Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2016 January 8

= January 8 =

North Korean nukes
This question pops to my head occasionally... Why does North Korea want to build nuclear weapons? Is it just a show of muscle? Do they think that somebody wants to invade them and thus they need it as a deterrent? Which begs the question, does anyone actually want to invade N.K.? Or do they want to invade someone else, probably South Korea, and think they need nukes to either help get that job done or protect it once they have S.K.? Dismas |(talk) 04:14, 8 January 2016 (UTC)


 * It's hard to say what they are really thinking. Their official position is that those are defensive, to prevent the evil US from attacking.  Of course, that's total BS, though, as the US has zero interest in attacking NK, unless it attacks first (although it's possible the leadership there is so delusional that they now believe their own lies).  At one point Western nations kept giving them stuff to get them to agree to stop their nuclear program, but that has pretty much stopped now, as it evidently didn't work.  So, why continue to bankrupt the nation to build more nukes ?  Perhaps it's a prestige thing.  Their leader wants the respect he thinks he gets from having nuclear weapons, and doesn't care a bit about the cost.  Or perhaps they are worried that China, supposedly an ally but getting more and more impatient with NK, will invade.  Note that the US has thousands of troops in SK, not enough to stop an NK invasion, but enough to ensure that the US would fight to protect them.  StuRat (talk) 04:28, 8 January 2016 (UTC)
 * While the North Korean leadership appears to be delusional at times and have done a lot of questionable things and regularly engages in highly provocative actions with apparently limited concern of the consequences, it doesn't make much sense to say the North Koreans had to be delusional to think of a threat of attack from the US. The US labelled North Korea part of the axis of evil along with Iraq and Iran. They then went on to attack Iraq, despite widespread international condemnation and despite highly questionable evidence even at the time of their alleged motivation for attack, evidence which was later proven to be basically bullcrap. At this time things may have changed (or alternatively things have gone back to the way they were before with limited direct invasion but a lot of interference), but it's likely final decisions on development were taken around the time this was all happening. While it may seem probable the threat of Chinese support for North Korea would be sufficient to ward off the risk of a US attack, the Iraq war basically proved a US invasion which seemed unthinkable only a few years ago could happen no matter what the world said. Probably the only way to you could stop that would be if you had sufficient deterrent capability of your your own    . It's unlikely even in 2002-2006 that North Korea felt they could rely on China always feeling keeping them around was better than allowing whatever came out of a US invasion. Nil Einne (talk) 11:35, 8 January 2016 (UTC)
 * What a bizarre world we live in. The US invades Iraq due to WMDs they thought they had, so NK thinks they can deter a similar invasion by proving that they do have them. And are then apparently proved correct. Matt Deres (talk) 14:32, 8 January 2016 (UTC)
 * LOL! Yes this is very funny but I don't think it is an entirely accurate representation. Still, it is funny. But seriously, if the US really thought Saddam was in position to have lobbed a nuke on Riyad, or Tel Aviv, let alone further afield, I think they might have hesitated a bit more. Assuming that the US really honestly thought Saddam had WMDs and only made an honest mistake (we can argue about that but that's not my point) they must have only thought that he was in the process of acquiring a full operational capability not that he had acquired it. Btw, besides deterring an attempt at "regime change" another incentive for nukes on the part of NK is blackmail: we'll dismantle our nukes if you do this or that. They've tried it at least once. Still, whether an honest mistake or a calculated deception on the part of the US, I think any sensible person agrees that the WMD issue was not the central motivation for regime change. This makes the situations in NK and Iraq extremely different and very difficult to compare. The Iraq was an attempt at "political engineering". After 9/11 some people convinced the Bush administration that the solution to Islamic terrorism was to establish a flourishing democracy that supposedly would attract the Arab masses away from Islamic terrorism and into enlightened Western style democracy in the Middle East. The model was how Germany (at first West Germany) and Japan turned out after WWII. The choice naturally fell on Saddam's Iraq. Not because he was in any way involved in 9/11 but because if you were going to try something like this, this is obviously where you were going to try it. A posteriori the vastly different cultural and historical contexts and maybe also the effort the US was ready to expend make that plan look rather foolish, not to mention the lack of foresight as to the possible consequences (strengthening Iran, actually strengthening Islamic terrorism, e.g. Isis, but that was also due to the civil war in Syria in which the US had absolutely no responsibility). In any case all those dimensions are missing in the NKan case, and unless the NKan leaders are very foolish surely they must understand that. As long as they don't fly planes in some landmark building on the US mainland they surely are safe from any serious attempt at regime change, nukes or no nukes. So, while superficially the the line "NK got nukes because of what happened to Iraq" may sound obvious, if you probe a little more maybe it isn't entirely. Contact  Basemetal   here  16:21, 8 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Unless Trump wins. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 16:39, 8 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Just a quick note: the WMDs discussed prior to the invasion of Iraq were of the chemical/biological variety, not nuclear, and the prospect of a chemical warhead being lobbed at Tel Aviv wasn't particularly more pronounced than it was when Scuds were fired at Israel during the prior Gulf war. So while there may be useful parallels between Iraq and North Korea, they won't be specific to behavior with respect to nuclear weapons. &mdash; Lomn 23:11, 8 January 2016 (UTC)
