[Nuke]

yea the 38th paralell is about the same as the berlin wall in my book. an old line drawn because of an old war. all koreans, regaurdless of north or south want a unified korea but neither side wants to convert there government over to the others. there is a good chance the tensions could end peacfully. though north korea's stroking of their nuclear phallus isnt helping much but they will get over that phase eventally. they will one day see unification as the way to go. i really dont care if they have nukes or not. they deserve to have them as much as we do. nuclear wars in the future will probibly be smal scaled battles between small countries. messing with the big dogs is suicide.

[Taristin]

How's NK's economy as compared to SK's?

I mean, NK makes nukes.... but SK makes technology and automobiles. Ne?

[Jetmech Jr.]

IIRC, SK's Economy was Far, far superior to NK.

[Nuke]

another paralell to the berlin wall

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by Jetmech Jr.
IIRC, SK's Economy was Far, far superior to NK.

That's my understanding of it; North Korea is basically a basketcase economy.... there's a potential for complete collapse, but I'm not sure if there's the communications freedom for an organised 'peoples revolution'.

[Getter Robo G]

Kim is just so misunderstood...


   "I'm so wonrey!  - Kim Il, Team America World Police

nuff said

    oh yeah, "god damn you Alec Baldwin!" - Kim Il

[Swamp_Thing]

You guys are under-estimating the possibility of a revolution coming from within. Maybe because, to your good fortune, you haven´t lived under a dictatorship. Take my country for instance:
We were under a harsh dictatorship for decades. The govt´s secret police would arrest anyone who even mentioned the word democracy. We had no newspapers, no TV, no media, except the official one. The country was runned by an iron fist. Pretty much like North Korea is now. The majority of our people was dirt poor, starving. Yet look at us! We had our revolution, and it came from within. After the war in Africa, even the military had enough. They formed a secret movement,  and one day made their move. It was a practically bloodless revolution, only a handfull of people got killed, at the hands of the diehard secret police.
The point is, it can be done! After decades of opression, no matter how indoctrinated the people are, there comes a time when they just can´t take it anymore.
The reason why you didn´t see a popular uprisal in Iraq is because they had been left hanging before. No one knew wether the US would go all the way or not. And plus, there was a large portion of the population who did not wanted to see the regime gone. Not to mention that the US isn´t exactlly loved in the region, and they weren´t starving to death.
But in NK it´s a diferent story. There is even canibalism going on there, from the starvation. It´s hell on earth. Not even the few middle class and party officials have it easy. They know darn well that all it takes for them to be killed along with their families is a slip of the tongue. They know they fall from favour all too easy.
Hence, if an oportunity presented itself, like a new war with the west, chances are the generals and other high up people would take the chance and start a coup.

PS: I wasn´t comparing the Balcans with North Korea. All i was saying is that an air campaign can effectivelly bring even the most well armed army. The serbians had the best air-defence in Europe, yet it was all destroyed within weeks. So was Iraq´s defenses.

[aldo_14]

Well, firstly - where are your from?  (War in Africa... I'm guessing Portugal?)  Is it a valid analogy - were you denied telephone access, electricity, i.e. any form of cross-country communications?  Could you go abroad and see other countries (travel abroad is banned in NK, so they only can see what the government tells them - for example, they're taught BMWs are made in Korea, the engine was invented there, etc)?  Was there a cult of personality developed by the leadership?  

Now, I'm not saying a revolution is impossible - far from it - but you cannot make any assumptions about if, where and when it may occur.  I'm not sure whether or not revolution is inevitable with totalitarian / undemocratic / dictatorship government, but it definately IMO is unpredicatable.

So, I reckon, any attack reliant upon sparking some form of popular revolution is far too risky and unproven to be a serious military option; especially when such an attack is valuable propaganda material to a regime that has used the 'evil America' to try and garner patriotic support for itself.

In terms of the Generals launching a coup.... I think it's more likely they'd slip away into the night than do that; there's also no guarentee such a coup would lead to democracy.

Incidentally, AFAIK there's a debate over how effective NATO was in elminating the Serbian air defenses.  Firstly, their air capability (in terms of interceptors) was certainly not europes best; they had something like 9 squadrons of antiquated Mig-21s and maybe 10-17 Mig-29s (some of which were lost to Croatia in the yugoslav civil war).  Secondly, the post Soviet era had led to a lack of experienced officers and crew; there was a lack of financing, fuel and spare parts.

