Is war imminent?! Dinner with generals the "calm before the storm."

[Onepoint]

Every single president is sending people in his stead to fight, no matter what they did previously.  You nor anyone else save maybe those close to them have any idea the gravity it is to anyone personally in command, and just because you don't like the guy, doesn't mean he is will to throw lives away.   They have to actually do that to show what's on their mind, like Bill Clinton and Obama actually did for political perception calculations. Or some could say Bush did in Iraq for other reasons.

[ImTryin]

I guess we should play the appeasement game with them like the previous three Presidents.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/17/world/asia/trump-north-korea-threat.html

Just another privileged draft dodging chickenhawk, willing to fight to the last 19 year old...

Tell about the last President's great military history..........How about Hillary Clinton's

I guess we should play the appeasement game with them like the previous three Presidents.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/17/world/asia/trump-north-korea-threat.html

Tell about the last President's great military history.

Sorry, but Trump talks tough, but when it was his time, in spite of being a very good baseball player, ran off to his daddies doctor for 5 medical deferments...
BHO was too young, but that wouldn't have been an option for him.. as it wasn't for the poor sob that went in Trump's place...

Didn't even have the balls  to take a stand and go to Canada.. daddy hooked him up though..

As revealing as that is as to his true lack of character.. it ultimately doesn't matter. What matters is that same spoiled little man baby is now our empororer.

Lecturing his own SOS over Twitter and every other ridiculous statement he's made about NK shows he's in over his head. And that the assessment tillerson made, then denied, then final admitted to making about Trump mental status was accurate....

Even if you think war is the answer, this is a carnival, not statecraft...

[sheepdog]

Well I guess if Hillary had won she could have gone to North Korea with the old reset button.

What Obama was too young????? He turned 18 once didn't he?

I have two nephews in the military. Wanna guess who they prefer as Commander in Chief.

[JimmyJamesKY]

I think I prefer appeasement to nuclear war, but that's just me...

I may even support action that was part of a coherent strategy, but I think if D. Trump takes action, it will be because war with Korea will be  "not what Obama would do" or even what any past President would do, and not an actual thought out strategy...

Trumps main "policy" these last months have shown that there really is no "policy", just actions based on personal vendetta.  A pissing match on Twitter was what I had hoped to avoid, but that's exactly was our "foreign policy" has devolved into regarding Korea.  Trump is in his own world, and directly counters the intentions of his own Secretary of State.  How is that sound policy?

[sheepdog]

We all need to learn history because it has a way of repeating itself. You might ought to read up on a guy named Neville Chamberlain. He thought appeasement would give England peace in their time.

Trump is just giving Rocket Man a little something to think about. Kim knows the United States could turn North Korea into a parking lot blowing his comfortable gig. Now he has someone in the White House with a pair instead of the appeasers he's dealt with in the past. Trump is playing tough guy and Tillerson is telling the Norks they better not piss him off. To me it's obvious.

We're telling Kim, the best defense is a strong offense. That plan has worked since WWII, no one has attacked the United States with nuclear weapons because they know it would mean the destruction of their world. Sometimes we have to remind others of that. It's not that we want to but it's there, think about it, live like you have been living or make the mistake of trying us and pay horrible consequences.

It might be a dangerous game but we live in dangerous times and we have never been attacked by another nation when they thought we had the upper hand.

[JimmyJamesKY]

I know who Chamberlain is, and how he thought he had won "peace in our time".  IF he had had 25 years of peace with Hitler after making that statement, then he would have been seen as a success, rather than the chicken he is known to be.

Is "good cop, bad cop" working?  How is Un and N. Korea behaving any differently than they have in the past?  So, NOW they're behaving because they're scared of Trump?  I just don't see it...  I'm pretty sure the Norks understood Mutually Assured Destruction, or
rather one attack on us and their destruction, even before Trump came along.

I understand what your getting at, but it seems like a dangerous game to play only to achieve the same results as others who used diplomacy. 


Another perspective would be to say the Kims, both past and present, used fear of imminent attack from US to cling to power, and loud, public threats from the President of the US play right into that. 

It's worth noting the the Chairman of the Council on Foreign Relations has stated that Trump's mindset is "volatile" and that he is "edging us closer to WWIII."  It's not like Bob Corker is some tree-hugging liberal....   

[ImTryin]

We all need to learn history because it has a way of repeating itself. You might ought to read up on a guy named Neville Chamberlain. He thought appeasement would give England peace in their time.

Trump is just giving Rocket Man a little something to think about. Kim knows the United States could turn North Korea into a parking lot blowing his comfortable gig. Now he has someone in the White House with a pair instead of the appeasers he's dealt with in the past. Trump is playing tough guy and Tillerson is telling the Norks they better not piss him off. To me it's obvious.

We're telling Kim, the best defense is a strong offense. That plan has worked since WWII, no one has attacked the United States with nuclear weapons because they know it would mean the destruction of their world. Sometimes we have to remind others of that. It's not that we want to but it's there, think about it, live like you have been living or make the mistake of trying us and pay horrible consequences.

It might be a dangerous game but we live in dangerous times and we have never been attacked by another nation when they thought we had the upper hand.

You ought to a read up on a guy named Winston Churchill..
Despite being a child of a great aristocratic family, actually fought when he was young, didn't run off to daddy for a way out...
Lead his nation with tough, cohesive dignity, even in the face of  bitter criticism.. Rose above it, didn't have a little temper tantrum about it...
Never contradicted his foreign minister, on the brink of war, in a public forum.

unlike our spoiled baby in Chief..

