Entire U.S. Senate to go to White House for North Korea briefing

[alexw]

No that's not true it's just media hype, the chain of command system has failsafes in place to avoid the risk of a president losing his mind. I.E the SoD would refuse to relay the order to launch (his codes or in his absence the codes of his assistant are required to launch) and then inform the Cabinet/Congress to report that the president had gone mad, the cabinet can declare the President unfit.

False.

If the SoD refused to confirm the launch it would simply fall to his second in command. It would then rapidly continue down the chain of command until the launch occurred and as the military have the obeying of orders ingrained into them over multiple decades someone would confirm it without a doubt. By contrast getting congress together to remove the president would take hours. The launch would have happened by then and it would be too late.

[Berengil]

South Korea has to approve any military action the US takes under US-SK agreement.

No SK approval, no nothing.

The US would also likely seek Japanese approval as well, but unlike South Korea, it's not required.

Lol? Wtf would SK do about it if we just went ahead and did it? Without us, they cease to exist.

The solution to NK, though horrid, is quite clear AND a consequence of our "non-serious policy" as you put it (I agree with that part btw):

Carpet-bomb NK's artillery positions targeting SK with tactical nukes, while using slightly larger nukes to target NK's nuclear stockpile. Then when they send their 1 million man army towards SK, the same to them just before they reach the border.

- - - Updated - - -

No one is entirely blameless in WW1. Its just weird that germany gets the main fault when it just hold up its contract. In the end the "winners" got what they deserved by setting up WW2 with blaming ww1 on germany alone.

I blame the Central Powers exclusively & collectively: Austria-Hungary for using the assassination of Franz Ferdinand to advance a set of unrealistic demands on Serbia, demands they knew very well would lead to war, drawing in Russia as Serbia's ally. A-H had territorial ambitions in the Balkans, and did not scruple to provoke a war for its own ambitions.

As for Germany, the Kaiser was a mercurial man-child who should have grown up and told A-H " The Serbians have agreed to all but one of your demands. Accept that, or you fight alone, idiots."

[Skroe]

Lol? Wtf would SK do about it if we just went ahead and did it? Without us, they cease to exist.

The solution to NK, though horrid, is quite clear AND a consequence of our "non-serious policy" as you put it (I agree with that part btw):

Carpet-bomb NK's artillery positions targeting SK with tactical nukes, while using slightly larger nukes to target NK's nuclear stockpile. Then when they send their 1 million man army towards SK, the same to them just before they reach the border.

How about because they live there, we're their friends and it's the right thing to do? Because it's our amorphous "security" but their homeland? Because being a leader means listening, not ordering, which is an aspect of that Americans seemingly forget on a regular basis.

And think about the implications of we just did what you said and "went ahead and did it". Who would in the world would host us knowing that they don't have control over their own security? What the US would get is a torrent of "thanks for everything, but we'd like you to leave". And you know what? Our (ex)-allies would be absolutely right to ask that of us. Why? The same reason... the EXACT same reason that Trump's NATO / Korea / Japan nonsense was so terrible and dangerous. Because their security depends on our predictability in our treatment of them. As soon as we're not predictable towards them, we become more trouble than we're worth. And they'll make alternative arrangements. And there are alternative arrangements. We are not the only game in town.

For the record, the South Korean military would clean North Korea's clock. They would also be doing the lion-share of any fighting, particularly ground forces.

[Deleted]

Because it's not like Russia ever acted badly towards it's western neighbors before any of that. Or that there is a more NATO presence in the eastern partners now than 15 years ago because of how Russia's acted over the past two decades. I remember the -hope- that was had in most of Europe when Putin took over. A man who could forge a new legacy for the nation. (Which he hasn't, he's just striving for the old age of gone glory).
It's not like Russian propaganda around Estonian policy and projects have cased internal strife due to the fact that they can broadcast Russian state sponsored television and control a message there (as well as radio).
When Estonia joined NATO Russia had already started to act as a belligerent in certain aspects of their SoI. They wanted out of that SoI as they had stopped trusting Russia.
Having stuff like this happen at their embassy, along with ethnic Russians rioting in Tallinn doesn't exactly remove fears about Russian intentions.

What a load of bullshit. I actually live in Tallinn, so I can safely say that all you just posted is bullshit political propaganda NATO is feeding to morons who believe anything anti-Russian.

Propaganda around Estonian policy? Please do enlighten us on what that is, while I enlighten you on what Estonian policy actually is.

