North Korea launches rocket (Nope, didn't happen)

[njiska]

Surprise level: nearly 0.

Same old DPRK.

[Ed Oscuro]

Update: The rocket had finally launched... then it fell apart shortly after take-off.

So is that where all the rice paste went?

Funny thing, they were fueling the rocket when I was typing my last reply - if I had been able to tune into the radio a bit longer I might have heard of the glorious denouement.

In all seriousness, I am worried for the rocket scientists, as people, because of knowledge about how the Soviet Union tended to treat scientists in what they might call vital defense industries.

But it is good they didn't achieve much. Unfortunately this may mean that the pressure is on to tie Kim Jong-Un to legitimacy and the military via another brutal attack, like the killings that presaged his father's ascension to power, or the shelling of that island a while back.

[Blade]

I heard somewhere they were running military campaigns to hide the fact people are starving...

If you ask me this whole thing was a cry for help...nobody knows how to run that country.

[GaijinPunch]

Wonder how many scientists will be executed.

[BIL]

Unfortunately this may mean that the pressure is on to tie Kim Jong-Un to legitimacy and the military via another brutal attack

Hopefully he agrees to star in a new state media franchise, Chubby Bareback Gulag Twinks. I'd chuck in a tenner to watch him getting some meat in his double bread from those scary NK troops.

[njiska]

Wonder how many scientists will be executed.

Sadly it's probably going to be a lot.

[Skykid]

Wonder how many scientists will be executed.

Sadly it's probably going to be a lot.

Dunno, they must be running thin on scientists these days. Can't imagine North Korea is famed for its educational system, even the country's leaders are dumbasses.

[CIT]

I also doubt scientists will be executed, they're too important for the regime to be wasted.

...even the country's leaders are dumbasses.

I disagree. I think they are acting very rational and from the perspective of preservation of power as their main goal they've done everything right!

[Icarus]

Someone needs to change the thread title to "North Korea *almost* launches rocket".

[neorichieb1971]

This thread just fuels speculation that NK is amounting to much.

From the youtubes i've seen they look well fed and healthy. I'm inclined to say we are about as misinformed of them as they are of us.

[Skykid]

This thread just fuels speculation that NK is amounting to much.

From the youtubes i've seen they look well fed and healthy.

Obviously you're talking about the Pyongyang elite, not the parents eating their children in the countryside?

[Jonathan Ingram]

If brainwashing and allowing the starvation of a populace to maintain absolute control isn't evil, I don't know what is.

The existing global socio-economic order starves millions of people to death yearly and drives hundreds of millions more into grinding poverty, but you probably don`t accuse the people in charge of the system of being evil(but maybe you do, in which case I apologize). Why is NK an exception? I think there are issues that rank quite a bit higher on the list of humanity`s concerns than NK`s shitty but otherwise benign regime(in the way it impacts global events). Yet all this unhealthy attention to the "North Korean problem" makes me think otherwise.

brainwashing

...happens everyday everywhere. Mass media in EU, US and everywhere else condition people to think in a certain way - the way that reflects the material interests of the class that owns them. This propaganda is smarter and less in your face than the stupid crap that exists in NK. It`s also far more effective and the amount of people who take everything they see on TV and read in newspapers at face value is simply tremendous.

[Randorama]

The existing global socio-economic order starves millions of people to death yearly and drives hundreds of millions more into grinding poverty, but you probably don`t accuse the people in charge of the system of being evil(but maybe you do, in which case I apologize). Why is NK an exception?

If I may, you answer this question below:

...happens everyday everywhere. Mass media in EU, US and everywhere else condition people to think in a certain way - the way that reflects the material interests of the class that owns them. This propaganda is smarter and less in your face than the stupid crap that exists in NK. It`s also far more effective and the amount of people who take everything they see on TV and read in newspapers at face value is simply tremendous.

[Ed Oscuro]

Also, we don't have Stalinist death camps.

Someone needs to change the thread title to "North Korea *almost* launches rocket".

No they don't.

[tinotormed]

Thread title changed after North Korea's rocket launch became a dismal failure.

http://www.interaksyon.com/article/2930 ... -a-failure

[Icarus]

Thread title changed after North Korea's rocket launch became a dismal failure.
http://www.interaksyon.com/article/2930 ... -a-failure

Well, that's what you get for trying to build a rocket with an Airfix kit and wood glue, and filling the fuel tanks with cooking oil.
In next month's news: North Korea tries to launch a rocket using a giant version of an Angry Birds catapult.

[Phoenix]

Epic fail. But i dont think any scientist will be executed. But their sons will be sent to one of their holidays inns.

Crazy country.

[Ed Oscuro]

I'm sure the families of the scientists are already being kept under close watch. Unfortunately for NK, they don't have the ability to recover the crashed (but still launched!) rocket to figure out what went wrong, which is one of the obvious pitfalls of being a hermit kingdom without any leeway to do much with international help.

[blackoak]

good article: http://www.wsws.org/articles/2012/apr20 ... -a14.shtml

[Jonathan Ingram]

Also, we don't have Stalinist death camps.

