North Korea there will be blood?

Here is a good report defining the situation in NK.

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In particular, the percentage of North Korean forces deployed within 100km of the DMZ has significantly increased during the past two decades. Currently, North Korea deploys approximately 65% of its military units, and up to 80% of its estimated aggregate firepower, within 100km of the DMZ. This inventory includes approximately 700,000 troops, 8,000 artillery systems and 2,000 tanks.

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If each one of those artillery systems fires once/minute that is 80,000 shells into Seoul in 10 minutes. How do you stop that?edit; Of course, 10 minutes is about all the time that they would have.Edited by Prototypical, : No reason given.

Even if this were remotely true, which it isn't, why should any rational person like yourself use that standard to gauge the harm that the US would suffer. A casualty is a casualty and there is no way that the US will suffer more than the N Koreans.I am sure that you are aware of the history of the Korean peninsula. This idea of just packing up and leaving is not only repulsive but incredibly naive. What about Japan and Taiwan? Shall we abandon them as well if Kim young son gets the urge to invade? Not our problem? The real potential for harm will be a disruption of global political stability.It is tragic that the Koreans have been screwed over for centuries by the Japanese, French, Chinese, Americans and Russians. The people there suffer for being at the front line of a global clash of ideologies. The idea of leaving them to their fate at this point in time is just wrong.

Different gov'ts certainly value life differently but a casualty is a casualty by any rational or moral standard. I thought that the question was how do we avoid the destruction of Korea. What makes you think that the harm would be less if the US were to pull out? US withdrawal would most certainly lead to a war that would quickly spread. How much would that cost?

Here you are saying that the US will suffer more harm than the N Koreans if we engage them. In order to support that notion you claim that US casualties are more valuable to the US than the Korean casualties are valuable to the US or to the Koreans. I think you went as far as saying that 1 US soldier was worth more than all of the N Koreans combined.I am not really sure if you mean that the Koreans can afford to lose more people than the US can or just that they are willing to sacrifice more people or what. Do you mean that there are some people who are more important to the war effort than others?In terms of casualties, any rational assessment of harm caused by a conflict will conclude that 1 dead person = 1 dead person. From the OP "4. what is a possible solution to stabilize this crisis?"And by "Korea" of course I mean South Dakota. When you said "We could just bring the troops home." Say we do nothing and let them hash it out. We abandon the S Koreans to be taken over by the North and we do nothing if they start sending missiles into Japan. (Which you claim is not an isolationist approach.)Then we wait a decade or two for them to realize that capitalism isn't quite as evil as they thought it was and then start trading with them?Somehow this makes sense to you because the average American thinks that 1 US casualty is more valuable than all of the Koreans combined?

I appreciate that every nation values it's own soldiers and citizens above all others but I would completely reject the idea that the lives of the 'enemy' have no value. The evidence is the public's reaction to 'accidental' killings of civilians and the treatment of foreign prisoners. It would seem that Americans actually do value the lives and rights of others.Many of them value the ideal of freedom above their own lives. This is why we, in the free world, are willing to spend blood and treasure to preserve and extend it. We do this for our own benefit and because our moral code says that what is good for me is probably good for you.This notion that the US has no interest in what happens in Korea or Japan is nonsense. There is the small matter of $67 B in annual trade with S Korea, $147 B with Japan and $48 B with Taiwan. Were all of this trade to be disrupted by some conflict the quality of life for millions would suffer.It is one world and the US by virtue of having emerged from WW2 on the top is obliged and fully interested in seeing the whole thing work. This is why Truman et al actually did spread the wealth around and made great efforts toward rebuilding the world that had just been ravaged. Cynically, we needed someone to buy our stuff and people to exploit. In reality, that is what puts food on the table for everybody. Eventually, like China and Russia, N Korea will come to understand this. Perhaps even jar.Edited by Prototypical, : add an is

In an effort to actually pin down your position (something like trying to pick up mercury with my fingers) I used trade interests as a blatantly obvious example of the interest that the US has in S Korea. So I don't know how your calculus works. Is $50b in trade worth 1 US soldier? Should the US put their flag down anywhere and make a stand? Should they have any allies or come to the aid of anybody? Is that the issue now? Was the German invasion of Poland in 1939 a threat to the US? What about the invasion of Kuwait in 1991? Was Bin Laden a threat to the continued existence of the US? What if Iran attacks Israel? No nation is an island unto themselves and this applies to the US more than most. See we can't even keep them out of a discussion about a conflict let alone a conflict itself.You suggested that the US might be best served by pulling out of S Korea to avoid any US casualties should a war break out ( I think). If this is the approach then why should the US worry about Taiwan or Japan. Again, N Korea has 000's of missiles that can easily reach Japan and cause them serious problems. Should the US be interested at that point?I am not trying to avoid anything jar. I certainly might be misunderstanding your position and so I am engaging you with responses designed to illuminate the implications of what it looks like you are saying.

Sure that's true. How is that particularly relevant to this topic? The important question is what do we value. That is why I used all zeros . I really do not know what specific ability they have. They do have a 1.1 million man standing army with another 4 million in reserve. They do have thousands of old Soviet scud type missiles that could reach Japan with conventional or chemical warheads. Perhaps they can not send an atomic warhead to Japan on a missile but they could certainly float one into a port city on a fishing boat. They have no love for the Japanese and why should they stop if they are unopposed in S Korea?I am trying to get you to define how far you think the US should go with a policy of not intervening in the local affairs of allied foreign nations. What constitutes local when you are talking about atomic weapons and the global economy? Even though the N Korean leadership may be bat-shit crazy I would guess that they fully believe that the US presence threatens them personally.I agree that the Koreans have to be the key players but I do not see how they can be the only ones. How do you suppose that they would work it out if the US was not there?----------------I can not fathom how the N Korean leadership, or anyone else, can look at the living conditions in the 2 countries and believe that they are on the right track. N Korean GDP is $506/capita. S Korean GDP is $23,020/capita. Sure that is not the only measure of success but it has to figure in there somehow.Isn't 60 yrs of trying to make something work enough time to figure that it is not going to work? Do we not know with absolute conviction that our political system is better than theirs? Can we not support this conviction with evidence?I disagree with the idea that what the N Korean leadership is doing to the N Koreans should not be of great concern to the US and the rest of the world. Don't we owe them something just by virtue of the fact that they are starving for reasons that are completely avoidable? Has history not taught us that there is something wrong with keeping millions of people in forced labour camps?and hey wait a minute... don't our iphone parts come from S Korea?!!!

I am not so sure that I would classify it that way. Didn't our intervention make it possible for S Korea to become China's 3rd largest trading partner? ( A fact that is news to me.) This is likely the thing that will keep the most peace and I think that the US and the UN deserve to take the credit for enabling this situation to exist because they interfered and gave S Korea a chance to get up on their feet. China especially has to step up and the world should pressure them to do so.