US considering Preemptive Strike against North Korea.

Zebra3

The_Valeyard wrote: »

Way to move those goalposts.

Way to dodge acknowledging US support for Islamic terrorism.

Gatling

Zebra3 wrote: »

Way to dodge acknowledging US support for Islamic terrorism.

There was no Islamic terrorists in Afghanistan when the soviets invaded and massacred the government.

Afghans Defending themselves against soviet Russia doesn't make them Islamic terrorists,
The same applies to Ukrainians Defending themselves against Russian aggression and Invasion

Ipso

Zebra3 wrote: »

The Soviet Union certainly did lose a lot in Afghanistan and good enough for them for invading another sovereign state.

Of course, I'm very interested with your description of the "rag tag militia". Would you like to give a more accurate description of them? "Islamic extremists" maybe?

And would you like to inform everyone on here who was funding these Islamic extremists?

You are very selective with your facts on here.

In Afghnistan, Saudi Arabia and Pakistani intelligence was also involved.

aloyisious

Cheerful Spring wrote: »

I doubt South Korea and Japan and China want a war. Trump i feel is on he's own with this and that's likely the reason it has not started yet. How do you move millions of citizens to safe zones?

It might be more: how do you make the zones the millions of citizens are in safe, rather than the other way around. It seems to me that there are two minds playing chicken with each other and both are in the head of Kim Jong-Un. The world knows Don is not interested in his fellow citizens, let alone those of SK.

Threatening to throw nuclear-capable missiles at countries thousands of K's away and boasting of having thousands of artillery pieces aimed at the denizens of your neighbours capital city is the act of a deluded mind.

Ask the Chinese how safe they feel about Kim at the moment, not how they feel about any other power.

Irish Praetorian

Irish Praetorian wrote: »

Two points, firstly why did it all begin to break down? ... I might be labouring under a misapprehension in thinking Communism fell because it was and remains a fairly useless method of organizing an economy, but you might be able to correct me.

Happy to.

Firstly, we need to differentiate between how economic "success" is measured in different economic systems. Since capitalism generally counts "success" in terms of economic liberty, and by proxy, economic inequality (number of billionaires, market capitalisation, etc.), it stands to reason that the same variables are pretty useless in determining the "success" of an economic system that stands for economic equality. In other words, you don't treat apples like oranges.

Socialism seeks to improve social welfare (in the sociological meaning of the term: free housing, free healthcare, equal rights for women and minorities, etc). The capitalist obsession with individual liberty and private property don't come into the picture. So if you're calling socialism a "useless" method of organising an economy, that's probably because it doesn't comply with capitalist desires. Why would it? It has different priorities.

Now, I can almost hear the fingers tapping "but, the FAMINE UNDER STALIN!" on keypads. Yes, yes; there have been famines under socialism. There have been many more in capitalist regimes, but we rarely blame capitalism for that. An Gorta Mor is one of the most often-cited examples of capitalist/ imperialist inefficiency by economic historians, yet many people (especially Irish people, sadly) still ascribe it to some odd kind of inferiority on behalf of the natives, and don't understand the catastrophic failure of capitalism that it really was.

Getting back to the point, and to North Korea specifically, North Korea was an industrial powerhouse in the 1960s and 1970s, during a time of massive economic expansion, when South Korea had atrocious working conditions, no social safety net, and very weak healthcare infrastructure.

Why was North Korea such an economic success, by any economic measure, in the 1960s and 1970s, as well as much of the 1980s? Did socialism suddenly turn into a bad idea in the late-1980s? Of course not.

The North Korean economies contracted and continued to decline because of Glasnost and Perestroika under Gorbachev. This brings us to the greatest weakness of socialism: its inability to progress and survive in isolation. The famous 'socialism in one country' problem.

Marx said that socialism could never exist in isolation. Stalin disagreed. Stalin was wrong, Marx was right. Socialism can prosper and thrive for a few decades when there is a bloc of co-operating socialist economies, but once this bloc is weakened, socialism will collapse. Socialism is inherently interdependent, it requires local as well as international solidarity.

