North Korea nuclear test: Hydrogen bomb 'missile-ready' | Hacker News Reader

North Korea nuclear test: Hydrogen bomb 'missile-ready'

bbc.com

150 pointsbdcravens188 comments

Every 10 years or so North Korea starts to run out of money from the last deal (1994, 2003). A big money maker has been concessions for not pursuing nukes [1]. The money must almost be dried up from the last one, thus the posturing.

In the end this stems from a lack of coherent plans after invading Korea back in the day. We are lucky Vietnam didn't end up the way Korea did or we'd have the same situation still today. The middle east may also turn into something like this.

The US has to learn to win wars by economically winning over people and giving them more opportunity and freedoms, like Marshall plans back after WWII, ones in which we were also paid for but benefitted all.

We are greatly failing at rebuilding after invasions and this is another example of how that has blowback.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agreed_Framework

The US did invest heavily in rebuilding Korea after the war and in "economically winning over people and giving them more opportunity and freedoms". The portion of Korea that was and still is occupied by UN (primarily US) armed forces is now a healthy, well-educated, free and prosperous country—South Korea.

North Korea, on the other hand, is an impoverished totalitarian state that has been using the threats to demand aid for decades. It wouldn't even exist if China hadn't decided to intervene against the UN command in Korea and flood troops into the peninsula, and to this day it is the one and only country in the world China has formed an alliance with.

And your assessment is that the problem wasn't that the PRK chose communism, but instead it was the US not offering enough freedom or economic opportunity!? What about its communist allies?

I'm not a fan of all of some the US's military actions in recent decades, but if ever there was a war worth fighting since WWII, then surely the Korean War was it. You'd have a hard time finding anyone in the south wishing the communists had won the entire peninsula and that they'd become part of the PRK.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_War#China_intervenes_.2...

It's worth mentioning that Korean democracy is a relatively new phenomenon. For a period of time, South Korea was effectively a military dictatorship. It was only until 1988 that SKorea actually elected a president for the first time. Before that it was just one military coup after another.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Park_Chung-hee

Park Chung-hee is largely credited for creating the "Miracle on the Han River" which led to the current prosperous SKorea we know today. He was also a brutally repressive leader who tortured and killed many of his opponents.

The other three Asian tigers weren't democracies then, either. But along with Korea they were free market economies. While political freedoms were limited, it was a far, far cry from the situation in any of the communist countries in Asia. The choice between living in South Korea vs North Korea was clear even in the mid 1980s.

This is very interesting, and not something that many have given much thought to (including me). It suggests that Capitalism is a more effective path to freedom than Democracy, over the long term. Perhaps this bodes well for China.

Free markets, free minds, free individuals.

It's a libertarian mantra. I'm not a libertarian but the substance behind the credo is commendable and accurate.

Not so clear before that. In fact the north did significantly better than the south then. There was a large influx of cash to South Korea from the Vietnam war (for which Korea provided 300000 mercenaries)

Yeah, before that quite a few Koreans migrated from the South to the North, as the north was doing better initially.

PRK chose communism but they've got dictatorship now - insane, totalitarian dictatorship.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Republic_of_Korea...

Excerpt of the aims:

"... guaranteed basic human rights and freedoms, including those of speech, press, assembly, and faith; universal suffrage to adults over the age of eighteen; equality for women; labor law reforms ..."

Sounds pretty good.

Many in the North probably would love communism (or anything!) in preference to what they have.

The communists didn't hold the North, the PRK was killed off quickly, the Kims soon took over as dictators - Wikipedia says the suggestion to have a "trusteeship" was from USA, that then put the Kims in power ...

An ignorant reading of this would be "USA saves communism from spreading by installing evil dictators instead". As a child we got our share of USA propaganda - in UK - the hated commies.

Except now it seems they were hated because they form a challenge to the rich capitalists. If workers demanded the profits from their labour in other countries, and the rich lost their places of power, then why wouldn't US Americans do the same?

Is that why USA has been at war against communism? To protect the positions of the wealthy elite over their own countrymen?

Am I wrong?

I will say the obvious. History showed that whoever wanted to implement Communism ended up in a similar situation. Perhaps we should drop the game of empiricism and accept that Communism is very very hard to implement and no matter how much you tune the parameters most likely it will end up a freak Totalitarian setup. It just does not worth it.

