08-18-2017, 09:30 PM
(08-18-2017, 06:37 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:(08-18-2017, 12:10 AM)Warren Dew Wrote:(08-16-2017, 09:35 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:(08-14-2017, 09:28 PM)Warren Dew Wrote:(08-14-2017, 04:58 PM)Kinser79 Wrote: Removing Kim's nuclear capabilities without removing his regime is an impossible task.
Can you clarify - in what way do you think it's impossible? Are you talking about the technical issues of identifying and destroying the sites and launchers, or are you talking about the political issues of who does what afterwards?
What I mean is that we aren't dealing with a unintelligent population chained to a medieval superstition like say Iraq or Libya.
Can the US destroy the sites? Probably. But I fully imagine that he has his nuclear scientists well protected and that as soon as he thinks its remotely safe they will be back to producing fissile material to make warheads.
The problem isn't so much physical as it is intellectual, unless you have a bomb that can make a population with a mean IQ around 105 to have a mean IQ around 85.
Sure. But it takes time to rebuilt nuclear reactors to produce plutonium, and enrichment plants for bomb grade uranium. Those can be destroyed faster than they can be rebuilt. Nuclear weapons take good scientists, but they require a production infrastructure.
At current, the whispers around the Pentagon (and I'm only reporting scuttlebutt here because I still know people connected with the services) are that NK likely has already stockpiled that material. And furthermore that if they have the capability of building said reactors the first time, they could do so again. As I said when dealing with North Korea we have to keep in mind that we are dealing with the North East Asian racial group and not the Arabic racial group. There is at least one standard deviation in difference in their IQs.
Furthermore, if we examine Korean culture itself (and this applies to South Korea too but with some modification) we see that they view the nation as more vital than the individual in nearly all aspects of life. Kim has already demonstrated that he is more interested in maintaining his nuclear deterrent than feeding his population if it comes down to that. Indeed from the same scuttlebutt he's been attempting to have the army convert some parts of their bases to the production of goats and vegetables to address some of the food shortage problems.
Overall the problem remains that if one wants to neutralize the North Korean nuclear threat (and it is expected they have about 10 or so warheads, or at least they did under Kim 2) then one must also completely occupy and then destroy the Kim Regime.
As of a few months ago, I believe we thought they had enough plutonium for about 20 nuclear warheads. Many of those would probably survive, whether they are stockpiled or installed on missiles. Without a working reactor, though, they couldn't produce more. And we could bomb it back faster than they could fix it - though I'd expect we'd take the regime out too the second or third time.
It currently seems like we're headed toward letting them have the weapons, though. I guess we're just going to wait until they or someone they sell nuclear weapons to decides to use one.