In terms of ground-based air-defense, their main/primary missiles were all old Soviet tech (again depleted due to the civil war) - SA-2s (1958-ish), SA-3s (1961), and SA-6s (1970).  Many Serb missiles were simply hidden during the initial stages of the air campaign, and were later optically fired in volleys later on.  The Serbs had just about enough AAAf to protect Belgrade, hence the NATO campaign was designed to try and spread them out and make them even more ineffective.

(there's incidentally a side arguement that the Serbs changed tact and used their air-defense as a type of guerilla unit, regularly shifting into areas for opportunist shots.  Also one that the primary effect of Serb air defense was - due to a long range - to force NATO craft to fly high-altitude bombing missions due to the pathological fear of losing an aircraft)

i.e. it wasn't anywhere near the best air-defense in europe; I'd imagine most european NATO countries had/have far better.  And even at that, there were significant concerns about the interoperation of the NATO airforces afterwards (poor communications, equipment, slow deployment).  Also, the air war actually required 700 aircraft - the original plan was 150.

All of which is beside the point, because it wasn't the air war that removed Milosevic from power; if anything, it gave him some added support, at least in the short term.  In terms of air-power versus armies, both Vietnam and Afghanistan have shown the extreme difficulty of using air-force against an enemy who is willing to fight using irregular measures and tactics, and who has the advantage of local movement and knowledge.

EDIT; or look at the insurgencies in Iraq / Afghanistan, or the difficulties the Columbians have with jungle based FARC guerillas.

[Swamp_Thing]

Originally posted by aldo_14
Is it a valid analogy - were you denied telephone access, electricity, i.e. any form of cross-country communications?  Could you go abroad and see other countries (travel abroad is banned in NK, so they only can see what the government tells them - for example, they're taught BMWs are made in Korea, the engine was invented there, etc)?  Was there a cult of personality developed by the leadership?  
 

We had phones, just as NK does. The thing is, only the middle class has them. And to that respect, the majority of our people did not have phone. Suffice to say that Portugal was 30 years behind from any other european nation, in terms of development. Mainly because the govt prefered to deal with an iliterate population. Our levels of literacy were the lowest in Europe.
Could we go abroad? I think we could, after all we migrated all over.
Was there a cult of personality? Definitelly! Salazar is one of the most infamous dictators of the 20th century, he was our version of Mussolini or Franco.
Could we speak out? Negative. Any word of "dissent" would get you thrown in jail, or you would simply vanish.
Could we freely assemble? No, we could not. All political parties, especcially the Comunist Party were illegal. All political leaders were arrested, or exiled.
In every aspect, we were just like any other regime out there. Yes Korea is even worst. But think about it, if we that had it bad managed to uprise and turn our country around, imagine how the N Koreans feel, when they have it even worst than we did!

PS:
The serbs power was in ground based air defense, not in airplanes. They had the highest concentration of AAA and ground-to-air SAM sites in Europe. But they avoided to turn them on because they were afraid of NATO´s anti-radiation missiles. NATO flew countless Wild Weasel missions, trying to get them to turn on their radars. Because they knew NATO would only commit air power, they prefered to hide the AAA and wait it out, since they knew there wasn´t going to be a ground invasion.
I´ll see if i can look up a couple of articles about that.

[Ghostavo]

Swamp_Thing, the problem with that analogy is that in Portugal, the war in Africa was creating unrest inside the military due to conscription that made those who were forced to serve to get higher ranks than those who served as a career option (mostly captains) that made a military coup possible.

NK is not at war with anyone, they have a stable military (from what we know).

[Flipside]

Also, much of North Korea believes that everywhere else in the world is poorer than them and are jealous countries inhabited by barbarians and animal-people.

With a bit of intelligence, this could be turned and used against him more effectively than any number of missiles and tanks.