Yeah it doesn't matter what the stated intent is.

Let's overthrow the old government.

Now let's say the population is in charge but they don't actually vote... We'll just have to "represent" them, vigorously.

Now let's choose our leader according to who can murder their rivals the best.

...how can that turn out well?

"Chose” might not be the right word here. The dmz between the Koreas approximates how far the Soviet tanks got through the Japanese-occupied Korea at the end of world war 2 before acknowledging the Japanese surrender. In this sense, North Korea is analogous to East Germany.

South Korea is a great example of how a country can prosper friendly to the US.

Japan, Germany (and much of Europe), Philippines, many others, they may have had conflicts with the US but after we helped enemies become friends. It is easy to win over the side that is already friendly, we need to economically turn the non-friendlies into friendlies.

Around the time of the Korean war, we also recently moved from #16 military in the world before WWII to arguably #1. With this our economic plans turned more harsh in the following conflicts, we thought we could win with harsher ultimatums rather than just getting money to the people in the state we are trying to win over. Eisenhower even warned about this and he saw everything from WWII through Korea, a complex was emerging, the military-industrial complex, that in some cases preferred conflict to extend chaos over actual war ending nation building.

We stopped nation building for the side that we needed to win over, not just the friendlies. We essentially turned into the strict parent instead of the one that makes a good time for everyone and lives life for quality.

Yes China is complicit in this, they also fought the other side in Vietnam but the whole of Vietnam is now friendly to the US and economically it is benefitting finally. A divided Korea helps China and is a buffer. They need to be called out on it and much of the turn for North Korea has to come from China but we can encourage that.

We should have worked harder at getting North Korea on our side much much earlier, 60+ years of division is not the solution.

What is your idea of "working harder" in this case? Are you familiar with what was attempted?

I am familiar with what we did, maybe not all but much of it, and do today for South Korea.

We also have attempted many things on North Korea but much of it is from a position of force for many reasons including internal conflict, ideology and external players.

We aren't finishing things decisively with nation building. We even have politics today that argue against nation building when they mention wars. Peace and security are only about economics and nation building, extremism is subdued in good economic systems, exasperated in bad economic situations that turn toward authoritarian systems. This is a big reason why the ME is so messed up, small force, no nation building, no economic plan, chaos ensues, large amounts of wealth are made in the chaos, lack of cultural awareness leads to the wrong people gaining power in the power vacuum etc but I digress. Not nation building goes against things like the Marshall Plans, Eisenhower Doctrine and more, this is largely our problem since the Korean war or just after.

Are you saying we did enough in 6+ decades in Korea? We didn't even get a peace treaty, they are still technically at war.

This is not just about self protection or about blackmailing to keep the regime going. The end game for North Korea has been and always will be the reunification of the Korean Peninsula.

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/interrogatio...

This has been North Korea's policy since going back to 1960 under Kim Il Sung. No discussion of what is going on right now as far as NKorea's motivations is complete without mentioning this. Everyone knows what happens to SKorea when the US pulls the trigger on NKorea. People need to start thinking of the ramifications of the US signing a peace treaty and exiting the Korean Peninsula. The status quo of us kicking the can down the line is coming to an end. It's time for people to stop thinking NKorea doesn't have an endgame.

I think most of the world wants Korean unification. The only big country against that really is China [1]. The US only wants it if South Korea is the model for the North, not China modeling the South after what the North is, their buffer.

[1] https://www.economist.com/blogs/economist-explains/2017/04/e...

Interestingly, I don't think South Korea would be very happy to unite.

You don't know South Korea very well then:

> "Having lived in South Korea for the past 15 years, I don’t share most Americans’ confidence that it will always choose America over a North-supporting China. My own impression—bolstered by the ongoing controversy surrounding the stationing of the THAAD missile defense system—is that a growing number of South Koreans would rather see their state’s security compromised than risk their own prosperity.

Let’s not overestimate South Koreans’ attachment to their own state, which a sizable but influential minority still considers illegitimate. The most popular movie in Seoul at the moment is a thriller about a joint North–South effort to catch a criminal ring of North Korean defectors. That plot tells you something right there. The main North Korean character is played for cool by a handsome Tom Cruise type, while his South Korean counterpart is a homely, tired-looking figure of fun. There is a tradition of this sort of casting. The subtext: Serving the North is glamorous; serving the South, not so much. Let’s keep in mind that Kim Jong-un is watching these movies too."

