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Indeed, you could do with that course yourself.

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
Indeed, you could do with that course yourself.

How so?

 Dreadwinter wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
Thing is, Kim most likely does not suffer any form of mental illness or psychosis. What everyone seems to neglect to remember is that he was a child of power brought up in that regime. With a father who probably told him constantly that all you survey is yours to do with as you like and all those dirty westerners are nothing but the enemy. He most probably wanted for nothing and has never had anyone tell him no. and on top of that, constant, false adoration of every person in his country. If you want a complex to apply, it's going to be superiority because it's most likely all he has ever known.

He does not exhibit the traits of a superiority complex. He exhibits traits of an inferiority complex.

Seriously, we really need to start teaching people about mental illness because this last page has proven that people know jack gak about it.

He was educated in Switzerland.
He has seen the west and was not in thr NK bubble his entire life.

Also yes. He has a rather much God complex, his people worship him, he had ultimate power, he does not know what "no" means in his current role.

If the international community recognized North Korea as a legitimate nuclear power and invited Kim over for dinner and cocktails at the White House he would cease being belligerent and aggressive immediately. Unfortunately that's a hard thing to justify when he's basically holding all of his own people for ransom.

It's an impossible situation. Either we pat the back of a tyrannical regime and give up all pretense of standards when it comes to human rights, or we'll be in perennial conflict with them until something eventually escalates out of control.

 jhe90 wrote:

 Dreadwinter wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
Thing is, Kim most likely does not suffer any form of mental illness or psychosis. What everyone seems to neglect to remember is that he was a child of power brought up in that regime. With a father who probably told him constantly that all you survey is yours to do with as you like and all those dirty westerners are nothing but the enemy. He most probably wanted for nothing and has never had anyone tell him no. and on top of that, constant, false adoration of every person in his country. If you want a complex to apply, it's going to be superiority because it's most likely all he has ever known.

He does not exhibit the traits of a superiority complex. He exhibits traits of an inferiority complex.

Seriously, we really need to start teaching people about mental illness because this last page has proven that people know jack gak about it.

He was educated in Switzerland.
He has seen the west and was not in thr NK bubble his entire life.

Also yes. He has a rather much God complex, his people worship him, he had ultimate power, he does not know what "no" means in his current role.

This assumes Kim is the genuine power and not merely a figurehead.

 feeder wrote:

 jhe90 wrote:

 Dreadwinter wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
Thing is, Kim most likely does not suffer any form of mental illness or psychosis. What everyone seems to neglect to remember is that he was a child of power brought up in that regime. With a father who probably told him constantly that all you survey is yours to do with as you like and all those dirty westerners are nothing but the enemy. He most probably wanted for nothing and has never had anyone tell him no. and on top of that, constant, false adoration of every person in his country. If you want a complex to apply, it's going to be superiority because it's most likely all he has ever known.

He does not exhibit the traits of a superiority complex. He exhibits traits of an inferiority complex.

Seriously, we really need to start teaching people about mental illness because this last page has proven that people know jack gak about it.

He was educated in Switzerland.
He has seen the west and was not in thr NK bubble his entire life.

Also yes. He has a rather much God complex, his people worship him, he had ultimate power, he does not know what "no" means in his current role.

This assumes Kim is the genuine power and not merely a figurehead.

True. But things like killing his brother. All him. A puppet master. Why would they need to do that?

 jhe90 wrote:

 feeder wrote:

 jhe90 wrote:

 Dreadwinter wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
Thing is, Kim most likely does not suffer any form of mental illness or psychosis. What everyone seems to neglect to remember is that he was a child of power brought up in that regime. With a father who probably told him constantly that all you survey is yours to do with as you like and all those dirty westerners are nothing but the enemy. He most probably wanted for nothing and has never had anyone tell him no. and on top of that, constant, false adoration of every person in his country. If you want a complex to apply, it's going to be superiority because it's most likely all he has ever known.

He does not exhibit the traits of a superiority complex. He exhibits traits of an inferiority complex.

