North Korean Missile Test

[Bengalzona]

(12-01-2017, 06:11 AM)hollodero Wrote: You guys can always come to Austria. No one hates us because no one knows us, so it's pretty safe. We watch US TV all the time, have our own politicians with sexual allegations, and recently even anti-abortion activists have reemerged, so you could feel quite at home. You'd have to watch soccer though, lots of really bad soccer.

As for Korea, I feel it is a mistake to treat the Iran deal the way it's treated. That somehow looks to me like slamming the door for every possibility to negotiate with North Korea. The outlook of reaching an agreement with the US that possibly isn't respected afterwards anyhow is not quite intriguing.

Well, I suppose that Crocodile Hunter guy is pretty cool there.  


Good point about the Iran deal.

[Bengalzona]

(12-01-2017, 02:56 AM)HarleyDog Wrote: Regardless of where anyone lives in the U.S., everyone will be affected. Think about transportation, communication, military, agriculture, etc. By this I mean much more than just your car, cell phone, canned goods and gun cabinet. A nuclear weapon detonated on U.S. soil would make all disasters in the U.S. previous very minimal in comparison. Although I dont fear such an attack for personal reasons, I do fear KJU is insane and will do whatever he want's because in his mind, he is mighty. Then you must worry about their allies. Forget the BS you hear on the news about China letting us tear them up if they strike us first. I mean, do you really trust that at all?

Once we negotiate our own fears and minimize, then we must alert them once again with the fear of our ecosystem and the devastation fallout from the sky will involve on our environment. Their will be blowback that will take many years to overcome. More than I have left of course, along with most, if not all of you.

This is a country which went ape-s**t when three buildings were destroyed during 9/11. Just wait until a whole city disappears in an instant.

[*jason*]

(12-01-2017, 06:11 AM)hollodero Wrote: You guys can always come to Austria. No one hates us because no one knows us, so it's pretty safe. We watch US TV all the time, have our own politicians with sexual allegations, and recently even anti-abortion activists have reemerged, so you could feel quite at home. You'd have to watch soccer though, lots of really bad soccer.

As for Korea, I feel it is a mistake to treat the Iran deal the way it's treated. That somehow looks to me like slamming the door for every possibility to negotiate with North Korea. The outlook of reaching an agreement with the US that possibly isn't respected afterwards anyhow is not quite intriguing.

You had me for a minute, then you mentioned bad soccer. How bad though? Not making the World Cup like us bad? Or just bad for Europe soccer?

[hollodero]

(12-01-2017, 09:55 AM)jason Wrote: You had me for a minute, then you mentioned bad soccer. How bad though? Not making the World Cup like us bad? Or just bad for Europe soccer?

First, our national league is bad. Consists of many true 5000-souls village clubs and many incredibly painful games to watch. It's torturing the football and it's tragic overall, especially if someone gets hurt, because it just ain't worth it.

As for world cups: We do not make world cups. Not our style. 
Here's how that usually goes. We are hopeful in the beginning of qualifiers when everyone has still zero points and not just us and Azerbaijan. Some time and losses later we always end up having to root for several other teams so our theoretical chance stays alive. Which is strange when you have to shout go Denmark or something, but the later the day, the worse it gets. So now it's if Andorra beats Germany by 6  goals... but oh we only drew against Liechtenstein, so there goes that.

Fictional examples, true pattern. North Korea of all countries qualified more recently than we did. Our last win in a world cup tournament dates back 26 years now, against you guys actually. Guess that still hurts.

So there's that, bad soccer. We are still quite decent in ski jumping though. Which is a sport.

[*TheLeonardLeap*]

(12-01-2017, 09:46 AM)Bengalzona Wrote: Well, I suppose that Crocodile Hunter guy is pretty cool there.  


Good point about the Iran deal.

Austria =/= Australia  

(12-01-2017, 11:47 AM)hollodero Wrote: First, our national league is bad. Consists of many true 5000-souls village clubs and many incredibly painful games to watch. It's torturing the football and it's tragic overall, especially if someone gets hurt, because it just ain't worth it.

As for world cups: We do not make world cups. Not our style. 
Here's how that usually goes. We are hopeful in the beginning of qualifiers when everyone has still zero points and not just us and Azerbaijan. Some time and losses later we always end up having to root for several other teams so our theoretical chance stays alive. Which is strange when you have to shout go Denmark or something, but the later the day, the worse it gets. So now it's if Andorra beats Germany by 6  goals... but oh we only drew against Liechtenstein, so there goes that.

