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North Korea thread (1 Viewer)

whoknew said:
So North Korea said they are closing to developing an ICBM.

Trump's response - 

Donald J. Trump ✔@realDonaldTrump

North Korea just stated that it is in the final stages of developing a nuclear weapon capable of reaching parts of the U.S. It won't happen!

--

Anyone know how Trump plans to stop this? Negotiations? Sanctions? War?
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Pretty sure he is openly mocking them - whatever they attempt with their ICBM missile will not work

 
whoknew said:
Why do you say that? You don't think the North Koreans can build an ICBM?
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I am pretty sure most of their medium range missiles have failed - I personally don't think they are getting a long-range missile - capable of carrying a nuclear weapon - will work.

But the question is what was Trump thinking - and I am assuming he is mocking their ability to get it done. :shrug:

ETA - past failed attempts

 
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Sinn Fein said:
I am pretty sure most of their medium range missiles have failed - I personally don't think they are getting a long-range missile - capable of carrying a nuclear weapon - will work.

But the question is what was Trump thinking - and I am assuming he is mocking their ability to get it done. :shrug:
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I'm assuming he has no idea about their past failures and was just talking like a wannabe tough guy. Again. 

 
Kim Jong Un's half brother murdered in Malaysia.  

The estranged half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has been murdered in Malaysia, a South Korean government source said on Tuesday.

Kim Jong Nam, the older half brother of the North Korean leader, was known to spend a significant amount of his time outside the country and had spoken out publicly against his family's dynastic control of the isolated state.

He was confirmed dead by Malaysian police, and was believed to be in his mid-40s.

Police official Fadzil Ahmat said that the cause of Kim's death had not been determined yet, but that a post mortem would be carried out on the body.

"So far there are no suspects, but we have started investigations and are looking at a few possibilities to get leads," Fadzil told Reuters.

According to Fadzil, Kim had been planning to travel to Macau on Monday when he fell ill at the low-cost terminal of Kuala Lumpur International Airport.

"The deceased ... felt like someone grabbed or held his face from behind," Fadzil said. "He felt dizzy, so he asked for help at the ... counter of KLIA."

Kim was taken to an airport clinic where he still felt unwell, and it was decided to take him to hospital. He died in the ambulance on the way to Putrajaya Hospital, Fadzil added.

South Korea's TV Chosun, a cable television network, reported that Kim had been poisoned with a needle by two women believed to be North Korean operatives who fled in a taxi and were at large, citing multiple South Korean government sources.

Reuters could not confirm those details.

The South Korean government source who spoke to Reuters did not immediately provide further details.

South Korea's foreign ministry said it could not confirm the reports, and the country's intelligence agency could not immediately be reached for comment.

"We don't know if there was a cloth or needles; the receptionist said someone grabbed his face, he felt dizzy," police official Fadzil said, when asked about the nature of the reported attack.

Malaysia is one of a dwindling number of countries that has close relations with North Korea, which is under tightening global sanctions over its nuclear tests and ballistic missile launches, the latest of which took place on Sunday.

Malaysians and North Koreans can visit each other's country without visas.

A phone call to the North Korean embassy in Kuala Lumpur late on Tuesday went straight to answering machine.

SECRETIVE FAMILY

Kim Jong Nam and Kim Jong Un are both sons of former North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, who died in late 2011, but they had different mothers.

Kim Jong Nam did not attend his father's funeral.

The portly and easygoing Kim Jong Nam was believed to be close to his uncle, Jang Song Thaek, who was North Korea's second most powerful man before being executed on Kim Jong Un's orders in 2013.

In an embarrassing 2001 incident, Kim Jong Nam was caught at an airport in Japan traveling on a forged Dominican Republic passport, saying he had wanted to visit Tokyo Disneyland. He was known to travel to Hong Kong, Macau and mainland China.

Koh Yu-hwan, a professor at Dongguk University in Seoul, said that Kim Jong Nam had occasionally been the subject of speculation that he could replace his younger half-brother, the country's third-generation leader.

"Loyalists may have wanted to get rid of him," he said.

Kim Jong Nam said several times over the years that he had no interest in leading his country.

"Personally I am against third-generation succession," he told Japan's Asahi TV in 2010.

"I hope my younger brother will do his best for the sake of North Koreans' prosperous lives."

His cousin, Lee Han-young, who defected to South Korea through Switzerland in 1982, was shot and killed by North Korean agents in Seoul in 1997, according to South Korea.

Kim Jong Nam's mother was an actress named Song Hye Rim.

"My father was keeping highly secret the fact that he was living with my mother who was married, a famous movie actress, so I couldn’t get out of the house or make friends," Kim Jong Nam was quoted as saying in a 2012 book by a Japanese journalist.

"That solitude from childhood may have made me what I am now, preferring freedom."

