tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post8627587440275539927..comments2024-03-29T04:06:37.402-07:00Comments on Had Enough Therapy?: The View from PyongyangStuart Schneidermanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12784043736879991769noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-68407486050946437212017-05-02T20:11:23.295-07:002017-05-02T20:11:23.295-07:00Kim is one of those who believes that if he could ...Kim is one of those who believes that if he could get one just one nuke on say Seoul, Takyo, or Bejing then he can survive anything but an actual nuke exchange. With him assassinating family and people close to himself in the NKorean power structure he knows that the most immediate threat to himself would come from inside and close. He also must consider would an order from him to launch be obeyed? Therefore he would have to have at least one that in his mind he could personally assure a launch with.<br />This brings us to the recent failures and the rumor that they were the result of sabotage. If true I am grateful, but it does bring the question to mind Just how secure is our nukes? Would we even know if they weren't. Also if you could mess with the propulsion why couldn't you manipulate the targeting of the missile? This would apply to every other country with an arsenal Russia, China, UK, France, Pakistan, India.....etc.Jameshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13642228725661059539noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-80895486963322658602017-05-02T11:48:27.858-07:002017-05-02T11:48:27.858-07:00Stuart: We'll drool over the therapeutic value...Stuart: We'll drool over the therapeutic value of empathy, but how many of us can see things from someone else’s perspective. <br /><br />This skill or mental faculty is also called "Cognitive empathy", which is in itself morally neutral, and capable of offering helpful context to negative behavior of others, but can be used to advance power over others, to manipulate others, especially those trapped in fear.<br />http://www.danielgoleman.info/three-kinds-of-empathy-cognitive-emotional-compassionate/<br />---<br />The first is “cognitive empathy,” simply knowing how the other person feels and what they might be thinking. Sometimes called perspective-taking, this kind of empathy can help in, say, a negotiation or in motivating people. A study at the University of Birmingham found, for example, that managers who are good at perspective-taking were able to move workers to give their best efforts.<br /><br />But there can be a dark side to this sort of empathy – in fact, those who fall within the “Dark Triad” – narcissists, Machiavellians, and sociopaths (see Chapter 8 in Social Intelligence) – can be talented in this regard, while having no sympathy whatever for their victims. As Paul told me, a torturer needs this ability, if only to better calibrate his cruelty – and talented political operatives no doubt have this ability in abundance.<br />---<br /><br />The strategy of "Mutually Assure Destruction" also was a rational policy during the cold war, but it also encouraged wasteful expenditures of resources. You can see some of our rational "insanity" in this video showing every nuclear test since 1945.<br />https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-QWXvNFWrc A Time Lapse Map of Every Nuclear Explosion Since 1945 by Isao Hashimoto, 4 minutes<br />https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGFkw0hzW1c Every nuclear bomb explosion in history, 2.5 minutes<br /><br />People might not get so crazy about nuclear power if they see how much radioactive material we already put into the environment with our nuclear tests.<br /><br />The North Korean predicament is China's problem, a country too poor to feed its own people, but willing to spend half its resources on the military.<br /><br />It is rational that a country allows its soldiers to fight and die to protect itself from invaders. And there's a long history of military sieges where a city or country is isolated from trade, and may have to choose between starvation of its people, or surrender to foreign powers.<br /><br />I really do hope that North Korea can be persuaded to trade nuclear missiles for food, but history says that's unlikely by itself.<br /><br />If a parent chooses to buy arms and ammo if their children are starving, we would say such parents need an intervention by social services. And it looks to me that China is the local authorities who have to make such an assessment.<br /><br />And like the Waco siege, how do you protect women and children by a "rational" leader who would prefer to let his people die rather than surrender?<br /><br />Ideally the U.S. and South Korea might "agree" that we're all better off with North Korea being annexed by China. But if a military invasion spurs a nuclear attack on a Chinese city, that's a high prices to pay for "other people's children."<br /><br />OTOH, if your country can absorb a nuclear attack, and not strike back with equal mass destruction, you can gain the moral high ground, and China will have a new province they'll have earned in just blood.<br />Ares Olympushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09726811306826601686noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8078379512095504946.post-72140940495709933472017-05-02T08:08:42.987-07:002017-05-02T08:08:42.987-07:00From the Friedman link: "An intercontinental...From the Friedman link: "An intercontinental ballistic missile launches at 10 Gs, vibrating like crazy. Then it enters a vacuum with wild swings of temperature and re-enters the atmosphere at scorching temperatures. At that point, a precision instrument must trigger an explosion"<br /><br />10G is not all that high for equipment. A shell fired from a 5-inch gun incurs forces of around 20,000 Gs...and American engineers were able to develop a radar fuse to fit in the nose of the shell and survive that shock in working condition...and they had to do it with *vacuum tubes*.<br /><br />The problem of re-entry did indeed prove to be a very difficult one in the early days of ballistic missiles, but I bet a lot of the approaches used have long been described at some level in the open literature. Also, if you put the weapons in orbit, with the idea of triggering them at some future point to perform an EMP attack, then re-entry is not involved.David Fosterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15464681514800720063noreply@blogger.com