Lets start with that riot you've mentioned. There was a monument in middle of city, it was about WW2. After collapse of USSR anything anti-Russian has become popular in Estonia, some even attempted to rewrite history claiming that Nazis were good people in WW2 and bad Russians defeated to good guys. Yes, for real, its not something I've made up. Those assholes got to power with massive support from NATO countries. NATO turned blind eye towards all that bullshit. Since then people have come to their senses, so Nazi bullshit no longer works. But when those riots happened, it was at its peak. During that pro-Nazi bullshit period government decided to remove anything that reminded of WW2, including monument in middle of city. For ethnic Russians, who make about 40% of Tallinn's population (and slightly smaller percentage country wide), it was unacceptable. Monument was hideous, so as far as I'm concerned, removal was a good thing, but only because it was ugly.

Removal of that monument is prefect example of oppression of minorities, something that western countries fight for so proudly today, ignoring of course oppression when it suits them.

Then what Estonian policy actually is (well... was. things started to look better recently, mostly because morons are no longer in power). As I mentioned above, since collapse of USSR anything anti-Russian became popular in Estonia. Russian schools are getting closed or funding reduced, until recently it was not allowed to have advertising in Russian language, everything that had Russian text on it has been replaced with Estonian text only. In some places multi-lingual means text in Estonian and English, not Russian. That's with over third of country's population being Russian.

Before you post nonsense about Russians invading or whatever bullshit you got brainwashed with, Estonia as country never actually existed, apart from few years between WW1 and WW2. Territory always belonged to someone. Russia owned this land for about 100 years before WW1. The beautiful old town in Tallinn, which is by far the best tourist attraction here is entirely built by Germans and Swedes when they used to own this land. Almost all landmarks and museums (except for ones showing village life) are built by non-Estonians who live there, mostly Germans. Capital was not built by Estonians. Nothing was. Nothing is. Even today everything is sponsored by EU.

So when USSR collapsed and nationalists got to power, they didn't know what to do with it. But being crazy nationalists, they wanted to remove all ethnic Russian from land, even though many lived here for many generations, so with blessing from western countries they made lots of laws that directly oppress minorities. Russian language got banned, Russian schools got funding cut and closed. Language police appeared, which had power to take anyone's job is person didn't speak near perfect Estonian.

Government even invented non-citizen passport. What is that? That's a passport, but with different cover color that doesn't give right to vote. Why did they do it? Because they were obligated to give passports to any citizens that lived in Estonia when USSR collapsed, but they didn't want it, so they found a loophole by giving piece of paper stating that you are Estonian citizen, while not giving same rights as to citizens. To get real passport person had to either have Estonian name or prove that his ancestors lived in Estonia before 1940 (which is how I got proper passport - my ancestors lived in eastern estonia for centuries) or pass Estonian language exam that was so hard that even many native speakers couldn't pass.

Would you find that acceptable? Then you'd be fine with Switzerland banning French and Italian languages. Then you'd be fine with Finland banning Swedish language (it is second official language there, even though % of swedes is tiny, compared to % of russians in estonia).

Things got better recently. Nazi bullshit is less tolerated, language police got less power than it used to have. Things are looking better.

[Berengil]

For the record, the South Korean military would clean North Korea's clock. They would also be doing the lion-share of any fighting, particularly ground forces.

They do have an impressive military, no question about it.

I think that the price of a US security guarantee (to any country) should be that the decisions are all ours to make. The protection of the greatest war-fighting machine to ever exist on this planet shouldn't come cheap. When we do consult someone else, it should be because of history (the UK mainly) or as a courtesy.

[Deleted]

I hope the reality has set in on the Trump administration that anyone saying this ends up in a ground war is INSANE. Seoul gets wiped off the map overnight and mushroom clouds appear in Japan and the rest of South Korea.

Trump would have to nuke. There is zero way around this.

How is nk getting a nuke to Japan?

[GennGreymane]

Korea has one hero who can save them from the diabolical north

[bladeXcrasher]

Yeah, those strikes in retaliation for the chemical attack were totally planned by the last administration. They just never carried them out because the attack hadn't happened yet...

I mean, yes they were but never carried out since Obama refused to with congressional approval.

http://www.cnn.com/2017/04/07/politi...strikes-trump/

[Skroe]

They do have an impressive military, no question about it.

I think that the price of a US security guarantee (to any country) should be that the decisions are all ours to make. The protection of the greatest war-fighting machine to ever exist on this planet shouldn't come cheap. When we do consult someone else, it's either because of history (the UK mainly) or as a courtesy.

That's an entirely unreasonable demand. Nobody would work with us. They'd be insane to work with out.

You need to keep in mind the US is not doing these country's a favor. By being involved in their security, we're also getting control over their ability to act independently of us in regards to security. This keeps the peace.

