Kim Jong Un could give up ICBMs but keep some nuclear weapons

[TexasTowelie]

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — After years of effort to develop nuclear missiles that can target the U.S. mainland, is North Korean leader Kim Jong Un really ready to pack them away in a deal with President Donald Trump?

Perhaps, but that wouldn’t necessarily mean Pyongyang is abandoning its nuclear ambitions entirely.

Tuesday’s meeting in Singapore between Kim and Trump comes after a sharp turn in North Korea’s diplomacy, from rebuffing proposals for dialogue last year to embracing and even initiating them this year. The change may reflect a new thinking about its nuclear deterrence strategy — and how best to secure the ultimate goal of protecting Kim’s rule.

A look at how Kim’s appetite for talks swung amid the North’s ups and downs in weapons development and what that says about how he might approach his negotiations with Trump.

Read more: https://www.mercurynews.com/2018/06/10/kim-jong-un-could-give-up-icbms-but-keep-some-nuclear-weapons/

[RockRaven]

1. If you believe that sh*t, I've got a f*cking bridge to sell you.

Point me to one nuclear/arms control promise DPRK has ever abided by in total...

*crickets*

They always a) act bad, b) raise tensions, c) agree to talk about it, d) offer something, e) get a concession in return, f) don't holdup their end. EVERY time.

But they respect this elderly, demented, reality-impaired demagogue so much they are going to break the pattern? Be still my heart...

[TexasTowelie]

2. Even if they gave up ICBMs and held to that promise

they would still maintain enough technology to send a nuclear weapon to hit our allies. I don't believe that Japan or South Korea would look at this as a solution to their menace in the neighborhood.

[SWBTATTReg]

3. I still think something is going on here, why all of a sudden is NK willing to act? ...

Rump is notorious for not keeping his word either. He flips/flops from moment to moment and then in dealing w/ NK, yeah, right.

John Bolton is not exactly one to listen to, either. Any agreement that rump and Bolton come up w/ should be viewed very skeptically and as with any rump actions will be rift w/ holes and poorly constructed, thus being mostly worthless. This may be what Kim of NK may be shooting for, that there will be enough loopholes that rump and Bolton will inadvertently leave in these agreement (rump knows it all!). There are major areas that need to be dealt w/ NK:

(1) nuclear;
(2) chemical and biological;
(3) military (troops, military equipment, etc.);
(4) icbms and their ability to deliver payloads thousands of miles away;
(5) subs and their ability to sit off coasts and delivery payloads;
(6) Russia, China, South K., Japan all have vested interests too, especially being right in that area.
They should have some say, especially SK;
(7) American troops stationed in SK, withdraw gradually (w/ SK input);
(8) NK has broken agreements before in the past. This should be considered but in lieu of the fact that rump
unilaterally said that the IRAN agreement is bad etc. and he doesn't want (despite what his buddy Putin
says too!); Some type of carrot agreement should be put in place, but aid to its hungry
people should be paramount, and should be guaranteed to be just for its people (not the upper tier);
(9) verification of whole process;

As I mentioned before, something else is going on here, we just haven't seen everything yet.

[secondwind]

4. Ten trillion in metals sitting in North Korea.

They lack the know-how and infrastructure to extract. Putin and Assad waiting in the wings. Not to mention China.

[haele]

8. Exactly. Lift the sanctions, and Putin and Xi get their minerals and metals at a discount.

All for making sure Drumpf gets his two scoops of ice cream on a beautiful chocolate cake and branding rights for the new Trump Pyongyang.
Probably even put it in that weird empty glass pyramid building the North Koreans built just to have something futuristically fancy looking in their capital city.

Haele

[Sherman A1]

5. I have two thoughts on what I believe to be behind the curtain

1). I have read that NK hacking into the SK intelligence computers reavealed some of the war plans and the scenario caused great concern at the top of the leadership. Apparently we knew much more about what and where than they expected.

2). The NK can afford to bargain away the nukes and missiles as A). They really don’t want them or the expense. B). They can direct more resources into cyber activities which may likely be very effective and are far less expensive.

3).The latest round of sanctions are having an affect as products are embargoed and NK workers have been sent home depriving the regime of hard cash.
My guess it’s a little bit of everything coming together.

[SWBTATTReg]

6. Good points, but I can't believe as brutal this regime is, that they would ...

be afraid of anything SK or the US could do, especially do a land invasion, which I think in the long run will be necessary, but then you have the China and/or Russia card. Giving away his nuclear warheads? I don't think this will ever happen, period. Sanctions? The country is already dirt rock poor, I can't imagine this would do anymore than what prior sanctions have done.