Reunification of the Korean Peninsula is something that has been on the mind of both North and South ever since larger powers made them.

Reunification will have huge costs for South. Also there were already few generations so "family reunion" is not really a motivation anymore.

For elites/high skilled workers/business of North unification is dangerous because they will be useless. For elites/business of South unification gives access to resources and to mainland, but has cost of humanitarian crisis.

Ideal situation for South - "Korean union" where North is independent and has somewhat democratic and calm government.

It was also insanely expensive for west germany (though not as much as here), but it was their goal from the start.

>Germany agreed to pay about 55 billion deutschmarks to the Soviet Union in gifts and loans, the equivalent of eight days of the West German GDP.[1]

Which if applied to US numbers 2016 GDP would be about 0.5 trillion dollars. The same source said the Germans would have paid 100 billion marks or roughly a little under 2 trillion.

[1]:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_reunification

Quickly googling numbers, it get between 100 billion euros and a trillion dollars[2]

[2]:https://www.quora.com/What-would-it-take-for-North-and-South...

The economic ration between the two countries are estimated to be not the 1:3 east and west germany was but more like 1:20 and the norks has half the numbers SK has, whereas there were 1 east german for every 2 west germans.

However that also does not take into account that a united Korea would be a huge economic powerhouse[3] (with a fully developed north, which will obviously take some time), Goldman Sacks estimate that it could have an economy that is bigger than any other G7 country, except the US.

Given that interest rates are super low right now, it might not be a bad idea to get some long interest loans for a unification.

[3]:http://koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/biz/2009/09/123_52202.html

>> The most popular film in Seoul

Does it have name?

I can't find it: http://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/jsp/news/boxOffice_Monthly.jsp?m...

Probably V.I.P. (it comes out top if you sort by week).

Who did you quote?

> China does not want the reunification of the Korean peninsula if it creates a single, larger American ally on its border.

So no, China does not oppose unification, it only opposes one modeled by the US, pretty much the same approach as the US. Also, we have an example of such a regime not modeled by the US - Vietnam.

Vietnam turned out well even after a failed conflict. The reason is mainly market economics and help through investment they have gotten after the war. Vietnam markets have been doing very well [1]. This is similar to what we did in Japan/South Korea etc with investment. The military part in Vietnam is something that wasn't great, the markets after are a success. Ultimately it was a fight against Communism and other things (opium supply issues from '67 Opium Wars that pulled in France then the US, East Asia influence, energy vicinity, trade) and the goal was a market economy with opportunity.

In the end economics and markets where people have comfort and opportunity is all you need to make people happy. In the US we can barely do that at home now so maybe conflict should go back to defense instead of this failed pre-emptive policy and regain focus on building economic opportunity, what people truly love about America.

[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-19/asian-out...

The ME won't turn into something like this. The US heavily influences, finances and arms the ME, so there aren't any leaders who need to pursue this type of tactic.

Additionally, Marshall plans won't help the ME at all. I'm going to leave it there. You can look up the reasons why it won't work.

My chime on why MP doesn't work in ME is simply because no one really asked US to come. The never-ending ethnic conflicts cannot be resolved by Marshall Plan. MP worked in WW2 because the entire Europe was buried in ashes, everyone hated the Nazi, everyone was in the same boat, everyone's life was at stake, so the only thing people wanted right post-war was to rebuild life, and nothing more (but of course soon countries split part...)

ME today? Unless, for example, you can tell Sunni and Shi to STFU and just love each other as Islam teaches them (sorry for the Shi and Sunni folks here), then expect no change. The same goes to Israel and Palestine, China and Tibet, China and Japanese over some stupid islands (for controlling the sea and oil). Stop this BS, and move on...

I'm sorry, but I find your viewpoint laughable.

Telling them to STFU, when in the ME they have been fighting for longer than 2000 years. 2000 years! Think about that for a second.

This video succinctly tells the story: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-evIyrrjTTY

Laughable? What is laughable about stopping the BS and just get along with one another? These conflicts are so meaningless right now. Japanese killed millions during WW2, and as a Chinese descendant I condemn Japanese government for not acknowledging their war crimes. But I won't start a war with Japan over that. Time to put the past aside, and fix the problems that really do matter.

