because of the bat shit crazy dictator of N. Korea, and a mutual defense treaty.

How many troops have they stationed here?

The "mutual defense" treaty is a half-century old relic of a foreign policy designed to contain Communism, (lest workers get ideas).

This guy is a buffoon not a bat shit crazy dictator.

so, yes, they are ready to come to our defense.

N. Korea constantly goads S. Korea with attacks in S. Korea.

And you're wrong, he is bat shit crazy.

If they were doing anything, they were defending the puppet government(s) (do you remember how many there were?) of South Vietnam.

and the NV and VC feared them.
The S. Koreans would, again, come to our defense if it ever came down to it.

I have no respect for North Korea, but we should never have killed as many innocent Vietnamese as we did, not to mention our own guys forced to go there.

saying that what we did in Vietnam was wrong after the discussion has turned to our participation in Vietnam does not mean someone is in favor of pulling out troops in South Korea.

Let's not forget the true suffering of the N. Korean people.

Are you saying he is powerless and benign?

I don't like propaganda. I prefer accuracy.

I don't like half-century military postings based on 60 year old foreign policy and recently minted propaganda.

And I don't want to be in Afghanistan a half century from now, long after I'm dead.

Last edited Sat Oct 17, 2015, 09:27 AM - Edit history (1)

That government policies haven't let to mass starvation? That N. Korea is not a repressive police state?

Owning an radio? A cell phone?

On Sat Oct 17, 2015, 10:59 AM an alert was sent on the following post:

John Birch? eom.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=7264872

REASON FOR ALERT

This post is disruptive, hurtful, rude, insensitive, over-the-top, or otherwise inappropriate.

ALERTER'S COMMENTS

Accusing another DU er of being a racist is not okay.

You served on a randomly-selected Jury of DU members which reviewed this post. The review was completed at Sat Oct 17, 2015, 11:15 AM, and the Jury voted 0-7 to LEAVE IT.

Juror #1 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: No explanation given
Juror #2 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: No explanation given
Juror #3 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: No explanation given
Juror #4 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: No explanation given
Juror #5 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: No explanation given
Juror #6 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: No explanation given
Juror #7 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: No explanation given

Thank you very much for participating in our Jury system, and we hope you will be able to participate again in the future.

And probably a higher percentage of its population in prison. It commits assassinations and extra judicial executions, and in the process, kills far more women and children, than intended targets. It is, without doubt, responsible for far more death and destruction, than N. Korea.

Lots of people around here, have 2x4s in their eyes.

We are free to discuss them, and to organize to end them.

On the percentage population, you are seriously misinformed and you can look at the concentration camps on google earth with your own two eyeballs.

This country has had, and as any human society will ever have, problems and injustices. There is no "final triumph" over that.

Our political system is certainly inefficient slow and imperfect. But, in the long run, it is self correcting as demonstrated by the challenges we have overcome and the ones yet to overcome.

If you cannot see the distinction in that, then I can't help you.

With its declaration of endless war, invasions, assassinations, torture network and murder of civilians in numerous countries, it is clearly the most violent entity on Earth. No one else could ever dream of bragging rights to such a body count; not the N. Korean government; not any terrorist outfit.

That's all I'm saying. I understand that saying it, is at odds with the established narrative about the US role and its conduct in the world, but sometimes I think reality needs to be reiterated around here, especially on threads like this one. Sorry about that.

without risk of being sent to a gulag or killed. You could not criticize the NK government and system like that out loud and get away with it.

We have the First Amendment and it does work. We can say what we want, no jail. Not the case is NK.

I've always found that rationalization for the US double standard, rather bizarre.

the facts of history and the reality of US foreign policy, simply do not favor the view that the United States bears no responsibility for the geopolitical status quo of the Korean peninsula.

How would you get that out of my post? You have that right. But the very posts you are making here could get you into trouble in NK. There's no double standard. You can't be jailed for shot for questioning anyone in the government, all the way up to Obama. That's just silly to say we are no better than NK in that regard.

