Jesse Waters of Fox openly calls for North Korea's Kim Jong un's assassination

[Badger]

Uh, assassinating Kim Jong-un may in fact be the easiest way to compel the North Koreans to actually launch a nuke.

Highly unlikely. The resulting confusion in the hierarchy would be interesting, to say the least. Kim Han-sol, Kim Jong-chun, Ri Yong-ho, Kim Ju-ae loyalists, and Choe Ryong-hae would presumably all compete for power. I think whoever Kim Sul-song sides with of the Kims would dominate in a short struggle for leadership.

Your explanation, while reasonably accurate, fails to explain why a destabilized North Korea with an internal power fight (or immediately afterwards, considering it would likely be resolved in days if not hours) wouldn't strongly increase the risk of a nuclear launch. The one thing that could trigger the Kims into a launch would be a serious threat to their dynastic survival. This would establish them as THE force of the government, and allow a "rally around the flag" dynamic to solidify support.

This scenario would surely end badly for all, particularly the Kims, but it is entirely feasible, or even the most probable outcome, with an assassination of Dear Leader.

[Badger]

Honestly, the kidnapping and murder of Otto Warmbier is causus belli enough. Whether it would be a good idea is up in the air, but justified? Absolutely.

I thought he was arrested while he was in North Korea for committing minor vandalism?

North Korea's story has been exposed as a lie. They claimed he was a member of a Church group conspiring to convert people, and his supposedly stealing the banner was part of that "mission". That story is unlikely for patently obvious reasons.

Their "evidence" is a filmed video of him supposedly taking down the banner, which was likely staged once they had decided to kidnap him and hold him for ransom. Why they decided to murder him, we'll never know.

Whether he did in fact commit some relatively trivial act of vandalism/theft or not is of little import when considering he was murdered for it.

[Badger]

Honestly, the kidnapping and murder of Otto Warmbier is causus belli enough. Whether it would be a good idea is up in the air, but justified? Absolutely.

I thought he was arrested while he was in North Korea for committing minor vandalism?

North Korea's story has been exposed as a lie. They claimed he was a member of a Church group conspiring to convert people, and his supposedly stealing the banner was part of that "mission". That story is unlikely for patently obvious reasons.

Their "evidence" is a filmed video of him supposedly taking down the banner, which was likely staged once they had decided to kidnap him and hold him for ransom. Why they decided to murder him, we'll never know.

Whether he did in fact commit some relatively trivial act of vandalism/theft or not is of little import when considering he was murdered for it.

Even presuming they kidnapped him, calling his death as the result of disease or poor treatment while in custody 'murder' positively reeks of internalized pro-war Orwellian propaganda. ( And what ransom demands were made? I never heard a whisper of this before this thread.)  It implies his condition was deliberately inflicted as the result of malice.  I don't seem to recall blue posters here being nearly so eager to label people dying directly or indirectly at the hands of law enforcement 'murder' when the law enforcement in question is located in the US.

Also, WTF does this have to do with Faux News publicly calling for the assassination of foreign heads of state?

1) From all I've read, to call Warmbier's death even the best case scenario (to North Korea) of "benign neglect" is false and misleading. He was at best left to die, and more likely suffered from intentional beatings/torture to result in his decades-premature death. I'm not saying it warrants war, but lets not let the bastard government that killed him off the hook to make that point.

2) No relation to the OP's thread really, though it's arguably at least more relative that your comment about supposed comparison to custodial deaths in the US.

[Badger]

Uh, assassinating Kim Jong-un may in fact be the easiest way to compel the North Koreans to actually launch a nuke.

Highly unlikely. The resulting confusion in the hierarchy would be interesting, to say the least. Kim Han-sol, Kim Jong-chun, Ri Yong-ho, Kim Ju-ae loyalists, and Choe Ryong-hae would presumably all compete for power. I think whoever Kim Sul-song sides with of the Kims would dominate in a short struggle for leadership.

Your explanation, while reasonably accurate, fails to explain why a destabilized North Korea with an internal power fight (or immediately afterwards, considering it would likely be resolved in days if not hours) wouldn't strongly increase the risk of a nuclear launch. The one thing that could trigger the Kims into a launch would be a serious threat to their dynastic survival. This would establish them as THE force of the government, and allow a "rally around the flag" dynamic to solidify support.

This scenario would surely end badly for all, particularly the Kims, but it is entirely feasible, or even the most probable outcome, with an assassination of Dear Leader.

Perhaps. But we can't underestimate how fragmentation works. No serious player in the ensuing struggle for leadership would even consider launching a nuclear weapon, as every North Korean top official understands the importance of not doing so. It's highly unlikely that a rogue general or politician could even muster the necessary supplies to launch the nukes. If it's anything like America, one of the people closest to him would gain all the codes. Whoever his personal guard was loyal to would be unlikely to change his policies regarding nuclear warfare. It would take a complicated struggle for a random insane person to manage to successfully launch the nuclear weapons.

I believe you're applying an overly rational thought process to an unquestionably irrational government.