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by Swamp_Thing


We had phones, just as NK does. The thing is, only the middle class has them. And to that respect, the majority of our people did not have phone. Suffice to say that Portugal was 30 years behind from any other european nation, in terms of development. Mainly because the govt prefered to deal with an iliterate population. Our levels of literacy were the lowest in Europe.
Could we go abroad? I think we could, after all we migrated all over.
Was there a cult of personality? Definitelly! Salazar is one of the most infamous dictators of the 20th century, he was our version of Mussolini or Franco.
Could we speak out? Negative. Any word of "dissent" would get you thrown in jail, or you would simply vanish.
Could we freely assemble? No, we could not. All political parties, especcially the Comunist Party were illegal. All political leaders were arrested, or exiled.
In every aspect, we were just like any other regime out there. Yes Korea is even worst. But think about it, if we that had it bad managed to uprise and turn our country around, imagine how the N Koreans feel, when they have it even worst than we did!

NK has a very small number of phones; about 2.10 per 100 (in 2002; the trend was declining from 2.5 in about 1998 or so).  The majority are almost certainly tapped (as the now banned government owned mobile phone network would have been), and can be cut off by the state at any time.  also consider that the infrastructure means that those phones are more concentrated in certain areas than, for example, in the farming / rural areas.

North Koreans are not allowed to leave the country; the government seeks to block any foreign contact.  This, combined with the complete lack of free internet or phone communications, makes it very hard for NK citizens to become aware of just how ****ty the conditions they live under are.  As far as they know, the rest of the world is worse, and is being ruled by a tyrannical United States.

The situation in NK and Portugal are IMO vastly different; the Portugese revolution/coup-d'etat took place after the death of Salazar, and after the new ruler failed to perform expected democratic reforms; insofar as I know, the N.Korean people never expected the same of Kim jong-Il; they don't even know what democracy is.  Also, insofar as I know, Salazar never had a personality cult of the Stalinist style seen in NK (neither did Franco, Mussolini or Hitler AFAIK, although the latter definately tried to achieve it by stamping our potential religious opposition); i.e. where the population are encouraged to revere the leader (literally) religiously, to the extent of stamping out other religions.

What I think you forget, is that the North Korean regime is probably the most repressive in the world.  Spain, Portugal, Argentina, Brazil, etc were relatively modern societies, they had contact with the rest of the world and knew what democracy was.  North Korea doesn't even have that contact; they don't know what democracy is, all they know is that dissenters who object to the glorious leader are taken away in the night.

It's a country where communications & geography mean the vast majority of the population probably aren't aware of the famines, the vast brownouts; where a single flashpoint doesn't have the far-reaching impact it does in more 'modern' countries (and that includes those in the 60s, 70s, 80s, etc... IIRC N.Korea is not far about the 50s, and even fuedal in the rural areas).

IMO, it's not likely there will be a revolution in anything like the short order you predict, after some form of surgical strike.  It's possible the groundwork is being slowly laid by the policy of (attempted) reconciliation by the South, and those Chinese who travel into the country, but I don't think its anywhere near on the edge of bubbling over.  I'm not even sure if there has even been a country equivalent to NK; Soviet Russia in the 60s maybe, although the sheer size of that country possibly prevented the state being quite so pervasive.

In terms of a military coup d'etat - what would the leaders have to gain?  Most of them probably get there by being local sycophants anyways.... I doubt they'd do better with a democracy than as loyal (and appropriately priveleged) servants of the regime.

Originally posted by Swamp_Thing

PS:
The serbs power was in ground based air defense, not in airplanes. They had the highest concentration of AAA and ground-to-air SAM sites in Europe. But they avoided to turn them on because they were afraid of NATO´s anti-radiation missiles. NATO flew countless Wild Weasel missions, trying to get them to turn on their radars. Because they knew NATO would only commit air power, they prefered to hide the AAA and wait it out, since they knew there wasn´t going to be a ground invasion.
I´ll see if i can look up a couple of articles about that.

Firstly, concentration means nothing if the vast majority of your SAMs are ****e.  The SA-2, for example, was used by the NVA in the Vietnam war - before the end of that war, it was so ineffective B-52s were striking Hanoi with impunity.  Offhand, about a quarter or so of the Serbian SAMS were SA-2s (about 60 IIRC).

Not to mention the aforementioned chronic shortage of parts, finances to upgrade, and experienced officers/crew to operate (which AFAIK applied as much to SAMs as conventional air defence).