N. Korea's incarceration rate is estimated to be very similar to the US rate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarceration_rate#United_States

But you're right. It is much more pleasant living in the US than it would be, living in N. Korea. Just imagine what it would have been like living there as our bombs carpeted the entire country.

"We went over there and fought the war and eventually burned down every town in North Korea anyway, someway or another, and some in South Korea too.… Over a period of three years or so, we killed off — what — twenty percent of the population of Korea as direct casualties of war, or from starvation and exposure?" -- Curtis Lemay

But at least the communists didn't get it.

Next time you are in Seoul, know where the nearest subway station is, and make a mental note of where the gas mask locker is. Could come in handy.

I'm not used to that, coming from you.

Character flaw? WTF?

I prefer my own country to any other. I was born and raised here, and my family's history goes back centuries, even millennia. Why would I fault someone else for preferring their own? I'm all about the sovereign right of a people to determine their own cultural and political destiny.

I'm judging my government's policies and conduct, and the apathy and hypocrisy of the American public, that's all. I wish it didn't offend patriots, but it does. Sorry about that.

Sometimes I'm overly fond of commas, or I'm not really sure about where to place a semi-colon, but I see a number mistakes in your posts. The one I am currently replying to, for example, is not quite flawless.

Unfortunately, your superior skills in that area do not guarantee the ability to think rationally about all issues.

where anything you said could land you in jail or shot. Or starving because the government does not have enough food and doesn't care and still feeds the elite. Not being able to leave the country and not being allowed on the internet unless the government says.

It would be most unpleasant, I'm sure. I would not want to live there AT ALL. We definitely agree on that.

Too bad for the Korean people that the Bush Administration reneged on the Clinton agreements and provoked N. Korean belligerence by characterizing them as a member of the "axis of evil'.

It's almost as if we don't want peace on the Korean Peninsula. It would surely remove the 'need' for a US military presence there.

North Korea invaded South Korea in 1950. What you fail to mention is that North Korea destroyed Seoul and most of South Korea. So maybe the communists did get it after all.

Last edited Sun Oct 18, 2015, 01:27 AM - Edit history (1)

I'm not seeing the logic in that.

Why would I mention that N. Korea destroyed Seoul, specifically? That wouldn't be surprising in the midst of a civil war. Anyone who wants to know the facts, can find them with ease. Did you know, that the S. Korean government, with help of the US, murdered tens of thousands of S. Korean civilians, out of fear that they would join the communist movement?

There were all kinds of atrocities going on, the worst of which, were committed by the US government, and all of it provoked by the US division of Korea, which was being planned as far back as 1943 during the Cairo conference.

The current president's father was a vile dictator who ruled South Korea for about 20 years before he got shot in the back of the head by one of his advisers.

Regardless, they were two separate countries before North Korea attacked and leveled Seoul starting the Korean War. My point was that it was North Korea that started the war, yet you blame the United States. We were asked by South Korea and NATO to intervene.

We didn't murder millions, we saved millions from being under control of Kim for the last 75 years. Had we not done so the southern half of Korea would look just like the northern half. Very dark, very hungry, and very cold.

My father-in-law fought on the side of South Korea despite being from North Korea. So don't dare lecture me on the history of a nation you have never had anything to do with except to argue with someone on the internet.

because you have a deep emotional investment in it?

Can you really see no problem here?

There is no way to rationally dispute the fact that the US bombed Korea to rubble. Cities, dams and food crops were targeted in violation of international law, and millions died as result. This is the very definition of mass murder. The motive for it, was geopolitical in nature and purely self-serving to the US, thus lacking any kind of moral legitimacy. The problem you have, is in the way it is characterized. You don't like the use of the word 'murder'. This is a prime example of the concept of cognitive dissonance.

Korea was used as a bargaining chip in negotiations and agreements with the USSR. When S. Korea, in violation of these agreements, declared independence in 1950 -- most likely at the urging of the US -- N. Korea Attacked. The history of it is very well established.

To say that S. Korea "asked" for intervention, is to proceed from a premise that is not accurate. No Koreans were involved in the division of their country, and the vast majority of them were utterly opposed to it. The S. Korean government was a US imposed dictatorship, plain and simple.