Move on.

so, trade the jobs and economic well being of mid westerners for some global peace and quiet.

That nuclear technology from Russian, also you can to see "topol-m" and mobile launcher of korea.

Is there a particular signature from a seismograph that would indicate this isn't solely a fission bomb?

No, but experts in the field tend to believe a yield this large is explained by a hydrogen bomb:

> That means it's probably "only" a few hundred kilotons depending on depth. 8/ Still a staged TN weapon. But I need to sleep. 9/

https://twitter.com/ArmsControlWonk/status/90419708681554329...

Cheers, that's very interesting.

I just found this too (from 2016), which backs up what you're saying

https://www.wired.com/2016/01/science-can-tell-if-north-kore...

It seems according to that, you could only tell from the radionuclides emitted as to what type of bomb it was.

Interestingly there was a 500kt fission bomb - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivy_King (but I assume experts must have a particular reason for thinking the DPRK detonation was a type of hydrogen bomb).

What if we just invited the Kim family over? Brought them to some state dinners, and conferences, or some such?

They're not great people, the stick doesn't seem to be working.

What's the worst that'll happen?

> the stick doesn't seem to be working.

The US has only used the carrot for decades, though, where NK is concerned.

On the contrary it has been consistently belligerent. At least since George W Bush

Sticks aren't about belligerance. Sticks are about muscle. Dopping bombs. Freezing bank accounts.

I doubt they would come. If they came we might not let them go.

I also doubt they'd come or be invited, but if they did, they would be protected by the Vienna Convention (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diplomatic_immunity http://legal.un.org/ilc/texts/instruments/english/convention...). The US could break that, but not without serious consequences for their own leaders and diplomats abroad.

Could the ICC issue an arrest warrant? Yes (https://academic.oup.com/jicj/article-abstract/7/2/315/90220...) if only the US was a participant in the ICC.

Using the 6.3 Richter scale, the energy released would be ~43 kilotons of TNT. I think that's a pretty good guess- they seem kind of skeptical of the 6.3, but there may be some additional energy that wasn't transferred into the quake, like heat loss/air pressure.

I plotted a 43.2 kiloton airburst bomb over LA using NUKEMAP[1], which is under heavy load right now (surprise surprise). tl;dr: 166k fatalities, 341k injuries, 270 m fireball and 100% fatalities within 1km. Almost all structures destroyed within 2.5 km, and 3rd degree burns within 3.2 km. Still far from a "real" nuke, but significantly more impressive than their last tests. It's about 1/10th the size of the biggest fission bomb the US made, the Mark 18. Our current missiles are ~475 kilotons per warhead, with 12 warheads per missile (several hundred times more destructive).

[1]: https://nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap/?&kt=43.2&lat=34.0453902&...

> Using the 6.3 Richter scale, the energy released would be ~43 kilotons of TNT.

That's curious. Every yield estimate I've seen so far was substantially higher than this. Could you explain how you arrive at this number?

I'm curious as well, my estimates based on data from a 5MT explosion being about 6.8 on the scale and various formulas, I'd get into the megaton range, then again, other methods do arrive at a sub-100kT range too.

Jeffrey Lewis says that its a megaton, that would make them part of the club. https://twitter.com/ArmsControlWonk/status/90419708681554329... (the guy from http://www.armscontrolwonk.com/ says so)

Interesting if India and Pakistan will decide that they now need to acquire and test thermonuclear weapons of their own. (unexpected side effects?)

Lewis' completion of that line of tweets says it's in the couple hundred kT range, but still a staged TN device.

Ten times the yield doesn't produce ten times the destruction, though. These are definitely "real" nukes, being well over twice the size of the only nukes ever used on a city.

Does anyone know how NK is able to successfully fully develop Nuclear and missile tech inspite of sanctions. I believe many countries like Iran Iraq have been trying without success for many years

For nation-states, nuclear weapons are not hard to do, they are 1940's technology after all. Once a source of uranium is available, the only obstacles are international treaties and countries that enforce them. Iran and Iraq's geopolitical situation makes it less delicate to enforce.

Same with rockets. The technology is basically 1950's and they would also have plenty of samples from the 60's and 70's. These days there are plenty of examples of amateur teams sending things to space and even private companies can build better rockets than nation-states.