(Reporting by Ju-min Park and Se Young Lee in SEOUL and Joseph Sipalan And Emily Chow in KUALA LUMPUR; Writing by Tony Munroe; Editing by Robert Birsel and Mike Collett-White)
Click to expand...

 
Don Quixote said:
His cousin, Lee Han-young, who defected to South Korea through Switzerland in 1982, was shot and killed by North Korean agents in Seoul in 1997, according to South Korea.
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Nice family you got there.

Kim Jong-nam seemed like a 'normal' person. Maybe I'm wrong.

There is still a sister who is close by KJU's side. She also seemed normal once, left the normal world and now is considered a power behind the throne IIRC.

 
I can only imagine there is real fear of a coup somewhere in the background.

NK just executed one of its prime military (or intelligence) leaders IIRC, just like a week or so ago.

 
whoknew said:
So North Korea said they are closing to developing an ICBM.

Trump's response - 

Donald J. Trump ✔@realDonaldTrump

North Korea just stated that it is in the final stages of developing a nuclear weapon capable of reaching parts of the U.S. It won't happen!

--

Anyone know how Trump plans to stop this? Negotiations? Sanctions? War?
Click to expand...
:popcorn:

 
SaintsInDome2006 said:
North Korea used VX nerve gas to kill KJ Nam in an international airport.

- Basically this is a WMD. Insane.
Click to expand...
This is a fascinating foreign affairs event that could now drag other countries in.  It's also pretty obvious who would have poisoned KJN, which leads me to suspect that it wasn't North Korea.  If they wanted him dead, he would have already been dead.  A car wreck would have been a much less suspecting death.  I'm sure some point in the last decade they could have got him in a much less 007 way. What a freaking spectacle.  On camera, using an illegal poison...  Is NK that brazen?

What kind of international pressure is going to come of this now?  I'm sure this violates all kind of international laws of which NK gives 0 fks about.  

 
Quez said:
This is a fascinating foreign affairs event that could now drag other countries in.  It's also pretty obvious who would have poisoned KJN, which leads me to suspect that it wasn't North Korea.  If they wanted him dead, he would have already been dead.  A car wreck would have been a much less suspecting death.  I'm sure some point in the last decade they could have got him in a much less 007 way. What a freaking spectacle.  On camera, using an illegal poison...  Is NK that brazen?

What kind of international pressure is going to come of this now?  I'm sure this violates all kind of international laws of which NK gives 0 fks about.  
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It's a good point, yeah NK knows everyone knows what they're doing, and why the need to do it?

 
lod001 said:
Weren't you leaving the country? I mean if you think that's the way we are going, you better haul ### while you can.
Click to expand...
Never said that.  I'm a white male.  I'll be fine.  Unless you want to try and make me.  We could just deal with that one on one though.   :boxing:

 
From being there for a week a few minor observations (All anecdotal)

  • SK people don't see NK as a threat at all.  They don't see escalation as an issue as they know that as soon as NK flinches they are flattened.  China won't even back them because they don't want to be flattened either.
  • SK is pissed because the US in coordination with Japan put a missile system in place in SK that is there to defend the region.  SK had minimal say and now it's hurting their economy and making tensions high, and less China tourists are travelling to SK among other issues.
  • NK is escalating their stuff because of this missile system to show capability and they will grow capability to exceed the defense systems.
  • China stopping import of coal from NK is a big deal.  This is a huge part of their cash flow.  
  • SK thinks that as soon as they get their next president in place (after they throw current one in jail) they will unify.  Unification may require US to not deploy troops above DMZ for some 20 years or more.  Will require ruling party get refugee status in China and immune to prosecution.  Etc. etc.  
  • Japan is also an issue. SK and Japan are fighting over some old disputes and are publicly lashing out at eachother.  Japan may benefit from NK/SK split but not clear, nobody really knows Japan's motivation.
 
culdeus said:
From being there for a week a few minor observations (All anecdotal)

  • SK thinks that as soon as they get their next president in place (after they throw current one in jail) they will unify.  Unification may require US to not deploy troops above DMZ for some 20 years or more.  Will require ruling party get refugee status in China and immune to prosecution.  Etc. etc.  
Click to expand...
How will this work out? Kim's not going to give up power and become a refugee.
Unless I misunderstood, and by "they" you mean North Korea. 

 
EYLive said:
How will this work out? Kim's not going to give up power and become a refugee.
Unless I misunderstood, and by "they" you mean North Korea. 
Click to expand...
The sk people I know think he will go quite easily. He is posturing with nukes so he doesn't end up on war crimes.

If there is weakness china might sell him out. 

 
culdeus said:
SK thinks that as soon as they get their next president in place (after they throw current one in jail) they will unify.  Unification may require US to not deploy troops above DMZ for some 20 years or more.  Will require ruling party get refugee status in China and immune to prosecution.  Etc. etc.  
Click to expand...
I wish there were more insights on this.