The US, through its actions in the past and its current wrong-headed policies, bears most of the responsibility for the geopolitical status quo in that region. Accept it.

First, the Republic of Korea was established on August 15, 1948. August 15 IS independence day here. Second, North Korea established their own government on September 9, 1948. These clearly were TWO separate countries. What you are spewing is some kind of historical revisionism (here are the citations for both of these facts (1) (2)).

Third, North Korea attacked South Korea on June 25, 1950. Forth, China and the Soviet Union backed North Korea. In fact it was Stalin who gave his blessing to Kim to attack (3) (4).

Fifth, as previously mentioned North Korea murdered millions of Koreans when they attacked South Korea. Carpet bombing? What the fuck do you think North Korea did to Seoul? They fucking leveled the goddamn city. Does that not also count as carpet bombing? In fact, North Korea destroyed almost ALL of South Korea except for a small area called the Pusan Perimeter. So please tell me who committed mass murder in starting the war?

Sorry on the first five you've been pawn'd.

Sixth, as I said in my previous post (which you either didn't read, or can't read), I know the history of Korea and the circumstances under which the country was founded. Seventh, I also know the circumstances under which the initial division was made prior to the end of the war in order to administer the country post-war. Eighth, yes most Koreans were opposed to the division. However, most Koreans couldn't decide whether they wanted a communist government (dictatorship) or too work toward a democracy. All three of these points once again show that I know Korean history.

No, democracy did not happen over night. It took decades. Not only was Rhee a dictator, but as I pointed out in my previous post the current president's father was a dictator for two decades.

You are quick to criticize history, to try to revise it as though we would have been better off leaving the Koreans in the hands of the Kim family. Your revisionist history leaves out a few things: 1) South Korea would not be the 13th biggest economy in the world; 2) the country would not have a per capita GDP 30th in the world with an average wage of $35,000 compared to $1,800 in North Korea.

So go ahead and continue to change the facts to suit your version of history instead of reality.

is that you, like most Americans, believe the US has a moral imperative to violently intervene wherever it chooses, even to the detriment of millions of people there. I already knew that. That's the part I have a problem with, not Wikipedia's basic facts about the Korean war.

You're the only source for the claim that N. Korea killed millions of S. Koreans, however. That volume of casualties would have required a sustained and intensive aerial bombardment, which N. Korea simply was not capable of.

I'm done here.

Revisionist history is a pretend game. Your head is so far in lalaland that you need to be deprogrammed after being fed the North Korean propaganda.

We just have a lot more people free to commit crimes that actually are crimes. NK will jail people for things we can do here, like criticize the government.

He was planning it for a year. Catch 22. The most mentally ill will never realize they are mentally ill.

Here in the USA, we tend to demand better for ourselves. Most of our government's injustices are committed against others, like N. Korea. We have a history of supporting despotism when it suites our geopolitical goals, so it isn't as if we're standing on some kind of universal principle. We support democracy for others, only if it advances our own interests.

It's humorous, sometimes, listening to Americans as they claim to be the light of freedom in the world.

is the hill to fight this on. We are on the right side there.

Why should our political goals include freeing others from despotism? Isn't that on them?

geared toward promoting democratic values internationally, just not through coercion and violence, which is really doing exactly the opposite.

I don't understand the first part of your comment. I would like to see Korea reunified, to reduce the risk of conflict in the region. I certainly wouldn't defend N Korea's system.

"estimated".

The USA's incarceration rate is out there for all to see with data to back it up.

The North Korean incarceration rate is, frankly, a guess based upon anecdotal evidence so it could be significantly different (and I am willing to bet it is).

Woohoo!

I don't blame you in the least. I would rather live here than N Korea, too (or anywhere, for that matter).

Not many that I'd prefer NK over, though.

Now you can call me crazy.

They have generous social welfare benefits. We want generous social welfare benefits. So why doesn't Canada, Scandinavia, etc. let everyone who wants to move there move there?

Greedy bastards.

You've been here one year.

I've been here eleven.

Looks like you are the much later incarnation.

