very important bargaining chip on the International gaming table!
BillW wrote:Sounds like they have a very important bargaining chip on the International gaming table!
They believe they do. I do not believe they in fact posses enough chips to stay in the game very long. They've just put their big bet down on the "No Limit" table, everyone else is showing aces and face cards, and all NK has is her openers; an attitude and a dictator ... a pretty low pair.
timber
Timber, If you are talking about total annihilation , yes. If you are talking about substituting for fuel oil to keep oneself warm during the winter,yes. If you are talking about this substitute creating a world wide political problem, yes to that too. A low pair wins if the rest fold!
For NK, it's all bluff and nothing to back it up. Hell, most of their citizens are starving, and they still spend most of their national budget on their military. How stupid! c.i.
The propaganda machine is working overtime. Iraq is a threat even thought they have no Nuclear bomb and NK is not a threat despite having one. Could the difference be "OIL"
Oil is a weapon as well. Manipulations with oil prices and political pressure applied through oil embargos may bring turmoil into the world economy. Western control over the world's second oil fields may prevent all these things.
au, What took you so long? Bush can't even provide proof Saddam has any WOMD, or is a threat to his neighbors or the US. Having provided no proof to the world, he is still building up our military around Iraq. c.i.
U.N.: N. Korea violating DMZ pact
The North Korean army has brought light machine guns into the Demilitarized Zone, the U.N. Command on the Korean Peninsula said today -- a violation of agreements signed in 1953 at the end of the Korean War.
Are we dealing with rational people???Do you think they give a damn what the UN say's. In fact for that matter does anyone?
http://www.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/east/12/27/nkorea.dmz/index.html
au, That's all part of the bluff. All show and no action..... They're going to play "chicken" to see how far they can go without actually firing a shot. c.i.
Nope. North Korea is trying to start a war. Rummy just let them know 1) We know what you are doing and 2) Just because we're busy in other areas, doesn't mean we're so weak we'll roll over for you.
Lash, Welcome aboard. I disagree that NK is "trying to start a war". I see their current shennanigans as their version of diplomacy. In their mind, they are negotiating trade concessions. They are under the impression our desire to avoid war will afford them telling advantage in the economic arena. It is humanitarian concern for the well being and future prosperity of her own people that motivates NK's braggadocious, bellicose, confrontational behavior. They think strangely, to our perception. This gives them a peculiar, nonstandard negotiating style.
timber
I can only hope you are correct and it's all braggadocio. However, I have to wonder. One thing I am certain of is that at the present time NK is by far more dangerous than Iraq. The Bush White House should be doing all it possibly can to reduce the tension instead of just the opposite. It seems as if irrational people are dealing with irrational people
Whether NK or Iraq is the more dangerous is matter of conjecture. Presently, Iraq is for various reasons more addressable than is NK. This situation will not persist.
Iraq is clearly done for. More will be given NK to consider as relevant assetts become more conveniently available. China, too, has a powerful hand in the game NK has joined, a hand yet to be played. All that is assured is escalating tension.
timber
Lash...welcome.
You said two things that I'd argue against. First:
Quote:NK is trying to start a war
and second
Quote:To me, most of our "humanitarian aid" is nothing more than blackmail to make nutcases around the world not try to acquire and develop WMD.
I cannot conceive that the NK military have any notion at all of starting a war as they will understand the obvious outcome easily as clearly as you and I. The only exception to this might be if they've concluded that they are next after Sadaam.
Your second statement regarding aid is surely not accurate, nor close to it, Israel being an obvious example.
P.S. To clarify, I believe NK is the aggressor toward the US, not the other way around. The UN seems to agree.
Kim is eccentric, not stupid. PRK dosn't want a war if it can gain its objectives by other means. Their style of negotiating is a subtle as any blunt instrument, but has been effective for them in the past.
Eight years ago the West, faced with the threat of conflict, chose to ignor PRK's clear intent to develop nuclear weapons. We thought we might be able to solve the problem with diplomacy. Recently it has been publically admitted that the PRK has some nuclear weapons. That has been "known" to a whole lot of people for a very, very long time.
Four years ago the PRK was on the point of collapse. Famine threatened to decimate the population and the economy was in the toilet. PRK agreed to cease a nuclear program that they denied existed at all. In return, the United States, South Korea and a host of other countries bailed Kim out. We shipped enormous amounts of food to the PRK, most of which went to feed the Army dugin around the DMZ. The North was in violation of its agreements almost from the beginning, and has used the time since to recover much of its military strength. The populace remain extremly poor. For the past fifty years almost the entire PRK economy has been funneled into its military, and today the fifty miles just north of the DMZ is one of the worlds most hardened defensive positions.
From those positions, the PRK army has prepositioned something like 70% of its military might. From those positions, tunnels have been dug deep into South Korean territory and used for the insertion of North Korean agents and saboteurs. From those positions, it is only 25 miles to Seoul -- easy range for artillery. Moving light machine guns into the DMZ is just another negotiating ploy. "Threaten violence, and the Americans will back down. The Americans backdown on this one, they will back down again later when we are stronger and have more punch." There is ample evidence that PRK tactics have gained support in South Korea, and even on these threads I've noted someone saying ... "get American troops out of South Korea, it isn't worth the cost of one more American life." Kim, The Current, is sleeping soundly tonight.
The PRK doesn't want a war, it wants to threaten us and intimidate us into surrender. It is a dangerous game they play. One mis-step, and we will clean their clocks.
Lash
You are, of course, entitled to stand by your statement. Without some coroboration of your opinion, I suspect you won't mind if I stand elsewhere.
blatham--certainly you are entitled to your opinion. Given that we are not a Socialist or Communist globe, and do not owe other countries large amounts of money, why do they all expect and recieve ungodly amounts of money from us. Surely it is nice to help starving or flooded countries. But many of these underdeveloped countries are ruled by tyrants who grossly mismanage their assets. My question: Why do we constantly give to these countries?
