Breaking: NK shells SK western border

Mr Freeze wrote: »

Is this fairly common there?

Common enough and it usually starts over a disputed soccer result. On Tuesday last, North Korea announced they had beaten Germany in the World Cup final. Kim Jong-un captained the team and scored 15 hat-tricks in the final, as they went on to win 95 - 0.

On Wednesday, the South Korean media disputed this result and claimed Kim Jong-un only scored 11 hat-ricks in the final. An angry Kim, then ordered the shelling of the south to show his disapproval.

Corvus Maximus wrote: »

Common enough and it usually starts over a disputed soccer result. On Tuesday last, North Korea announced they had beaten Germany in the World Cup final. Kim Jong-un captained the team and scored 15 hat-tricks in the final, as they went on to win 95 - 0.

On Wednesday, the South Korean media disputed this result and claimed Kim Jong-un only scored 11 hat-ricks in the final. An angry Kim, then ordered the shelling of the south to show his disapproval.

This is as reliable as any source from over there I suppose.

Famine is looming in the North, so they are raising tensions to extract concessions

Internationally it has to be taken seriously, but in reality, everyone knows what the score is

Infini2 wrote: »

NK is a failed broken state its got nukes but it knows it cant ever use them because if they did its game over for them the US would have every reason to move in on em and China would not allow it to exist either considering any nuclear fallout would be a major threat to them

Realistically it may cave in on itself at somepoint in the future its got a massive PAPER army. They say 1mil but they couldnt even fully arm half of it even most of the regular army is antiquated soviet equipment they would stand little chance against modern weapons. In addition the new kim has been going batty with executions left right and center hell be lucky to have any reliable people at all in a few years.

Funny thing with china tho: They want NK to exist because they dont want US troops on their border yet ironically if NK ceased to exist the US would have little reason to remain there expecially if China did buisness with SK and got on well with one another post united korea. Realistically NK will only exist as long as china wants it to. If it becomes a complete liability or starts causing more trouble than its worth then NKs days are numbered and they have been pusing their luck the last few years.

The problem is I can't see NK collapsing or Korea being united without major bloodletting. The NK regime won't give up power likely. I'd be concerned that if their President senses he is done for he will try and bring the rest of the Korean peninsula (and potentially further afield with the likes of Japan) down with him. It would mean inevitable and instant defeat for North Korea but he may think he has nothing to lose.

DetroitSpinR wrote: »

Is Seoul really within shelling distance?
Probably not even worth the bother anyway since the DPRK can launch conventional warheads (and now nuclear) that could reach Pusan in minutes.

Kinda like saying "I should be worried about Joe's ability to be able to punch me because he has a long arm......when all the while he has a cabinet of rifles too"

well rant inbound but Korea is actually fascinating...

the issue with their nukes is a reliable delivery system. they cant really launch **** to be honest, however, as the saying goes they only need to be successful once. building a nuke is one thing launching it on a rocket is the real trick. they do have a massive amount of fixed artillery that can reach Seoul, at least the outskirts. that would cause massive damage, you would be looking at tens of thousands of casualties if not more not to mention the worldwide economic affects. he would have the advantage for a short window to maximize damage before he is hit with a counterpunch of epic proportions. all i can say if i was a NK artillery man i would fire my 5 rounds and run as fuk fast as possible because otherwise the return fire will be pinpoint and nightmarish. the advantage ole Kim has is he just has to hit 'over there, somewhere, anywhere'.

the politics are making game of thrones look childish.

there is china who really cant afford and yet needs a war now. despite what you hear, china is in deep deep trouble. that port explosion has seriously limited their export business exactly at a time when they can least afford it. it also looks like the local communist party heads had an involvement and the latest is the cyanide rain and the fish kills. mix that with a largely hidden revolution underway, a collapsing stock market and a hidden but soon to be very public local banking failure that will make the wall street/housing crash look like a picnic. all those ghost cities they built, well they hid those loans (ala what the US did with houses) inside other loans to make them look good. those chickens are coming home to roost now, unless they can divert attention.

