North Korea News

[Zlaxer]

Why don't we just end all this sanction nonsense and flood NK with luxury goods.

Seems like the only surefire way to topple Communist regimes... works damn near every time. Sanctions work damn near never.

:Face Palm:


Man - I'm really shocked at how many people here just don't fucking get it.


You flood goods into DPRK, the party will hoard them and sell on black market to foreigners.

[Smitty-48]

Luxury goos in of themselves is not really a lever for most people living in a place like North Korea, outside of Pyongyang, it's a subsitence peasant society, so Western luxury goods are not actually a status symbol, they'd just trade them for food if they could.

[ssu]

Well, it's not like Trump has much to lose here. I mean the MSM has already painted him as a irrational actor so if he doesn't blow up DRPK they lose and if DRPK were to launch LRM near Guam they will get what's coming.

Why is the media so fucking important?

If nothing happens I guess they'll be in a week going through the next bizarre mess Trump gets into. Next month we likely have forgotten Korea, until the next "crisis".

And Trump does have a lot to lose if he really panics here and makes a military move against North Korea. But I don't think that will happen.

Yeah, again, Americans have this idea that somehow the Chinese are going to leverage NK by economic means, but it's a mistaken assumption, the North Koreans have demonstrated that they can endure everything up to and including mass famines, so sanctions don't actually leverage them, they just dig their heels in, thus, the Chinese would have to employ a total embargo, but they wouldn't do that, because that would just destabilize the situation ever more, which is exactly what they don't want.

Get it through your heads, Yanquis, the Chinese are not afraid of you, the Chinese don't give a shit what North Korea does as long as they keep that shit in Korea, and so they ain't gonna do shit for you, other than continue to shine you on about it.

It would be hard to get that through, Smitty. I still don't understand why people think the Chinese ought to do or want to do much here about North Korea. Or be afraid of North Korea.

North Korea is like your eccentric introvert neighbour that whines all the time that somebody has walked on his land and vows to shoot every goddam trespasser with his shotgun. You just stay clear of the guy. Not like he's going to come up to you kill you in your house. And what you really don't need to do is to go and shoot the guy, just because he has the shotgun. Just in case.

[kybkh]

But Able Archer was in response to the Soviets encroaching on sub patrols in the Atlantic I thought.

[DBTrek]

Yeah, again, Americans have this idea that somehow the Chinese are going to leverage NK by economic means, but it's a mistaken assumption, the North Koreans have demonstrated that they can endure everything up to and including mass famines, so sanctions don't actually leverage them, they just dig their heels in, thus, the Chinese would have to employ a total embargo, but they wouldn't do that, because that would just destabilize the situation ever more, which is exactly what they don't want.

I see why you never became a General.

"The Chinese are the economic lifeline of NK and the military power responsible for the very existence of the country, but only dumb Americans think China can influence NK, durrrr-hurrr-hurrr"

Top-notch analysis there, noob.

[kybkh]

The Memo pointed out the importance of the Media and the roll it plays in creating a narrative that turns into a meme.

[Hanarchy Montanarchy]

Meh.

Continue the brinkmanship then. It is going swimmingly.

Black markets for goods outside the DPRK's purview are already all over the place. They are where the seeds of resistance to the party are planted. Threatening people with annihilation, on the other hand, sends them into the protective cover of the only thing they know, strengthening and encouraging the regime.

[Smitty-48]

It would be hard to get that through, Smitty.

Oh, it's impossible actually, once the Americans latch on to one of these myths, they cling to it tenaciously and never let go no matter what you say.

[DBTrek]

Meh.

Continue the brinkmanship then. It is going swimmingly.

Black markets for goods outside the DPRK's purview are already all over the place. They are where the seeds of resistance to the party are planted. Threatening people with annihilation, on the other hand, sends them into the protective cover of the only thing they know, strengthening and encouraging the regime.

Indeed.
Fifty years of kowtowing, dealing, bribing, and relying on the awesome power of "black markets" to topple the regime has worked splendidly.
Which is why we're where we are today with NK.

Regular world class think tank up in this place.

[Smitty-48]

Yeah, again, Americans have this idea that somehow the Chinese are going to leverage NK by economic means, but it's a mistaken assumption, the North Koreans have demonstrated that they can endure everything up to and including mass famines, so sanctions don't actually leverage them, they just dig their heels in, thus, the Chinese would have to employ a total embargo, but they wouldn't do that, because that would just destabilize the situation ever more, which is exactly what they don't want.

I see why you never became a General.

"The Chinese are the economic lifeline of NK and the military power responsible for the very existence of the country, but only dumb Americans think China can influence NK, durrrr-hurrr-hurrr"

Top-notch analysis there, noob.

It's not that they don't have economic leverage, it's that they don't have any ability to tailor it to make the North Koreans do anything; with regards to North Korea's nuclear and missile programs, North Korea will go to the matresses over their nuclear and missile programs, so there's no way for China to leverage them over those things, by any means, to include even Chinese force of arms.

North Korea's nuclear and missile programs are not up for negotiation, under any circumstances, to include war, including even war against the Chinese, and the Chinese are not going to war against them, for America, Japan, and South Korea, so the NK's ain't worried, make no mistake.

There's some countries which can be leveraged economically over military issues, North Korea is simply not one of those countries, they will go to the matresses, they will go to war, so you're barking up the wrong tree, America.