KR Korean Cold War Officially Over - Leaders shown holding hands and crossing borders

Normally North Korea news goes in the mega thread but this is probably the biggest thing since the Berlin Wall came down and deserves it's own stand alone. You can see the meeting between the two leaders and crossing each others' boarders while holding hands for pictures before the peace summit.

https://www.voanews.com/a/north-south-korean-leaders-historic-summit/4367114.html

 

[frozenrunner]

Yeah but Reagan didn't just suddenly decide to jump in a monster truck and drive it into the Berlin wall one day. Even if it's just solely symbolic, it's still important. Becaust things are moving forward, not backward.

Only progressives get to determine the way forward, Drumfpkins!

 

[Curt Sibling]

Kim Jong-Lardboy will never allow real change in the peninsula - He knows this would lead to his eventual downfall.

 

[frozenrunner]

Kim Jong-Lardboy will never allow real change in the peninsula - He knows this would lead to his eventual downfall.

Maybe. Or maybe he's trying to find a way he can save face (and his ass from going to prison for human rights abuses) while also slowly winding down a dictatorship even he knows is doomed.

NK is kind of a black box, politically. How would we know the difference between the above and business as usual? I don't know if we could, but allowing for a peaceful, gradual end to this shitshow, if possible, might not be a bad idea.

 

[Curt Sibling]

Maybe. Or maybe he's trying to find a way he can save face (and his ass from going to prison for human rights abuses) while also slowly winding down a dictatorship even he knows is doomed.

Sadly, dictators seldom surrender power willingly and politely turn themselves in for war crimes.

 

[Nacho Man Randy Salsa]

I don't trust anything the Kims say or do. Their words are meaningless and their actions are empty.

 

[Shokew]

Can't even make it passed the first page without someone mentioning Hillary Clinton.

Don't let yourself get triggered, now - that shit's dangerous, m8. Especially over that old fucking lizard bitch.

Kim Jong-Lardboy will never allow real change in the peninsula - He knows this would lead to his eventual downfall.

Sad, but true - too bad what the lefties are striving for will only make things WORSE. Lovely as the idea of a unified Korea is, let alone a unified world, it's better to always be prepared to fight and stay educated as well so you can fight with more than weapons, after all. Lardboy clearly knows this and clearly, if we're being optimistic here, likely just wants to open up trade to his fellow Nork loyalist richboys/girls (the underlings will still suffer, unfortunately...).

Regardless (as so many have put it better than I could ever have or will, which I'm A-OK with, BTW.), there's nothing we can do that won't make things worse for the common citizen of BEST Korea that doesn't involve them turning permanently into poison green veggies. Dealing with this in a way that doesn't cause a power vacuum and make things worse for the common man is gonna take a lot more work than what we've witnessed here over the weekend.

 

[cactus]

Yeah but Reagan didn't just suddenly decide to jump in a monster truck and drive it into the Berlin wall one day. Even if it's just solely symbolic, it's still important. Becaust things are moving forward, not backward.

The thing with the Berlin Wall coming down that people here may not know about is that it only came down because there was a miscommunication. Kim Jong-Un is the one doing talks, so it's unlikely something that dumb will happen in this case.

 

[PS1gamenwatch]

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...for-denuclearization-pms-office-idUSKBN1I001G

Japan's Abe, Trump agree Korean summit positive for denuclearization: PM's office

TOKYO (Reuters) - Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and U.S. President Donald Trump welcomed the inter-Korean summit as good for denuclearization and a “historical step” towards peace and stability in northeast Asia, Abe’s office said on Sunday.

The leaders of North and South Korea pledged at a historic summit on Friday to work for “complete denuclearization” of the Korean peninsula. However, Trump said he would maintain pressure on Pyongyang through sanctions ahead of his own unprecedented meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

Abe and Trump spoke on a 30-minute phone call on Saturday, in which they agreed on how crucial it was that Pyongyang take concrete steps towards denuclearization, the Japanese premier’s office said in a statement.


“The important thing is whether North Korea will take specific actions in the future,” Abe told reporters late on Saturday, according to remarks released by his office.


Trump and his South Korean counterpart, Moon Jae-in, agreed on the need for an early summit between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, which Trump has said would take place in the next three to four weeks.