Without this, socialism is a lame man walking towards a grave. This is why most serious socialists (not the archetypal 1st Arts loafer) have little time for the likes of Chavez, Morales, or even Stalin and Tito. These men have all foolishly pursued their own egotism at the expense of a slow and evolving permanent revolution, as espoused by the likes of Trotsky. In 1939, Trotsky wrote in 'Three Concepts of the Russian Revolution', that "[o]nly the victory of the proletariat in the West could protect Russia from bourgeois restoration and assure it the possibility of rounding-out the establishment of socialism".

Trotsky's theory was entirely verified 50 years later, when Gorbachev formally re-established the bourgeoisie, and Russia became the capitalist hell-hole it is today.

In short, then, socialism fell because it did not reach a critical mass of international solidarity. It had plenty of success, but lacked the most crucial one: permanence.

SeanW wrote: »

You mean "let's ignore North Korea's current military dictatorship, concentration camps and grave human rights abuses? It took me literally 5 seconds to find this on DuckDuckGo:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_North_Korea

Oh, welcome back to the thread. I didn't think you'd show your face in here after that clanger you dropped about China having created North Korea. It still makes me chuckle.

I suggest you use 'DuckDuckGo' to do some basic research on Korean history, then maybe we'll talk.

ilkhanid

A Tyrant Named Miltiades! wrote: »

Socialism seeks to improve social welfare (in the sociological meaning of the term: free housing, free healthcare, equal rights for women and minorities, etc). The capitalist obsession with individual liberty and private property don't come into the picture. So if you're calling socialism a "useless" method of organising an economy, that's probably because it doesn't comply with capitalist desires. Why would it? It has different priorities.

Individual liberty is not a "capitalist" obsession, it is part of the common tradition of rights that has been gifted to us by the evolution of societies and thought since the Middle Ages, and especially by the Enlightenment. If "actually existing socialism" had been any good it would have built on, expanded that heritage. Instead it sought to trade those rights, the "free healthcare, equal rights for women and minorities, etc" in a bargain that deprived people of the rights of speech, association and publication in return. Even some Communists understood this right at the start, like Rosa Luxembourg
"Freedom only for the members of the government, only for the members of the Party — though they are quite numerous — is no freedom at all. Freedom is always the freedom of dissenters. The essence of political freedom depends not on the fanatics of 'justice', but rather on all the invigorating, beneficial, and detergent effects of dissenters. If 'freedom' becomes 'privilege', the workings of political freedom are broken"
" Without general elections, without freedom of the press, freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, without the free battle of opinions, life in every public institution withers away, becomes a caricature of itself, and bureaucracy rises as the only deciding factor".

In fact the bargain wasn't even kept, In return for terror, the people of Mao's China got...more starvation and the people of North Korea got the right to turn the fruits of their labour over the army and the Kims.

A Tyrant Named Miltiades! wrote: »

The North Korean economies contracted and continued to decline because of Glasnost and Perestroika under Gorbachev. This brings us to the greatest weakness of socialism: its inability to progress and survive in isolation. The famous 'socialism in one country' problem.

Glasnost destroyed the comand economy state because that state was ultimately built on coercion and falsehoods. the history of the so-called Socialist states were a tissue of lies, fantasies and fabrications. When the people realised that the jig was up. No state, "Socialist", Capiatalist, Theocratic, Monarchical has institutionalized coercion to the degree of the DPRK

A Tyrant Named Miltiades! wrote: »

Marx said that socialism could never exist in isolation. Stalin disagreed. Stalin was wrong, Marx was right. Socialism can prosper and thrive for a few decades when there is a bloc of co-operating No socialist economies, but once this bloc is weakened, socialism will collapse. Socialism is inherently interdependent, it requires local as well as international solidarity.

There was never any socialism, only a command economy regulated by a self-perpetuating class of dogmatic bureaucrats inculcated with the mumbo-jumbo of Marxism-Leninsm. Even perceptive communists like Milovan Djilas saw it for what it was long ago.

A Tyrant Named Miltiades! wrote: »

In 1939, Trotsky wrote..

