North Korea: Threat or Blackmailer?

[CRedskinsRule]

Originally Posted by 12thMan

We'll treat North Korea like a threat even if they're not. Look, I think the tougher U.N. sanctions further isolates and marginalizes North Korea to a degree. Russia, China, and Japan, among others, all support these tougher sanctions and stand at the ready to enforce them.

And let's face it, they're not going to be rolling out a ship every other week just to test a missle aimed at Hawaii.

I wonder if Serbia was considered a threat before WWI.
(my point on that is more to say that treaties and alliances cause little irritants to become major threats)

The problem with NKorea is simply that they are an uncontrollable regime. The fact that they are isolated makes them more dangerous, not less. They are marginalized when they are under China's influence because we have a rational country to deal with. but as a rogue country, even if they act stupidly, China won't let them be militarily defeated.

as for sanctions, I really am tired of hearing about them. Can anyone cite examples of where international sanctions affected a rogue country's politics? Maybe S. Africa. Any others?