Fictional examples, true pattern. North Korea of all countries qualified more recently than we did. Our last win in a world cup tournament dates back 26 years now, against you guys actually. Guess that still hurts.

So there's that, bad soccer. We are still quite decent in ski jumping though. Which is a sport.

AKA, when Mike Brown took over The Bengals. So your country last won a world cup game roughly the same time the Bengals last won a playoff game.

[*jason*]

(12-01-2017, 11:47 AM)hollodero Wrote: First, our national league is bad. Consists of many true 5000-souls village clubs and many incredibly painful games to watch. It's torturing the football and it's tragic overall, especially if someone gets hurt, because it just ain't worth it.

As for world cups: We do not make world cups. Not our style. 
Here's how that usually goes. We are hopeful in the beginning of qualifiers when everyone has still zero points and not just us and Azerbaijan. Some time and losses later we always end up having to root for several other teams so our theoretical chance stays alive. Which is strange when you have to shout go Denmark or something, but the later the day, the worse it gets. So now it's if Andorra beats Germany by 6  goals... but oh we only drew against Liechtenstein, so there goes that.

Fictional examples, true pattern. North Korea of all countries qualified more recently than we did. Our last win in a world cup tournament dates back 26 years now, against you guys actually. Guess that still hurts.

So there's that, bad soccer. We are still quite decent in ski jumping though. Which is a sport.

I learned many things from this post. One if them was surely unintentional. If a gun were put to my head, I would have guessed Azerbaijan was in Asia. I googled it to clarify. I then read that technically Europe and Asia are not separate continents. So now when we generically refer to people from the far East as "Asians", I will also be thinking of you, and your fellow Austrians... I guess all of the Swedes and Norwegians too.

[hollodero]

(12-01-2017, 12:04 PM)TheLeonardLeap Wrote: Austria =/= Australia  

They do know that. They just want to make fun of me. WEll joke's on them, I take being mistaken for an Australian as a compliment. Or being mistaken for anyone, actually. Maybe except Alabama.

(12-01-2017, 12:04 PM)TheLeonardLeap Wrote: AKA, when Mike Brown took over The Bengals. So your country last won a world cup game roughly the same time the Bengals last won a playoff game.

And yet people wonder why I was drawn to the Bengals. It just felt like home is all.

[Sociopathicsteelerfan]

An unstable regime such as N. Korea having a nuclear ICMB is bad enough, but if things stand as they are then Iran will have one in the near future, guaranteed. If you have no problem with N. Korea and Iran having nuclear weapons then I have to question your sanity.

[hollodero]

(12-01-2017, 12:19 PM)jason Wrote: I learned many things from this post. One if them was surely unintentional. If a gun were put to my head, I would have guessed Azerbaijan was in Asia. I googled it to clarify. I then read that technically Europe and Asia are not separate continents. So now when we generically refer to people from the far East as "Asians", I will also be thinking of you, and your fellow Austrians... I guess all of the Swedes and Norwegians too.

Right on, we're basically family. As it says. Cauc"asian".

And Azerbaijan is geographically Asia, they just prefer to play with us, just like Kasachstan and then some stan. There's more money in playing Italy then playing Iraq.

Israel does also, for understandable reasons.


I think I'm doing a decent job so far distracting you from these Korean missiles.

[CKwi88]

(12-01-2017, 12:34 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: An unstable regime such as N. Korea having a nuclear ICMB is bad enough, but if things stand as they are then Iran will have one in the near future, guaranteed.  If you have no problem with N. Korea and Iran having nuclear weapons then I have to question your sanity.

Should any sane person have no problem with anyone having nuclear weapons? 

Until all nuclear powers decide to denuclearize, talk of making certain countries disarm themselves is a waste of time. 

[*jason*]

(12-01-2017, 12:34 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: An unstable regime such as N. Korea having a nuclear ICMB is bad enough, but if things stand as they are then Iran will have one in the near future, guaranteed. If you have no problem with N. Korea and Iran having nuclear weapons then I have to question your sanity.