Trotsky was little better than the rest of them. He was no hero, no saviour

A Tyrant Named Miltiades! wrote: »

Trotsky's theory was entirely verified 50 years later, when Gorbachev formally re-established the bourgeoisie, and Russia became the capitalist hell-hole it is today.

What Gorbachev did was remove the monopoly of power that the Communist Party enjoyed. Of course to you that is "re-establishing" the "bourgeoise". The party was so weak, so arthritic after decades of its unthinking oiligarchy that it dissolved like snow in the sunshine.

A Tyrant Named Miltiades! wrote: »

In short, then, socialism fell because it did not reach a critical mass of international solidarity. It had plenty of success, but lacked the most crucial one: permanence.

What was called "socialism" fell before it even began, on march 7th 1921.

SeanW

Gatling wrote: »

There was no Islamic terrorists in Afghanistan when the soviets invaded and massacred the government.

Afghans Defending themselves against soviet Russia doesn't make them Islamic terrorists,
The same applies to Ukrainians Defending themselves against Russian aggression and Invasion

It should also be pointed out that the group initially supported by the US in Afghanistan were the Mujihadeen, and their delegation to the White House to meet with President Reagan included a woman, Faridah Ahmadi, who appeared to be an equal part of the delegation and was not (unlike women under the Taliban) forced to wear a burka.

This would seem to suggest that the Mujihadeen were not crazy, and that the error was not in supporting them, but in allowing the Saudis to get involved in the resistance - "Taliban" is literally the Pashtun word for "students" and the first "Taliban" were the students who were taught by Saudi missionaries in the refugee camps in the 80s.

Oh, welcome back to the thread. I didn't think you'd show your face in here after that clanger you dropped about China having created North Korea. It still makes me chuckle.

I suggest you use 'DuckDuckGo' to do some basic research on Korean history, then maybe we'll talk.

Korea was united. After the North invaded the South - without a declaration of war, the South and their allies in the democratic world pushed the Northern Communist aggressors way back. The American etc. forces had pushed the Commies almost to the Chinese border, where they would have been wiped out. North Korea had been effectively obliterated. Korea was united.

Then China invaded - again without declaring war in a surprise attack. They pushed the US etc back to a middle ground, drew a new border and restarted the North Korean regime. And they've been maintaining it ever since. So yes, China is responsible for North Korea, that is a fact.

A Tyrant Named Miltiades! wrote: »

Happy to.

Firstly, we need to differentiate between how economic "success" is measured in different economic systems. Since capitalism generally counts "success" in terms of economic liberty, and by proxy, economic inequality (number of billionaires, market capitalisation, etc.), it stands to reason that the same variables are pretty useless in determining the "success" of an economic system that stands for economic equality. In other words, you don't treat apples like oranges.

Really? "The number of billionaires, market capitalisation" are the only measures of success in a capitalist society? Are you seriously suggesting that we don't consider things like average income, income in relation to the poverty line, the unemployment rate, progress in the fight against disease and so on? Are you seriously suggesting this? How does Jonas Salk (inventor of the Polio vaccine) fit into your warped narrative, considered by most to be an American success story, having fulfilled his American Dream, despite not getting rich in the process?

Socialism seeks to improve social welfare (in the sociological meaning of the term: free housing, free healthcare, equal rights for women and minorities, etc).

Ahhhaahahahahahahaha ... oh wait you're actually serious. Tell me, why don't you ask the 100,000,000+ people murdered by Chairman Mao, Josef Stalin, Pol Pot and so on what they think of Socialist "equality?". Or the Tibetans, Ukrainians or Baltic States peoples what they think of "equal rights for minorities".

So if you're calling socialism a "useless" method of organising an economy,

You're right. It isn't just useless. It's evil.