Secondly, you've gone from the NATO airstrike devastating the Serbian air defence, to the Serbians willingly hiding that air defence.  It's scarcely a fair way to evaluate the NATO airstrike effectiveness.

AFAIK the Serbian air defence was never classed as 'europes best', but rather as an outdated yet capable force which seemingly failed to fire during the NATO air campaign.

[Mongoose]

The question remains, what's to be done?  This is something that not only this region, not only the US, but the entire free world has to decide on.  We can't sit back and let this little arrogant bastard continue what he's doing.  We should not, and simply cannot, accept the situation of a country where millions of people are unaware of basic facts about the current state of the world.  I don't care if the answer is military, economical, or political; someone has to come up with a plan and follow it.  The nation of every person on this forum claims to value freedom; we need to back these claims up.  There's no easy answer, but we can't continue to sit on our hands and do nothing.

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by Mongoose
The question remains, what's to be done?  This is something that not only this region, not only the US, but the entire free world has to decide on.  We can't sit back and let this little arrogant bastard continue what he's doing.  We should not, and simply cannot, accept the situation of a country where millions of people are unaware of basic facts about the current state of the world.  I don't care if the answer is military, economical, or political; someone has to come up with a plan and follow it.  The nation of every person on this forum claims to value freedom; we need to back these claims up.  There's no easy answer, but we can't continue to sit on our hands and do nothing.

The problem is that you need an answer that won't do more damage to the people than the regime... military is out IMO because you can't guarentee it won't rally support for the regime, and odds are it'd see thousands or even millions killed in a worst-case scenario war.  And that's assuming China doesn't assist its neighbour and ally (or even take the diversive opportunity to start its own war, perhaps on Taiwan).

Similarly for economic; it's the people who end up starving, not the leaders (and arguably a starved people are too hungry and concerned with surviving than organising dissidence).  Again, this hardship can be used to forment hatred of the outside world, that will support the existing leadership.

Politically...potentially it's a solution, but it's a long road.  You can't just force democracy on a people as oppressed as the North Koreans - they have no concept of it, for one thing.  They may not even be ready to accept it.  What I think is most likely to succeed is containment and gradually thawing relationships; once new ideas are able to begin to filter into North Korea, it'll begin to provide a counterpoint to the propaganda.... it's even starting now, via China of all places, and probably / possibly via South Korea.    It'd still take decades, but I think that's inevitable; I don't think there's been another modern dictatorship as isolated from the outside world as North Korea.

Aside from that, the only other hope is for a relatively sane leader to take over and initiate some glasnost-equivalent style scenario.  But that's probably highly unlikely and unpredictable, meaning you can't really just arrange for the right man to take over at the right time.

[Swamp_Thing]

Obviously Bush does not intend to do anything about NK. With the army stressed out, if they were to make another military move it would be to Iran. By a number of reasons.
Smaller military, huge oil resources, proximity to Iraq and its air bases, etc etc. NK could have been beaten if they had striked it first. As it is, we will have to wait until either they rise themselfs, or Kim dies.

I once saw a footage of NK, taken by some reporter with a hidden camera, posing as a humanitarian worker. The city was composed almost entirelly of soviet block style apartment buildings. There were big clean avenues and large streets crisscrossing the city, that were used only by an ocasional comunist party vehicle going by. No other cars in sight.
There wasn´t a living soul around. All streets were empty of people, there were no stores, nothing.
All the colour you could see was from Kim Yong Il and Kim Il Sung posters and banners. The rest was composed of a greyish white paint. All the windows were closed, there wasn´t even people´s cloths hanging out the windown to dry.
It was a ghost city. I shiver just thinking about it...

[Flaser]

That could have been the "presentation town" that visitors are allowed to see - it's close to the SK border.

I'm quite dubious wheter that allaged riported ever made it into the country.

[aldo_14]

Oh, the NKs allow some westerners into the country; it's just that said westerners are subject to constant surveillance and being followed by a minder.  IIRC there was a BBC or Channel 4 documentary about 'holidaying' in the worlds worst countries (I forget the exact title of it), where the reporter was posing as the tourist; in the NK one, he was basically led around a series of showpiece places designed to impress upon him the glory of Nk yadayadayada.

Even then, the food he got served in the (deserted) supposed top-notch resteraunt was noticeably worse than you'd expect to have for an everyday dinner at home......