"why would a nation care if we were deploying anti-missile batteries to defend ourselves?"

Why would you care if everyone in your class carried guns to defend themselves?

@Synapse, I don't think that's a fair comparison to draw. With a gun, it can be used as an *Offensive* weapon.

While with the anti-missile batteries, I don't think they can be used as offensive weaponry as itself.

From what I understand the thing that stops the northerners sleeping at night is the fact that we've never signed a peace treaty. This has led them to believe (somewhat understandably) that we're simply waiting for the moment they drop their guard to go all Iraq/Libya/Afganistan/etc etc on their ass. The war for them never ended. They have had 60 years of constant vigilance, military dominance of every day life, harsh rationing, sons and daughters called up to the front for brutal training, starvation, and fear.

One cannot blame them totally for going ever so slightly crazy.

Now, their new chap, Kim Ill kong or whaever his name is, is bloody well fed up. Enough is enough, he seems to be saying, and is doing his damnedest to get peace agreed once and for all using the only way that has shown signs of working in the past. Bat shit crazy brinkmanship.

You have to admire the number of ways he's found to "up the stakes", although he's getting a tad desperate now. Moving a long range missile a few miles further east in the hope of making it look more threatening is scraping the barrel a bit. There's not a huge amount left aside from firing a few warning shots or perhaps "invading" a south korean uninhabited island near the boarder. Maybe he'll find another phoneline to turn off...

Time to give the North their damned treaty under the condition of disbanding all their nukes with strict international (but non US) inspections. Let's be done with this.

A fairer comparison might be a shield, instead. While it is true that it can be used in a fight - it is usually limited to a defensive role. Just the same, Anti missile batteries *might* be used in a war, but only under a supporting or defensive role.

The U.S. govt need to grow up. When will they finally realize that war-mongering is wrong for so many reasons. It may help international arms sales/proliferation which it obviously does.
People don't want the American way of life, firstly their govts can't afford to get into that amount of debt and secondly they don't want a fast food joint and a coffee shop on every street corner and an obesity epidemic.
When is it time to admit this system of govt is failing, 16 trillion? 20 trillion? 30 trillion?
Maybe something needs to be done about the debt, maybe more focus is required on domestic issues. To a short sighted individual this would be 20-20 vision but not the US govt.
What I don't get also is why there are so many Americans supporting such aggressive military policies all around the world. Is peace not good enough?
What is all of these military exercises proving, that the USA is king of the world and we should all want to live like this, and if you step out of line the USA has the military might to crush you?
It's lazy bullshit politics and rhetoric being pumped out by a war machine with not enough wars to fight, isn't it time to talk peace?
If the US govt want to impress me and sell me the 'American Dream' then show me you can run a country with stable economic policies and balanced budgets, then I'll listen.

"Why don't they train their diplomats to talk to people without bullying them. This is a crisis all of their own making...... idiots"

Yes, because saving a nation from communism only to have the offending country's obese adolescent fourth-rate nuclear-armed tyrant become a pugnacious pain-in-the-ass 60 years later is clearly America's fault.

You didn't save China from Communism and now they are the country keeping the Capitalists solvent ..... oh the irony.
If they stopped 'saving' everyone and focused on saving themselves the world would be a safer and a better place.
US Govt ...... financially & morally bankrupt.

You're right; we didn't save China from communism. We saved South Korea from communism.

Also, calling China "communist" is a little disingenuous. They have many of the totalitarian elements of communism but their economy is in practice no different from a crony capitalist economy.

Furthermore, America is already financially/morally bankrupt.

"They have many of the totalitarian elements of communism"
I think you'll find that the view of Communism espoused by Marx was very far from 'totalitarian'. Countries that have called themselves 'Communist' seemed to have swerved violently from the original ideas of the founders of Communist ideology, probably because they were idealists like Marx, and not pragmatists.
For a small elite to control a mass you need to strong controls/strict rules. Those strict rules don't have to stretch human rights abuses and oppression.which has been evident in so-called Communist countries.
Communism is govt of the people by the people and for the people, not totalitarianism.

There's a distinction from Communism in theory and Communism in practice. Pure Marxian Communism has never been a government. Nor has pure Smith Capitalism. However, pretty much every Communist country in the world, pure or not, has had major issues. Except Vietnam. But they started with nothing. So when they switched to communism, they ended up with... nothing. So they didn't tend to care much.

Nigee, stop being such an anti American duche!