The capitalist obsession with individual liberty and private property

On what planet does this evil garbage make sense? A love for human freedom is not necessarily tied to capitalism, although the two are often linked. But citizens in a free "capitalist" society are free to pursue happiness however they please. It need not be monetary - like how Jonas Salk invented the Polio vaccine in the evil, capitalist, America that gave him the freedom to live his life as he pleased, the "individual liberty" you obviously despise. Of course, many do define success as getting lots of money, but under Capitalism this can usually only be done through forced altruism. I.E. if you want to get rich under capitalism, you have to provide other people with things that they want or add value to their lives. Like how railway builders in the US got super-rich in in the 19th century by giving people a previously unavailable ability to get people and goods across long distances in short timeframes (an improvement over horse drawn carts on unpaved roads) or technological innovation in the current era, to say nothing of many great and small inventors over the last 500 years.

Now, I can almost hear the fingers tapping "but, the FAMINE UNDER STALIN!" on keypads. Yes, yes; there have been famines under socialism.

Famine was just one of the tools that Stalin used to exterminate the peoples he wanted to destroy. His regime also used mass murder in the captured "republics" and mass deportations to Siberian gulags to kill may more people than the many who died in the artificial famines.

There have been many more in capitalist regimes, but we rarely blame capitalism for that. An Gorta Mor is one of the most often-cited examples of capitalist/ imperialist inefficiency by economic historians, yet many people (especially Irish people, sadly) still ascribe it to some odd kind of inferiority on behalf of the natives, and don't understand the catastrophic failure of capitalism that it really was.

There is so much horse**** here I don't even know where to start. First of all, Capitalism and Imperialism are dichotomous opposites. Imperialism at its worst is what the British did in Ireland (to Hell or to Connaught), what the Soviets did in the Baltic States, what China is doing in Tibet and East Turkestan. The superiority of a metropolitan state over a subdued people in colonies. Like Ireland in the 1840s, the Baltic states in the 1940s-1990s, Ukraine earlier, and Tibet today.

Capitalism seeks to elevate people and societies, by giving anyone with the ability a fair shot at success, howsoever and individual might measure this. Money, personal happiness, noteworthy accomplishments etc.

Regarding Ireland specifically, there is the specific story (don't know if its true or just an old wives tale) about how Queen Victoria captured a grain shipment intended for the Irish people during the famine and redirected it towards other ends. That is Imperialism.

Under capitalism, that grain ship would have belonged to its owners, and they would have been free to distribute its contents as they saw fit - in this case, to assist the people of Ireland. Speaking of which, where did the Irish of the 1840s go when if they had enough money for boat fare? That's right, evil Capitalist America, where most were able to recover and not be hungry anymore, because they had moved from an Imperialist dictatorship to a Capitalist Republic that rewarded their desire to work. Funny.

In 1939, Trotsky wrote in 'Three Concepts of the Russian Revolution', that "[o]nly the victory of the proletariat in the West could protect Russia from bourgeois restoration and assure it the possibility of rounding-out the establishment of socialism".

By 1939 the Soviet Union had already committed genocide against the people of Ukraine by doing exactly to them what the British Empire did to the people of Ireland in the run up to 1847. A mass movement of "planters" (colonists) to overwhelm the native people in their own land, the murder and deportations of large numbers of native peoples, and a semi-intentional famine.

In 1939 itself - the year you chose to wax lyrical about - the Soviet Union invaded the peaceful, small Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. They subsequently engaged in a wanton rampage of cultural destruction, mass murder, deportations, expropriation and tyranny.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x440cUS4uTU

There is only one word for this. Evil. You seem to be keen to ignore Communists crimes against humanity which are too numerous to repeat here, but even by the standards of this post your reference to the year 1939 is particularly troubling. What is your position on the murder of 50,000 Latvians (among other crimes against humanity) that the Soviet began in 1939 when Trotsky was rabbiting on about whatever it was?

Zebra3

Gatling wrote: »

There was no Islamic terrorists in Afghanistan when the soviets invaded and massacred the government.

Afghans Defending themselves against soviet Russia doesn't make them Islamic terrorists,
The same applies to Ukrainians Defending themselves against Russian aggression and Invasion

Yet, they are magically terrorists since they started fighting the American occupation. :rolleyes:

Elmer Blooker

Zebra3 wrote: »

Yet, they are magically terrorists since they started fighting the American occupation. :rolleyes:

ISIS in Iraq = terrorists.
ISIS in Syria = (any of the following) Moderates, Rebels, Opposition forces, "Free" :pac: Syrian Army.

