As speculation mounts that Kim Jong-un and Trump could meet this month, analysts say Pyongyang will continue to see nuclear weapons as a matter of survival

As speculation mounts that Kim Jong-un and Trump could meet this month, analysts say Pyongyang will continue to see nuclear weapons as a matter of survival

North Korea’s launch last week of a missile from a naval destroyer elicited an uncharacteristically prosaic analysis from the country’s leader, Kim Jong-un. The launch was proof, he said, that arming ships with nuclear weapons was “making satisfactory progress”.

But the test, and Kim’s mildly upbeat appraisal, were designed to reverberate well beyond the deck of the 5,000-tonne destroyer-class vessel the Choe Hyon – the biggest warship in the North Korean fleet.

His pointed reference to nuclear weapons was made as the US and Israel continued their air bombardment of Iran – a regime Donald Trump had warned, without offering evidence, was only weeks away from having a nuclear weapon.

  • crystalmerchant@lemmy.worldEnglish
    0·
    6 months ago

    That’s because nukes ARE the only path to security lmao. As soon as the first one was tested, and then fuck me used against civilians everyone watching jnmed understood this.

    It sucks, and I would much prefer a world without nuclear weapons, but this is reality unfortunately. If you have nukes, you have leverage without ever having to use them

    • givesomefucks@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      6 months ago

      used against civilians

      Uhhhh…

      I don’t quite know how to break it to you but:

      1. There’s no other way to use a nuke, they cover too wide an area.

      2. Killing civilians was the norm in WW2, every war before that, and the vast majority of every war since.

      Like, if the nukes on Japan wouldn’t have been dropped, it would have had to be more firebombing and then a ground invasion.

      Firebombings which still had a higher kill count in Japan than both nukes combined.

      The entire point of a nuke, is that all it takes is a single one to wipe out entire square miles of a city. There’s no way to do that without civilian casualties, and it’s only a matter of time until one gets thru defenses.

      • crystalmerchant@lemmy.worldEnglish
        0·
        6 months ago

        You don’t know me so you would have no way of knowing this about me, but yes I am very familiar with all the tradeoffs and decision making in this part of WW2 around ground assault vs nukes and continued bombing etc 🙌

          • B-TR3E@feddit.orgEnglish
            0·
            6 months ago

            I’d better not express what impression I’m getting from your words, dude.

            • givesomefucks@lemmy.worldEnglish
              01·
              6 months ago

              I get paid a lot to be right and say it in ways powerful idiots understand.

              Not having to be polite is a relief valve, but it doesn’t mean the information is incorrect.

              The smallest “tactical nuke” is orders of magnitude bigger than what was used in Japan and even at their lowest settings would snowball into environmental catastrophe.

              You can’t contain an atomic blast. Even what’s left is irradiated and now nuclear waste. Especially any kind of metal, which is probably going to be whatever you nuke.

              Being smaller just means idiots are more likely to use them.