[sheepdog]

Yet Churchill knew appeasement was Bull Shyte.

"An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile —- hoping it will eat him last."

In the past we've had appeasers who have just kicked the an down the road letting the next guy worry about it. Well now we have a nuclear North Korea and probably a nuclear Iran because of it. I guess you would wait till we have Honolulu in cinders before we wake up. Well that's the way of appeasers.

You might not like Trump's tactics or his methods but IMHO I prefer letting our enemies know that if they dare mess with the United States you will regret it if you live.

Drinking a quart of gin and smoking as many as 20 cigars a day, not exactly normal behavior, Churchill was one of my heroes, Trump can't compare to the great man, true, couldn't come close to filling his shoes but Trump, who has his own share of peccadilloes is who we have. We could have Hillary the appeaser with her reset button or Trump letting the little boy with the bad haircut and the Iranian Mullahs know that destruction awaits them if they want to push the envelope. I would rather have that in the backs of their minds.

[Onepoint]

All the diplomacy and appeasement has not once stopped a war, just delayed it.  We were looking at conventional war when we 1st started diplomacy with NK, now we are looking at regional nuclear war, before its over NK will be able to cover the entire US with its missiles, and we have to hope our defense can stop it. Obviously, NK won't stop developing and threatening.  In no stretch of imagination would I call that a success for diplomacy, except for NK.

[sheepdog]

By the way Corker, one of my Senators is a full blown RINO.

All the diplomacy and appeasement has not once stopped a war, just delayed it.  We were looking at conventional war when we 1st started diplomacy with NK, now we are looking at regional nuclear war, before its over NK will be able to cover the entire US with its missiles, and we have to hope our defense can stop it. Obviously, NK won't stop developing and threatening.  In no stretch of imagination would I call that a success for diplomacy, except for NK.

Hasn't it been shown that Lil' Kim just doesn't know what to make of Trump? I like that, he knew what to make of previous Presidents with their aid for peace and their lines in the sand. That's how we got to the situation we're in now, they knew we were a paper tiger. IMHO Rocket Man knows those days are probably over.

[Onepoint]

Those days of ranting until a payday may be over for now, but he won't stop regardless, he will just ignore trump and wait him out for the next Chamberlain to come along, because unless he does something overt, even Trump won't risk a war that is seen as unjustified, his ego couldn't take it for starters, and it would force China to intervene on NKs behalf.   

[sheepdog]

It's a dangerous situation, I remember the Cuban Missle Crisis too and it was acting like we weren't kidding by a President that the previous year came off as a fool with The Bay of Pigs that got us out of that. China stands to loose too much with it's economy and war with it's biggest customer and North Korea has to know that. Kim might like to play with fire and act like the little tough guy to his masses but would he risk his life, all his comforts and power by provoking the most powerful military on the planet and an American President that some think is a fool and he just can't figure out?

Kim might be smart enough to know, history repeats itself.

[ImTryin]

It's a dangerous situation, I remember the Cuban Missle Crisis too and it was acting like we weren't kidding by a President that the previous year came off as a fool with The Bay of Pigs that got us out of that. China stands to loose too much with it's economy and war with it's biggest customer and North Korea has to know that. Kim might like to play with fire and act like the little tough guy to his masses but would he risk his life, all his comforts and power by provoking the most powerful military on the planet and an American President that some think is a fool and he just can't figure out?

Kim might be smart enough to know, history repeats itself.

NK, despite all their bluster, was never going to start a war.. (not intentionally at least)... They are not a moral nation, but they are not stupid, how many warheads the US has, and the capabilities to deliver them, accurately, with in a matter of minutes, to any spot on the globe isn't exactly a state secret..

They like their little hermit kingdom, and their Dom' Perigone, and their Scandinavian hookers way too much..

But they remain convinced that the way to further entrench their power is to develop thermonuclear weapons, and the means to deliver them.
One could argue, perhaps, that they aren't wrong..

One thing for certain is that all of Trump's bluster, has done zilch, to stop them.. Their programs to create nuclear material doubled this year, and it's not exactly news that they are progressing rapidly with missile tests.

You may have convinced yourself that Trump's Twitter tirades are a genious application of the "Good cop bad cop routine" with Rex Tillerson.
I am not convinced that isn't staring into an ink-blot and finding the most comfortable picture you can see... The easiest person to BS is always yourself...


But, even if, it's not working... 

[sheepdog]

Who has done anything that's stopped him. At least Kim has a little more to think about with Trump. So the only other scenario was Kim and Hillary or more of the previous 8 years. I prefer bluster and bravado to signs of weakness such as we've had, lines in the sand that really weren't there, Benghazi, a military that was a laboratory for social experimentation.

It was people like you Mr. I'm Tryin that got us Trump for President. Kind of ironic isn't i?

[panoz77]

It's a dangerous situation, I remember the Cuban Missle Crisis too and it was acting like we weren't kidding by a President that the previous year came off as a fool with The Bay of Pigs that got us out of that. China stands to loose too much with it's economy and war with it's biggest customer and North Korea has to know that. Kim might like to play with fire and act like the little tough guy to his masses but would he risk his life, all his comforts and power by provoking the most powerful military on the planet and an American President that some think is a fool and he just can't figure out?

Kim might be smart enough to know, history repeats itself.

NK, despite all their bluster, was never going to start a war.. (not intentionally at least)...

Really?  What if they do this stunt again? 
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-32013750
Seems like an act of war to me.