http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040912/ap_on_re_as/nkorea_explosion&e=1&ncid=
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If anyone wants proof that the world is in deeper s**t than expected here it is. This worries me a hell of a lot.
"f**k" is one of the correct words to use for this.
Dude...I must be psychic or something.
I had just finished reading that very same article and then I clicked the link to go here.
The North Korean Communists are the only REALLY SERIOUS threat next to al-Qaeda.
I view the N. Korean govt. as dangerous & poisonous insects that must be quickly killed lest they sting you and inject their deadly venom.
Better that they do it to themselves rather than to us.
I hope that explosion occured in a place where many hardcore USA /successful Western Nation hating Communists were stationed.
Someone recently mentioned having to saw off a gangrenous limb in order to save the whole. (on my Chechen School Standoff thread)
N. Korea is such a limb.
Many others might label N. Korea's government a form of global cancer that must be irradiated at once to save the patient's (earth) life.
That regime WILL fall eventually.
They must realize that Communism does NOT work and their government will eventually be overthrown or will crumble from within
Hopefully from within.
Post Edited (09-12-04 16:54)
Well if anyone wants to start taking bets on what country we are going to be at war with next I'd put my money on North Korea. Thing is that a war with North Korea would probably delve us into anouther world war, because Im sure there communist buddys China and Vietnam would want to join into the fight.
Maybe not --
North Korea is so weirdly "out-there" that even China and Vietnam are put-off by them.
Really, if they do set anything off in either the South or in Japan, they would meet a very quick end from the numerous submarines we have off their coast.
I think Syria or possibly Iran will be our next ground-invasion target. Or the Pakistani border/tribal area, especially if the current government collapses.
Meanwhile, we can watch the Kim Jung Il show on MAD tv . . .
peter johnson/denny crane
I think the US needs to have a secret metting with the UN leaders, get what support they can and do a sting attack involcing a couple hundred missles targetting as many military area's as possible, including where Kim Jong Il's psycho regime is.
No one should be informed of this until its happened/all over.
Just because they are communist doesn't mean all the other communist countries are just going to jump to their aid. China, for example, would only back North Korea if it had a really really good reason.
Oh, and Communism doesn't work? It only doesn't because human nature doesn't allow it to work. China, whilst a pretty s**tty regime, is surviving pretty well on it; they certainly haven't got it easy, but they are growing financially at a very high rate. It's kinda scary.
Oh yes, and f**k...
Well the US government has stated that it was not a nuclear explosion but its still pretty scary news.
Yeah, that's the trippy part of the story to me, they keep saying it's not that without saying what it could be. An asteroid? One of those aerosol thingies? A huge pile of TNT going off?
[Arch Hall Jr]Oh poopy. Oh double poopy.[/Arch Hall Jr]
I like how they say "They couldn't do any testing without losing a lot of their own people. Like Lil' Kim REALLY FREAKIN' CARES! But as small as that country is, it would be kinda like setting off a daisy cutter in your garage, wouldn't it?
Certainly something to worry about. While I think some of the things said here (like the limb that must be amputated) are too over the top there is no doubt that Noth Korea is a serious threat to the rest of the world. If George II hadn't been so obsessed with Irak (where are those mass destruction weapons?) we could have done something about it, but now the US (and UN depends too much on US troops for military operations) are wasting their efforts in a two front war which still has to produce real results. OK, so the Talibans and Saddam are out of power, good, but what have we replaced them with? Two pro-western governments so weak that they won't last a year if US troops pull off.
About the Communism not working, it's not my favourite type of government at all, but China and Vietnam are two examples of Communism (if quite altered) working fine. Not that that makes it fair, though.
I agree...China and Vietnam are at least in part trying to play with the rest of us. After all we do a LOT of trade with China. Who knows, maybe all that $$ coming into their country will help sway their opinion.
I did some history lessons a while ago and there's this historian, Pierre Vilar. He understands History as a neverending class struggle that creates progress (I guess that's why they call this current "Marxist History"). If his theory works, China is on the way to change, because sooner of later those who are obtaining benefit from China's approach to Capitalism will try to gain power in order to consolidate their position. With more and more pro-capitalism members in the government, China should, with time, abandon Communism completely.
I am not that confident on it, but we are living strange days, that's for sure.
Neville : Wepons of Mass D? Likely Syria or Iran.
As for Chineese Communisim...its becomming a version of Hitler's Germany.
The various armaments companys of Germany, (Porche, Messerschmitt, Junkers, Krupp, Ect,) were pitted aginst each other in a Capitilist manner...just as the Soviets did with Migg , Soukoi and Yakovlev in air craft construstion. Most people arn't aware of that....so that the companys had to work out how to meet the governments requirments. I.E., an admittion that the Communist ideal does not work, as human nature does not allow it to. We are not "all Lumpen Prolitaret". People are too complex for that.
However, the power was still vested in a narrow range of individuals. Just like every where else.
