how does North Korea 'end'?

[el-ahrairah]

provided the chinese could be incentivised to ignore the whole thing and the american public can be persuaded another war is good for business the americans will go in. however, they can probably get the chinese to abandon NK economically, they are unlikely to be able to get the chinese to agree to having an american puppet state so close.

in fact, i reckon the americans don't give a flying fuck about NK. they're harmless enough and don't have anything anyone wants. i think it's more likely that sooner or later the chinese will get a bit sick of their sabre-rattling cousins and annexe the entire place.

 

[Teepee]

far enough away not to bother me, no plans to ever go there . Although id quite like to visit DPRK .

Anyone who visits the DPRK as a tourist is tacitly approving of and funding mass imprisonment, torture, labour camps, oppression and human misery on a scale matched only by the holocaust.

(go to 18.22 to skip the introduction)

Start there, then read a few defectors' accounts, and see if your ethics are still low enough to visit that fucking hellhole.

 

[Casually Red]

if youd said that about the united states I might concede youve a point but im quite sure youd have no difficulty going there despite their infitely greater death toll,their mass imprisonment , their torture etc etc nor would you presume to lecture anyone who would . Which entitles me to tell you to fuck off when you presume to start questioning my ethics .Or indeed anyone elses .

 

[Teepee]

if youd said that about the united states I might concede youve a point but im quite sure youd have no difficulty going there despite their infitely greater death toll,their mass imprisonment , their torture etc etc nor would you presume to lecture anyone who would . Which entitles me to tell you to fuck off when you presume to start questioning my ethics .Or indeed anyone elses .

In NK, three generations of a family - mother, kids, grandkids, are imprisoned if one family member speaks out against the government. Life imprisonment with arbitrary torture. You are clueless if you think it's in any way comparable to the USA (which I'm no fan of either by the way - I refuse to travel there).

Let's see if these defectors' testimonies sounds like something that happens in the USA:

In Kim Yong’s section of Camp 14, guards
executed some twenty-five prisoners. In one
execution, a prisoner by the name of Kim
Chul-min was executed for collecting, without
authorization, ripe chestnuts that had fallen to the
ground from a tree at the mine entrance. Another
hunger-crazed prisoner, Kal Li-yong, died after
having his mouth smashed by a feces-covered
stick for having stolen a leather whip, which he
soaked in water and then ate the softened leather.

Both areas within Yodok where Kang, Lee,
An, and Kim were imprisoned—Knup-ri and
Daesuk-ri—had public executions by hanging,
shootings, and sometimes worse for prisoners
who had tried to escape or who had been caught
“stealing” food. Lee witnessed one public killing
of an attempted escapee, a Mr. Hahn Seungchul,
who was tied and dragged behind a car in
front of the assembled prisoners until dead, after
which time the other prisoners were required to
pass by and place their hands on his bloodied
corpse. Another prisoner, a Mr. Ahn Sung-un,
shouted out against this atrocity, and he was
immediately shot to death. Kim witnessed a
public execution by firing squad, after which the
assembled prisoners were required to pass by
and throw a stone at the corpse still slumped and
hanging from the post to which the victim had
been tied. Several women prisoners fainted as
they were pressed to further mutilate the corpse.
Kang witnessed some fifteen executions during
his ten years at Knup-ri.

Source: http://www.hrnk.org/uploads/pdfs/HRNK_HiddenGulag2_Web_5-18.pdf (beware, far more harrowing evidence within)

This stuff is literally all over the web, from multiple sources, although that's one of the better ones. You can view the prison camps on Google earth! You owe it to yourself to read this stuff, unless you want to be wilfully ignorant. When you do understand what's happening over there, you'll see why I have every right to question someone's ethics if they send so much as one penny to the NK government.

 

[yield]

Anyone who visits the DPRK as a tourist is tacitly approving of and funding mass imprisonment, torture, labour camps, oppression and human misery on a scale matched only by the holocaust.

Start there, then read a few defectors' accounts, and see if your ethics are still low enough to visit that fucking hellhole.

