08-10-2017, 05:06 PM
What worries me is the potential to escalate. This could draw in China and even Russia. At the moment they've urged calm and regard NK's nuclear tests as reckless. But they aren't desperately impressed with what they see as Western provocation.
The reason Cuban Missile Crisis remained a crisis rather than the start of WWIII was very careful communication between JFK and Khrushchev. In both cases what you have is a colossal, and very dangerous, game of chicken. To de-escalate that you have to negotiate a series of steps backwards. With the CMC they had to ensure none of the steps were too humiliating for either side. That whole process of de-escalation came down very much to the personalities of both leaders. Kim and Trump are very different to JFK and Khrushchev. Furthermore they don't have a line of communication (I'm not counting Trump's twitter account!). The risk is that something gets misinterpreted and there is no way to correct it.
NK says it will go for Guam. Three things to note about the plan: a) Guam isn't mainland USA; b) they plan to hit the sea rather than land; c) the plan is non-nuclear. If they hit mainland USA with a nuke (and that is a big IF) that would be suicidal and within an hour Pyongyang would cease to exist. Short of massive escalation, by which time China would be involved too, I really don't see that happening plus there are a load of technical reasons why NK isn't quite there yet (I'll return to this). Also it is odd to give a very precise indication of what you plan to do militarily in a week or so. The risk for NK is if this demonstration fails. The risk to the USA is if they try to shoot the missiles out the sky and fail.
Assuming they managed to detonate missiles around the edges of Guam, then how does the USA respond? My guess would be hitting military and nuclear sites in NK. Is that interpreted as a limited response or the start of something bigger? Does that then provoke NK into using it's conventional weapons on Seoul? It is a very tightly packed city, quite close to the border, and NK has a lot of firepower pointed at it. At what point does the USA flatten Pyongyang? And how much will China tolerate before getting involved. We seriously do NOT want a war with China. They seriously do not want millions of refugees arriving from NK.
NK on its own can't do that much to the USA. I know nuclear missiles are scary, but there is a question mark about whether they have the technology to deliver. They've lied before about their firepower e.g. claiming they had tested a hydrogen bomb. It yielded 6-9 kilotons which is a bit less than Hiroshima or Nagasaki. A proper hydrogen bomb uses an atomic bomb (fission) to ignite the fusion process, and so gives you a megaton yield. Those are the "city killers" we all feared through the cold war. That said 6-9 kilotons is hardly trivial, but it would need to be right on target to be really devastating. If it drifts off a few miles then the city may need to deal with radioactive fallout, but the heat and blast would be over a less populated area. None of that is good, but nothing like what Japan had at the end of WWII. Besides which, it is so obviously suicidal. NK developed nukes to avoid "regime change" like with Iraq. That suggests they want to continue, not end in a fireball.
I don't want this to be partisan because it is an international crisis, but I worry about Trump in times like these. Nuanced and delicate diplomacy isn't his strong point.
The reason Cuban Missile Crisis remained a crisis rather than the start of WWIII was very careful communication between JFK and Khrushchev. In both cases what you have is a colossal, and very dangerous, game of chicken. To de-escalate that you have to negotiate a series of steps backwards. With the CMC they had to ensure none of the steps were too humiliating for either side. That whole process of de-escalation came down very much to the personalities of both leaders. Kim and Trump are very different to JFK and Khrushchev. Furthermore they don't have a line of communication (I'm not counting Trump's twitter account!). The risk is that something gets misinterpreted and there is no way to correct it.
NK says it will go for Guam. Three things to note about the plan: a) Guam isn't mainland USA; b) they plan to hit the sea rather than land; c) the plan is non-nuclear. If they hit mainland USA with a nuke (and that is a big IF) that would be suicidal and within an hour Pyongyang would cease to exist. Short of massive escalation, by which time China would be involved too, I really don't see that happening plus there are a load of technical reasons why NK isn't quite there yet (I'll return to this). Also it is odd to give a very precise indication of what you plan to do militarily in a week or so. The risk for NK is if this demonstration fails. The risk to the USA is if they try to shoot the missiles out the sky and fail.
Assuming they managed to detonate missiles around the edges of Guam, then how does the USA respond? My guess would be hitting military and nuclear sites in NK. Is that interpreted as a limited response or the start of something bigger? Does that then provoke NK into using it's conventional weapons on Seoul? It is a very tightly packed city, quite close to the border, and NK has a lot of firepower pointed at it. At what point does the USA flatten Pyongyang? And how much will China tolerate before getting involved. We seriously do NOT want a war with China. They seriously do not want millions of refugees arriving from NK.
NK on its own can't do that much to the USA. I know nuclear missiles are scary, but there is a question mark about whether they have the technology to deliver. They've lied before about their firepower e.g. claiming they had tested a hydrogen bomb. It yielded 6-9 kilotons which is a bit less than Hiroshima or Nagasaki. A proper hydrogen bomb uses an atomic bomb (fission) to ignite the fusion process, and so gives you a megaton yield. Those are the "city killers" we all feared through the cold war. That said 6-9 kilotons is hardly trivial, but it would need to be right on target to be really devastating. If it drifts off a few miles then the city may need to deal with radioactive fallout, but the heat and blast would be over a less populated area. None of that is good, but nothing like what Japan had at the end of WWII. Besides which, it is so obviously suicidal. NK developed nukes to avoid "regime change" like with Iraq. That suggests they want to continue, not end in a fireball.
I don't want this to be partisan because it is an international crisis, but I worry about Trump in times like these. Nuanced and delicate diplomacy isn't his strong point.