The Fucking nutjob in north Korea just threatened to start a

nuclear war!

Must be nice to be able to criticize us all the time knowing that wed have your back if some crazy ass country was threatening to send nukes your way!

But if they're going to nuke the japs or the south Koreans, than the big ol bad US should just keep to our own bizness?

Duchebag!

@phil - best not to ask why they is threatening war, or why they feel the need to say these things, the answer is watch Fox News then kill, kill, kill.
In this situation if you were president of the USA would you do the following:-
1) Threaten to meet their use of weapons with bigger weapons
2) Seek dialogue through China/UN to calm the situation
3) Get in a preemptive strike
4) Go on a diplomatic offensive to reassure North Korea you have absolutely no interest in invasion, get Obama on the telly saying he is looking at ways the two countries can cooperate with each other to build bridges, trust, sporting & cultural ties
5) Meet their war rhetoric with increased war rhetoric of your own, mobilisation of weaponry, troops, reconnaissance activities, start deploying missile defence systems, etc, etc.

There are always choices, which one would you choose, is it the same as the one the US Govt are choosing, I think I'd be talking the situation down if I were Pres.

"@Synapse, I don't think that's a fair comparison to draw. With a gun, it can be used as an *Offensive* weapon.

While with the anti-missile batteries, I don't think they can be used as offensive weaponry as itself. "

A destroyer can be, or a B-52.

the US bombed the HELL out of Japan in WW2, what makes people think they're afraid to do the same to NKorea?

Nigee, you forgot an option:

6) tell Nigee to stop being an anti-american duchebag.

I choose 6)

But if I was O'Bama (nice Irish chap ) and I had to choose one or more of your options, it would be 1 and 3 - pre emptive strike with bigger weapons.

"But if I was O'Bama (nice Irish chap ) and I had to choose one or more of your options, it would be 1 and 3 - pre emptive strike with bigger weapons"

That is because you are an idiot, maybe you deserve your govt but the rest of us shouldn't have to suffer the consequences of a mindless US foreign policy
Just because you were late for the first two world wars, it doesn't mean you have to make sure you're first in for World War III.

Obama has been a walking disaster in terms of foreign policy. I've never seen America look so impotent on the world stage.

"Obama has been a walking disaster in terms of foreign policy. I've never seen America look so impotent on the world stage."
+1. Considered making a multi to +1 twice.

All we need is an ounce of common sense, this sounds a bit more promising:-

"Many of North Korea's angry statements have cited the annual military exercises between US and South Korean forces as provocation.

Reports in US media quoting unnamed Pentagon officials suggest Washington is now questioning whether some of its actions may have contributed to the tension.

CNN quoted a Pentagon official as saying the US would now try to "turn the volume down" on its rhetoric."

Source: BBC Website

There are very few military problems on Earth that cannot be solved by 94 B-52H strategic bombers. The question is whether or not Obama has the balls to retaliate.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2010/09/22/130040247/obama-says-we-can-absorb-a-terrorist-attack-your-thoughts

Obama has a *remarkable* tolerance for watching people die, as long as it does not affect him. Just ask the Syrians. I suspect North Korea will be granted a couple of opening moves without any response before Obama decides to do anything. You know...that whole cowardly leading from behind bull shit...

^---- +1

"There are very few military problems on Earth that cannot be solved by 94 B-52H strategic bombers."

There are very few problems on Earth that can be solved by 94 B-52H strategic bombers, however.

Agreed with Synapse, no matter how you look at it, there are innocent lives at stake on BOTH SIDES.

Actually, the effective use of air power has solved many problems and saved many lives over the years, if you know anything about military history. Obliterating enemy ground forces before you send in your own is a great and effective way to shorten the duration of a conflict and ultimate save lives, both of soldiers, and the inevitable collateral damage of an extended ground campaign.

Or, you know, you could just not have wars. That would seem to save more lives, logically.

Yes, bury your head in the sand...pretend that you can snap your magic fingers and stop all war. Moron. Yes...I called you a moron, because when you ride around on your magical little unicorn in happy land and pretend that if we all just wish it hard enough and pass out lollipops we can stop war...because nobody has EVER thought of that...then you are being a moron. And that's being kind to you...

Of course, your happy land fantasy is also based on the premise the US is the root of all evil in the world, I suppose, and that we are responsible for every horrible act ever perpetrated on humanity, and therefore we can stop all war unilaterally.

Which, again, is why you are a moron.

The U.S. is the world leader in causing unnecessary wars..