China sees the need to use, not squash, the abilites of the Chineese people, which are conciterable, but they still want to keep power over them.
To do this, they are playing the Nationalist card.
China's pride is being stoked, and it works better then the heavy hand of Communisim.
However....that does not prevent them from possably becomming the Germany of the East, so to speak.
In short....China is not free as we know it. But, they might become so...if they decide what freedom means, and it agrees with the image we westerners have.
And THAT is an argument i'm not prepared to enter....i have a life, thank ya! :)
SEOUL, South Korea â€" North Korea (search) said Monday that an explosion last week that raised a huge mushroom cloud was the planned demolition of a mountain for a hydroelectric project, and the reclusive government invited a British diplomat to visit the site to confirm the story.
North Korea denounced the speculation over a nuclear test as part of a "smear campaign" against it, aimed at diverting world attention away from new revelations about past South Korean nuclear activities.
A U.N. official, who asked for anonymity, said the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (search) â€" a U.N. body that monitors explosions worldwide for signs of nuclear activity through an international network of sensing devices â€" had not picked any signs that the explosion was a nuclear blast.
Good to know, but you'd think they would have made it widely known. Y'know, a small press release something like
"Hey, we know y'all think we're bats**t insane and that we have a bunch of nukes. Well, we are and we do or soon will, but this gigantic mushroom cloud you're gonna see next week is just us making a hydroelectric dam. That is all. Good day AND WE WILL DESTROY YOU ALL. hahaha
XOXOXO
Love,
Kim"
Thanks Susan! I don't think Glen Reynolds has even blogged on this yet, and you've already got me kind of informed. I think the Soviets used nuclear devices for that type of demolition. Even very small countries do have areas remote enough to set of H-Bombs, IMHO, if you're as unconcerned about fallout as we seemed to be in the 50s. Like the mountains, or whatever. Does anyone know if the prevailing winds there are more toward Japan or China?
Come in Neville. Sounds odd dosen't it? Come in ... Neville. Nothing quite cleanses like fire. Does Pierre Villar have a recliner of rage? The writtings Communism is based on are really not very well though out, so every form of Communism has been "modified" merely by virtue of having had people seriously try to put it into practice, so we have Bolshevism, Menshevism, Trotskyism, Maoism... (I suppose I could tie this into movies by comparing it to movies made from books, and how it neccessetates changes, how the best Frankenstien movies resemble the book the least, etc) As long as society is functioning at all, I believe that that means some level of capitalism (normalcy) is going on, underground or whatever. The psychopathic moderate elder Bush left a real matzo ball hanging out in Iraq, and his immediate predecessor did nothing about in but use our military as a freaking peace corps and throw missles around like snowballs. Some grown-up was going to have to wrap up that situation at some point, and if the general public is too effing Presbeterian to want anything done about it until their leaders play up the likelyhood of nukes, then so be it. I find it unlikely that we did not have a pretty good idea that the Koreans had not only nukes, but rockets that could reach our west coast before Iraq was invaded (any criticism of the guy who sold those to them is really only about sex though, and anyway, that was one entire administration ago, that's eons in pundit time) way before 9/11. What was keeping us from doing anything about it is that they can't be dealt with as simply or easily as middle easterners. Islamic society is inherently frivolous (check out their architecture, ROTFL!!!), and Koreans are *serious* people. You don't mess with them, you hide behind them when the blacks get rilled up. I think what we need to do with Korea is a cross between what we did in Afghanistan and the movie Damnation Alley, which was apparently theatrically released.
And thus, I plug my blog:
[url]http://davemunger.blogspot.com[/url}
www.fark.com
It has been my place of visit since 2002.........
China isn't truly communist. If they were, they wouldn't have the Olympics. This is because they could never develop the facilities it takes to put on such an event under the communist system.
Let's call a spade a spade. China is a military dictatorship with a pseudo free market economy. They are doing their best to be an economic democracy while maintaining a totalitarian regime.
brother - expect it. They are not hiding the fact they have nuclear weapons altho they claim they do not have uranium. They do plan on testing nukes, and i have no doubt they would freely announce it.
f**kity f**k f**k
f**kity f**k f**k
Look at frosty go!
Heh heh.
George wrote: "China isn't truly communist. If they were, they wouldn't have the Olympics. This is because they could never develop the facilities it takes to put on such an event under the communist system."
Two words, George: Moscow 1980.
Some stuff I googled:
http://www.aph.gov.au/library/pubs/rn/2003-04/04rn03.htm
http://www.worldthreats.com/Asia/North%20Korean%20Nuclear%20Test%20Question.htm
http://www.militaryconnections.com/news_story.cfm?textnewsid=1168
http://english.yna.co.kr/Engnews/20040903/300200000020040903115919E3.html
And my blog:
http://davemunger.blogspot.com
What's this doing up here? I made that last post a really long time ago.