China has claimed coral reefs in the middle of the ocean and and building them up to put military bases on them. There are two reasons for that. 1) natural resources under the ocean and 2) right of passage. Putting aside the natural resources argument for a second, the issue of right of passage is an important one. If China does choose to block any access to that area will interrupt trade including the movement of natural resources from other areas stopping trade and choking the economies of Japan, South Korea, and other countries. Whether it happens or not is yet to be seen, but it is possible they could do this.

So, yes, South Korea stands ready to come to our defense, just as we do to theirs.

What a small, Ameri-centric view of the world you have.

You of all people should know the Americo-centric purpose of these "mutual;" defense treaties.

South Korea does in fact stand ready to come to our defense, and has proven it.

If you consider that a "small" thing, I would suggest you reconsider it. Even Iran gave us air defense in the early days of Afghanistan (W., idiot asshole that he is, squandered that goodwill quickly; a real President would have nurtured it).

What an odd thing to say.

It's not odd if you consider them allies in aggression.

While I was an Air Force officer during the last four years of the Vietnam war, I am more than happy to admit it was a huge mistake. Much of the American public was taken in by the so called "Domino Theory" which later was proved to totally wrong. But a policy of isolation is recipe for disaster.

The leader of North Korea is both a buffoon and a bat shit crazy dictator. His entire family tree is full of egomaniacs who believed their own monstrous lies, and he is no different. Because he has put all of his country's resources into his military while his people starve, he is also extremely dangerous.

South Korea is one of our best allies. They have a model democracy and, by necessity, they also have a large, very highly trained military that is admired around the world. No one want see the ROK army on the other side of a battlefield. They have proven time and time again they are more than willing to help defend us.

On the other hand you are only free to live you life in peace while bitching about the military because that military is there to protects your freedoms, if necessary with their lives. Don't blame the the young men who fought and died in past wars because of the mistakes of the politicians. And those politician didn't exist in a vacuum - if the public had not supported them they would have never gotten into or stayed in office. Also keep in mind that many of the young men who served in Vietnam were draftees or joined because they were going to be drafted. They are not at fault, the American public and the politicians they elected were at fault. If you were politically active at the time, you too were at fault because you didn't do enough to stop the war.

And one more thing to remember, pacifist and isolationist only exist because others are willing give their lives to protect them.

As is leaving thousands of troops in Afghanistan for decades.

There is nothing isolationist about it.

If he, and his dynasty, are as dangerous as you unblinkingly believe, they can have, and should have, been removed decades ago.

I will concede South Korea is a model democracy.

1) The Seoul Metro Area is close enough that North Korea could still partially level the area with almost 25 million people and cripple the economy.

2) China is still an ally and the reaction to us going in and removing him would suck us into a conflict with them.

On the flip side, the removal of the 28,500 troops and all US military equipment would essentially be a surrender and could lead to the possible second invasion of South Korea by the North.

I find it interesting how you mock South Korean's parliament and government after conceding the point that South Korea is in fact a democracy.

It seems as though you like to rehash this same topic about every 6 months or so without fail. I have no problem talking about it, if it discussed in the context of reality.

I haven't discussed this before.

After propaganda is removed, there is reality.

So what is the other option?

NGOs have been sending flyers and stuff via balloons to make North Koreans aware of the lies their own government is telling them. The black market smuggles in TV and movies. Most North Koreans know what is going on, but are too afraid to act. The only choice has been to try to get out. That is getting harder and harder to do.

The best way would be for North Korea to fall on its own, but the chances of that happening are slim and even if it does happen we will have no warning. It will cause absolute chaos. South Korea, China, and the US will have to agree what to do in the event that were to happen.

If you think otherwise, you are kidding yourself.

I would think that any small bit of research would have made that more than obvious.....

Whatever it is looks gross.

The worker looks terrified. He should be. When crazy dictators laugh like that usually someone is about to lose an appendage.

It doesn't change with repetition.

That's why the worker looks terrified and Kim Jong Crazy looks so happy.

But thanks anyway.

Luckily they don't have anyone they can invade atm.

My post implied otherwise.