Seriously, we really need to start teaching people about mental illness because this last page has proven that people know jack gak about it.

He was educated in Switzerland.
He has seen the west and was not in thr NK bubble his entire life.

Also yes. He has a rather much God complex, his people worship him, he had ultimate power, he does not know what "no" means in his current role.

This assumes Kim is the genuine power and not merely a figurehead.

True. But things like killing his brother. All him. A puppet master. Why would they need to do that?

I don't know. The devious machinations of the NK political elite would probably read like Game of Thrones.

The whole discussion about definitions of “crazy” on the continuum of mental illnesses is really dragging this thread into hostile territory.

Can we just settle on agreeing on something like “he’s not clinically insane and pushing nuke-test buttons because the voice telling him he’s a god tells him to, but he is definitely cold and ruthless and lacks empathy and compassion and probably has daddy isssues”?

 feeder wrote:

 jhe90 wrote:

 feeder wrote:

 jhe90 wrote:

 Dreadwinter wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
Thing is, Kim most likely does not suffer any form of mental illness or psychosis. What everyone seems to neglect to remember is that he was a child of power brought up in that regime. With a father who probably told him constantly that all you survey is yours to do with as you like and all those dirty westerners are nothing but the enemy. He most probably wanted for nothing and has never had anyone tell him no. and on top of that, constant, false adoration of every person in his country. If you want a complex to apply, it's going to be superiority because it's most likely all he has ever known.

He does not exhibit the traits of a superiority complex. He exhibits traits of an inferiority complex.

Seriously, we really need to start teaching people about mental illness because this last page has proven that people know jack gak about it.

He was educated in Switzerland.
He has seen the west and was not in thr NK bubble his entire life.

Also yes. He has a rather much God complex, his people worship him, he had ultimate power, he does not know what "no" means in his current role.

This assumes Kim is the genuine power and not merely a figurehead.

True. But things like killing his brother. All him. A puppet master. Why would they need to do that?

I don't know. The devious machinations of the NK political elite would probably read like Game of Thrones.

True. The fact is NK is a hard country to confirm anything.
Yet alone understand its exact internal structure.

 d-usa wrote:
The whole discussion about definitions of “crazy” on the continuum of mental illnesses is really dragging this thread into hostile territory.

Can we just settle on agreeing on something like “he’s not clinically insane and pushing nuke-test buttons because the voice telling him he’s a god tells him to, but he is definitely cold and ruthless and lacks empathy and compassion and probably has daddy isssues”?

When it gets right down to it, the NK leadership is no different than any other modern politician in their motivations: they'll do whatever it takes to retain their power to live the lifestyle they want. It's the methods they use to achieve that goal that make them seem so very different from other politicians/leaders. There is no possible future for them in a free/democratic North Korea that would allow them to continue to live the life they have to come to enjoy, and they know that.

 jhe90 wrote:

 Dreadwinter wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
Thing is, Kim most likely does not suffer any form of mental illness or psychosis. What everyone seems to neglect to remember is that he was a child of power brought up in that regime. With a father who probably told him constantly that all you survey is yours to do with as you like and all those dirty westerners are nothing but the enemy. He most probably wanted for nothing and has never had anyone tell him no. and on top of that, constant, false adoration of every person in his country. If you want a complex to apply, it's going to be superiority because it's most likely all he has ever known.

He does not exhibit the traits of a superiority complex. He exhibits traits of an inferiority complex.

Seriously, we really need to start teaching people about mental illness because this last page has proven that people know jack gak about it.

He was educated in Switzerland.
He has seen the west and was not in thr NK bubble his entire life.

Also yes. He has a rather much God complex, his people worship him, he had ultimate power, he does not know what "no" means in his current role.

He also went to a NK Military academy where he earned a degree as well as a degree in Physics from a NK University.

 d-usa wrote:
The whole discussion about definitions of “crazy” on the continuum of mental illnesses is really dragging this thread into hostile territory.