You have the exploitation of peripheral capitalist countries through economic means to make up for that(hence the existence of the term 'imperialism'). That nets enough profits to keep the living standards somewhat decent and helps to maintain the "human face" facade(the humanist superstructure was already brought up in this thread). Most of the misery is successfully exported to elsewhere. No need for "Stalinist death camps" at home just yet(XD at the liberal use of the term "Stalinist").

On the topic of the missile launch, Japan and Philippines just dodged a bullet.

[Skykid]

good article: http://www.wsws.org/articles/2012/apr20 ... -a14.shtml

Very good article. Eyebrow raising in-fact.

Not sure why I haven't considered the matter from that perspective before, especially since it's the most logical. That's Rupert Murdoch TV for you eh?

[Randorama]

You have the exploitation of peripheral capitalist countries through economic means to make up for that(hence the existence of the term 'imperialism'). That nets enough profits to keep the living standards somewhat decent and helps to maintain the "human face" facade(the humanist superstructure was already brought up in this thread). Most of the misery is successfully exported to elsewhere. No need for "Stalinist death camps" at home just yet(XD at the liberal use of the term "Stalinist").

So, what is exactly your point? We should celebrate the dismal failure of a state that NK is, because they have their own concentration camps, unlike the dismal failures of western states that have them in some convenient third world dictatorship (when jails cannot be used to this effect)?

Or perhaps you want to tell us that, indeed, Juche is the pinnacle of Marxist thought?

On the topic of the missile launch, Japan and Philippines just dodged a bullet.

NK simply lack any knowledge and tools to effectively be a problem, except to themselves.

[tinotormed]

http://www.interaksyon.com/infotech/net ... ket-launch

Aight, this here article will let you people have something to laugh about da rocket launch fail! (My favorite has to be the Wile E. Coyote one)

[BulletMagnet]

In next month's news: North Korea tries to launch a rocket using a giant version of an Angry Birds catapult.

South Korea is already halfway there on that one.

[tinotormed]

My own reaction after the rocket launch failure:

http://twitpic.com/99pfvs

Blah, this one's probably more hilarious:

http://twitpic.com/99tn3x

[Skykid]

good article: http://www.wsws.org/articles/2012/apr20 ... -a14.shtml

Follow up on this blackoak, I found this report from last September, suggesting the anti-missile defence shield around Asia has been making rapid progress:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8N0oq63DxQ

So what's that now, Australia, Turkey, Romania, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan (amongst others?). I'd say the US is doing a good job of swift containment of their primary targets (hint: Not North Korea.)

Very disappointed to hear they're running wargame scenarios for 2016 and that they actually ignored requests from Russia and China for a peaceful disarmament of missile bases on both sides. (Assuming this report is correct, of course.)

[blackoak]

good article: http://www.wsws.org/articles/2012/apr20 ... -a14.shtml

Follow up on this blackoak, I found this report from last September, suggesting the anti-missile defence shield around Asia has been making rapid progress:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8N0oq63DxQ

Thanks for posting that. Some good albeit brief information about some of Obama's backers as well. I regularly read about the strategic posturing around China, especially concerning relations with Australia. Its not an area of intrigue I've looked into very deeply yet, though. What I can say is that the gulf between official rhetoric and actual events is, as usual, very disconcerting.

[Moniker]

Very disappointed to hear they're running wargame scenarios for 2016 and that they actually ignored requests from Russia and China for a peaceful disarmament of missile bases on both sides. (Assuming this report is correct, of course.)

Nuclear disarmament doesn't make much sense to me. You can't put this genie back in the bottle. Sure you get a little lip service and brownie points for reducing your nuclear stock, but it doesn't amount to much in reality. The nuclear deterrent will be the only real option until it's outclassed technologically by a working missile defense system or similar.

Then you get assholes and/or morons like the leadership in North Korea and Iran and I'm damn glad we have silos in Turkey and nuclear subs around S. Korea.

[GaijinPunch]

Nuclear disarmament doesn't make much sense to me.

It's like gun bans in the US. I suppose it's possible I could butt fuck Beyonce while one of the Olson twins sits on my face. The laws of physics allow it, although reality does not.

[Ed Oscuro]

The argument for disarmament goes something like this:

Russia got scared about American nukes, so they proliferated nuclear weapons.
China got scared about Russia.
India got scared about China.
Pakistan got scared about India.

Iran and the DPRK are doing their own things right now. News commentators have had a lot of fun recently saying that the lesson of Libya was that no dictatorship should give up its nuclear weapons programs, but in truth we probably could have bombed them anyway. Nuclear weapons could have been something to spur us into acting more quickly.

Disarmament (more correctly arms reduction, just like in the name of the treaty) is more about preventing chains of nuclear envy so that relatively well-funded governments seen as legitimate (i.e., with access to banks) do not feel as strongly that they need to build lots of weapons to balance their regional rivals.

Right now the problem isn't Iran, and it isn't the DPRK. It's Pakistan, which appears unstable and offers terrorists unique potential to steal weapons. Given the above, it also shouldn't be any surprise to learn that Pakistan is the most active proliferator of nuclear weapons.