Five Years

[Amyral]

[Jowy Atreides]

But there is still a choice, is there not? It would probably isolate North Korea even further, but who knows what those guys are thinking.

OK, that's fine about the military-first policy. I think something got cut out of your post though; the sentence doesn't end.

Historically-speaking, yes, China and the Soviet Union were much closer with North Korea, especially before the ideological split, as all they were all nominally "communist."

How are you using the word 'buffer' here? Do you mean a literal military buffer, or something else entirely? I'd have to know how the word is being used before responding.

If you look at relations between North and South, they've come a long way, even to the point of talking about formally ending the Korean War. They had their first summit back in 2000, and another just took place in 2007. There are even talks of resuming train service between the two capitals. Compare this to Chinese, where Hu Jintao has only met Kim Jong-il once, and even then, nothing of consequence happened. Just a photo-op, mostly.

My primary point is that the United States was fully within its power as one of the Permanent Five to reject the Resolution that woud sanction Sudan, but did not. This was initially in response to this part of one of your posts:

[Vextor]

With the election of Lee Myung Bak, the South has started taking a tougher stance against the North. Personally, I've always thought the "Sunshine Policy" was a load of horse manure, so I'm glad to see this change. I've always thought Roh was a totally incompetent president, which shows from how unpopular he was even within South Korea (at one point polls showed that only 5% of South Koreans supported Roh).

South Korea may emotionally wish for reuinification, but doesn't want reunification from a pragmatic perspective because an incredibly inpoverished North Korea merging with South Korea will create a socio-economic catastrophe. There's already social tension between South Koreans and those who have escaped North Korea and took residence within South Korea. Over 50 years of separation and cultural isolation has transformed the two Koreas into culturally separate nations. Integrating the two would be a pretty tough task, and the resultant economic instability is something that no nation in the region wants. Even though South Korea has been one of the largest contributor of aid to North Korea next to China, it's uncertain if this would continue under Lee.

Although Kim Jong-Il is far less friendly with China compared to his dad, North Korea still gets a bunch of goods from China, and the border-region along the Yalu Rive directly faces China's Manchurian industrial zone. A lot of goods both legal and illegal pass into North Korea from China, and cheap goods from North Korea flow out into China largely from this trade route. Without oil coming from China, North Korea will be in dire straits, too.

Kim Jong-Il is politically closer with Russia, considering how he was born and raised within Russia and is fluent in the language, etc. He frequently goes to Moscow aboard his special train (he refuses to travel by plane). Even if Russia is now a democracy, he probably trusts Russia more than China for whatever personal reason he has.

So there's ample trade between Russia and North Korea, even though a lot of it may be black-market and unofficial. A lot of trade takes place between Nahodka / Korsakov and the various North Korean ports in the eastern shore. The Russian ports function as a transit point for Japanese goods, such as second-hand cars, bicycles, electronic equipment, etc. In turn, goods from North Korea are exported to Japan, bought secretly by fishermen and given a "made in Japan" stamp. As a result, a pretty interesting underground trade route exists in the Sea of Japan.

As far as "buffer" goes, the reason China got involved with the Korean War was to make sure North Korea remained as a buffer between itself and "US-controlled regions" (South Korea). As mentioned previously, the Manchu industrual region which was developed by Japan before WWII existed beyond the Yalu, and was (and still is) strategically important to China. I assume Amyral meant "buffer" in that context.

[Jowy Atreides]

Looking at how little North Korea has changed in roughly 60 years, I don't think a tough, or overly-friendly stance towards North Korea from the South will change anything. In most situations I prefer carrots over sticks, but maybe a combination would be better, and that seems to be what the Six-Party Talks are all about.

It seems that these are the same fears that people expressed when West and East Germany united, so I'm not so sure. Perhaps there would be a backlash, but I think things would settle down with time. Reunification definitely won't be happening for a while though; I can agree with you on that. If reunification were inevitable, I'd definitely prefer Southern control rather than Northern.

Yeah, it's too early to see how the new President will treat North Korea.

[Amyral]

[Jowy Atreides]

I was reinforcing your final statement in the first paragraph:

[Fu Su Lu]

My toughts are simple...this was a war for oil, oil and oil.

This war was and is a shame which never should have happened.

However, leaving the country now would likely take us to a country in chaos, a lot worse (yeah, worse, even if its a contradiction) than Saddam was in charge. So, probably leaving troops in Irak for years would be the right choice (yep, another contradiction...) at this point.

The cost? Hundreds of lives...is the US government ready to pay it for the years it may take? Or more important, will the people, the families of the dead ones tolerate it for long?
_________________
The drunkest cavalry unit in the world.
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Uncle Weirdo is on hoilidays... by now

[Jowy Atreides]

It looks like our 4000th soldier has died, and he was homosexual.

How interesting.