Separately, Abe told reporters after a call on Sunday with Moon that the South Korean president had raised at the summit with Kim the issue of past abductions of Japanese citizens by North Korea. It has been one of the thorniest issues in relations between the two countries.

North Korea admitted in 2002 to kidnapping 13 Japanese in the 1970s and 1980s to train spies. Five of them returned to Japan, but Tokyo suspects that hundreds more may have been taken.


Abe has made the abductions a keystone of his political career, and has pledged to work until all 13 of the people North Korea admitted to abducting have returned to Japan.

 

[Trilby]

The thing with the Berlin Wall coming down that people here may not know about is that it only came down because there was a miscommunication.

I've read about that, it was kinda amusing how that happened at all.

Kim Jong-Un is the one doing talks, so it's unlikely something that dumb will happen in this case.

Certainly won't be like what occurred in Romania due to the events that bubbled by the end of '89. That leader really had it coming.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanian_Revolution

 

[RP 520]

I think the Kim Jong-Un meetings are more comparable to the US/Soviet SALT agreements and Deng Xiaoping's overtures rather than the fall of the Berlin Wall or collapse of the Soviet Union. North Korea will probably formally end the war, maybe reduce their nuclear stockpile and very slightly ease restrictions on their citizenry from 1984 tier down to life at the height of Stalinism. Even if Kim Jong-Un actually wanted to free up some people it would be a massive threat to the power of his inner circle of generals since they would be losing the most out of all of this. They would probably rather put a bullet in his head and turn North Korea into a warlord state than lose any more power than that.

 

[TowinKarz]

Maybe. Or maybe he's trying to find a way he can save face (and his ass from going to prison for human rights abuses) while also slowly winding down a dictatorship even he knows is doomed.

The optimistic part of me thinks this is it, he knows the regime is doomed. Or rather, "doomed" as he defines it.... the fall of his clique as the absolute ruling class, there has got to be some significant rumblings of discontent that even he can now hear from just below where he sits. North Korea itself isn't going to fall, but, something, or some group of somethings, is causing it's current power structure to become untenable on the inside for him.

Who knows what they are.

Is it China telling them that having a leaky nuclear testing site right next to them is not appreciated? And they'd happily replace him with a more loyal puppet who'll make sure that shit blows SOUTH from now on?

Are his fellow elites feeling the crunch of sanctions? Is the price of black market western goodies getting too high?

Something has him spooked, and he realizes that if he gets booted out of power, not only does he lose all his toys, but there is not a single place out there for him to run to that would shield him from being offed in retribution by someone in the oligarchy, long before any honest attempt could even be organized to someday put him in the dock at The Hague for human rights violations.

It used to be, back in the day, that tinpot socialist dictators in Africa, Asia, or Micronesia could always run to the USSR for asylum when the Generals pulled a coup or the Marines suddenly showed up on his doorstep, but in this case, Kim's only safe harbor is, where?

I think whoever he had as his "safehouse" option may have sent him a telegram in the last month or so telling him "Yeah, uh, about that, deal's off, you fuck up bad enough the world powers come looking for you? Don't knock on this door"

Because absolute dictators don't show concessions unless they HAVE to.

 

[Olhelm]

Kim heard that SoKo was getting Krispy Kreme.

Dem original glazed can make a man go nuclear, I tell you what.

 

[Nacho Man Randy Salsa]

I wonder what the NK citizens must be thinking. Years of propaganda of Worst Korea being a puppet state of the western imperialists and now Dear Leader is breaking bread with them.

God is compromising.

 

[TowinKarz]

"Best Korea has never hated on Worst Korea"

"Best Korea has always treated Worst Korea as a loyal servant, this is just a routine talk"

"Winston Smith report to room 101"

 

[PS1gamenwatch]

Now Duterte changes his tone on the guy:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...th-koreas-kim-hero-of-everybody-idUSKBN1I00DZ

Philippines' Duterte calls North Korea's Kim 'hero of everybody'

MANILA (Reuters) - Philippine President Rodridgo Duterte said on Sunday North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, whom he had previously called a “fool”, is now the “hero of everybody”, after Kim pledged to work with Seoul for “complete denuclearisation” of the peninsula.