the US is not much better financially (you could argue worse) and not to be political, Mr Obama is wobbly at best on the whole war thing and neither is Russia or Japan in any shape. Also the US is committed to supply a massive army in the defense of SK. Something they dont have the manpower, money or will to do now, however China and Russia would love to see it sucked into a bloody ground war in both cost and image. Then there is a rumour that China and the US have agreed to split NK if it kicks off. NK is a total pain in the hole for new China, they need it and want it gone at the same time. the rumour is the Chinese will take northern part and South will push to a further line north. China does not want the US on its border, NK is simply a buffer state for them. it would be in China's interest for the population of NK to go South. the last thing they need is a starving population bursting north, they need engineers not farmers making pig iron in their back yard and farming skills last updated in the 1950's, jesus they dont need people who think Mao was right, not where they are now. also it would pretty well destroy South korea if the population went south, at least for the next 20 years as they try to pay for it all (sort of east germany on steroids). to china that would be good, they get the business South korea currently has.

either way, think of the reeducation they would have to do with NK citizens, 'no you dont need to stockpile your food', no the police wont execute you for not crying for dear leader, this is the internet, here is a shop, this is a car, that is a phone.... they are not going to be using samsung or foxconn built phones and gigabit internet or buying kia cars anytime soon. also without sounding horrible, but what can they bring to the SK economy? they also need engineers, not McDonalds food people who keep eating and stealing the burgers. (and no i dont mean that as a smarmy joke). for many NK citizens, seeing Seoul will be like us meeting an alien species.

then there is the mining rights...NKorea(aka Best Korea) has huge underdeveloped mineral deposits...apparently.

Ole Kim maybe thinking he can bombard his way to a stalemate and cower S Korea. unfortunately for him the modern war is vastly different. the SK and US forces have had 50 years to build a pixel by pixel image of NK defensive and offensive lines. Kim is thinking static defense while everyone else is thinking Shock and Awe +10,000%. i always love Kims masturbatory military videos of artillery and rockets hitting a mountain, thats easy, the mountain isnt shooting back. The nuke threat is only good once. if he fires, he knows he is going to swing from a rope as are his cronies, in fact if it is going bad a lot of his cronies wont do as he says as a way of avoiding the aftermath. if he does lob one, China will disown him. NK is starving, its always starving, their harvest is underway now and they need western grain to survive every year. if he was to do 'something' it will all be over in weeks, definitely a month. There will be the usual guerrilla war, he could succeed in that as Iraq has shown but its not like he can hide in the populous, not with his weight for example, kinda like a well fed nazi in a holocaust photo, they kinda stand out. he really has nowhere to run, if he uses any nuke material he is persona non grata even in the maddest ****holes on the planet.

its likely this is bluster for food for demands on food, for pressure on China for more free **** from S Korea and the US and right after a joint SK/US war game when everyone is fully trained...but then again he is not exactly mentally stable...

the saddest part is the people of NK. for 50 years they have been living in a time bubble. have a look at the night time image of the korean peninsula below. there is what 50 years does of 'best korea' and their version of communist nirvana. its a giant prison camp.

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/imageo/2013/03/31/the-two-koreas-like-night-and-day/#.VdcGQEYs-3s

If it kicks off, Kim better hope the Americans get to him first otherwise it will not be a very pretty end for him. no bunker, even one filled with his unicorns will hide him then...

just my opinion obviously

While the US would have no obligation to remove itself from a unified democratic Korea, I think it would do so anyway.

If not in its entirety, certainly scale back considerably.

With the threat assessment greatly diminished, the affordability of keeping 12+ brigades in Korea/Japan would compel redeployment.

Especially with the US army undergoing its biggest shrinkage in multiple generations.

the evasion_kid wrote: »

I dunno about that shur didn't they land a man on the sun there a while ago,plus they came up with a cure for Ebola,AIDS and mers

wasn’t all of that achieved by kim himself? personally like?