North Korea says/does surprising and alarming thing - Page…

On March 09 2018 14:46 Taf the Ghost wrote:


It holds the potential for a huge win for Trump. That'll come later. As I said, Heads of State don't meet unless there's already a deal worked out. (That's the detail that braying talking heads are going to skip over in their rush to claim this is bad.) We'll need to see what the deal that has emerged is.

Denuclearization alone is a huge win. End of the Korean War and demilitarization of the border would be "EPIC WIN!" territory. Especially if it meant the removal of US Forces. Korea is not going to re-unifying this century, but there's a wide gap between regular threats to nuke the South Korea and North Korea as the new Cambodia.

The US military has been moving a massive amount of assets into the theater since at least February 2017. Big shift in deployment patterns came in with the Trump Administration. This is the currently desired path to an end-state, so it's good to see it proceeding well.

And always think of Trump's Tweets as strategic in nature. While normally having a bit of theatrics about it, the mockery & bluff calling were intentional. We normally see "public diplomacy" as communicating via the press, Trump just does it via Twitter. Optics matter and Trump was playing "bad cop", which is why Kim met with South Korean officials and had his message relayed to Trump via that channel. It's rather unusual for a Security Adviser to show up at the White House like what happened today, which is why you know this is anything but the normal "games" that have been played. It's also noteworthy that Trump allowed the South Koreans to announce the information.

We'll know more in the weeks ahead, but this is most definitely a huge development. Kim is still a murderous dictator, but ending the charade is good for everyone. Though possibly not China. They've gotten a lot of benefit out of using NK as a buffer zone.

On March 10 2018 02:40 Taf the Ghost wrote:


NK agreed to stop all nuclear & missile testing, so that's a start. If the nukes go away, North Korea basically becomes a non-issue to everyone. Doesn't mean the Kim Regime isn't oppressive and murderous, but there's a big difference between tinpot dictator and tinpot dictator with nukes. (Proliferation is another issue involved as well.)

If that happens, there is an actual avenue for deescalation on the peninsula. Since his is a Liquid site, what that could mean is the end to the required military service for South Korean men. That's a few years off, but this is the first time that's actually been a possible outcome.

On March 09 2018 19:16 Pandemona wrote:
Trump will spin this off as a huge win for him whether or not he did much anyway, all politicians do. Fact is, for the world and the Koreans most importantly this is actually the best news i have read in years! Hoping a nice peaceful meeting and the end of North Korea being silly with nuke testing!

On March 10 2018 06:00 Mohdoo wrote:


Can you explain how this is different from the other times NK says it'll get rid of its nukes? I don't see why this is special.

On March 10 2018 05:17 Taf the Ghost wrote:


The point of propaganda is keeping people from going against the party line. They could switch to Aliens being the great evil and it wouldn't matter. (It'd be damn hilarious, though.) The personality cult around the Kims is the only aspect that actually matters for their control, though it's control of the Military that's the basis of their power.






As I said back a few pages, we don't know why Kim's half-brother was assassinated last year. Thus, from the outside, it's hard to judge the exact power dynamics at play. It's fairly straight forward to analyze the USA's & SK's approach because we can judge the actual moves. When it comes to the Hermit Kingdom, we lack all that much concrete information to go on, at least publicly.

The slightly behind the scenes issue is less the ICBMs or nukes. It is the Sub-launched missile platform and a 20-25 man submarine able to travel 2000+ km or more. It's not a threat to the USA, but it puts chemical & nuclear weapons right on the doorstep of every country in the region. It's part of the reason China & Russia were willing to go along, at least publicly, with the last round of sanctions.

NK can posture for whatever, but they aren't looking for a deal if the pressure isn't getting to them. And they don't give up one of their main pieces of leverage (nuke + missile testing), for a time, without at least a framework for a deal mostly in place.

As for security guarantees, who is it against? NK's Army? SK? China? USA? Since we don't know, from the outside, what the power dynamics are, it's hard to figure that one out. Someone killed Kim's older brother. If you can solve why that happened, you can project who Kim would want protection against.

On March 10 2018 02:44 Plansix wrote:
More like a couple decades off. This is not the first time NK has come to the table and then drove up tensions soon after. They are dependent on having an outside threat to scare their citizens.

Instead, Kim only promised to stop nuclear and ballistic missile testing and said he accepted the right of the US and South Korea to move forward with joint military exercises later this year.