I saw a documentary on RT yesterday about a Syrian TV crew who were butchered by the moderate "Free Syrian Army".

aloyisious

Maybe this link is trustworthy in relation to veracity of NK, and other nations, ICBM technology and knowledge....

https://www.google.ie/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwibxeHk24PVAhUkJMAKHbYUAv4QFggvMAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.bbc.com%2Fnews%2Fworld-asia-17399847&usg=AFQjCNGas4nOmW5f0_psKm70BlZ7ZOKVag

fxotoole

Elmer Blooker wrote: »

ISIS in Iraq = terrorists.
ISIS in Syria = (any of the following) Moderates, Rebels, Opposition forces, "Free" :pac: Syrian Army.

I saw a documentary on RT yesterday about a Syrian TV crew who were butchered by the moderate "Free Syrian Army".

It's not as black and white as that. They are Islamist extremist elements in the Free Syrian Army, but that doesn't mean the entire army are terrorists.

RT is Russian propaganda by the way, so take what they report with a massive mountain of salt.

Gatling

Zebra3 wrote: »

Yet, they are magically terrorists since they started fighting the American occupation. :rolleyes:

No that was the Taliban often confused with the Mujahedeen for some strange reason ,

But wouldn't expect anything less on boards , most of the Mujahedeen became the Northern alliance who actually fought against the Taliban which was run by foreign fighters,
But russia is now negotiating with them must make they legitimate to some now

Elmer Blooker

fxotoole wrote: »

RT is Russian propaganda by the way, so take what they report with a massive mountain of salt.

I see. There was no Syrian TV crew butchered by the cuddly moderates, it was all made up.

most of the Mujahedeen became the Northern alliance

More fairytales. The Northern Alliance were insignificant and only held a small portion of the country after the Soviets left, they only entered Kabul in 2002 with the help of the US.

Gatling

Elmer Blooker wrote: »

I see. There it was all made up..

Russian media for you

ilkhanid

Zebra3 wrote: »

Yet, they are magically terrorists since they started fighting the American occupation. :rolleyes:

Fighting the American occupation? Leaving aside the fact that the decline in the numbers of International forces has led to little decline in Taliban activity-as far as I can see most of the targets of the Taliban in Afghanistan have been Afghan soldiers, Afghan policemen, Afghan judges, Afghan teachers, Afghan students and generally people minding their own business doing business in civic buildings or out shopping. I'm afraid that your attempt to paint these fanatic thugs as some kind of freedom fighters is well wide of the mark.
Since you don't like the word "terrorist" Maybe you can come up with a better word for the kind of person who does something like this...
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3221073/Hundreds-Afghan-girls-poisoned-toxic-gas-two-schools-suspected-attacks-Taliban-militants-opposed-education.html

A Tyrant Named Miltiades! wrote: »

Marx said that socialism could never exist in isolation. Stalin disagreed. Stalin was wrong, Marx was right. Socialism can prosper and thrive for a few decades when there is a bloc of co-operating socialist economies, but once this bloc is weakened, socialism will collapse. Socialism is inherently interdependent, it requires local as well as international solidarity.

How could there be a bloc of co-operating socialist economies when the leaders of the "socialist" economies started to fall out with each other before a decade had passed? Stalin tried to destroy Tito. Mao fell out with Khruschev. Albania fell out with Khruschev. When the leaders of Czechoslovakia tried to go their own way they were crushed by Bhrezhnev. Then Romania fell out with Moscow. When Cambodia came under Khmer Rouge rule, they turned on Vietnam. Vietnam invaded and then China invaded them in turn.
The impossibility lies in the nature of the people in charge of the so-called "Socialist" states. Almost without exception, the people in charge of these states were authoritarians and zealots. At worst they were simply psychopaths. Yet it was imagined that they would be able to solve their differences and come to an understanding on matters of policy and dogma. Of course, the default setting in the mentalities of these people was violence, both directed at those in their power, and, when they disagree, at each other. Anybody who imagined that out of the crooked timber of the communist fanatics, the straight structure of socialism was ever going to be made was dreaming!

fxotoole

Elmer Blooker wrote: »

I see. There was no Syrian TV crew butchered by the cuddly moderates, it was all made up.