Oh well, we'll see eventually what's going on/what's happened, although w/ rump who lies through his teeth, you have to shift through the facts and other misc. garbage.

[Sherman A1]

12. The land invasion may or may not be necessary

From my read of things (in the piece that I cannot find) is that things were targeted that the NK were rather unhappily surprised about. Include their mountain with the tunnels for testing was recently destroyed because it was about to collapse anyway and from what Condi Rice mentioned in a C-Span piece about the sanctions now including brandy and cigars which are near and dear to the upper crust of the regime. The country is indeed dirt poor, but cutting off the bosses brandy, just may be too much.

Like everyone else, we will see.

[Lee-Lee]

9. The Kim Regime is barely holding power and barely keeping its citizens alive

And all indicators are that it’s getting worse.

The only way the Kim family has maintained its hold on the people has been deep brainwashing that behind at the youngest ages and continues in a never ending cycle.

The people there are desperately hungry all the time. They only accept that because they don’t know there is any alternative.

And anyone who speaks of an alternative is rapidly thrown into a re-education camp.

In any other nation where people have any idea about the fact that most people don’t live like that a revolution would have long ago happened.

So the first problem is that technology is making it harder and harder for the country to have total control on what the citizens learn. They have no internet, but there are common crossings to China, allowed and clandestine, where they come back with smart phones- and even without service they store pictures of what reality is outside the north. Shortwave radios that were ones large and clunky can now be had in palm size and smuggled in.

The citizens are learning. That’s bad for the Kim regime.

The second problem is thier economy is tanking worse- they hit rock bottom and are now drilling. The collapse of the Soviet Union meant the sudden loss of not only direct aid in commodities and cash, but the loss of a huge influx of industrial and economic activity. The Soviets built or helped build virtually every power plant, chemical plant, major industrial plant and many small ones. Thousands of Soviet engineers worked in North Korea on this.

The loss of the direct aid was crippling. However the loss of the technical support and invest from the Soviets has manifested itself slower- they have kept those old facilities running as best they can but now with 30 years of no upgrades or support they are hurting. The failures are coming faster and are more damaging every time.

On top of that, a third problem exists. Other than nuclear weapons and middles the DPRK has had zero new major weapons systems or upgrades to its military forces since 1990. All their Aircraft are no better than 3 decade old Soviet technolgy that was the reduced capability stuff the Soviets exported, and most of their Air Force is running places from the 1960’s. On top of that the pilots only get 20-30 hours of flight training a year, compared to a typical US pilot who gets 150-175. So his entire military aside from his nuclear and middle forces are using 30-50 year old planes, tanks, artillery, communications and vehicles. And suffers from a lack of training.


So his industrial capacity and infrastructure are aging out and failing without any modernization. His stranglehold on information to his citizens to maintain his power is getting harder and harder to find. And his military capabilities are aging and weaving every day.

What he has isn’t sustainable. It remains to be seen if he can emerge from this with something that is.

Failing that either a coup happens there and we don’t know what that brings or he gets desperate and starts a kind war as a last chance shot where he either wins or is destroyed, knowing he’s about to be destroyed so he has nothing to lose.

[SWBTATTReg]

10. Thanks for nice writeup on NK, I didn't know that infrastructure was as bad as it was...

so you note. It seems like infrastructure, as it become 'modern' requires an ever increasing share of resources just to keep running and so forth.

thanks again, and take care!

[Lee-Lee]

11. The Collapse of the Soviet Union has had long lasting effects

The Soviets were willing to expend a lot of capital on countries like North Korea for several reasons. First was it was viewed as essential to supporting worldwide communism even if there were significant ideological differences. Second it was viewed as a Strategic in that it kept US forces tied down as long as North Korea was a threat.

With them gone, there is only China. China does not want a strong North Korea economically because they want to have control. But they want them there as a buffer to having a capitalist nation with strong ties to the US on their border.

So they provide much, much less and as the idea of a unified Korea on their border becomes less and less an idea that scares them it has even less importance. I have seen written that aid from China to NK now is less about keeping the US from having accces to a border with them and more about avoiding the flood of brainwashed refugees who would flee across the border in terror at the idea of reunification or during a collapse because of what they have been told about the US and South Korea.

[workinclasszero]

7. Hello Japan...

and fuck you, love POTUS.