To be concerned about the North/South Korea situation?

[wibblyjelly]

I don't understand the complete political background, but as I understand it, North Korea is on the brink of declaring war on South Korea. I believe that we would side with South Korea if such a situation arose.
AIBU to be worried about a conflict happening with a country that is testing nuclear weapons without permission, and don't seem concerned about the consequences of using such a weapon? Just to clarify, its the nuclear side of things that I'm worried about, not about getting involved in the first place.

YANBU I'm worried too - primarily by the lack of news coverage. Makes me smell a rat.

There's no news blackout, there's nothing to worry about. He's just willie waving to show his own people 'strength'

They've no weapons that would reach, they've no decent nuclear stuff.

Bumping, totally agree. I know normally no news is good news, but in this situation, makes me more concerned

This seems to be a fairly cyclic thing and a lot of the noise is coming from the North.

On the one hand I like to think that it is just sabre rattling but on the other we cannot allow the proliferation of nuclear weapons, especially when they are in the hands of an essentially rogue state.

The silence of the news is deafening though. Hmmm

I suspect there's alot more going on behind the scenes with the US planning how best to bomb the shit out of them planning how to resolve this diplomatically. YANBU though and I should think no-one really wants it to go nuclear.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/1723557-To-not-fully-understand-this-whole-North-South-Korea-thing-and-hope-someone-will-explain-it-to-me

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/in_the_news/1719696-Korea

They have never not been at war as far as I remember - apparently there is a place at the border where half the conference table is in the north and half in the south where they come to talk. I think they have had a cease fire/truce but are still effectively at war.

You'll be upset if we get to the stage of another Cuban Missile Crisis and WWIII does kick off.

They're not on the brink, they did it on 30th March.

Its worrying me.

YANBU.

Just a shame someone can't go in and take the mad fucker out.

Can we say mad fucker???? surely that's mental health-ism at its very worst!

YANBU. I'm worried.

YANBU

It has been worrying me quite a lot for the last few days.

Not sure if I feel better or worse to know that other people are worried . I know there is not much we can do if something does happens.

The only saving grace is, if he does decide to hit a little red button, the whole area will be bombed to oblivion .... that makes me sleep a whole lot better (not)

Nah. People with MH issues aren't power pissed despots. That's my definition of mad fucker.

I know why they can't just take him out, but oh it must be tempting.

YANBU, hopefully this will be resolved but there's always a chance of the worst happening.

I live in an area known as Little Seoul as it has a huge number of South Koreans. I hope nothing drops on us

I've always said that about Robert Mugabwe - must be easy to sneak in there and get rid of him .... they could have done it at Rome Airport the other week without too much trouble

Mind you, who are "they"? we always think "they" can do this or that, but who are they? these people who can do anything we want them to!

If I lived in North or South Korea I'd be a bit worried.

Every nuclear western submarine will be converging on the area.

The only reason to be worried about something like this is if China decided to side with North Korea - I can't see this happening as they seem to be getting pissed off with them and they can't afford to go to war with America. North Korea may try to launch a nuclear strike (god forbid) but the missile defence systems will stop anything hopefully and then they will be blown to kingdom come.

One of my best friends is in Seoul and I am worried about her.

Lets hope they manage to talk him down. I guess there must be a huge amount of negotiating going on right now.

I visited Seoul when I was pregnant with DS, and I really loved it and the people there.

I'm worried. I'm not worried that they can reach us here, because they can't. The problem is the knock-on effect, will China help them? Even China (according to articles I've kept up with in the Economist over the last year or more) has been trying to distance themselves a little bit from some of the crazier declarations NK has made.

The US will help, they will have to help, Korea is our ally (sorry, am American hence the 'our'). We have bases there, we were integral to the rebuilding effort after the war and haven't really 'left'. We have very close relations with their government.

China has been one of the few countries to aid NK. What will they do? I don't know. China shouldn't want a war with the US. Economically, they are producers, and we are consumers. It would have a massive knock-on effect on everything they've achieved over the last 20 or more years. The two countries have a massive trade imbalance, in China's favour. They own a lot of American currency as well as stocks of ours.

But they could, if they wanted to. There's only one country in the world that spends more money on their military than the US, and that's China. And this particular Chinese government is very military-orientated.

The thing about nuclear weapons is they are a great deterrent. Everyone has one; no one wants someone crazy who doesn't care anymore going and using one. The problem with NK is (imo) they are getting close to having nothing to lose. The people are very, very poor, starving and beaten down. If he decides to take them all down in a blaze of glory by starting WW3, he could. NK doesn't have economic incentives not to do it (unlike the Chinese one I touched on above). They've had sanctions against them for ages and have no real trade outside of China and a few others.

I'm babbling. I could seriously go on about this for ages. :)