Can we just settle on agreeing on something like “he’s not clinically insane and pushing nuke-test buttons because the voice telling him he’s a god tells him to, but he is definitely cold and ruthless and lacks empathy and compassion and probably has daddy isssues”?

Yes, please.

On the subject of North Korea and missiles...


https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/two-north-korean-spies-a-ukrainian-jail-and-a-murky-tale/ar-AAsAc62

 Dreadwinter wrote:
I am sorry, words have meaning. The meaning of crazy is pretty well defined. I apologize that you do not like the meaning of the word, but you cannot change it to fit your argument.

I would stop if I were you. You have contradicted yourself here and it is just painful to see.

You know, when someone has actually contradicted themselves and you want to make a point of it, it's pretty normal to actually, you know, show the contradiction. You could even quote some stuff, that's one of the good things about text based mediums.
But you don't, and there's no points for guessing why.

Also, claiming that crazy is pretty well defined is some incredible nonsense, that doesn't just show that you don't know much about crazy. If crazy was a simple concept with a clean and constant definition we wouldn't have highly trained specialists to making individual assessments on lots of people, and disagreeing among themselves about who is and who isn't crazy.

It also shows you don't know much about words, because different people in different circumstances use words very differently. If a guy on the street says 'that guy is crazy' no-one on God's earth will assume he means 'that person is displaying personality traits that are identified in psychiatry as very mentally unhealthy, but the person is still likely to be a rational person who can be trusted to keep up bargains for their own self interest'.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 jhe90 wrote:

 feeder wrote:
This assumes Kim is the genuine power and not merely a figurehead.

True. But things like killing his brother. All him. A puppet master. Why would they need to do that?

He isn't a figurehead, but he also isn't a puppet. Dictators never have absolute power, there is always a collection of elites underneath him who both grant him power and in turn are granted power by him. That's the complex dynamic, which means in order to keep his position Kim has to maintain a constant appearance of strength and also ensure the elites all get a nice bit of power and wealth.

This is why Kim has to kill potential rivals, and it's also why it is so hard for him to back down from nuclear ambitions.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 d-usa wrote:
Can we just settle on agreeing on something like “he’s not clinically insane and pushing nuke-test buttons because the voice telling him he’s a god tells him to, but he is definitely cold and ruthless and lacks empathy and compassion and probably has daddy isssues”?

I'd rather go with US Navy Admiral and SC NATO James Stavridis, who was paraphrased in a report saying "(Kim is) a fundamentally rational leader whose overiding goals are to ensure the survival of his regime and his personal control over North Korea."

That's what matters. If people want to go off and make personal diagnoses about Kim, well I guess they do whatever makes them happy, as long as they agree to the key part above.

For fun times, in the same article Stavridis says the chance of nuclear war with NK is about 10%, and conventional war about 20 to 30%. So that's fairly terrifying.

 Luciferian wrote:
If the international community recognized North Korea as a legitimate nuclear power and invited Kim over for dinner and cocktails at the White House he would cease being belligerent and aggressive immediately. Unfortunately that's a hard thing to justify when he's basically holding all of his own people for ransom.

It's an impossible situation. Either we pat the back of a tyrannical regime and give up all pretense of standards when it comes to human rights, or we'll be in perennial conflict with them until something eventually escalates out of control.

Or he would not stop. Being friends with US is no quarantee they won't turn you and invade as history has shown.

 Luciferian wrote:
If the international community recognized North Korea as a legitimate nuclear power and invited Kim over for dinner and cocktails at the White House he would cease being belligerent and aggressive immediately. Unfortunately that's a hard thing to justify when he's basically holding all of his own people for ransom.

It's an impossible situation. Either we pat the back of a tyrannical regime and give up all pretense of standards when it comes to human rights, or we'll be in perennial conflict with them until something eventually escalates out of control.

