North Korea Nuclear Threat

[dodbringr]

So, as many of you may have heard, especially if you live in the U.S, North Korean leader Pyongyang has threatened to send a nuclear weapon to destroy either the capital or Manhattan (which is the financial hub of the U.S). Anyone have any thoughts on this? Because personally, we find this to be absolutely HILARIOUS. We could go on and on about how unrealistic it is that North Korea could successfully send a missile over the ENTIRE U.S just to hit the capital, which is one of the most protected places in the entire nation, but we would probably max out the character limit if there is one.    And, to add insult to injury, the UN has decided to sanction luxury items in North Korea. So basically, it's like parents taking the toys away from a little kid who is throwing a tantrum. (No offense meant to anyone who is from or has family in North Korea)  Hopefully you can now see why we find this so amusing. 

[Storm Fox]

Do you have a news source for this that you can link to or quote?

[Foxpup]

We could go on and on about how unrealistic it is that North Korea could successfully send a missile over the ENTIRE U.S just to hit the capital,

Huh? Why on Earth would a missile fired from North Korea to D.C. fly over the U.S? No offence, but do you actually own a globe?

[Mylo]

Quick!  Evacuate the StarCraft players!  The Koreans probably already have evacuation spaceships so that Samsung executives, the government, and said Starcraft players can escape to outer space while Seoul is fired upon and North Korea becomes part of the sea.  The StarCraft players can then Zerg rush across the DMZ and defeat the DPRK once and for all.   

[Mylo]

Do you have a news source for this that you can link to or quote?

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/09/world/asia/north-korea-sanctions.html?_r=0

[Mylo]

Sorry if you've seen this a million times, but it just has to go here, also in response to Foxpup:

[Jacoby Quinn]

i hope it happens, we have a corrupt goverment and this is one of the few ways i see us starting anew

[Kobuk]

i hope it happens, we have a corrupt goverment and this is one of the few ways i see us starting anew

Are you like.....ok in the head? WTH? 

[dodbringr]

We could go on and on about how unrealistic it is that North Korea could successfully send a missile over the ENTIRE U.S just to hit the capital,

Huh? Why on Earth would a missile fired from North Korea to D.C. fly over the U.S? No offence, but do you actually own a globe?

Ok, have fun sending a missile over all of CANADA. No one would EVER notice that... And excuse us for making a mistake. We should have realized that we have to have complete knowledge on the path which a nuclear missile will take to the U.S. Besides, have fun trying to coordinate a missile that will fly undeterred over THE ARCTIC CIRCLE.

[Mylo]

The parallels between this and Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace are too hilarious to ignore...


KOREAN WARS

Episode VII
THE NUCLEAR MENACE
(This time, we really really mean it.  No joke.)

Turmoil has engulfed the
Korean Peninsula.  The taxation
of trade routes to outlying
nations is in dispute.

Hoping to resolve the matter
with a blockade of deadly
battleships, the greedy United
Nations has stopped all
shipping to the small country
of North Korea.

While the United Nations
endlessly debates this alarming chain of
events, the President of the United
States has secretly dispatched two Jedi
Knights, the guardians of
peace and justice in the
galaxy, to settle the conflict...


The two Jedi were Eric Schmidt and Dennis Rodman.
The negotiations were short.
Now we just have to wait for the President to begin landing ground troops.  
Then, Samsung will show off their new Galaxy Battle Droids, running Android 4.1 with TouchWiz.
Then there will be a war, lots of explosions, and then the President of South Korea, Park Geun-hye, will raise that energy ball thing at the end, celebrating a unified Korea.
Add some pod-racing, and you've got a full reenactment of 1999's greatest movie ever made.

[Jacoby Quinn]

why wouldn't i be? yes people would die, but how many people have already died fighting a battle that isn't even ours anymore over in the east? how many people sign the checks for their own salaries, stealing money intended to better our nation? how much does the government ACTUALLY help the people it is supposed to be protecting?