If you compare the USA and North Korea, America doesn't come out smelling of roses. Have you seen The House I Live In?

Then when I started to think about the secret prisons the CIA runs all around the world.

And how many countries the United States has attacked since world war 2. I'm not sure which is worse anymore.

 

[Casually Red]

get back to me with the USAs death toll of innocent people over the same period and Ill tell you whether or not your a hypocrite for ever letting one penny of yours go to an American company . And Ill tell you the same thing about questioning my ethics.

 

[Teepee]

get back to me with the USAs death toll of innocent people over the same period and Ill tell you whether or not your a hypocrite for ever letting one penny of yours go to an American company . And Ill tell you the same thing about questioning my ethics.

If you compare the USA and North Korea, America doesn't come out smelling of roses. Have you seen The House I Live In?

Then when I started to think about the secret prisons the CIA runs all around the world.

And how many countries the United States has attacked since world war 2. I'm not sure which is worse anymore.

Why do people keep bringing the USA into this? Yes, they are a horrible country as well, does that diminish the gravity of the NK situation one bit? If you have two heinous criminals in court, is one made less guilty by the evil of the other, or should they both be punished?

We should be fighting torture and oppression in all of its forms, whether it carries a red flag, the stars and stripes or none at all.

 

[Casually Red]

If you compare the USA and North Korea, America doesn't come out smelling of roses. Have you seen The House I Live In?

Then when I started to think about the secret prisons the CIA runs all around the world.

And how many countries the United States has attacked since world war 2. I'm not sure which is worse anymore.

without a shred of doubt the USA has murdered and imprisoned infinitely more people right accross the globe in the same period .Its specifically recruited trained and armed death squads to kill mutilate and torture many more..honduras, guatemala, contras, pinochet ..an endless list .
By his own standards if hes ever worn a pair of levis, drank a coke or hired a DVD hes helped fund it . So he can fuck off lecturing me on my ethics.

 

[yield]

without a shred of doubt the USA has murdered and imprisoned infinitely more people right accross the globe in the same period .Its specifically recruited trained and armed death squads to kill mutilate and torture many more..honduras, guatemala, contras, pinochet ..an endless list .
By his own standards if hes ever worn a pair of levis, drank a coke or hired a DVD hes helped fund it . So he can fuck off lecturing me on my ethics.

I hope he posts on forums discouraging people to be a tourist in the USA. Wouldn't want to tacitly approve of them.

 

[Teepee]

OK chaps, continue your backslapping circlejerk without me. The only reason I posted here was in the hope that I may be able to convince someone to not fund the NK regime, and therefore maybe reduce the burden of human suffering there, even by an minute fraction. What good for others did you try to achieve today? Fucking go there if you want, and be reassured rightly or wrongly that the USA is worse - because obviously it therefore follows from this, that your actions are OK in comparison. It's not a logical fallacy at all.

 

[Casually Red]

I hope he posts on forums discouraging people to be a tourist in the USA. Wouldn't want to tacitly approve of them.

exactly the point i was trying to make, without being as presumptious as him to question his ethics or morals .

 

[likesfish]

North korea is a hellhole with no excuse.

 

[Jon-of-arc]

Whilst its hard to argue that america doesnt have a track record of some pretty nasty stuff, the stuff that strikes me about the above DPRK descriptions is the whole "banality of evil" thing. Its become normalised for its people to brutalise, torture, mutilate and murder their own fellow citizens. Not for any reason, except maybe to convey the message that "the exact same thing could happen to you, so don't fuck...". A genuine, totalitarian and authoritarian regime, run by lunatics, with no freedoms, starvation & poverty, strict party control of anything that matters. The thought is absolutely terrifying. I think there's a reasonable case to be made for boycotting that kind of society.

Why it has to be "but youre not telling me to boycott america, are you?" I don't know. As if disapproval of the Kim dynasty is tacit approval of the US. I might suggest that there would be other, more effective ways to influence the US than a boycott which will have no noticeable impact, and is virtually impossible anyway. Encouraging a boycott towards NK might genuinely hit its tiny (but probably relatively lucrative, considering how poor the country is...) tourist trade.