The US is already a proud ally of Saudi Arabia, an absolute monarchy that sponsors wahabist terror cells across the Middle East. The US could pivot on a dime to support the Democratic People's Republic of Korea and the entire political class wouldn't blink to pretend that things were ever otherwise.

 jhe90 wrote:

True. But things like killing his brother. All him. A puppet master. Why would they need to do that?

Well, if a foreign power was preparing to organise a coup and convinced his brother to go along with it. That's one obvious scenario.

 sebster wrote:

For fun times, in the same article Stavridis says the chance of nuclear war with NK is about 10%, and conventional war about 20 to 30%. So that's fairly terrifying.

Interesting. I wonder what factors would lead to North Korea using their normal forces but withholding nukes?

 Luciferian wrote:
If the international community recognized North Korea as a legitimate nuclear power and invited Kim over for dinner and cocktails at the White House he would cease being belligerent and aggressive immediately. Unfortunately that's a hard thing to justify when he's basically holding all of his own people for ransom.

The issue here is that without a big existential threat, a great enemy, his internal powerbase collapses and Kim ends up like Mussolini, Gaddafi, Saddam, Ceaușescu, etc.

The entire political philosophy of the DPRK is built around the fairy tale story of an isolated land of pure people, violently oppressed for centuries by foreign powers, currently under threat of existential annihilation by an imperialist foreign power that occupies half the country, and that the Kim family is keeping them safe and the Military is their instrument. Once you take out that foreign aggression part, the Kim's serve no purpose.

The Kim dynasty has every reason to want to keep things in a proverbial knife edge. It's dangerous for everyone else, but it's also where Kim is safest personally.

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Luciferian wrote:
If the international community recognized North Korea as a legitimate nuclear power and invited Kim over for dinner and cocktails at the White House he would cease being belligerent and aggressive immediately. Unfortunately that's a hard thing to justify when he's basically holding all of his own people for ransom.

The issue here is that without a big existential threat, a great enemy, his internal powerbase collapses and Kim ends up like Mussolini, Gaddafi, Saddam, Ceaușescu, etc.

The entire political philosophy of the DPRK is built around the fairy tale story of an isolated land of pure people, violently oppressed for centuries by foreign powers, currently under threat of existential annihilation by an imperialist foreign power that occupies half the country, and that the Kim family is keeping them safe and the Military is their instrument. Once you take out that foreign aggression part, the Kim's serve no purpose.

The Kim dynasty has every reason to want to keep things in a proverbial knife edge. It's dangerous for everyone else, but it's also where Kim is safest personally.

Yes but in past few years he damaged the key China allience further than it had degraded.

Now they backing sanctions.
Shutting NK companies in China and closing there joint investments for now.

Kim 2 had a good relationship with China, one kim 3 does not.
He has managed to damage the only nation that backs then support.

Yea, thats...strange.

it's weird to see china coming down on NK, but then I have to wonder if the tactile factories they closed were the ones that makes the trumps line of clothes.

Perhaps China values it's good relations with the US more than it's good relations with NK. Perhaps China does not want a nuclear NK anymore than the rest of the world does. Perhaps Kim3 made a pass at Jinping's favorite niece.

We may never know.

 jhe90 wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Luciferian wrote:
If the international community recognized North Korea as a legitimate nuclear power and invited Kim over for dinner and cocktails at the White House he would cease being belligerent and aggressive immediately. Unfortunately that's a hard thing to justify when he's basically holding all of his own people for ransom.

The issue here is that without a big existential threat, a great enemy, his internal powerbase collapses and Kim ends up like Mussolini, Gaddafi, Saddam, Ceaușescu, etc.

The entire political philosophy of the DPRK is built around the fairy tale story of an isolated land of pure people, violently oppressed for centuries by foreign powers, currently under threat of existential annihilation by an imperialist foreign power that occupies half the country, and that the Kim family is keeping them safe and the Military is their instrument. Once you take out that foreign aggression part, the Kim's serve no purpose.

The Kim dynasty has every reason to want to keep things in a proverbial knife edge. It's dangerous for everyone else, but it's also where Kim is safest personally.