I saw a report recently which indicated that in the 90s SK military had trained its soldiers for the downfall of NK and that intelligence training looked 10 years down the road (ie to the early 00s) in which there would be no NK.

It seems to me that along with the other stuff we weren't paying attention to in the 90s (AQ, the return of authoritarian Russia, the banking system...) the fall of NK is really something we should have been pushing. Russia was on the sideline, China was not the behemoth it is now, we really could have solved that problem. After the 50s that was a second bite at the apple.

Now their missiles are projecting to one day reach the east coast (and if you don't believe me check out Slap's article above...).

It just seems to me there must be some price we can offer the apparatchiks to turn in KJU and the loons running the show.

 
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culdeus said:
The sk people I know think he will go quite easily. He is posturing with nukes so he doesn't end up on war crimes.

If there is weakness china might sell him out. 
Click to expand...
I hope so. According to the interviews given by the defected diplomat last month, Kim's grip on power is weakening and his opposition at all levels of government is growing. If Kim keeps killing officials, there will be no one left to work for him.

 
culdeus said:
From being there for a week a few minor observations (All anecdotal)

  • SK people don't see NK as a threat at all.  They don't see escalation as an issue as they know that as soon as NK flinches they are flattened.  China won't even back them because they don't want to be flattened either.
  • NK is escalating their stuff because of this missile system to show capability and they will grow capability to exceed the defense systems.
  • China stopping import of coal from NK is a big deal.  This is a huge part of their cash flow.  
Click to expand...
Lived in Japan for the past five years and spent  A lot of time in Seoul South Korea. While everybody went about their business, did you not notice the warning signs and safety gear in the subways? 

Also, North Korea escalates their stuff at particular times of year because of US/South Korea military exercises.  It's to be expected...

 
SaintsInDome2006 said:
I wish there were more insights on this.

I saw a report recently which indicated that in the 90s SK military had trained its soldiers for the downfall of NK and that intelligence training looked 10 years down the road (ie to the early 00s) in which there would be no NK.

It seems to me that along with the other stuff we weren't paying attention to in the 90s (AQ, the return of authoritarian Russia, the banking system...) the fall of NK is really something we should have been pushing. Russia was on the sideline, China was not the behemoth it is now, we really could have solved that problem. After the 50s that was a second bite at the apple.

Now their missiles are projecting to one day reach the east coast (and if you don't believe me check out Slap's article above...).

It just seems to me there must be some price we can offer the apparatchiks to turn in KJU and the loons running the show.
Click to expand...
If we could talk China into it it's a done deal. Need to be willing to let the guy walk. Anyone trust trump to work it out ?

 
 


Trump Inherits a Secret Cyberwar Against North Korean Missiles


hree years ago, President Barack Obama ordered Pentagon officials to step up their cyber and electronic strikes against North Korea’s missile program in hopes of sabotaging test launches in their opening seconds.

Soon a large number of the North’s military rockets began to explode, veer off course, disintegrate in midair and plunge into the sea. Advocates of such efforts say they believe that targeted attacks have given American antimissile defenses a new edge and delayed by several years the day when North Korea will be able to threaten American cities with nuclear weapons launched atop intercontinental ballistic missiles.

But other experts have grown increasingly skeptical of the new approach, arguing that manufacturing errors, disgruntled insiders and sheer incompetence can also send missiles awry. Over the past eight months, they note, the North has managed to successfully launch three medium-range rockets. And Kim Jong-un, the North Korean leader, now claims his country is in “the final stage in preparations” for the inaugural test of his intercontinental missiles — perhaps a bluff, perhaps not.

An examination of the Pentagon’s disruption effort, based on interviews with officials of the Obama and Trump administrations as well as a review of extensive but obscure public records, found that the United States still does not have the ability to effectively counter the North Korean nuclear and missile programs. Those threats are far more resilient than many experts thought, The New York Times’s reporting found, and pose such a danger that Mr. Obama, as he left office, warned President Trump they were likely to be the most urgent problem he would confront.


Mr. Trump has signaled his preference to respond aggressively against the North Korean threat. In a Twitter post after Mr. Kim first issued his warning on New Year’s Day, the president wrote, “It won’t happen!” Yet like Mr. Obama before him, Mr. Trump is quickly discovering that he must choose from highly imperfect options.

He could order the escalation of the Pentagon’s cyber and electronic warfare effort, but that carries no guarantees. He could open negotiations with the North to freeze its nuclear and missile programs, but that would leave a looming threat in place. He could prepare for direct missile strikes on the launch sites, which Mr. Obama also considered, but there is little chance of hitting every target. He could press the Chinese to cut off trade and support, but Beijing has always stopped short of steps that could lead to the regime’s collapse.