 

[Casually Red]

in fact, i reckon the americans don't give a flying fuck about NK. they're harmless enough and don't have anything anyone wants.

remember Grenada

 

[petee]

rule 1: always triangulate by bringing the states into the moral equation

 

[el-ahrairah]

remember Grenada

you, me, a bottle of tempranillo, the sunset over andalucia, we kissed at midnight, how could i forget?

 

[not-bono-ever]

In NK, three generations of a family - mother, kids, grandkids, are imprisoned if one family member speaks out against the government. Life imprisonment with arbitrary torture. You are clueless if you think it's in any way comparable to the USA (which I'm no fan of either by the way - I refuse to travel there).

Let's see if these defectors' testimonies sounds like something that happens in the USA:





Source: http://www.hrnk.org/uploads/pdfs/HRNK_HiddenGulag2_Web_5-18.pdf (beware, far more harrowing evidence within)

This stuff is literally all over the web, from multiple sources, although that's one of the better ones. You can view the prison camps on Google earth! You owe it to yourself to read this stuff, unless you want to be wilfully ignorant. When you do understand what's happening over there, you'll see why I have every right to question someone's ethics if they send so much as one penny to the NK government.

I did post something longer, but decided to scrub it. the HRNK you link to are quite an interesting lot, with much funding from the NED in Washington if you know of them.

No one on here is supporting the regime or its practices. Some have commented on the US, but we how much money do we spunk on Chinese made goods every day ? I would hardly hold up the Chinese as an outstanding model for openness.

Tours to the DPRK are restricted to a couple of thousand punters a year - this is hardly keeping the country afloat, especially once the tour operators take their cut.

Yes,There are some wankers who openly support the regime - google Alejandro Cao de Benos for a prime example of a NK apologist.

No one I know who has been to the DPRK has come back with any opinion other than a confirmation of what a terrible oppressive shithole it really is.

 

[Casually Red]

the national endowment for democracy are basically a desk of the CIA

 

[Gromit]

Alien invasion or maybe a superflu like in Stephen King's The Stand.

 

[Casually Red]

Cartain elements of the far-left and conservative intellectual right didn't think it was impossible, more like a certainty. Only the political and academic mainstream thought the USSR and allies was permanent.

most people from eastern europe ive spoken to never regarded it as permanent . I did . But sure i was only a youngster

 

[cyprusclean]

the Chinese are going to get increasingly embarrassed by the current regime,

I think so too. It'll be interesting to see how they "deal" with this.

 

[dylanredefined]

what it will take is to do a non-stop 48 hour bombing campaign on their military sites that will flatten it back to the stone age. since they don't have the capability to launch a nuclear strike, get them before they do. Sortie after sortie after sortie and then follow that up with an immediate invasion. avoid going right up to the boarder so as not to antagonise the Chinese.

As the North Korea has approximately 8000 rockets and artillery guns in range of Seoul. Which could kill 30 000 Koreans in the first 2 minutes of any war. No one is bombing Korea anytime soon.

 

[Stanley Edwards]

...
in fact, i reckon the americans don't give a flying fuck about NK. they're harmless enough and don't have anything anyone wants...

They have a nuclear weapon capability. The US wants that, or more precisely wants to be sure North Korea don't have the capability.

Fundamentally this is the issue. North Korea has nothing now. With nuclear weapons they will be a force to consider.

 

[Steel Icarus]

I have this really odd separation of guts and brain when it comes to this stuff. I've been trying to avoid this latest calculated escalation and of course also following it avidly; earlier the "we have ratified a nuclear strike on the US" announcement was to me simultaneously (a) obvious bluster designed to get a "reward" for behaving later through more aid etc and (b) so terrifying I couldn't eat my fucking tea for butterflies in my stomach. Maybe I'm too sensitive, although I don't think growing up in the 80s and being made to read books about nuclear warfare by my parents has helped me be rational about such things. I do know it's not nearly as dangerous a situation as when Russia and the US were genuinely unfriendly towards one another - N. Korea is hardly a bigshot in terms of destructive power compared to the US and even their neighbours to the South. But what does China do if Fat Kim goes too far and actually attacks a US base? Back him up against the US? Give Kim a bollocking and order him to cease and desist?