Yes but in past few years he damaged the key China allience further than it had degraded.

Now they backing sanctions.
Shutting NK companies in China and closing there joint investments for now.

Kim 2 had a good relationship with China, one kim 3 does not.
He has managed to damage the only nation that backs then support.

Absolutely the relationship with China has degraded. However, as long as that external threat remains or can be manufactured, and is needed to keep the Kim family in Power, the North Koreans will continue with their course even if they starve. It feeds into that whole mentality and political narrative, and gives them a meaningful deterrent capability to boot, which they can then use as a negotiating tool.

China can and will make life suck even more for NK, is getting serious about doing just that and has obviously had enough of their antics, however, as long as US forces remain in Korea, China isnt going to allow NK to collapse either. They dont want US forces up to the border, and they dont want to deal with the refugees.

We can hope that China getting more serious however knocks some sense into people on all sides of this, but unless theres something to address US forces and refugees, China isnt going to allow NK to fall either, unless they become a bigger threat than the US. Which is not impossible, it could eventually sway that way, but doesnt appear to be there yet.

It's true that the DPRK needs a boogeyman to justify its totalitarian stance on the face of things, but that fairy tale is losing its importance one way or another. Even with the profound amount of constraints around the populace, people in North Korea are generally aware that their government is lying to them and that the outside world is not what it's claimed to be. They just don't have any choice but to go along with it. As time goes on it will be harder and harder to keep the civilian population from getting outside information. So the regime will need outside support (or at least a complicit passiveness) in order to stay in power and keep its population under control.

The DPRK is constantly paying political consulting groups in the U.S. to find out how it can understand the political situation here and probing for any kind of support it might garner. They want to sit at the adults' table, but they're just not willing to lose any face to do so. Either we kiss and make up with them and turn a blind eye to whatever it is they're doing, or they keep up the rhetoric and saber rattling. But that's a pattern that is only going to last so long, one way or another.

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Luciferian wrote:
If the international community recognized North Korea as a legitimate nuclear power and invited Kim over for dinner and cocktails at the White House he would cease being belligerent and aggressive immediately. Unfortunately that's a hard thing to justify when he's basically holding all of his own people for ransom.

The issue here is that without a big existential threat, a great enemy, his internal powerbase collapses and Kim ends up like Mussolini, Gaddafi, Saddam, Ceaușescu, etc.

The entire political philosophy of the DPRK is built around the fairy tale story of an isolated land of pure people, violently oppressed for centuries by foreign powers, currently under threat of existential annihilation by an imperialist foreign power that occupies half the country, and that the Kim family is keeping them safe and the Military is their instrument. Once you take out that foreign aggression part, the Kim's serve no purpose.

The Kim dynasty has every reason to want to keep things in a proverbial knife edge. It's dangerous for everyone else, but it's also where Kim is safest personally.

So the best thing to do is just ignore them then. Check.

Strange how avoiding simplistic labeling like "crazy" actually engenders interesting discussion of nuance and strategy in the last few posts. Who would have thunk it? Keep it up dakka folks.

 Vaktathi wrote:

 jhe90 wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Luciferian wrote:
If the international community recognized North Korea as a legitimate nuclear power and invited Kim over for dinner and cocktails at the White House he would cease being belligerent and aggressive immediately. Unfortunately that's a hard thing to justify when he's basically holding all of his own people for ransom.

The issue here is that without a big existential threat, a great enemy, his internal powerbase collapses and Kim ends up like Mussolini, Gaddafi, Saddam, Ceaușescu, etc.

The entire political philosophy of the DPRK is built around the fairy tale story of an isolated land of pure people, violently oppressed for centuries by foreign powers, currently under threat of existential annihilation by an imperialist foreign power that occupies half the country, and that the Kim family is keeping them safe and the Military is their instrument. Once you take out that foreign aggression part, the Kim's serve no purpose.