[Kobuk]

I'm going to quote something from a previous old debate forum thread.

Will NK go to war? It's really hard to say. If we and/or the United Nations push too hard with sanctions and other resolutions, then NK may feel backed up against a wall with no way out except for war. Their leadership is very hardline communist, almost to the point of being paranoid I'd say.  Everything that's happening right now in the news may be "sabre rattleing" by the NK, but at some point in the future, I wonder if there really will be war. The only thing from stopping the NK from crossing the Demilitarized Zone into South Korea is just a very, very fragile truce. No "official" peace agreement was ever put into place.
Can the NK cross the DMZ and invade South Korea? Frankly, there's really not much to stop them. Their land forces are the highest concentrations of troops and equipment in that region of the world second only to China. The NK has nearly 1 million troops with another 3-4 million in reserve. They've got THOUSANDS of pieces of tanks and combat vehicles. If we get into a land war with them, I fear we may not win it. The downside to their ground forces is that most of their equipment is 1950's to 1970's stuff which is inferior to today's modern stuff and may be lacking in fuel, parts, and maintenance. The plus side is that large quantities of that equipment is scattered and hidden in underground facilities which are hard to locate and destroy. We don't know where they all are due to lack of intelligence.
Their Air Force and Navy is pretty much the same way. Large quantities of equipment, but a lot of it older stuff which is surplus and was bought from China and the Soviet Union. Their Navy is probably no match for us or our allies. Most of their "fleets" are medium or small craft which comprise mostly patrol boats. They have nothing that can go against us in open ocean. Their Navy is mostly a coastal force.
Can we beat them in the air? Possibly. But first, we have to defeat their VERY high concentrations of Surface-to-Air missile networks. The NK has the highest concentration of SAM equipment and sites ever seen in that region of the world.
Further reading:
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/dprk/index.html (Scroll down a little after you get there to see further links.)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Korea
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_Demilitarized_Zone

So would NK go to war now? I still don't know for sure. I doubt they'd risk it as they need the economic aid and food supplies that are coming into their country to help their people. Can they reach the U.S. with a nuclear missile? Again, I'm not sure. I doubt it as I feel they may not have the technical expertise/knowledge, etc. yet. Even if NK launched a missile, a U.S. Navy Arleigh Burke Class AEGIS destroyer armed with the following missile system.......
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RIM-161_Standard_Missile_3
........and parked in the Sea of Japan or other water area near NK, could potentially knock out a missile from NK early in the missile's boost phase right after launching, provided there is sufficient warning and time to intercept.

[bkatt500]

i hope it happens, we have a corrupt goverment and this is one of the few ways i see us starting anew

Um wut.  No offence, but that's really kinda very dumb.  Firstly because of the obvious "OMG TONS OF PEOPLE NOT RELATED TO THE GOVERNMENT WILL DIE" part and "you are literally hoping for the deaths of hundreds of people" part, and then for the part where they likely wouldn't take out the government, because do you really think they haven't thought of "Hm, what should we do in case someone tries to wipe out the government with a nuke?"  This would possibly ignite a third world war, and worse, a NUCLEAR ONE.  We're talking MILLIONS upon MILLIONS of people dying.  There are better ways of fighting corruption than starting a huge friggin' nuclear war.

And the benefits of sending it over Canada is that it will not spend a lengthy amount of time over the Pacific (over which we detonate and test weapons all the time), but spend more time over populated ground, making people more hesitant to attempt to stop it.  The most they could do is evacuate the area.

[Mylo]

why wouldn't i be? yes people would die, but how many people have already died fighting a battle that isn't even ours anymore over in the east? how many people sign the checks for their own salaries, stealing money intended to better our nation? how much does the government ACTUALLY help the people it is supposed to be protecting?

Go out and do something if you are so wronged instead of encouraging attack on our own nation.  It's insulting to all the people in Washington who actually are trying, as well as all the citizens who are just going about their daily lives.