I never said they weren't. All I'm saying is "consider the source". No need to twist my words.

Gatling

fxotoole wrote: »

I never said they weren't. All I'm saying is "consider the source". No need to twist my words.

Maybe he should post something to back up his claims

Zebra3

ilkhanid wrote: »

Fighting the American occupation? Leaving aside the fact that the decline in the numbers of International forces has led to little decline in Taliban activity-as far as I can see most of the targets of the Taliban in Afghanistan have been Afghan soldiers, Afghan policemen, Afghan judges, Afghan teachers, Afghan students and generally people minding their own business doing business in civic buildings or out shopping. I'm afraid that your attempt to paint these fanatic thugs as some kind of freedom fighters is well wide of the mark.
Since you don't like the word "terrorist" Maybe you can come up with a better word for the kind of person who does something like this...
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3221073/Hundreds-Afghan-girls-poisoned-toxic-gas-two-schools-suspected-attacks-Taliban-militants-opposed-education.html

Yes, the American occupation. Do you not remember the American war crime when it invaded another sovereign state? I know it gets difficult to remember them all, but in this case Afghanistan. And then America sets up a puppet regime for pipelines and the usual sheeple swallow whatever line they hear on BBC or Sky "News".

And my point about the word terrorist is that different terms are used to describe forces fighting different occupations. Naturally if you're fighting the US led occupation of a country you're a "baddie".

And if you want I can post pictures of innocent civilians blown up by US drones. I'm sure you'll be outraged. :rolleyes:

ilkhanid

Zebra3 wrote: »

Yes, the American occupation. Do you not remember the American war crime when it invaded another sovereign state? I know it gets difficult to remember them all, but in this case Afghanistan. And then America sets up a puppet regime for pipelines and the usual sheeple swallow whatever line they hear on BBC or Sky "News".

Sovereign state? There was no such thing in Afghanistan at the time of the American intervention, just warring factions.
As for "pipelines"? Proof, please. We've been hearing people rabbiting on about pipelines, as the deep reason behind every American war for decades now, just like the Iraq war was supposed to be about oil.

Zebra3 wrote: »

And my point about the word terrorist is that different terms are used to describe forces fighting different occupations. Naturally if you're fighting the US led occupation of a country you're a "baddie".

Most normal people would regard the word "baddie" as childishly euphemistic applied to a group that likes to murder schoolteachers, mutilate girls wanting an education, detonate suicide bombs in street markets and assassinate heath workers inoculating children against polio. I don't know when cowardly, demented acts like that became " fighting the US led occupation".
Anyway, this is no occupation. It's an international, UN-mandated mission to help the Afghan government, that includes troops from Belgium, Luxembourg, Turkey, Portugal and Canada.

Zebra3 wrote: »

And if you want I can post pictures of innocent civilians blown up by US drones. I'm sure you'll be outraged. :rolleyes:

Knock yourself out (as they say in the USA) and I'll post a score of pictures of civilians butchered by the Taliban psychopaths for every one of yours.

ilkhanid

ilkhanid wrote: »

Individual liberty is not a "capitalist" obsession, it is part of the common tradition of rights that has been gifted to us by the evolution of societies and thought since the Middle Ages, and especially by the Enlightenment.

Individual liberty is a capitalist obsession. You seem to use the expression 'gifted to us' in a quasi-biblical sense, which reminds me of the American fundamentalist trope of 'God-given freedoms'.

Marxism rejects the so-called Enlightenment philosophy of history; its so-called enlightenment is little more than a superstitious belief in its own rational prestige, whose arrogance has perhaps culminated in Fukuyama, and his ludicrous prophecy of the end of history.

There is nothing sacred about individual liberty. It is a feeble, manmade concept that serves the interests of capital and is nothing more than a vacuous capitalist obsession.