In two meetings of Mr. Trump’s national security deputies in the Situation Room, the most recent on Tuesday, all those options were discussed, along with the possibility of reintroducing nuclear weapons to South Korea as a dramatic warning. Administration officials say those issues will soon go to Mr. Trump and his top national security aides.

The decision to intensify the cyber and electronic strikes, in early 2014, came after Mr. Obama concluded that the $300 billion spent since the Eisenhower era on traditional antimissile systems, often compared to hitting “a bullet with a bullet,” had failed the core purpose of protecting the continental United States. Flight tests of interceptors based in Alaska and California had an overall failure rate of 56 percent, under near-perfect conditions. Privately, many experts warned the system would fare worse in real combat.

...
Click to expand...

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/04/world/asia/north-korea-missile-program-sabotage.html?_r=0

- So NK may have been the no. 1 thing that Obama warned Trump about when he left - something which Trump has hinted at but never (of course) said what it was.

- The likelihood that Trump has the capacity to really focus on this and deal with it seems dubious. Color me concerned.

 
SaintsInDome2006 said:
 



https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/04/world/asia/north-korea-missile-program-sabotage.html?_r=0

- So NK may have been the no. 1 thing that Obama warned Trump about when he left - something which Trump has hinted at but never (of course) said what it was.

- The likelihood that Trump has the capacity to really focus on this and deal with it seems dubious. Color me concerned.
Click to expand...
Fortunately he's very supportive of the intelligence organizations he will rely on.

 
SaintsInDome2006 said:
 



https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/04/world/asia/north-korea-missile-program-sabotage.html?_r=0

- So NK may have been the no. 1 thing that Obama warned Trump about when he left - something which Trump has hinted at but never (of course) said what it was.

- The likelihood that Trump has the capacity to really focus on this and deal with it seems dubious. Color me concerned.
Click to expand...
I was listening to a History podcast by Dan Carlin the other day.  He made an interesting point (talking about the beginning of the Atomic age).

He said that some of the military advisers of the presidents that followed Truman encouraged the presidents to use the bomb a time or two, but that they resisted that urge.

The thing about Trump is that he is such a neophyte when it comes to politics and especially foreign affairs, that he's going to trust his military advisers 100%.  So what happens if he gets a few aggressive military guys.  I'd imagine that a military man is going to be more gung-ho than a president, as fighting is what he does. Who are the guys keeping Trump from joining the fray?  Bannon?  Kushner?  

 
shader said:
He said that some of the military advisers of the presidents that followed Truman encouraged the presidents to use the bomb a time or two, but that they resisted that urge.
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Same thing happened with Kennedy in the Cuban Crisis.

shader said:
The thing about Trump is that he is such a neophyte when it comes to politics and especially foreign affairs, that he's going to trust his military advisers 100%.  So what happens if he gets a few aggressive military guys.  I'd imagine that a military man is going to be more gung-ho than a president, as fighting is what he does. Who are the guys keeping Trump from joining the fray?  Bannon?  Kushner?  
Click to expand...
I don't know Shader. I don't think either belong in that discussion but they probably should be because of what you say.

I'd imagine the real handlers in that situation would McMaster and Mattis.

 
Mattis is gung ho, but he's also very cerebral and measured. I'm not particularly worried about him advocating being too quick on the trigger with nukes. 

 
Is North Korea's leader Kim Jong-un rational?

Is Kim Jong-un rational? The new US ambassador to the United Nations thinks he is not. Nikki Haley said after North Korea's simultaneous launch of four ballistic missiles: "This is not a rational person." But is she right?

***

Scholars who study him think he is behaving very rationally, even with the purging and terrorising of those around him. Prof Andrei Lankov of Kookmin University in Seoul told the BBC: "He is perfectly rational. He sometimes overdoes it. He sometimes tends to apply excessive force. Why kill hundreds of generals when dozens will do?

***

Prof Delury said that there was nothing irrational about Kim Jong-un's drive to obtain credible nuclear weapons: "He has no reliable allies to guarantee his safety, and he faces a hostile superpower that has, in recent memory, invaded sovereign states around the world and overthrown their governments.

"The lesson North Koreans learned from the invasion of Iraq was that if Saddam Hussein really possessed those weapons of mass destruction, he might have survived."

This was compounded by the lesson of Libya, according to Prof Lankov: "Did American promises of American prosperity help Gaddafi and his family? Kim Jong-un knows perfectly well what happened to the only fool who believed Western promises and renounced the development of nuclear weapons. And he's not going to make that mistake. Once you don't have nuclear weapons you are completely unprotected.

"Did Russian or American and British promises to guarantee Ukrainian integrity help Ukraine? No. Why should he expect American, Russian or Chinese promises to help him stay alive? He is rational."

 
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