And here is just one way the government is helping you right now: you have the free time to post your free opinion on a free website with out fear of legal repercussion.  How many countries can you purposely say that you favor the destruction of its capital without getting in some sort of trouble?  This in no way justifies the wrongs that our government does, but still.

[Kobuk]

Well if we're going to get nuked by NK, I hope it can wait till after tomorrow. I have a model contest to go to and I'd like to win another award. If I'm going to die soon, I want to die happy knowing I went to a last model contest winning another award for my modeling handiwork.

[Jacoby Quinn]

oh thats helping me? no that is just not punishing me for what i would be doing anyway

and go do something? what the hell am i supposed to do anyway?

i am 19 years old, born into lower middle class in a state that noone in this country has taken seriously since the civil war, i have a crap memory, so working my way onto, much less climbing the political ladder is out, if i start a protest, i just look like another psychotic tea party member, i don't see what i can do

[Arashi_Calunata]

Oh, GOODIE. This thread is making me ALL SORTS of happy and paranoid.

I for one believe we should regard it as at least some sort of medium threat. I'd be more worried if Russia-Or heaven forbit, China- were to threaten us, though. Because they have a proven arsenal of Nukes. I don't think the Cold War really ended per say, because it would still be a situation of mutaually assured destruction... Assuming our firing controls for the missiles still would function with some certaincy, and the world was NOT destroyed and turned into a Fallout-Like waste, we would likely SHOOT BACK.

[bkatt500]

Whtwolf: Again, a nuclear strike would in all likelihood NOT take out a significant portion of the government.  If anything, it would make living conditions WORSE with more restrictions on your rights, and higher taxes to fund a war and retaliation.  What it WILL result in is the initial deaths of thousands (even with an evacuation, not everyone would be able or willing to leave by the time it hits) and then millions because there WILL be retaliation.

Anyway, I don't think North Korea would do it.  They're crazy, but that would be very stupid for many reasons, since not only would they have retaliation, but they might lose their allies who may not want to get caught up in the resulting mess.

[Foxpup]

Can they reach the U.S. with a nuclear missile? Again, I'm not sure. I doubt it as I feel they may not have the technical expertise/knowledge, etc. yet. Even if NK launched a missile, a U.S. Navy Arleigh Burke Class AEGIS destroyer armed with the following missile system.......
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RIM-161_Standard_Missile_3
........and parked in the Sea of Japan or other water area near NK, could potentially knock out a missile from NK early in the missile's boost phase right after launching, provided there is sufficient warning and time to intercept.

That's a pretty big if.

And the benefits of sending it over Canada is that it will not spend a lengthy amount of time over the Pacific (over which we detonate and test weapons all the time), but spend more time over populated ground, making people more hesitant to attempt to stop it.  The most they could do is evacuate the area.

Actually, the benefit of sending it over Canada is that it's simply the shortest distance between the two points, and therefore there is less time available to detect and destroy the missile. Also, no missile in North Korea's arsenal has anywhere near the range required to go the long way around.

[Arashi_Calunata]

How good is the fuel cap and max effective range on a North Korean Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile? Anybody know?

[Jacoby Quinn]

range? for max icbm 10000 kilometers

max missile capability? orbit

[Arashi_Calunata]

For North Koreans? Wow... I'm impressed that a bunch of Chinese Wannabes managed to make something like that.

[Foxpup]

How good is the fuel cap and max effective range on a North Korean Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile? Anybody know?

The Taepodong-2 (North Korea's only ICBM) has never been successfully tested and very little is known about it, though it is estimated to have a maximum range of around 10,000 km, just enough to hit the U.S.

[Jacoby Quinn]

it has never been sucessfully tested AS FAR AS WE KNOW

[Foxpup]

it has never been sucessfully tested AS FAR AS WE KNOW

It's a ballistic missile, not a stealth bomber. It's impossible to launch one without it being seen by nearly everyone on the same side of the planet. There's just no way to cover up a ballistic missile test (apart from claiming it's a space rocket, like North Korea did with their previous missile tests, but everyone knows better).