I remember being a little rattled when India and Pakistan took turns showing off their new toys years ago. The thought of Iran and North Korea having them is beyond disturbing.

[Bengalzona]

(12-01-2017, 12:34 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: An unstable regime such as N. Korea having a nuclear ICMB is bad enough, but if things stand as they are then Iran will have one in the near future, guaranteed.  If you have no problem with N. Korea and Iran having nuclear weapons then I have to question your sanity.

True

Iran already has a missile program which was not covered in our nuke agreement with them. They have continued development. We were making headway in getting an agreement with them on the missiles, but that has now been washed aside. And the current no-nuke deal with Iran (which might be the most productive thing the Obama admin did in 8 years) is in danger of being discarded. Without the deal, they could have nukes within 5 years I'd wager.

If Trump can re-write an agreement with Iran that keeps the no-nuke agreement and adds the missiles, then I will have more respect for him. If he can work deals to get both countries to be no-nuke, I may even give his admin a passing grade despite whatever else may occur (not that they care about my grades). That is what I hope for.

I mention Trump because he is "Johnny-on-the-Spot" right now. There is no doubt that the Bush and Obama Admins can be implicated in letting the NK situation get to where it is (we were actually making some good progress with NK under Clinton, believe it or not). That said, the "blame game" no longer matters in this situation. It is a "where we go from here" situation right now. This is where real leaders show their worth, or weak leaders fail.

[Bengalzona]

(12-01-2017, 12:47 PM)CKwi88 Wrote: Should any sane person have no problem with anyone having nuclear weapons? 

Until all nuclear powers decide to denuclearize, talk of making certain countries disarm themselves is a waste of time. 

There have been no nuclear weapons used in warfare since 1945. This is do to the restraint shown by the existing members of the "nuclear club". New members may not feel the need to have such constraint as the other countries have already demonstrated.

If you want a world with no nukes, it seems to me to be a two step approach. First step - persuade or dissuade other countries from obtaining nukes. Second step - persuade country "nuclear club" countries to abandon their weapons.

We are still on Step 1.

[Bengalzona]

(12-01-2017, 12:04 PM)TheLeonardLeap Wrote: Austria =/= Australia  

I have been teasing hollodero about that for years. He is a good sport.

[Sociopathicsteelerfan]

(12-01-2017, 03:36 PM)Bengalzona Wrote: True

Iran already has a missile program which was not covered in our nuke agreement with them. They have continued development. We were making headway in getting an agreement with them on the missiles, but that has now been washed aside. And the current no-nuke deal with Iran (which might be the most productive thing the Obama admin did in 8 years) is in danger of being discarded. Without the deal, they could have nukes within 5 years I'd wager.

If Trump can re-write an agreement with Iran that keeps the no-nuke agreement and adds the missiles, then I will have more respect for him. If he can work deals to get both countries to be no-nuke, I may even give his admin a passing grade despite whatever else may occur (not that they care about my grades). That is what I hope for.

I mention Trump because he is "Johnny-on-the-Spot" right now. There is no doubt that the Bush and Obama Admins can be implicated in letting the NK situation get to where it is (we were actually making some good progress with NK under Clinton, believe it or not). That said, the "blame game" no longer matters in this situation. It is a "where we go from here" situation right now. This is where real leaders show their worth, or weak leaders fail.

While I applauded, and still do, the Iran deal at the time I don't think it's likely it will/would prevent them from securing nuclear weapons.  Once you have them the cat is out of the bag.  All the Iran deal really did was ensure a deepening of Iran's pariah nation status if they completely reneged on the nuclear deal, especially after years of saying they weren't trying to develop nuclear weapons and that they didn't want them.  Once they have them it's a classic case of "come and get them".  How we deal with North Korea will determine whether Iran ends up with nuclear weapons. 

I was firmly against the second Iraq war, from the beginning.  I also don't like the idea of preemptive war, but the stakes in this case are too high to let North Korea continue to exist as a nuclear power.  Pay a lot now or pay a hell of a lot more later.  Kicking the can down the road is no longer an option.

[Dill]

(12-01-2017, 02:18 AM)Bengalzona Wrote: Both are neighbors amd both have relations with NK. I wouldn't put it past Putin. I loves to stick thorns in our side every chance he gets. I say the smart money would be on Russia. As close as China is to NK, I'm pretty sure they aren't real pleased with them having these types of weapons.

