North Korea has just tested their first hydrogen bomb

Rroff · 9 Sep 2016 at 13:02

[TFU] Thegoon84;29990523 said:
Anybody know when a fresh delivery of freedom is being shipped first class to North Korea?

Or have we learnt that war solves nothing? At the very time when a mental dictator actually has "MAYBE" the potential to nuke a country close?

Yet we went in to Iraq based on a guess WMD's were there! And yet people still are convinced it wasn't to control the oil/Petrodollar LOLCAKES.

Using a nuke is a bit of a lose, lose situation for NK (not that would necessarily stop them) - but possessing a viable system gives them enormous political clout.

I can't see NK nuking SK for reasons that are longer than a reasonable post here - they aren't easily going to be able to deliver a device to mainland USA so the next likely target would be US forces Japan - and nuking Japan is gonna play out well for them on the international stage :S

[TFU] Thegoon84 · 9 Sep 2016 at 13:16

Rroff said:
Using a nuke is a bit of a lose, lose situation for NK (not that would necessarily stop them) - but possessing a viable system gives them enormous political clout.

I can't see NK nuking SK for reasons that are longer than a reasonable post here - they aren't easily going to be able to deliver a device to mainland USA so the next likely target would be US forces Japan - and nuking Japan is gonna play out well for them on the international stage :S

But my point is hypocrisy of the west!

FTM · 9 Sep 2016 at 13:18

Rroff said:
NK have (supposedly) buried a lot of their military infrastructure beyond the reach of regular ordinance and the terrain and dispersion of their forces doesn't tend to be favourable to the tactics normally employed by the US, etc. either (and the US has learnt some harsh lessons about fighting wars on unfavourable terrain).

they might have millions of bullets..but they cant eat them

the entire country teeters on the edge of starvation..if you mobilise an army you have to feed them..they can barely feed their entire population and required outside food aid

they would starve before then ran out of ammunition

RaohNS · 9 Sep 2016 at 13:36

Hence what I said previously. A war longer than a few months would end the NK regime. Its the fallout, casualties and most importantly what replaces it that may be the reason we don't go in.

The US doesn't care about any of those points mind, especially the last one

Mr Jack · 9 Sep 2016 at 13:44

FTM said:
they might have millions of bullets..but they cant eat them

There's also a bullet shortage in North Korea. Even their supposedly "elite" units do hardly any live fire drills. It's not really clear how North Korea would perform in an attack but troops short on food and ammunition are hardly likely to stand in the face of a Western military. I suspect the entire country would be rolled over inside of a week. The big problem is the artillery they have aimed at Seoul and the civilian causalities that could result from a retaliatory strike from NK.

Rroff · 9 Sep 2016 at 13:44

FTM said:
they might have millions of bullets..but they cant eat them

the entire country teeters on the edge of starvation..if you mobilise an army you have to feed them..they can barely feed their entire population and required outside food aid

they would starve before then ran out of ammunition

War changes many of the rules mind - not sure what kind of potential there if for them to conduct operations outside their borders to secure logistics like food though. Still it wouldn't happen overnight would be weeks or months before it really started to have effect.

Mr Jack said:
There's also a bullet shortage in North Korea. Even their supposedly "elite" units do hardly any live fire drills. It's not really clear how North Korea would perform in an attack but troops short on food and ammunition are hardly likely to stand in the face of a Western military. I suspect the entire country would be rolled over inside of a week. The big problem is the artillery they have aimed at Seoul and the civilian causalities that could result from a retaliatory strike from NK.

They have a fair amount of ammo in storage (the military has a fair bit of food and ammo stockpiled) - the way ammunition is handled is partly cultural and partly to stop it being used as a commodity by people who are little more than scraping by.

dcsarge · 9 Sep 2016 at 14:45

NK's leaders know that their greatest weapon is that any conflict they create will put China and US/SK at loggerheads, as neither party wants the other in unilateral control of a broken NK.

IronWarrior · 9 Sep 2016 at 14:55

dcsarge said:
NK's leaders know that their greatest weapon is that any conflict they create will put China and US/SK at loggerheads, as neither party wants the other in unilateral control of a broken NK.

China wouldn't do anything rash, their economy and ours both depend on each other and China is getting fed up with NK.

dcsarge · 9 Sep 2016 at 14:59

I didn't say they would do anything rash but they aren't keen to have US military activity on their border. Their activity in the South China Sea shows exactly what they think of international law and world opinion.

They aren't going to allow military action against NK and will probably push for diplomatic resolution.