 

[Yu_Gi_Oh]

I have this really odd separation of guts and brain when it comes to this stuff. I've been trying to avoid this latest calculated escalation and of course also following it avidly; earlier the "we have ratified a nuclear strike on the US" announcement was to me simultaneously (a) obvious bluster designed to get a "reward" for behaving later through more aid etc and (b) so terrifying I couldn't eat my fucking tea for butterflies in my stomach. Maybe I'm too sensitive, although I don't think growing up in the 80s and being made to read books about nuclear warfare by my parents has helped me be rational about such things. I do know it's not nearly as dangerous a situation as when Russia and the US were genuinely unfriendly towards one another - N. Korea is hardly a bigshot in terms of destructive power compared to the US and even their neighbours to the South. But what does China do if Fat Kim goes too far and actually attacks a US base? Back him up against the US? Give Kim a bollocking and order him to cease and desist?

I don't think China will let it escalate too far. The last thing they want is the US hanging around any more than they already are.

I saw some reports that China is moving their troops down to the border at the moment, but I'm a bit about that as The Washington Times is referring to Shenyang as a border city, which it's just not, and saying large amounts of fighter jets have been seen flying over where I live, which I feel like I would have noticed, and they get the province our city is in wrong. So not reliable reports coming from the western press.

 

[el-ahrairah]

They have a nuclear weapon capability. The US wants that, or more precisely wants to be sure North Korea don't have the capability.

Fundamentally this is the issue. North Korea has nothing now. With nuclear weapons they will be a force to consider.

this is true. but the US won't do anything unless they actually can start building nukes. that is a very different thing - i mean, nukes are fairly easy science these days but effective delivery systems are something else. i still think the chinese will eventually annexe the place - for their own security as much as anything else. and the US may well let them do it - unless that expansion threatens american interests more than NK's own belligerence. i'm by no means an expert though so will accept this might be completely wrong and if anyone can give me some good links to change my mind i'd appreciate it.

 

[2hats]

I can't see the Chinese simply walking in and annexing the country. Very slowly subsuming it in some manner, perhaps. But that would be a very slow 'slowly'.

Not only do North Koreans have a very strong sense of identity, indeed, purity (they're not really interested in spreading Juche far and wide, they, well the elite, just want to be left alone, by and large) one needs to bear in mind that you are dealing with something that is quite akin to a serious mindfuck of a religious cult here.

Doubtless the US would be more than happy for the Chinese to sort it out but I suspect that the Chinese wouldn't be too enthusiastic about having to deal with starving millions next door/trying to pour across the border and associated chaos.

 

[Dogsauce]

I've seen very limited reports of belicose statements being made in the south - does anyone know anymore about this? This included a South Korean saying the rhetoric in the south was worse than what the north was coming out with (no idea if this was government or if they have a nutty xenophobic press like we do), as well as statements from the north condeming hostility from the south (not just the US exercises). I guess this might not be reported as it doesn't fit the good guys/bad guys dichotomy, but is this a factor, and what is being said?

 

[Pingu]

imo it may end like this.

someone close to the seat of power will off lil ol kim and blame it all on him and then take the reins . then renegotiate the aid stuff in return for backing down and halting the nuclear prog.

the elite in NK are well used to their lifestyle and power and this is going to turn all that to shit.

 

[likesfish]

south korea isnt the one running mass concentration camps playing with nukes and starving its population.
So yes explain how there equal again?

the north korean leadeship to a man are missing bullets to the head the south korean leadeship are the usual shower of cunts you get in charge of nations rather than sadestic mass murderers with a torture fetish