30-40 years ago the North has stronger military than the south. The Soviet Union for the most part was pumping them up. But when the Soviets fell, politicians in Moscow didn't see much use for North Korea anymore so the food and military shipments stopped (although they were declining in the 80s anyway). That resulted in a massive famine in the early 1990s in the North that is believed to have killed perhaps millions but forming an accurate number is very difficult. At the same time, the South experienced a massive economic boom and has maintained steady growth through today.

The North does have nuclear weapon capability. How advanced that capability is isn't fully understood. Their military is also extremely large but poorly equipped. Most of the little money and resources they have goes to the military. It's a philosophy started by Kim Il-Sung called Songun. They are currently the most militarized country in the world.

The reason they represent a threat is the government is literally run by maniacs and it's an out of control dictatorship. You can't ever be sure what they are going to do. Kim Jung Un is also very young and some defectors have said he had had trouble maintaining control of the inner circle which is why he's had some odd executions. If he does ever feel as if his power is threatened, he may do something stupid.

Officially, we are still at war with this country. We never signed an agreement with them to end the Korean war.

but with their artillery they could level Seoul. They also are able to put a nuclear warhead on a missile that can possibly reach the US. If that is true, then it certainly would be capable of reaching South Korea.

It is a deterrent. North Korea's military is something like three times the size of South Korea's.

Now granted (and I say this with great amount of humor), if the North Korean troops came to Seoul and saw all the gentleman's clubs, I think they'd pretty much surrender and partake.

That changes a lot of things.

The dour military "minders" following him everywhere run the show.








http://kimjongunlookingatthings.tumblr.com/

The root cause is the US's constant inability - starting pretty much from the day the armistice was signed with them - to adhere to agreements we make with them.

The very first agreement that the US decided it didn't have to honor was the portion of the armstice that said we weren't to introduce new weapons to the area - And we decided that our forces currently in S. Korea needed atomic weapons.

We had a good chance back in 94 to start making things right with them, but with Congress changing over to Republicans soon after the agreement was signed, well... As KEDO's first director said "The Agreed Framework was a political orphan within two weeks after its signature"

but there are no nuclear warheads in South Korea. If a nuclear warhead were to be used in a war with North Korea it would either have to be sent on a missile or dropped from a B-2 bomber.

There are no nuclear rounds in Korea for these artillery pieces, but tactical nuke warheads could be flown in. That has been the case since the sixties and the first development of artillery fired nukes.

I'm just going to copy a couple posts I made about this a while back.

http://journal-neo.org/2013/06/10/the-korean-war-and-the-peace-treaty-issue/

For a quick look, here - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_Armistice_Agreement#United_States_abrogation_of_paragraph_13.28d.29

For a more longer look, this - http://www.japanfocus.org/-Lee-Jae_Bong/3053/article.html

The Pentagon claimed that North Korea had introduced by early 1956 some 450 fighter planes into North Korea, of which over 250 were jet aircraft, and that it was a matter of urgency to replace obsolete weapons and equipment used by the U.S.F.K. and South Korean forces. They proposed two ways to introduce new weapons, including nuclear and other materiel into South Korea. One was the temporary suspension of the armistice agreement, and the other was the reinterpretation of paragraph 13(d) of the agreement. The UNC also iterated the need to replace obsolete weapons in South Korea through a more 'flexible' interpretation of the relevant clause.

...Although the Pentagon acknowledged that evidence to back up raw intelligence reports on the physical existence of nuclear weapons or its delivery systems in North Korea did not exist, it contended that new weapons and equipment had been introduced after the ceasefire and that it might not be long before delivery systems for nuclear weapons entered the communist nation.

Nevertheless, at a June 1956 meeting of the Military Armistice Commission at Panmunjom, the U.S.F.K. and UNC issued a statement detailing 'alleged' North Korean violations of paragraph 13(d) of the armistice agreement and indicating that the UNC would no longer consider itself bound by that paragraph until such time as the relative military balance has been restored and North Korea has demonstrated its willingness to comply with the terms of the armistice. On the heels of the expulsion of the NNSC inspection teams in June 1956, the U.S. had abrogated the very clause that prevented it from deploying nuclear weapons in South Korea.

