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N. Korea lifts restrictions on private markets as last resort in food crisis

Ockham

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By Chico Harlan
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, June 18, 2010; 4:27 PM


SEOUL -- Bowing to reality, the North Korean government has lifted all restrictions on private markets -- a last-resort option for a leadership desperate to prevent its people from starving.

In recent weeks, according to North Korea observers and defector groups with sources in the country, Kim Jong Il's government admitted its inability to solve the current food shortage and encouraged its people to rely on private markets for the purchase of goods. Though the policy reversal will not alter daily patterns -- North Koreans have depended on such markets for more than 15 years -- the latest order from Pyongyang abandons a key pillar of a central, planned economy.

With November's currency revaluation, Kim wiped out his citizens' personal savings and struck a blow against the private food distribution system sustaining his country. The latest policy switch, though, stands as an acknowledgment that the currency move was a failure and that only capitalist-style trading can prevent widespread famine.

Read story here

Free markets or die from starvation. Must it come to such an extreme to see the light?
 
We can only pray that the US elects a real president, who will blockade N Korea until the regime collapses. Then China can help pay for the country's reconstruction and re-unification with the South.

I also hope the UN will bring charges against China for violating its committments to various Human Rights conventions preventing the non-repatriation of refugees seeking shelter from murderous regimes.
 
We can only pray that the US elects a real president, who will blockade N Korea until the regime collapses.

That won't work. It has been tried for decades without success. North Korea is already the most sanctioned country on earth.

Then China can help pay for the country's reconstruction and re-unification with the South.

I don't think so. China propped up NK primarily because they don't want a U.S. backed country sitting right on their border.

I also hope the UN will bring charges against China for violating its committments to various Human Rights conventions preventing the non-repatriation of refugees seeking shelter from murderous regimes.

China will then veto or ignore them, and nothing will happen as a result.
 
We can only pray that the US elects a real president, who will blockade N Korea until the regime collapses. Then China can help pay for the country's reconstruction and re-unification with the South.

I also hope the UN will bring charges against China for violating its committments to various Human Rights conventions preventing the non-repatriation of refugees seeking shelter from murderous regimes.

Yeah, starve them some more! That'll show them!
 
We can only pray that the US elects a real president, who will blockade N Korea until the regime collapses. Then China can help pay for the country's reconstruction and re-unification with the South.

What makes you think China will be willing to pay for North Korea re-unifying with South Korea when it is the U.S., in your scenario, that caused North Korea to fall?
 
That won't work. It has been tried for decades without success. North Korea is already the most sanctioned country on earth.
What will not work, praying?
Or electing a "real" President to do the bidding of warmongers?
Or sanctions?


I don't think so. China propped up NK primarily because they don't want a U.S. backed country sitting right on their border.



China will then veto or ignore them, and nothing will happen as a result.
What separates us from the monkeys is that when we do something and it does not work, we re-think and try something new. . . Monkeys will keep on doing things the old way.
 
What makes you think China will be willing to pay for North Korea re-unifying with South Korea when it is the U.S., in your scenario, that caused North Korea to fall?

China will not pay for reunification, indeed nor should they.
South Korea will be the paymasters much the same as West Germany was when reunification of East Germany to West Germany enabled the whole to become Germany.

N. Korea failed for much the same reason the USSR failed, it's leaders thought that they could hold on to power indefinitely principally by having strong armed forces equipped with the best equipment they could afford, to the detriment of the civil population.

I hope that the people will rise up and throw the megalomaniac and his issue out of power in much the same way the Romanians did, although I have my doubts they have the stomach for that.
 
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I said it facetiously about getting china to pay for the re-unification.

As for further sanctions, nk makes most of its money from illegal arms/tech sales, so a blockade would starve the regime of its bribery money, which would dry up any internal support left.

As for "starving them more," the US/West isn't starving anyone - it is the jong il regime that is doing that. The leftist "blame the West" mentality is something that monkeys would do, since they seem to repeat it over and over.

It's just like what they did with iraq - blame the West for the iraqi sanctions, or with African countries, where the leftists want to endlessly throw money at the failed dictatorships over there without end.
 
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As for further sanctions, nk makes most of its money from illegal arms/tech sales, so a blockade would starve the regime of its bribery money, which would dry up any internal support left.

Trying to intercept every ship leaving from NK would inevitably lead to war, so its a non-option. NK is a particularly bad situation because we have exhausted nearly every peaceful solution there is.
 
If his father wouldn't be the head of state, he would be turning his grave.
 
What separates us from the monkeys is that when we do something and it does not work, we re-think and try something new. . . Monkeys will keep on doing things the old way.

Actually I think even monkeys would have figured it out by now...
 
Yea because the Cuban embargo has worked sooooo well.

Worked so well at what? Castro is isolated, the best and brightest run from Cuba, the country is contained, has no allies, not sure what the issue is there. Should the US invade Cuba, is that your alternative?

Oh and sanctions only hurt the people not the regime

Is that a slogan you neglected to include in your signature?
 
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Worked so well at what? Castro is isolated, the best and brightest run from Cuba, the country is contained, has no allies, not sure what the issue is there. Should the US invade Cuba, is that your alternative?

That's the situation NK is in. So sanctions worked well up to that point. But for the purposes of toppling a regime they are basically useless.
 
For all those complaining about sanctions... got any better ideas??
 
For all those complaining about sanctions... got any better ideas??

Indeed this is the case. Unless you're willing to march in there and take over the country, nothing is going to work, you will not break this government unless every single scrap of food is disallowed from entering the country, even then, the people are so tightly controlled and have no freedom of mobility or assembly, I suspect they just wouldn't know what to do, and they've been through hard times before and not revolted.