 * You're very right of course. My bad. The documents supposedly proving that Iraq was attempting to acquire yellowcake from Niger were finally declared by the IAEA to be forgeries shortly before the invasion and the US had never taken them very seriously. It was sort of a "rhetorical" mix up between the hypothetical ("what would have happened if Saddam had nukes") and the actual on my part. You were entirely right to point that out. Contact  Basemetal   here  00:48, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Unless Trump wins. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 16:39, 8 January 2016 (UTC)
 * To be clear, I don't think it's clear, and didn't intend to suggest NK got nukes because of Iraq. Rather I was simply pointing out that the idea Sturat presented, namely that a risk of US invasion was completely delusion ignores the relaties of history. The Iraq invasion showed much of the world that there is still strong risk of basically unilateral (yes the UK was pushing it too and a few others were involved in various ways, but it was mostly perceived as a US effort) invasion from the worlds superpowers. Even the US despite their supposed disdain for such things. And many were hardly conviced that the WMD allegations were the primary motivations of the invasion. (This doesn't mean that they were right, simply that it's a widely held believe.) This is not to say the US's reputation was particularly stellar before that (as said, it was somewhat seen as fairly willing to get involved in various ways short of full on invasion). Even from the POV that the Iraq was was totally about WMD, I don't think it's particularly surprising that invasion would encourage people to get WMD, or in particular nuclear weapons. (There are in fact quite a few related examples, e.g. with firearms but since they're likely also fairly controversial even if easily sourced, I don't think they add much.) As Basemetal has, the perception that the US would be far less willing to invade if Iraq had nuclear weapons and may be willing to use them in the event of a full-on invasion is hardly surprising. So the options open were cooperate as much as you can and hope you are able to convince them (often problematic for domestic reasons particularly since full cooperation of entails exposing far more of you military than you would like, to inspectors who history showed could be aiding spying for the US. On the flipside, this likely significantly improves your ability to engage with the international community which is generally an advantage if you care about your people a bit (perhaps in your own weird way), or at least want to improve your country to ward off discontent leading to a possible uprising. Or alternatively going ahead with the development of nuclear weapons (probably in secret), and hoping you can succeed before the US invades. This may make you something of an international pariah once you do, particularly if nearly everyone perceives you as a madman who's one of the last countries anyone wants to have nukes. But if you are that perhaps you don't care. (You probably also worked out a way to ward off an uprising despite your peoples poor condition.) And the immediate aftermath of the Iraq invasion was a good time to do this as it would be difficult for the US to support three simultaneous invasions if we include Afghanistan. (For NK, ignoring the China factor and the far greater risks given NK's likely ability and willingness to inflict fair damage to key allies even without nukes.) And while many believed it would happen, ultimately no one was certain that would get so severally bogged down. If they had managed to pull off a short successful invasion, appetites for more would likely be fairly different then they ended up. Okay, there is somewhat of a middle ground where you cooperate but also develop your capabilites so you can quickly produce nuclear weapons if it comes down to that. Some people argue that was what Iran tried to do. But this carries the risk you'll fail at both. In fact, these options weren't even so much new to the invasion, more that the invasion proved the perceived risk of invasion only with UN support, but unilaterally from the US, if you don't have WMD to ward off such an invasion. One of the sources above mentions how Libya showed even full cooperation doesn't guarantee other countries aren't going to somewhat unilaterally involve themselves. None of this is intended as meaning I believe the various people were nice or people any decent human wanted to hang around. Nor that I disagree with all actions to get rid of them. As said my main point was to address the claim NK must have been delusion if they believed a US invasion was a risk. Believing there's a threat of a US invasion nowadays may be delusional at least partially because it's likely the US would be reluctant to invade if there's a risk of Tokyo or Seoul being nuked. Also it seems unlikely China will tolerate it at the moment but as said if this ever changes, there is still another strong deterrent. While as said, it isn't just nukes, North Korea may have the capability to cause resonable damage to at least South Korea even without them, nukes to provide a significant extra element of fear and risk. Nil Einne (talk) 18:07, 8 January 2016 (UTC)


 * WMD / Weapons of Mouse Destruction have been proven to exist in numerous evil dictatorships. Victor-Mousetrap.jpg  --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 18:54, 8 January 2016 (UTC)