China DEFINITELY does not want a nuclearized NK on its borders. Same for Russia I think. China has a mutual defense pact with NK, which obligates them to defend NK in the event the US initiates an attack--but not if NK starts it.  That accounts for some of brinksmanship we see from that side.

There is an interesting article in Foreign Policy which suggests that China should station 30,000 troops in NK. That would deter US and SK "aggression" for sure.

On the face of it, this seems like a great and workable solution. I just question whether the overly paranoid NK leaders would go for it. Seems a violation of "Juche," plus lil Kim is so close to a real weapon now, there may be no workable incentive to back off.

http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/11/28/china-should-send-30000-troops-into-north-korea-symmetrical-reassurance/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Flash%20points%2011/28&utm_term=Flashpoints

 On present evidence, it remains doubtful that even the sharpest diplomatic and economic measures will dissuade Kim from his nuclear and missile ambitions.

Perhaps it is time to explore a different initiative: Could China reassure North Korea as the United States reassures South Korea? As Beijing has grown anxious over North Korea’s behavior, it has qualified its 1961 defense agreement with Pyongyang by emphasizing that it would assist against attack — but it would not support the Kim regime if it began a war. That is a constructive stance, but it may well be read by Pyongyang as a wobble that justifies the longstanding policy of self-reliance. The young Korean dictator may have little knowledge of China’s tremendous sacrifices in the war of 1950 to 1953 — almost 3 million soldiers engaged, more than 380,000 were wounded, and 180,000 were killed. Their casualties far exceeded the killed and wounded suffered by the United States; they approach the estimated losses by the North Koreans themselves.

Unwelcome as China’s intervention was to America and other nations defending South Korea, those numbers lend credibility to Beijing’s security guarantee. That guarantee would be most credible, however, if coupled with actual deployment of Chinese forces on North Korean territory.

 A symmetrical policy of reassurance could involve possibly 30,000 Chinese military personnel stationed there, a total comparable to U.S. forces south of the 38th parallel.

[ballsofsteel]

Just take that Trillion dollars the Repubs were going to give the rich in this new tax cut bill and pay off that NK Porkchop. Problem solved.

[Dill]

(12-01-2017, 03:36 PM)Bengalzona Wrote: True

Iran already has a missile program which was not covered in our nuke agreement with them. They have continued development. We were making headway in getting an agreement with them on the missiles, but that has now been washed aside. And the current no-nuke deal with Iran (which might be the most productive thing the Obama admin did in 8 years) is in danger of being discarded. Without the deal, they could have nukes within 5 years I'd wager.

If Trump can re-write an agreement with Iran that keeps the no-nuke agreement and adds the missiles, then I will have more respect for him. If he can work deals to get both countries to be no-nuke, I may even give his admin a passing grade despite whatever else may occur (not that they care about my grades). That is what I hope for.

I mention Trump because he is "Johnny-on-the-Spot" right now. There is no doubt that the Bush and Obama Admins can be implicated in letting the NK situation get to where it is (we were actually making some good progress with NK under Clinton, believe it or not). That said, the "blame game" no longer matters in this situation. It is a "where we go from here" situation right now. This is where real leaders show their worth, or weak leaders fail.

Two quick points:

1. Most of the responsibility for muffing Korean diplomacy falls on Clinton, then Bush. Clinton had what amounted to an Iran deal with them and then tried to play them, hoping the death of Kim Il Sung would lead to regime change and the US would not have to uphold its end of the deal.

2. No chance that anyone can re-write the current Iran deal, least of all Trump. That deal was three years in the making, and kudos to Obama and crew for wending their way through numerous efforts to sabotage the deal by Republicans, Netanyahu, Saudis, and hard line Iranians.

The one ray of hope here is that if Trump manages to back the US out of the deal, the other signatories will nevertheless continue to hold to it without US leadership. 

[Bengalzona]

(12-01-2017, 04:09 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: How we deal with North Korea will determine whether Iran ends up with nuclear weapons. 

I was firmly against the second Iraq war, from the beginning.  I also don't like the idea of preemptive war, but the stakes in this case are too high to let North Korea continue to exist as a nuclear power.  Pay a lot now or pay a hell of a lot more later.  Kicking the can down the road is no longer an option.

Agreed and agreed.