In the end, they are the most heavily controlled, repressed and misinformed (not by choice) population in the world... if you're counting on regular North Koreans to rise up, it's not gonna happen.
 
Indeed this is the case. Unless you're willing to march in there and take over the country, nothing is going to work, you will not break this government unless every single scrap of food is disallowed from entering the country, even then, the people are so tightly controlled and have no freedom of mobility or assembly, I suspect they just wouldn't know what to do, and they've been through hard times before and not revolted.

In the end, they are the most heavily controlled, repressed and misinformed (not by choice) population in the world... if you're counting on regular North Koreans to rise up, it's not gonna happen.

This would put them in a similar situation to the iranians. Since we agree that the civilian population would be unable to overthrow the criminal dictatorship, that would leave only 2 options:

1-total blockade until the regime collapses
2-war to liquidate the leadership and its military protective infrastructure
 
This would put them in a similar situation to the iranians. Since we agree that the civilian population would be unable to overthrow the criminal dictatorship, that would leave only 2 options:

1-total blockade until the regime collapses
2-war to liquidate the leadership and its military protective infrastructure

Option 1 would lead to the starvation of most of the population. The militay hordes any and all resources necessary to survive, and the civilian population is left to die as it is. If you strangle them, the weak die first.

Option 2 leads to mass casualties in Seoul as the North Korean artillery lays waste to the city. Not to mention the extremely large number of ground troops NK has.

Option 3: Status Quo. :(
 
Read story here

Free markets or die from starvation. Must it come to such an extreme to see the light?

You mean North Korean is giving in to the evils of capitalism? I wonder if the Democrats will follow suit now? :lamo
 
Option 1 would lead to the starvation of most of the population. The militay hordes any and all resources necessary to survive, and the civilian population is left to die as it is. If you strangle them, the weak die first.

Perhaps elements of the army might turn to reality, and help overthrow the regime. Maybe in coordination with a blockade, the West could make behind-the-scenes contacts with senior army officials there promising amnesty for past crimes if they order troops to help remove the regime...

Option 2 leads to mass casualties in Seoul as the North Korean artillery lays waste to the city. Not to mention the extremely large number of ground troops NK has.

It would obviously be a signal to the north, but once the West has decided that it can no longer tolerate this regime - a decision it should have reached the moment it discovered that it was selling nuclear weapons technologies abroad to terror sponsors - the seoul population could be transferred south out of range of the artillery fire. A full-scale bunker development program similar to what israel has instituted, could also be implemented to give south koreans shelter.

As for the ground troops, the West would have a massive air and materials advantage, so this would negate some, if not all, of the NK troops. Kind of hard to run across the border when you are being carpet bombed with things like daisy cutters and spread bomblets.

Personally, i agree this would lead to significant casualties, but the n koreans are selling nuclear weapons know-how to cancerous regimes like syria and iran, who will no doubt try to use them as blackmail against others. Eventually, NK might and probably will decide to sell to groups like al qaeda once the number of potential rogue regime customers has dried up.

You either fight a war now to clean up the garbage on your terms - or wait until they are far more powerful and do so on theirs. When the options are:

A-all out war to eradicate NK, iran, and syria's regimes
B-allow them to grow immensely more powerful and a greater threat, blackmailing the West in many ways

I'll take option A.

The West could have take option A in 1933, but waited until they were attacked when the Germans were far more powerful. Hitler himself said he was shocked the West allowed him to build a navy and airforce, it was what propelled him to push further and further.

Option 3: Status Quo. :(

In the words of the immortal Beck in the "Rundown," "there is no option "C"".
 
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Perhaps elements of the army might turn to reality, and help overthrow the regime. Maybe in coordination with a blockade, the West could make behind-the-scenes contacts with senior army officials there promising amnesty for past crimes if they order troops to help remove the regime...

There are zero intelligence assets inside NK, completely unworkable.

It would obviously be a signal to the north, but once the West has decided that it can no longer tolerate this regime - a decision it should have reached the moment it discovered that it was selling nuclear weapons technologies abroad to terror sponsors - the seoul population could be transferred south out of range of the artillery fire. A full-scale bunker development program similar to what israel has instituted, could also be implemented to give south koreans shelter.

You can't build a bunker large enough to fit the entire population of Seoul. Even if if you could, NK has plenty of chemical weapons and likely some nuclear ones as well. You can't escape the massive casualties.

Personally, i agree this would lead to significant casualties, but the n koreans are selling nuclear weapons know-how to cancerous regimes like syria and iran, who will no doubt try to use them as blackmail against others. Eventually, NK might and probably will decide to sell to groups like al qaeda once the number of potential rogue regime customers has dried up.

AQ doesn't own any of the needed materials or facilities to build nuclear weapons, so they are harmless. Syria had its program destroyed by Israel, and it would be infinitely easier to attack Iran than NK.

You either fight a war now to clean up the garbage on your terms - or wait until they are far more powerful and do so on theirs. When the options are:

NK has been getting weaker every year, not more powerful. Their military technology is seriously outdated and their only ally is starting to get cold feet. SK could probably beat them if it came to war, compared to the scenario 50 years ago.

The West could have take option A in 1933, but waited until they were attacked when the Germans were far more powerful. Hitler himself said he was shocked the West allowed him to build a navy and airforce, it was what propelled him to push further and further.

That is pathetic hindsight criticism at its worst. While we were at it, we should have bought a few of Hitlers paintings to keep him an art student.

In the words of the immortal Beck in the "Rundown," "there is no option "C"".

No option C is precisely the only option that makes sense.
 
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