Duterte said he would “congratulate” Kim, who just became his “idol”, if he gets a chance to meet him. He said he would tell the North Korean leader “I admire you. You know how to time (your moves)”.

“For all of the time, he was pictured to be the bad boy of the community. With one masterstroke, he is now the hero of everybody,” Duterte said when asked to comment on the historic meeting between Kim and South Korean President Moon Jae-in during a news conference after he returned from an ASEAN summit in Singapore.


“He appear to be amiable, jolly good fellow, and very accommodating,” Duterte said of Kim.

Duterte has more than once criticized Kim over his nuclear ambitions. In April last year he questioned his sanity and urged the United States to show restraint and not be baited by a man who “wants to end the world”.

A few months later, Duterte called Kim a “fool” and held nothing back in rebuking Kim for “playing with dangerous toys”.

The leaders of North and South Korea agreed on a common goal of a “nuclear free” peninsula during a summit on Friday.

Meeting at the Demilitarized Zone that has divided the Koreas for more than six decades, Kim and Moon announced they would work with the United States and China this year to declare an official end to the 1950s Korean War, and establish a permanent peace agreement.

“He (Kim) can treat me as his friend ...The impact is really, there is less stress now in the Korean Peninsula. And maybe, just maybe, we can avoid a war which nobody can win anyway,” Duterte said.

 

[Jewelsmakerguy]

I don't trust anything the Kims say or do. Their words are meaningless and their actions are empty.

Now now, not all their actions are empty.

After all, not many countries would be willing to put their own citizens and soldiers to death by ground to air missiles in the public square.

 

[AutistocLolCow]

I can't wait to see this backfire hilariously on SK and the US.

You sound texan, They REALLY love to put nuclear vaporizing into everything.

UK going brexit? A texan reply "Nuke them!"
Mexico narc issues "Glass them!".
A politician farts nearby "Blast them from orbit"

But god forbid something happens in texas..

The reason why they don't is because there's too much at stake. If the North were to invade the South, it would warrant a full scale response from the US military. Saddam Hussein had tech that was decades ahead of North Korea and he still got his shit kicked in. But if the South were to invade the North, it would warrant a response from China to protect their closest ally. The Chinese military of today isn't the peasant army of the past which was sent charging across frozen terrain hoping that the Americans would eventually run out of bullets. They have hardware and tactics they've been itching to use.

Not exactly, Saddam had no nukes and probably had SCUD like missiles (KUWAIT). if you followed the narrative during the war. The Iraqi elite guard didn't engage and pretty much surrendered. Not that the US 't and "allies" didn't have overwhelming forces that made the war pretty laughable.

 

[AutistocLolCow]

NK isn't China's closest Ally, and they both know it. They are simply partners in a Mexican stand off with the Japanese Americans. China knows NK needs them to avoid being overrun - Honestly, forget the US. South Korea has double the population of NK, better weapons, and armed forces that aren't near-starvation level conscripts, SK could probably take NK in a straight fight.
NK knows that China doesn't want SK Korea sharing a border with them. NK is a nice convenient buffer zone. And if not for the degree and incredible scale of human rights abuses atrocities being committed in NK, honestly it'd really just be in everyone's best interest for the status quo to remain.

EDIT:


This is standard NK diplomatic playbook. The reason is Trump's responding to their bluster with bluster of his own has put them back into "seem to be reasonable and cooperative until this blows over and the next limp-wrist we can jerk around gets elected" mode we saw for mid-Clinton the early part of Bush II.

The NK diplomatic strategy is to keep all the big players bouncing off each other. When NK does something, its usually because they believe some of the parties involved in the pennisula are getting too chummy.

Woulnd't South Korea lose Soul from artillery barrage and conventional missiles?

 

[Your Weird Fetish]

It wouldn't be any fun for anyone but from what I understand they've spent decades preparing for that and the city is full of very hardened bunkers for just such an occasion. It'd be an absolutely disaster but it wouldn't wipe out the entire or even most of the population of the city like it's sometimes portrayed.

 

[Ghostse]

Woulnd't South Korea lose Soul from artillery barrage and conventional missiles?

YWF is correct, the city would be flattened but the most of the population would survive. Seoul getting leveled (and maybe NK using nuclear/dirty weapons) is why I said "probably" and not "for absolute certain".