If "actually existing socialism" had been any good it would have built on, expanded that heritage. Instead it sought to trade those rights, the "free healthcare, equal rights for women and minorities, etc" in a bargain that deprived people of the rights of speech, association and publication in return.

First of all, if you read any of my posts, you'd see that I am very critical of the forms of socialism that came into actuality and were theoretically compomised from the mid-20th century, which were usually the doomed, pet projects of egomaniacs.

I don't have a problem with civil liberties per se, even Marx himself espoused these freedoms as being necessary. But they are not an end in themselves. They don't enjoy some superior, God-given spot at the apex of the hierarchy of social justice.

Trotsky was little better than the rest of them. He was no hero, no saviour

Well he clearly wasn't a saviour, since his doctrines were officially rejected. And many communists of the tankie variety would vehemently agree that Trotsky was no hero.

I simply referenced his writings , and those of Marx, to demonstrate how the failure of the 'socialism in once country' lunacy was foreseen 50 - 100 years before it eventually collapsed. It collapsed because the political application of socialism by the likes of Stalin, Mao, Tito, and now, by North Korea, was (and remains) untenable

I haven't quoted much of your post, because I happen to agree with a lot of it. If you're looking for a debate with some Stalinista, you're looking at the wrong guy. That's not to say I don't accept that Stalin did a lot of things correctly, but his ideas were intellectually tainted from the very outset, and have no place in 21st century Marxist discourse.

SeanW

SeanW wrote: »

Korea was united. After the North invaded the South - without a declaration of war, the South and their allies in the democratic world pushed the Northern Communist aggressors way back. The American etc. forces had pushed the Commies almost to the Chinese border, where they would have been wiped out. North Korea had been effectively obliterated. Korea was united.

Then China invaded - again without declaring war in a surprise attack. They pushed the US etc back to a middle ground, drew a new border

This is just bizarre.

Not only were the Chinese out of the room when the Korean borders were established, even the Koreans weren't consulted. The border was determined by the Americans, and agreed to by the Soviet Union.

You seriously need to DuckDuckGo back to your Korean history. I'm not wasting my time with someone who cannot grasp the basics, even on a second attempt.

BillyBobBS

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-nuclear-exclusive-idUSKBN19Z1EN

Looks like the North Koreans may have more nuclear capability than previously thought.

jackboy

BillyBobBS wrote: »

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-nuclear-exclusive-idUSKBN19Z1EN

Looks like the North Koreans may have more nuclear capability than previously thought.

Seems to be mostly speculation based on a little bit of circumstantial evidence.

jackboy

BillyBobBS wrote: »

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-nuclear-exclusive-idUSKBN19Z1EN

Looks like the North Koreans may have more nuclear capability than previously thought.

Seems to be mostly speculation based on a little bit of circumstantial evidence.

Gatling

jackboy wrote: »

Seems to be mostly speculation based on a little bit of circumstantial evidence.

Not really no

BillyBobBS

jackboy wrote: »

Seems to be mostly speculation based on a little bit of circumstantial evidence.

Did you actually read the link? It's anything but.

jackboy

BillyBobBS wrote: »

Did you actually read the link? It's anything but.

Yep, I read it. No hard evidence. They could be producing material.....or carrying out maintenance.

aloyisious

It'd be good to see and hear what the Chinese and Russian analysis of the photos are before doing anything pre-emptive, like a port blockade or something more forceful.

Zebra3

BillyBobBS wrote: »

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-nuclear-exclusive-idUSKBN19Z1EN

Looks like the North Koreans may have more nuclear capability than previously thought.

Sounds all too familiar.

WMDs and Iraq.

Any excuse for the US to launch into another of its blood thirsty wars.

Gatling

aloyisious wrote: »

It'd be good to see and hear what the Chinese and Russian analysis of the photos are before doing anything pre-emptive, like a port blockade or something more forceful.

You likely won't hear anything from either china or russia ,
No point having a naval blockade if the Chinese government are still going to supply them with military resources and equipment to launch missles ,

And we seen that China were quick to respond to impose embargoes on southKorean companies because their government deployed the THAAD missles systems to protect against missles from the North