 * It would be extremely delusional to think that the US has any interest whatsoever in invading the workers' paradise. For what? Iraq has oil. North Korea has kimchee. Clarityfiend (talk) 00:19, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Ah yes, Kim Chee. An early fixture of the other other Manhattan project. InedibleHulk (talk) 19:02, 9 January 2016 (UTC)


 * And it's not like invading Iraq allowed the US to somehow magically steal their oil. It's not just sitting in a giant tanker, it would take decades to pump it out of the ground, and any invader would have to remain in control of the oil fields  and delivery channels for all that time, to get it.  Plus the cost of the invasion and occupation far outweigh the value of the oil.   StuRat (talk) 01:05, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
 * There's clearly an inherent contradiction in saying "the US didn't invade Iraq for oil" and "the US would never invade North Korea because they have no oil". This contradiction can work both ways, but I never intended to suggest that the US invaded Iraq for oil (or that they didn't), simply that the idea it was completely delusion is inherently unsound when in 1999 many people would have been saying a full on invasion of Iraq with the intention of disposing of Saddam Hussein, was unthinkable (I'm sure some what have said delusion). Note that there are many possible factors in why the US may have invaded Iraq which don't involve oil nor concerns about WMD. And considering there were many people involved in the US, a number of them probably private individuals, it's likely the factors vary from person to person (It's not like many of those publicly involved are saying they made a mistake, or that there weren't people in the US who made a lot of money from the war.) In any case the key point is not whether the US had any interest in invading North Korea at the time, but whether such a unilateral invasion was a possibility if the situations changed which included how confident North Korea was the could ward of such a situation when that happened, without relying on external parties they weren't sure they could trust to always be there. In case it's not clear, I never intended to suggest the Iraq war was the main factor or even it definitely was a factor at all in the minds of the North Korean leadership, but rather that it was a very serious bit of evidence of the continuing prove of the willingness of the US to do whatever the hell they want without regards to what anyone else thinks. Frankly IMO anyone who thinks the US wouldn't have considered an invasion if Iraq and Afghanistan hadn't gone so badly; and China and to a lesser extent Russian weren't factors is the one who's delusion, but whatever. It's not like such thinking was unique to the US nor to the neocons anyway. Simply that the US was and is the only superpower after the collapse of the Soviet Union, despite the strides Russia and China are making. Remember also that it is possible to wish someone was gone while simultaneously understanding why they, wanting to stick around and do whatever wacky stuff they seem to like to do which often concerns the whole world, may have genuine concerns when they see what's happening that the same thing could easily happen to them. Nil Einne (talk) 17:05, 9 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Not sure why there is all this talk about Iraq War II since the North Korean nuclear program went into high gear during the collapse of the Soviet Union in the late 1980s. Timeline of the North Korean nuclear program Rmhermen (talk) 06:41, 9 January 2016 (UTC)
 * But the article you site clearly says Phase IV, when North Korea finally developed nuclear weapons begun in 2002; after a freeze in Phase III from 1994-2002. As I said before your reply, it's impossible to know if the Iraq war was a factor, but from the POV of those outside North Korea (even those who disliked the leadership), it wasn't hard to see why it would be quite a concerning time. Undoutedly earlier factors we at play as well, as I said above, the Iraq war was good proof that the US was still willing to practice large scale unilateral invasions (and with the collapse of the Soviet Union, had no one that interested other than the parties invaded sufficiently concerned to try military discouragement). Earlier efforts had shown that the US was at least continually willing to involve themselves in various ways as I said above, but a full on unilateral invasion of a medium size or larger country hadn't really happened for a while. Of course, these earlier factors may not have been so much about whether a US unilateral (or for that matter UN supported) invasion was seen as a realistic possibility some day, but whether there was anyone who may assist in trying to ward off such an invasion. One thing which I didn't mention before, it's not like nuclear weapons are only a deterrent against fullscale invasion anyway. As the current situation has shown, having nuclear weapons (combined with a willingness to do wacky things) makes it more difficult for everyone else to completely ignore you. They also make the sort of short of full on invasion actions I did mention more tricky. Really a lot of this stuff isn't that difficult from cold wars and arms races between significant powers. It's a matter of the small power who may not have a hope of matching the much larger power maintaining themselves as a big enough threat that the bigger power thinks twice, then thinks again, and again and again.... And just to re-iterate, this doesn't mean this was the thinking of the North Korean leadership. It's very hard to know anything for sure about something so opaque. All this is ultimately about is looking at it from an outside POV and seeing whether the initial claim that North Korea must be delusion holds up. The answer seems to be a resounding no. Nil Einne (talk) 17:05, 9 January 2016 (UTC)


 * I disagree. Looking at it now, the US would have a difficult time taking on NK's massive conventional forces, let alone their nukes.  And then China would intervene and there would be collateral damage to SK, Japan, etc.  So the idea that the US could invade NK now really is delusional. StuRat (talk) 21:00, 10 January 2016 (UTC)