The NNSC was the group meant to monitor both sides to ensure no new weapons were introduced. The UNC alledged that NK had new weapons and pretty much forced out their monitor teams, telling them to go and look into N. Korea harder because they are hiding new toys somewhere. Well, guess what we did right after that?

Yep. Christmas time, new toys!

The NNSC later pulled out of NK since they were not allowed back in to monitor SK, realizing that the only reason they weren't let back in was because one side was playing dirty - Since one side had no intention of staying to the agreements, they felt no need to hold the other side to them pretty much.

As for the 'They had new weapons in in early 1956..." comment, well...

The U.S. Department of Defense began weighing the option of deploying atomic weapons in South Korea around January 1956 at the latest. In a joint meeting of State and Defense Department officials on January 6, 1956, Maxwell Taylor, the U.S. Army Chief of Staff, said that new tanks and new types of artillery would be introduced into Korea if it were not for paragraph 13(d) of the armistice agreement, and in particular, mentioned the possibility of introducing Honest John missiles that could be mounted with atomic cannons and nuclear weapons. Also, the Commander-in-Chief of the UNC (CINCUNC) Lyman Lemnitzer sent a telegram dated January 30, 1956 to the Department of the Army in which he suggested that it was highly desirable for the U.S.F.K. to possess weapons with atomic delivery capability in order to alleviate the imbalance of strength between the opposing forces in Korea.

We were trying to get new weapons in at the same time, or even before.

Combine this with the unproven allegations made against NK, that we used to justify ignoring the armstice, well... If it talks like a duck and walks like a duck...

The US was worried about them getting new hardware, replacement's were a secondary concern - Though, under the agreement replacements would have been allowed.

The only craft that entered operation around that timeframe was the Mig-17 - In 1952, though they were in such limited numbers that they never played a part.

The second aircraft entering operation around then was the Shenyang J-5, a Chinese knockoff of the Mig-17, and it entered service in July 1956, which was after the date the US said that NK supposedly recieved 'new jets'.

It's entirely possible that the 'new jets' (And speaking of the allegations lacking specifics, notice how they never gave a model number?) N. Korea recieved were Mig-15's, the US's reasoning for putting new weapons into SK was to ensure that the current hardware they had wouldn't be rendered obsolete. So given the timing, the Mig-15 is the most likely jet for N. Korea to have received if they actually received hardware in violation of the armistice. But here's the funniest thing about that - Even if N. Korea violated the armstice and recieved a new shipment of Mig-15's, it wouldn't have done ANYTHING to render our current hardware in S. Korea as obsolete - We had F-86's in SK at that time, and they played apart in the Korean war fighting against the Mig-15s and they kicked the absolute shit out of them. Seriously, kill ratio pushed at the time? 792 Mig-15 kills to 78 F-86 losses. Many people have since revised the kill numbers, but at this time period we were running with 792 to 78, which was a drastic count to our favor.

So, even if NK did violate the agreement, our entire reasoning behind introducing nuclear weapons was completely bogus.

Still though, if that agreement was violated and we had proof of it we would have shown it. But we never had anything to show, just allegations that they recieved new weapons.

...Come to think of it, didn't we make some other allegations - unproven and later shown to be false - relating to weapons in a more recent war?

Can you at least conceive of the possibility that there are bad things in the world that aren't the US's fault?

But this isn't one of them.

That worker looks nearly starved though.

But not my circus. Not my monkeys.

. . . . according to Fox News.

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2015/05/13/n-korea-executes-defense-chief-for-falling-asleep-during-meeting-s-korea-spy/

Didn't Breitbart say he was executed by a thermonuclear device for eating a slice of bread, while sitting?

When Pyongyang gets it, I bet he's going to use this to add timed mass executions as the next Olympic Sport.

I predict gold to North Korea, silver to China, and bronze to the IS.

one of them has not be killing and maiming innocent women and children by the hundreds in war and in peace, or incinerating hospitals in example, all in both domestic and foreign lands.

Glass houses.

ROK forces are badass. They can't hold their own?