One Korea??

[JJ_BPK]

Is this good??

Maybe..

Kim Jong Un walks into South Korea to shake hands with Moon Jae-in

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2018/04...ic-summit.html

This announcement is not a SMALL deal and has the potential to create a new Korea or destroy the country.

I suspect that South Koria has wrestled with the question for some time.

What to do with 25 million starving North Koreans, with no education nor infrastructure???

Back before Germany united, I work with a friend that lived in West Germany but had most of his relatives on the East side. He and I were both doing systems development and integration for corporate & government systems infrastructures. We spent a lot of our free time discussing this topic.

Germany spent many years planning on how to re-integrate the East. The major problem was that there was nobody in the East that had ever lived in a democracy. They were so ingrained in socialism, with the state running their lives, that they had no conception of how a free market society operated. The West knew they would need to continue the welfare state to support the East until they could be educated on capitalism. The West worked with all the large manufacturing companies to develop a plan to move education, jobs, and infrastructure to the East. They knew it would cost billions.

Germany is a good model for converting totalitarian states into a modern capitalist society, abet one that has a bit too much progressiveness.

With Korea?? Not sure how they will roll. I see China playing a large part and maybe Japan. The problem with North K is 5 fold what the Germans had to deal with.

Like Africa, the Middle East, Russia, South America, the Koreans peoples do not have a "history" of capitalism. It's going to be ruff. AND CHina's has set a bad model for the Asians.

Keep your finger crossed..

[mark46th]

Considering Korea's history with Japanese occupation, I would think China would be a better choice for assistance.

[Old Dog New Trick]

Whatever happens it will be historical.

If the newly unified Koreas ask the US to remove US forces from the 38th parallel and ultimately the peninsula that will be a major issue for any CinC.

I would think we would have to remain only as invited guests, otherwise leave in a coordinated withdrawal. (Knowing that this could be a ploy or ruse by KJUn to weaken the south.)

[Box]

Peace on the peninsula doesn't have to include reunification; in fact, unconditional reunification seems like a YUGE pipe dream. I'm sure that NORK would only agree to reunification if it meant that KJU would be clearly recognized as the winner of the free and democratic elections that would occur in the coming years. SOKO would clearly disagree with anything that looked like NORK citizens voting themselves a super-sized happy meal of economic justice financed by their South Korean brothers and sisters.

...but agreeing to call a war "ended" and pursuing a peace process isn't all that impossible and shouldn't necessarily require complete reunification.

[bblhead672]

If I remember correctly I seem to remember that the Japanese and Koreans hold a mutual hatred for each other.

Kim Jong Un and his top general should make the first gesture by resigning and turning over control of the country to an international body (not the UN, one that can actually work) to oversee dismantling of their nuclear forces, food and medical relief to the millions of abused N. Korean citizens and unification of the two countries into a constitutional republic. Local elections from village level up, with no former NK regime officials allowed to hold office. Educate the NK citizens on being part of a civilized, free society.

And now that my pipe dream is over....it's probably a ruse by the Norks to get US to withdraw to make it easier to invade.

[cbtengr]

I don't think this has anything to do with removing us from Korea. I am under the impression that the US does not have the military presence it once had in Korea, I am also under the impression that the govt. in the South is not always all that warm and fuzzy towards us. Forty years ago when I was with the 2D ID I was told that we were there to hold the South back from attacking the North not the other way around. I see no reason that the North could not prosper like the South has, I hope it works out for the better and does not involve us pouring billions of dollars into the North.

[Team Sergeant]

Not carter, not nixon, not Reagan, not kennedy, not bush one or two, not slick willy, not spineless barry soetoro, but President Donald Trump made this happen.

Thank you Mr. President. You continue to show the world what leadership really is………


(Now that this is finally happening you may want to run out and purchase stock in "de-mining" companies..........)


Picture by;

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-n...-idUSKBN1HY01L

[RCummings]

Hope for the best for South Korea. '78-'79 Camp Hovey we were told repeatedly that we were a "tripwire" and would be dead within 3 minutes of the start of hostilities. I never witnessed or heard that the South Koreans wanted any part of any problems with the North. The only thing that I saw was folks making money from the whole affair. I am no SME, has a situation like this N verses S with one side being controlled by Dictators for generations ever been resolved? I have been to Germany '69-'71 and Korea and the only commonality I see is an armed border. Am I missing something?

Congratulations to President Trump!

V/R

Bob

[Flagg]

Originally Posted by JJ_BPK

Is this good??

Maybe..



This announcement is not a SMALL deal and has the potential to create a new Korea or destroy the country.

I suspect that South Koria has wrestled with the question for some time.

What to do with 25 million starving North Koreans, with no education nor infrastructure???

Back before Germany united, I work with a friend that lived in West Germany but had most of his relatives on the East side. He and I were both doing systems development and integration for corporate & government systems infrastructures. We spent a lot of our free time discussing this topic.