Draeger · 9 Sep 2016 at 15:39

Release 'Team America 2'.

Job done.

insane200 · 9 Sep 2016 at 16:27

DrToffnar said:
Ulterior motives my friend. Or, indeed, lack there of.

kindai said:
Oil

Guess the UN needs to write a harshly worded letter to them in this case.

Dis86 · 9 Sep 2016 at 16:28

insane200 said:
Why is it when other countries have supposed chemical weapons the US and UK where there having a war immediately, but with NK all the countries are condoning it but doing nothing.

Because nobody truly believes that nutbag will use them.

Tefal · 9 Sep 2016 at 16:36

wordy said:
Kim Jong-Un is stable?

what international conflict has he started?

I mean if we're judging stability by number of wars started/disruption to the world, then NK is pretty stable.

It does the exact same thing every year for decades

Craig321 · 9 Sep 2016 at 16:37

"Ohh Kim, your hydrogen bomb is SO cool... we all REALLY like it... you must be some sort of genius. It's definitely real."

Tefal · 9 Sep 2016 at 16:38

insane200 said:
Why is it when other countries have supposed chemical weapons the US and UK where there having a war immediately, but with NK all the countries are condoning it but doing nothing.

cause we know NK actually has WMDs including chemicl.

Countries have WMDs so you don;t attack them

Tefal · 9 Sep 2016 at 16:46

Mr Jack said:
There's also a bullet shortage in North Korea. Even their supposedly "elite" units do hardly any live fire drills. It's not really clear how North Korea would perform in an attack but troops short on food and ammunition are hardly likely to stand in the face of a Western military. I suspect the entire country would be rolled over inside of a week. The big problem is the artillery they have aimed at Seoul and the civilian causalities that could result from a retaliatory strike from NK.

like the iraqi army?

they fell very quickly. Problem is the little groups of resistance who just blend into the population.

I'd imagine NK not being stupid has done much like Britain did in WW2 and prep the entire country and population for invasion.

Weapons cache buried everywhere, civil defence teams set up in cells, plans drawn up for destroying infrastructure etc.

http://www.historylearningsite.co.u...s-home-front-in-world-war-two/the-home-front/

Think before you act. But think always of your country before you think of yourself.

those were our governments words to our grandmothers and grandfathers.

how extremists do you think the words from a government as fanatical as NK are?

I mean we were prepared to spray our beachs with mustard gas etc if an invasion came

Mr Jack · 9 Sep 2016 at 16:53

Tefal said:
like the iraqi army?

Yeah, pretty much. Defeating the military of NK will be the least of our worries, any military invasion is going to lead to a decade or more of clean up and serious diplomatic issues with China.

Weapons cache buried everywhere, civil defence teams set up in cells, plans drawn up for destroying infrastructure etc.

I'm sure they have. For the most part, however, I think the North Koreans won't act on it. They're a starving, desperate people.

Tefal · 9 Sep 2016 at 16:55

Mr Jack said:
I'm sure they have. For the most part, however, I think the North Koreans won't act on it. They're a starving, desperate people.

they're a starving and desperate people....who have just been invaded by the people who have made them starving and desperate.

People they've been told for their whole lives are evil and against them, inhuman monsters who have tried to starve their proud country and people because they are scared of them.

the north Vietnamese where desperate and starving in many cases, they still held off the Americans for 15 years.

Jamauk · 9 Sep 2016 at 17:09

[TFU] Thegoon84;29990615 said:
But my point is hypocrisy of the west!

This is one of the things I've wondered, whilst I don't trust NK with a nuclear weapon, I also don't trust other countries, including this one with nukes, but then I guess that's why it's called a nuclear deterrent, thankfully nobody actually has the intention of using them, it's all about leverage. The American attacks on Japan in WWII shocked the world and made everyone realise they don't have the right to play God like that - this however didn't stop countries developing it.

It is incredibly hypocritical for the rest of the world armed with nuclear weaponry to be telling NK how wrong it is for them to be developing it. Perhaps NK feel they need it as a deterrent as the rest of the world has it?

Mr Jack · 9 Sep 2016 at 17:15

Tefal said:
the north Vietnamese where desperate and starving in many cases, they still held off the Americans for 15 years.

The North Vietnamese were desperate and starving and backed by the USSR. Which is not a small point. The Vietnam War was as much a proxy war as anything else; that's unlikely to happen in North Korea.

It's hard to say how brainwashed the North Koreans are but I rather suspect less so than their dictatorship would like to believe. I suspect that things there are closer to East Germany where everyone pays lip service to the regime but knows better underneath.