Consider for example, that few posts up somebody was musing that if North Korea nuked South Korea, the US would never retaliate with nuclear weapons. Nonsense. The US absolutely would. Why? Because South Korea (and Japan) are under the US's nuclear umbrella. This was not altruistic. This was strategic. Non-proliferation -
by ANYBODY - is a core US security goal. Bringing them under it was done under the agreement they would not pursue independent nuclear programs. This kept knowledge about nuclear weapon (warhead and missile) design to a far smaller and more localized group of people, and prevented that knowledge from spreading. It also prevents allies from using nuclear weapons without our approval, potentially drawing us in.

If the US didn't honor the umbrella, then Germany (likely on behalf of the EU), Japan, South Korea, Australia and others would all start independent nuclear programs because our ganratee would be hollow. And we'd face a spread of the very technology we've worked, reasonably successfully, to control for 60 years.

This is one example but it should illustrate how the guarantee can't be "do what we say if you want it". Any country would be insane to accept such terms, and without that relationship, regional, and then global security would rapidly deteriorate against our interests.

Besides it's kind of a moot point isn't it? The US isn't looking to pick a fight with North Korea. If the North Koreans do something that would engender a US response, chances are, South Korea would concur in their own right.

But as a matter of respect - because you know, they do live there and would be the ones dying the most and fighting the most - they must have a say.

[bladeXcrasher]

It doesn't matter what the stance is. You can have a stance of x,y,z but as long as the power is in someone elses hands that stance in meaningless, and in terms of the president being able to launch ICBM's, that's exactly what that stance is. Only one person can determine whether ICBM's will be launched, and his desires on this issue cannot be over-ruled, and that person is the president. All he has to do is say I want to launch at x,y,z and they will launch. The Sec of Defense does have to confirm that its the president authorizing the launch but all he can do if he doesn't want to confirm is resign, and then it simply falls to his second in command and so on down the line until they launch meaning that it isn't a block at all.

You are very ignorant on this subject and clearly have NO idea of fail safes in the process.

I really haven't had time to vet iiss, but typically i am wary of any 'think tanks' bias on subjects.

[Aggrophobic]

They do have an impressive military, no question about it.

I think that the price of a US security guarantee (to any country) should be that the decisions are all ours to make. The protection of the greatest war-fighting machine to ever exist on this planet shouldn't come cheap. When we do consult someone else, it should be because of history (the UK mainly) or as a courtesy.

The US would be alone if that was ever their stance.
Very much alone.

[bladeXcrasher]

Without. It isn't the same thing though. If we use that logic many military actions are planned by the previous admin. This admin is the one that pulled the trigger without consulting Congress.

Yes without, on phone. Doesn't change the fact that the planning was completed long before. They knew were and how to strike for months already. (again, don't take this as agreement with the recent decision)

[urasim]

No one is entirely blameless in WW1. Its just weird that germany gets the main fault when it just hold up its contract. In the end the "winners" got what they deserved by setting up WW2 with blaming ww1 on germany alone.

It all depends on who you talk to. If you're talking to an uneducated person, they'd probably spout a lot of bullshit on the subject. Don't go assuming everyone thinks Germany is the only state who started the wars.

[lonely zergling]

It all depends on who you talk to. If you're talking to an uneducated person, they'd probably spout a lot of bullshit on the subject. Don't go assuming everyone thinks Germany is the only state who started the wars.

Schools in Germany teach that Germany alone is responsible for WW1. No shit. I had to go through this bullshit myself.

[Zelk]

America going for a 2nd round of Korean genocide then

[Lothar from accounting]

Cant wait to see how historians try to blame WW3 on the germans again.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvVFd6J_MA8 Done.

[urasim]

Schools in Germany teach that Germany alone is responsible for WW1. No shit. I had to go through this bullshit myself.

Germany is a special case and has been guilt tripping their people for a long time. I have many German relatives, so I am very familiar with this.

[Skroe]

Schools in Germany teach that Germany alone is responsible for WW1. No shit. I had to go through this bullshit myself.

Losing wars has consequences.

Germany lost two of the largest ones in human history within a 30 year span.

Sucks, doesn't it?

[lonely zergling]

Losing wars has consequences.

Germany lost two of the largest ones in human history within a 30 year span.

Sucks, doesn't it?

Yeah it sucks, getting dragged into WW1 - getting blamed for it which caused Hitler to rise - and then loosing the war because the Führer was retarded and attacked his Bro'seph Stalin.

Only needed half the world to defeat us. Hahah.

[Berengil]

The US would be alone if that was ever their stance.
Very much alone.

And?

Then we go with a 21st century version of the Monroe Doctrine: " The Americas are our concern. We don't care what you do to each other on the other side of the world. Bring that sht over here, and you'll regret it."