Trump v Kim

[Kralizec]

Trump declares Fire, Fury and Frankly Power against North Korea.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-40869319

RIP World.

My theory on this rethoric: Kim called the Oval office and said that Hillary got a bigger share of the vote and that Obama's inauguration crowd was larger.

[Shaka_Khan]

Or maybe Trump paid Kim to get Kim distract the US attention away from Trump's problems...

[spmetla]

Nations start to choose sides

"If the US and South Korea carry out strikes and try to overthrow the North Korea regime and change the political pattern of the Korean Peninsula, China will prevent them from doing so," said an editorial in the state-run Global Times.

"China should also make clear that if North Korea launches missiles that threaten US soil first and the US retaliates, China will stay neutral," it wrote

But others nations have been keen to choose a side. Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull told Melbourne radio station 3AW on Friday that Washington "has no stronger ally than Australia."
"Let's be very clear about that. If there is an attack on the United States by North Korea, then the ANZUS treaty will be invoked and Australia will come to the aid of the United States," Turnbull said.

One of my bigger worries with Trump has been that his failures as a diplomat would make us so distasteful and our allies mistrust our judgement that they won't take us at our word. If the US was clearly attacked I've no doubt that our allies would stand by us but if we chose to strike first I don't think too many of our allies would send more than tokens of solidarity aside from those in the field of fire (ROK and Japan). Given the US records with the Gulf of Tonkin incident and Powell's smoking gun before the UN I understand their skepticism but the Trump factor where he berates his allies and friends but even thanks Putin for reducing our staff at the Moscow Embassy does little to build coalitions.
I understand the point some have that the ball can't be kicked down the road any further but if we were to strike first under this president it would be spun that we are no longer a force for maintaining relative political/economic stability in the world but the unhinged belligerent that can no longer be trusted with such a prominent place in the world.
As I quoted above, China would stand by DPRK in that circumstance and perhaps judge this point in history as the time to confront us, while we're being led by a man who sees no use in the international order and no understanding of its complexities.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Nations start to choose sides





One of my bigger worries with Trump has been that his failures as a diplomat would make us so distasteful and our allies mistrust our judgement that they won't take us at our word. If the US was clearly attacked I've no doubt that our allies would stand by us but if we chose to strike first I don't think too many of our allies would send more than tokens of solidarity aside from those in the field of fire (ROK and Japan). Given the US records with the Gulf of Tonkin incident and Powell's smoking gun before the UN I understand their skepticism but the Trump factor where he berates his allies and friends but even thanks Putin for reducing our staff at the Moscow Embassy does little to build coalitions.
I understand the point some have that the ball can't be kicked down the road any further but if we were to strike first under this president it would be spun that we are no longer a force for maintaining relative political/economic stability in the world but the unhinged belligerent that can no longer be trusted with such a prominent place in the world.
As I quoted above, China would stand by DPRK in that circumstance and perhaps judge this point in history as the time to confront us, while we're being led by a man who sees no use in the international order and no understanding of its complexities.

The "reducing staff thank you" was by way of being a joke. Trump told it with his usual (aka miserable) comic timing.

The posturing and counter-posturing between leaders is exactly the kind of designed-for-image-camera-games drama that Trump enjoys.


As to our allies finding us distasteful, Trump is only moderately more nauseating [he has a crassness to him] to many of them than would be any other US-definition-right-wing leader. What most of our allies want from the USA is a foreign policy that is a)consistent, b) non-aggressive, and c) based on international collegiality [Carter was, in many ways, their ideal US leader with Obama a reasonable alternative]. Anyone other approach makes them think "yahoo with no sense of how the world really works."

[Montmorency]

Nations start to choose sides





One of my bigger worries with Trump has been that his failures as a diplomat would make us so distasteful and our allies mistrust our judgement that they won't take us at our word. If the US was clearly attacked I've no doubt that our allies would stand by us but if we chose to strike first I don't think too many of our allies would send more than tokens of solidarity aside from those in the field of fire (ROK and Japan). Given the US records with the Gulf of Tonkin incident and Powell's smoking gun before the UN I understand their skepticism but the Trump factor where he berates his allies and friends but even thanks Putin for reducing our staff at the Moscow Embassy does little to build coalitions.
I understand the point some have that the ball can't be kicked down the road any further but if we were to strike first under this president it would be spun that we are no longer a force for maintaining relative political/economic stability in the world but the unhinged belligerent that can no longer be trusted with such a prominent place in the world.
As I quoted above, China would stand by DPRK in that circumstance and perhaps judge this point in history as the time to confront us, while we're being led by a man who sees no use in the international order and no understanding of its complexities.

The "reducing staff thank you" was by way of being a joke. Trump told it with his usual (aka miserable) comic timing.

The posturing and counter-posturing between leaders is exactly the kind of designed-for-image-camera-games drama that Trump enjoys.


As to our allies finding us distasteful, Trump is only moderately more nauseating [he has a crassness to him] to many of them than would be any other US-definition-right-wing leader. What most of our allies want from the USA is a foreign policy that is a)consistent, b) non-aggressive, and c) based on international collegiality [Carter was, in many ways, their ideal US leader with Obama a reasonable alternative]. Anyone other approach makes them think "yahoo with no sense of how the world really works."

'Thank you to the industrious North Koreans for their assistance in my infrastructure plan to get construction booming again. It was a great deal, a tough deal, but now the economy is so big, Koreans are loving it, and they're paying US companies to do it!'

I don't believe Trump is capable of parsing paradox. His capacity for "jokes" ends at one-sentence insults.

Diplomacy isn't just public appearances, but private deliberations between those empowered to carry out policy. Coordinating contingencies between potential allies for the event of war now is probably unachievable beyond the Japan-ROK-USA military staff. For the political dimension with countries outside East Asia we will likely be relying on plans and promises established over the past generation, insensitive to the unique contemporary.

[rory_20_uk]

There was no longstanding issue after North Korea sunk a South Korean warship and the shelling of civilians.

The only thing Trump has ever followed through on is litigation.

[Montmorency]

There was no longstanding issue after North Korea sunk a South Korean warship and the shelling of civilians.

The only thing Trump has ever followed through on is litigation.

In 1968 North Korea captured a US Naval Intelligence craft and its 83-man crew. They held and tortured the crew for about a year. The crew were repatriated after the United States gave a formal apology and admission of culpability for the incident. This occurred a short period of time after DPRK special ops crossed the DMZ and killed a number of South Koreans attempting to assassinate the military dictator of South Korea.

Today the spy ship they captured is a museum in Pyonggyang.

North Korea usually has the upper hand in these matters, but from day to day now - we won't know which day until after the fact - we're coming to decide on what pur final commitment, if any, looks like.