Also, to add, I think a lot of the perception that North Korea is technology backwards is thanks to propaganda which is often exaggerated. Having seen a computer science team from there speak about 15 years ago, I was quite impressed by their level and sophistication (it was a presentation about the kwangmyong network) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kwangmyong_(network) so I'm sure they have many other clever people in other branches that are competent to work on anything the state requires.

Google Bill Clinton North Korea deal... there ya go.

That deal had North Korea's weapons-grade production facilities shut down for eight years, despite US foot-dragging on our side (we'd agreed to supply reactors that were not suitable for weapons production, and then the GOP Congress refused to fund that).

So, what restarted weapons-grade plutonium production there? The George W. Bush administration effectively abrogated the deal, claiming that the DPRK had a separate active nuclear weapons program, based on evidence about as sketchy as what they provided to argue that Saddam Hussein had one. (He didn't.) The Yongbyon plutonium-production reactor was back in operation within a month.

Clinton's deal was imperfect, but it worked a whole lot better than get-tough shit from his Republican successor.

Ref: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agreed_Framework

That's some serious revisionism.

Bill Clinton's administration allowed NK to obtain nuclear weapons while supplying them with food and fuel. Their approach didn't work at all and is how we wound up in this state.

For the record not blaming the administration (Republican administration have done things equally or more stupid so not a partisan taking point, it's just they can't be excused for the dramatic failure on this because someone prefers Democrats). Likely it seemed the best course of action, they expected at least some compliance, but NK did not abide by it's agreements at all.

https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/dprkchron

<edit> NK also made commitments to Putin to suspend the ICBM program in exchange for aid which they also violated. So again, Clinton is not the only one burnt by them. But saying the Clinton administration's approach was a success is not right. It was very much an unsuccess.

The DPRK's first nuclear test was in 2006 --- six years after Clinton left office, and three years after Bush's temper tantrum led to the breakdown of Clinton's deal and the unsealing of the Yongbyon reactor. If you think it's revisionist to say Clinton couldn't have done much about North Korea years after leaving office, you have an odd way of defining that term.

Because they had been cheating on Uranium enrichment in the late 90's while receiving food and fuel aid.

There is plenty of blame to go around, the Bush administration certainly handled, well just about everything it came across, very badly, but saying the Clinton approach worked is just wrong. It didn't work, NK was cheating on the deal while being fed and fueled. Certainly we shouldn't go back to paying them extortion and bribes, that is not a good idea at all.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2017/08/...

I thought China's wording in their statement had interesting wording: "If the U.S. and South Korea carry out strikes and try to overthrow the North Korean regime and change the political pattern of the Korean...."

They particularly mention "regime change" and use the "and" word, not "or" word. Given there is a language and cultural difference, I may be reading into this too much, but nevertheless I thought it was intersting.

I'm empathetic to China's position... having a war that close the homeland is bad for business. They have some difficult decisions ahead of them. [If someone was threatening Canada or Mexico, we'd probably intervene for purely geo-political reasons, for example]

What I don't understand is Russia's alliance, I'm hoping someone can explain. NK seems a lot less of geo-political importance for Russia than it is for China.

Russia's position is "Nk is sonovabitch, but it trolls US, let's support it"

I'd be more inclined to think of it as an "enemy of my enemy is my friend" kind of a relationship. The USSR has historically supported North Korea as well, so the expectation and past relationships at various levels are still going to be there regardless of what the Russian government looks like these days.

Morbid question: If you want to guarantee 11 9s of durability in a world where nuclear war doesn't have negligible probability, do you need to start building data centers inside of nuclear bunkers? Would that even help with EMP attacks?

https://xkcd.com/705/

Put it at the bottom of the ocean in shallow water, on top of a fiber optic line. You get free cooling as a bonus! Not sure about backup power, though.

https://news.microsoft.com/features/microsoft-research-proje...

South Africa, we’re quite far away from global conflict zones and have a very low chance of natural disasters like earthquakes, hurricanes or volcanoes too.

Don't forget the great food and nice weather.

There is at least one such data center: https://www.thebunker.net/ Is it useful? Not so much. Your data might be safe but after a nuclear war you'd have a hard time accessing it unless you were also in the bunker with it.