Germany spent many years planning on how to re-integrate the East. The major problem was that there was nobody in the East that had ever lived in a democracy. They were so ingrained in socialism, with the state running their lives, that they had no conception of how a free market society operated. The West knew they would need to continue the welfare state to support the East until they could be educated on capitalism. The West worked with all the large manufacturing companies to develop a plan to move education, jobs, and infrastructure to the East. They knew it would cost billions.

Germany is a good model for converting totalitarian states into a modern capitalist society, abet one that has a bit too much progressiveness.

With Korea?? Not sure how they will roll. I see China playing a large part and maybe Japan. The problem with North K is 5 fold what the Germans had to deal with.

Like Africa, the Middle East, Russia, South America, the Koreans peoples do not have a "history" of capitalism. It's going to be ruff. AND CHina's has set a bad model for the Asians.

Keep your finger crossed..

Interesting perspective.

I've often used the example of Germany's reunification in conversations about the inevitability of Korean reunification.

The biggest differences I see between the German and Korean examples include relative difference in development.

In 1989-1991, the economic inequality between West and East Germany was quite substantial in both the micro/macro sense.

But despite the pervasiveness of the STASI, East Germans were not on the brink of starvation, they "enjoyed" an ok standard of living, relatively high hard science education(stripping out the political ideology), mediocre to modernish industrialisation(granted with much IP theft from the west), overall......not a horrible situation from a clinical perspective(obviously the lack of freedom and pervasive surveillance is anathema).

Yet still, more than 25 years later and closing on 30, Eastern Germany still has considerably less economic success than Western Germany despite a trillion dollars invested.

Considerable disparity still exists and likely will persist for some time.

Now let's look at North Korea.

The full spectrum disparity between North and South Korea makes the disparity that existed between the two Germany's seem like a rounding error.

I would agree with Team Sergeant that DMZ de-mining business would be booming.

But I wonder if mines would be replaced with more concertina razor wire?

That's what I would do.

I don't see Japan playing a big role due to historical reasons.

I do see China forcing themselves into any reunification, maybe trying to create the Northern part of a unified Korea into something akin to an Austria/Finland like non alignment....mixed with a special economic zone model China has used with great success starting in the 80's.

Also, North Korea reportedly has a massive amount of rare earth material commodities that I'm sure China would want to "work" with Korea on ensuring maximum opportunity for local/regional economic value, and maximum export value(if they even allow it in raw form and no value add).

Perhaps a rare earth trading block.

Maybe we could see an unexpected shift in alliance in terms of unlikely bedfellows?

China/Korea

Think about it.

5 years ago no one would have predicted Turkey/Russia, but money(and potential for Central Asian energy distribution monopoly) talks.

One of the main reasons why I think North Korea should be demined, but the barbed wire tripled is that the value of cheap labour is in significant decline.

Think back to the problems the US had in the rust belt transitioning relatively well educated and healthy steel workers......far too many wound up with McJobs.

North Korea is that times a zillion....and with the onset of cheap robotics, cheap labour isn't what it used to be.

I'd say that 95% of anyone over the age of 15 in North Korea would be net-negative to South Korea in terms of lifetime economic/social value.

Harsh...but looking at it from the perspective of a commercial acquisition, it's like Samsung acquiring Chernobyl AND Fukushima.

[Joker]

You put your right hand in,
You put your right hand out,
You put your right hand in,
And you shake it all about,
You do the hokey pokey
and you turn yourself around
That what it's all about.

[35NCO]

KJU made walking look hard. Huffing and puffing signing papers....

KJU will drop dead. China, as always planned will save the day.

For SK to ensure de-escalation, we will be asked politely to leave.

More for Japan?

KJU looked very nervous to me. I suspect China already told him this firmly. Something in his eyes was pure fear. Fear of messing something very important up.

....another thought is maybe he is already dying of something else.

[cat in the hat]

"(Now that this is finally happening you may want to run out and purchase stock in "de-mining" companies..........)"

There are enough 1-1 SFG types from the 90's on this site with Cambodia Demining experience, maybe we should be strarting our own company

[rsdengler]

Hummmmmm...makes you wonder, not sure if you could trust
Kim Jong Un, reminds me of the Cheshire Cat with that malicious grin....I wonder what is inside that pudgy guy's head besides Twinkies....

[JJ_BPK]

There have been a bunch of MSM espousing and pontificating on the little fat guy's reason.

1)Many think that his bomb test site has gotten so contaminated, that the area used is permanently useless, not unlike Japan's Fukushima Daiichi and Russian's Chernobyl site.

2)Others say he has terminal diseases and needs mode meds than NK has.


My conundrum is
1)do you replace him with another NK despot, and leave them as separate identities?
2)or try to merge NK into SK?

[Ret10Echo]

Figure it's a ploy to get the ROC to let their guard down. That guy is freakin' cuckoo for cocoa puffs