The Kim dynasty has every reason to want to keep things in a proverbial knife edge. It's dangerous for everyone else, but it's also where Kim is safest personally.

Yes but in past few years he damaged the key China allience further than it had degraded.

Now they backing sanctions.
Shutting NK companies in China and closing there joint investments for now.

Kim 2 had a good relationship with China, one kim 3 does not.
He has managed to damage the only nation that backs then support.

Absolutely the relationship with China has degraded. However, as long as that external threat remains or can be manufactured, and is needed to keep the Kim family in Power, the North Koreans will continue with their course even if they starve. It feeds into that whole mentality and political narrative, and gives them a meaningful deterrent capability to boot, which they can then use as a negotiating tool.

China can and will make life suck even more for NK, is getting serious about doing just that and has obviously had enough of their antics, however, as long as US forces remain in Korea, China isnt going to allow NK to collapse either. They dont want US forces up to the border, and they dont want to deal with the refugees.

We can hope that China getting more serious however knocks some sense into people on all sides of this, but unless theres something to address US forces and refugees, China isnt going to allow NK to fall either, unless they become a bigger threat than the US. Which is not impossible, it could eventually sway that way, but doesnt appear to be there yet.

Well China values two things that seem to conflict abit..

Money and stability.
US is a massive trade partner and major block of their exports abroad, a key foundation to there economy.

NK. Well they do not want them becoming unstable on their border so they cannot let them fail. It seems they would happy for a balenced maybe of a more weaker NK?

Reliance on them is expensive for China but when you control their main food and fuel supply you have substantial leverage.

Easier to reign kim 3 in of he now struggling to keep the Pyongyang set happy, and the elites who prop up his rule alone without China's "generous" aid.

sebster wrote:He isn't a figurehead, but he also isn't a puppet. Dictators never have absolute power, there is always a collection of elites underneath him who both grant him power and in turn are granted power by him. That's the complex dynamic, which means in order to keep his position Kim has to maintain a constant appearance of strength and also ensure the elites all get a nice bit of power and wealth.

This is why Kim has to kill potential rivals, and it's also why it is so hard for him to back down from nuclear ambitions.

Here's a nice (and a bit abstract) video that explains some of the stuff you need to stay in power:

 Easy E wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Luciferian wrote:
If the international community recognized North Korea as a legitimate nuclear power and invited Kim over for dinner and cocktails at the White House he would cease being belligerent and aggressive immediately. Unfortunately that's a hard thing to justify when he's basically holding all of his own people for ransom.

The issue here is that without a big existential threat, a great enemy, his internal powerbase collapses and Kim ends up like Mussolini, Gaddafi, Saddam, Ceaușescu, etc.

The entire political philosophy of the DPRK is built around the fairy tale story of an isolated land of pure people, violently oppressed for centuries by foreign powers, currently under threat of existential annihilation by an imperialist foreign power that occupies half the country, and that the Kim family is keeping them safe and the Military is their instrument. Once you take out that foreign aggression part, the Kim's serve no purpose.

The Kim dynasty has every reason to want to keep things in a proverbial knife edge. It's dangerous for everyone else, but it's also where Kim is safest personally.

So the best thing to do is just ignore them then. Check.

Not really. There are two reasons we can't ignore them

1) They can control what their population sees of the outside world, so even if we do nothing they can still lie to their people and say how we are threatening them.

2) They're not just staying inside their borders and shaking their fists at us. They shoot artillery at South Korea with a good amount of regularity. And now they're looking at testing a Hydrogen bomb in the middle of the pacific, potentially harming many other countries.

sebster wrote:It also shows you don't know much about words, because different people in different circumstances use words very differently. If a guy on the street says 'that guy is crazy' no-one on God's earth will assume he means 'that person is displaying personality traits that are identified in psychiatry as very mentally unhealthy, but the person is still likely to be a rational person who can be trusted to keep up bargains for their own self interest'.

You need to make up your mind. Do words have meaning or are we able to change the meaning of words on a whim to whatever we wish?