Make that at least two. This one is in Iowa: http://www.infobunker.com/overview.shtml

There's one under Stockholm in Sweden too - might not survive a direct hit, but would probably survive anything that the network connection survives...

https://www.bahnhof.net/page/datacenter-pionen

You want a badass underground Faraday cage to survive an atmospheric EMP and if you're a target of a direct nuclear bunker buster, there isn't much you can do obviously. I have a hard time imagining what good would a working commercial data center would do in case of a nuclear war, though :)

I think North Korea is getting lots of help: their rockets are from Ukraine (or perhaps Taiwan) and now a hydrogen bomb? If it truly is an H-bomb, then did some other nation gave it to them?

In any case, NK is moving in the wrong direction. If we don't stop them, Japan will.

Yeah, as long as they have nukes, even a single working one, no one will touch them.

Kim Jong Un is no fool. His iron grip on power comes from his ability to steer the nation towards a situation where there is adequate amount of fear about the chaos of interfering with it.

>Kim Jong Un is no fool.

Eh, do you actually think Kim Jong has any power in North Korea ? I see him as a pure figurehead, with all power in the hands of top military brass.

Dosen't seem like it. He seems to be in total control. It's not far fetched to think so. In any case, on what basis do you say that he is only a figurehead?

That his supposed power is entirely based upon the North Korean military, I see him as nothing but a puppet.

Well, his family's cult of personality ensures that the military will tow the line.

It's not unheard of in history for one person to have absolute control over a large military force. Hitler comes to mind.

Read about the Korean War and how his grandfather managed to get China and Russia to help. This situation also reminds me of the Cuban Missile Crisis under Kennedy - perhaps the only short term viable option if you want a real embargo.

We'll just have to learn to live with it. American exceptionalism is a farce.

What American exceptionalism? There are seven countries besides the US and NK with nuclear weapons, including China itself.

> The North has previously claimed to have miniaturised a nuclear weapon

"The North" What is this game of thrones?

Kim is becoming less sure of his grandpa's defence treaty with China.

Yet, NK is a Chinese proxy state. All what it did to harm SK and Japan goes on in total synchronicity with political climate in Beijing

This guy seems to have his cards flat out on the table, open to all, that he wants nuclear war and he will start it as soon as his weapon systems can deliver it.

Hard to see how to avoid such an outcome when that's all he wants and all he's planned and planning for.

And when it comes of course then the U.S. will be blamed and it will be on for all.

And NK has spent many many years preparing for conventional war with SK so all the artillery and weapon systems are going to be dug underground and hidden. U.S. style bombing won't have much of on outcome and we've seen from Iraq, Afghanistan and Vietnam that boots on the ground wars don't go anywhere good.

Great. Just great. As if the world wasn't already sufficiently fucked from global warming.

Always assume the worst reason someone is doing something. It might work in Game of Thrones. It is unlikely to be the best way to do world politics.

Other reasons:

+ Kim Jong-un needs to stay in power and look strong to his people.

+ Kim needs negotiation material to lift sanctions.

+ Kim feels threatened by Trump and plays defense as best as he can: playing the nuclear display card.

+ Kim is controlled/manipulated by (foreign) actors we don't know.

Etcetera.

This has been escalating for decades.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2017/08/...

I imagine that in the 21st century it’ll be easier for many more to build nuclear weapons.

He doesn't want nuclear war, he wants to go legitimate like Mao and the Chinese did. He wants NK to be treated like a legitimate world power, even if it's at the butt of a gun.

It would be true if it was his father. The Nuke program was always a bluff to get more economic aid. For Un? We don't know...we do know he has attempted to purge those critical of him in his own inner circle.

Unfortunately, I don't think our leader is that sane either.

It seems pretty straight forward to me - Un needs nuclear weapons to ensure NK remains an independent state that can defend itself.

> we do know he has attempted to purge those critical of him in his own inner circle.

Similarly, when your hold on power isn't through any kind of legitimacy except a fading family legacy you need to be strong and eliminate the competition.

He's not insane, he's just playing a very brutal game with higher stakes than you or I will know in our lifetimes.

Whether Un's motives are rational is bikeshedding.. for now, the world has to answer to his bluffs.

It's incredibly amusing to watch the commentariat re-discover Realism.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Realism_(international_relatio...

Mao was never legitimate. Even today's communist Chinese regime recognize the cultural revolution was a bloodbath (ie. 30 to 50 millions DEATH).

