Reset With North Korea

if they run out of matches their rockets wont fire.

Their government is really screwing their own people from sanctions. North Korea is not a threat, unless they have an idiot who would fire first to destroy his own country. North Korea is a pipsqueak country whose trying to flex their little muscle to the international community, but their own people are starving.

http://time.com/4274666/arduous-march-north-korea-famine/

No, N. Korea has always been a protectorate of China so deciding to attack N. Korea without provocation would have invited war with China. Also, the US has no authority to unilaterally attack N. Korea and our strong ally S. Korea has never asked for us to strike N. Korea and would probably not approve doing so from bases in S. Korea. Also, there has never been a policy of "reset" with N. Korea.

engineer-

Thank you. I would guess you are right about China's relationship with North Korea.

The following is from an article in The New York Times. I think it was the "reset" (but is wasn't so named) that I was thinking of:

On Monday [in June 2000], the administration will publish in The Federal Register the provisions of a broad lifting of economic sanctions that have been in place since North Korea invaded the South 50 years ago. President Clinton announced the easing of sanctions in September as a reward for North Korea's suspending missile testing while talks proceeded on a more permanent ban.

Let's just hope that if N. Korea ever launches a nuclear tipped rocket, it'll blow up on their launch pad.

so far, thats been the career path followed by most NK missiles

The purpose of the sanctions against N. Korea (or the sanctions against anyone) is to get them to change their behavior. President Clinton eased sanctions because N. Korea changed their behavior and honestly because N. Korea is a slow motion humanitarian disaster and no one likes to see lots of innocent people starve. When N. Korea started again with missile testing, the sanctions went back in place.

engineer-

Thank you.

Are you sure? Might it have been that North Korea fooled the U.S. into believing that it had stopped its nuclear program, while it continued that program?

It's many years ago, but the US was part of a group of countries working together and UN inspectors were involved. I don't know that it really matters whether N. Korea stopped and then restarted or if they just said they stopped. If you want the details, you can go here.

It seems China is finally restricting trade with North Korea.
https://www.americanactionforum.org/print/?url=https://www.americanactionforum.org/research/primer-north-koreas-nuclear-weapons-program-international-economic-sanctions/?print

The people of North Korea are starving because of their nuclear program.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2624164/North-Korea-Starving-people-child-labourers-dilapidated-homes-appear-harrowing-new-images-taken-inside-rogue-state.html