US and China allied level North Korea?!!

I do not think Korea by itself poses a great threat. They need a foil.

North Korea is suffering from famine which will destabilize the society. and some reports show how abject a life people are leading for the moment. each person, it is said, is given rice of only 100g every day. women being "without breasts" and men barely over 170cm in height, it is obvious that the whole population are suffering from malnutrition. if the population's patience wears thin in the course of time, the whole regime may well collapse.
the motivation that drives North Korea to produce nuclear weapons is to trade its nuclear threat for foreign economic aid. simply put, if the US wants a North Korea without nukes, then it must give food.
what's more, the US proclaimed that North Korea had already owned nukes in arsenal. be it true or not, North Korea's on the verge of going crazy. when it goes crazy, what's it going to do...?

Discover oil! Billions in reconstruction to be had!!

Think!
North Korea may wanna divert its people's attention and attract the attention of the international society to listen to its voice.
It may collapse? I don't think so, at least, won't in a very short time.
North Korea is a country which close to international intercourse for such a long time, so we cannot force it to have a big change immediately,and we may think a better way to help, and that's our interests, too.

Reallife:
"It may collapse? I don't think so, at least, won't in a very short time."

granted, North Korea will not collapse in "a very short (period of) time". for sure, it won't collapse in the next minute after i cast my post. but the point is that as a nasty totalitarian state, North Korea is at the mercy of that stupid and hysteric dictator's whims.in this minute, he might think people should eat as little as possible for the sake of staying healthy (this is proclaimed on the local TV); in the next, he might well decide to test his nukes on the territory of US, Japan or China. then even if the social unrest does not kick North Korea's great leader in the butt, the US or some other states will ensure that his head is lopped off.

Hindsight tells us that North Korea is more receptive to, than responsive to bribes. Hindsight offers no advice on what would have worked.

um well i am an idealist, i would immediately offer food, fuel, medical services sans any conditions, i would also encourage other nations especially in the bordering nations (japan-china-S korea) to do the same. as the living conditions imporved i would begin talks with N. Korea as to how continued aid and support could be negotiated with concessions for arms reduction and international integration. but, like i said, i am a knee-jerk liberal idealist.

I'd say (reluctantly) it's worth trying, dys, except that it has been tried there already.

Hey, don't be so agitated, friend
From outside world, we may think that the people are leading a miserable life, but believe your own eyes, we can say, we don't know the real situation. the leader,perhaps, intend to change the situation,however,he use a terminus way.
Surely, we must protect ourselves, but if America or Japan interfere much,that may be much more dangerous to China.

Dys, really good for you to think in this way; if only everybody in this world thought the way as you do. unfortunately, it is a flimsy fantasy.

for the moment, both the US and N Korea have sth to trade. for N Korea, it wants food and economic aid and the price it is going to pay is dumping nukes. for the US, it asks for international and above all, national security while the price it pays will be aids N Korea requires.
international politics never escapes the nature of money-related.

if the US takes the actions you recommended, maybe it woks, but just in the short run. when the domestic crisis is relieved, what if its leader fails to carry on further cooperation with some political conditions? in the final analysis, war might well be inevitable.

Acepoly, that avatar of yours really has me thinking I'm talking with dlowan.

Roger, what does that word mean? dlowan?

And maybe it will be cheaper to change there a regime? If the food is given, it will not make North Korean economy more efficient, and extortion will go on. Changing regime in Pyongyang may lead to reunification of the Koreas, by the way, and expenses on restoring the Northern economy will be completely of the South Korean concern (the same process happened after reunification of Germany, but, of course, situation in the East German economy prior to reunification was million times better).

acepoly- Welcome to Able2Know- What Roger was referring to is that there is an old member of A2K named dlowan, who uses the same avatar.
It could tend to get a bit confusing!

Phoenix, thanks

steissd, the trade between food and peace doesn't work out peace and security for internaitonal community. food only counts as deterrence of the pace the North Korea works on the nukes. when the food runs out once again--and it will, i am quite sure about this--N korea's going to play the same game blatantly. and as i said, totalitarian states are susceptible to the whims of its dictator and therefore, much more difficult to predict. not only people in NK are gasping out for their survival, but the international security is also dangerously threatened.
although wars are always the last resort we turn to, for N K, our patience is spent.

That is exactly what I say. The radical and efficient treatment of the problem implies replacement of Kim and reunification of Koreas on base of the Southern socio-political and economical model. Preventive nuclear attack on the nuclear facilities of Kim may be needed, though, for making such a mission possible and not dangerous for both Armed Forces and civilians of the USA.

ok, if a war is inevitable, is it possible that the US is able to carry out unilateral military action against N K without the consent of China? the point here is that N K serves for a very long since the Korean War in the 50s as a buffer state between the US and China. so China, i think, will not stand by, watching the US attacking N K. the military action, if any at all, will have to be a collective one between the US and China. and the post-war reconstruction will be a little bit more complicated when some conflict might arise as to how to distribute the interests between the US and China.
btw, the nuclear attack against nuclear facilities in N K is not sensible. it sounds too reckless and sensational.

butter? guns? umm i go for the butter, but then thats how us non-reality based liberals are.