Generally speaking NK will never be treated legitimately if they keep behaving like the worst left-wing dictator the world has known in the last centuries. Kim's assassination of his brother in Kuala Lumpur or the regular purges are abject. You can criticize Trump [ed. without being deported to concentration camps!], but Kim is worse by a thousand order of magnitude.

Constantine killed his own wife and son, yet he's been venerated for over 2000 years, and was even canonized.

> Mao was never legitimate. Even today's communist Chinese regime recognize the cultural revolution was a bloodbath

Have you been to Tien An Men? Mao's portrait is still there, proudly displayed at the entrance of the Forbidden City. He's still very much legitimate in China (sadly), and if you criticize him a bit too openly you'll get in trouble.

Legitimate is as legitimate does. Mao was terrible, but Nixon shook hands with him and paved the way for US recognition of the PRC under Carter. There are some nasty people in charge of nations, and it's not clear to me that not acknowledging them as the de facto leaders of their countries makes the world a safer place.

I honestly don't believe he actually wants nuclear war - but he wants to perceived as someone who has, and is willing to use, nuclear weapons. History here is simple - no country that has nuclear weapons has ever been invaded. They will sanction North Korea, call it out on international forum - but no one will actually attack a country willing to launch nukes at US/SK. If US one day decides they had enough of the posturing and attacks NK - that's 100% on them.

Why would he or anyone in NK want a nuclear war? Do they think that anyone of them will come out alive if they try to attack South Korea or Japan?

The point is that NK gov't is trying to ensure that they have a seat at the table, and so far, all evidence they have points to the fact that having nuclear weapons gives them a seat to negotiate.

There is no need for them to use nuclear power to attack SK. Conventional shelling would immediately kill over a million people in Seoul at any point. One of the reasons nobody can touch them right now. (And historically while we knew they're continuing the nuclear tests / missile research)

So it is probably for display and power at this point. Being dangerous to Japan and SK is only slightly worse than just SK.

I really don't think Kim gives a shit what happens. He is probably literally living a kilometre under ground in a palace with as much food and women and luxury as he wants.

He wants the big one - the war - and he doesn't care what happens to his people or anyone else.

Kim is the head of a brainwashed cult of "Dear Leader" and his actions are not rational.

If this is so obvious, why don't any of the people who know the DPRK well think this is what's going on? The majority of them believe the purpose is deterrence. Literally no-one outside of blogs and newspaper comment sections believes its intention is war. What information do you have that they don't?

Sorry, the missile launched over Japan is not deterrence.

Along with the many explicit statements that he intends to use his weapons.

> Sorry, the missile launched over Japan is not deterrence.

You say that as if it's a known fact. But deterrence seems like by far the most likely hypothesis to most observers. What's the alternative?

> Along with the many explicit statements that he intends to use his weapons

KCTV is a State TV station, issuing propaganda. It often claims it is on the brink of invading South Korea, destroying Seoul and raining fire upon New York, Guam, and sundry other targets. Perhaps a small proportion of the less critical part of the DPRK population, having been force-fed State propaganda since childhood, believes what it is told. No-one else does.

It's a bit more complicated than that. May I recommend Mr Lindley-French strategy blog?

Yeah, because Fallout style life would be great every one would want to live rest of his life underground

I wonder how plausible a decapitation strike would be. The Chinese apparently had a coup lined up until Kim killed his uncle. Would the US and China be able to assassinate Kim and install a pliant regime from the existing elites in exchange for economic and security guarantees? Assassination of foreign leaders is an extreme step that is rightly shunned, but it might be the best of a host of really bad options.

The problem is, after Ukraine, the elites know that all such "economic and security" guarantees are completely worthless. The only thing that counts is nukes.

You're not wrong. The failure of the West to honour its agreement with Ukraine is a serious impediment to future disarmament.

This is the only way to prevent a USA invasion, glad for NK

Given the DPRK's secrecy, there's always tealeaf-reading involved in any interpretation of its behaviour. Many DPRK-watchers do suggest that the neocon drive to regime change in general, and the 2011 Libyan intervention in particular, cemented its determination to gain a credible nuclear deterrent.

If the US had a normal President, this might be rational enough. As things stand, we're a whisker away from a war which will incinerate millions, kill the world economy stone dead for decades, and prevent all progress on the many critical issues facing our dying planet.

You say a normal president would help, but a "normal president" was behind the shit in Libya that you said cemented NK's determination. No matter what kind of president America has, our reckless foreign intervention through the past few decades is to blame.

I didn't say a normal president would 'help', nor did I defend the US's MIC. I said nuclear deterrence as a rational response on the part of the DPRK depends on the assumption of a normal functioning President. Given the incumbent, the DPRK may have made a miscalculation that will end in ashes.

> If the US had a normal President

The president is a non-issue on strategic matters, he has no knowledge on this, he knows it and the people around him know it. If you watch him, you'll see him do the typical alpha-male thing solely for his crowd, then the generals will tap him on the shoulder, whisper something in his ear, and after that he will do and say what he's told. Happened for Syria, happened for Iraq, happened for Afghanistan, and it will be the same for NK.

> he has no knowledge on this

True

> he knows it

I've seen no evidence of this yet

> it will be the same for NK

We'd better hope so, but the clear first rule of thinking about the future is to give scant attention to anyone who expresses much confidence in their own prognostications. No-one knows what will happen, because the future is undetermined (read Tetlock amongst others: political predictions are difficult and generally of low accuracy).

Don't forget that the whole design of the US nuclear deterrent system is precisely to make their use not "strategic", but keep it rather within the tactical ambit of the POTUS (for an expert description see https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/12/01/...). So if in a fit of pique Trump decided to 'teach Kim a lesson' (this is the level of sophistication at which he thinks), "the generals" may well tap him on the shoulder, but it will be entirely a matter of his whim whether or not he heeds that tap.

Your retreat into comforting certainty is quite understandable.

Which war? The one with NK, or the one with Russia?

War with NK could break out any day or hour if we're unlucky. With Russia? Not impossible, particularly if someone badly stuffs up in Syria, but far less likely.

If you don't believe me.. go take a look a Syria, Irak, Lybia, soon Venezuela.

Sorry you are being downvoted. But what you write is the perspective of North Korea. And within some underlying assumptions it is perfectly relational.

Nrk is spending massive amounts on military but probably is losing to South Korea. Nuclear weapons offers nrk a way out of being outspent.

The west accepted Pakistan as a nuclear power; my guess is that we will accept nrk as well.

What Syria, Iraq and Libya all have in common -- dictators with brutal policies that naturally create a lot of domestic enemies. Did US try to influence those countries? definitely yes. Playing dirty? of course. But that's world politic for you.

Single out the US isn't helpful for the discussion. Do you think Russia, China, EU have all just stayed away from all of the conflicts? How about Iran, Israel, Saudi Arabia, even Turkey?

Ask South East Asia countries what they think of China; or ex-USSR states of Russia; or Sri Lanka of India.

North Korea has the support of China and holds South Korea ransom. They don't need nuclear weapon for self defense.

Common point of all of these countries: they're bloodthirsty dictature enslaving / mass-murdering their population.

Thankfully the US invasions put a stop to all the murders /s

As much as I hate the NK regime I have to agree with this. If I were on the USA's shit list I'd be trying to become nuclear capable as quickly as possible to prevent "regime change".

How about you try not to enslave your population in the last communist totalitarian dictatorship in the world ? What course of action make you think treating your population like shit is wise ? It consumed the Stalinist USSR, what do you expect will happen when you keep pissing off the whole world ?

> It consumed the Stalinist USSR, what do you expect will happen when you keep pissing off the whole world ?

At a guess, once you are a nuclear power, absolutely nothing.

Exactly nothing, if you have the capacity to nuke the capital cities of the whole world.

To be clear: I think the Government of NK is monstrously evil, and I wouldn't shed a tear if their population rose up and lynched them.

But their behaviour in seeking nuclear weapons is rational, because history has shown that non-nuclear dictatorships with valuable resources get invaded.

Does anyone remember in 1999, the Bosnian war. Where the US bombed the Chinese embassy?

Who is to say, that if HK nuked Guam. That the US launches missiles and a few of those hit China (by mistake). I mean, in this instance a first strike in key locations. Would mean that China couldn't retaliate as quick.

Thoughts?

I don't think the US would launch anything without China's tacit approval of non-retaliation.

China already stated that if the US first strike, they would retaliate. But if HK first strike, then they would be neutral.

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