Forum - View topicINTEREST: Swiss Expert Outs N. Korea's Kim Jong-un as Avid Manga Reader, Poor Student
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GainaxFanboy
Posts: 60 |
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What i got from this article is that i share similar tastes in manga with Kim JOng-un
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ultimatehaki
Posts: 1090 |
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I don't think Kim understands that USA also has a nuclear button, and got like 100 times more of those buttons then him.
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7jaws7
 Posts: 704 Location: New York State |
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Kim’s attraction to the NBA and basketball in general makes sense, given his previous contacts with Dennis Rodman.
Personally, I think the MSM has a problem with fear-mongering because there’s no war happening anytime soon. All of Kim’s sword rattling will just be chalked up as the “North Korean Missile Crisis” in our history books fifty years from now 
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Narutofreak1412
 Posts: 338 |
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I read about that in a german newspaper a few months ago when Kim was missing for a month. They wrote some theories about what happened, like that he could be ill or that he could be on vacation. They also jokingly wrote that maybe he started drawing his own manga because he's a manga fan for many years xD
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gpanthony
Posts: 241 |
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Reading a manga by him would be pretty interesting. It would probably be very insightful as far as his behaviors and motivations go. |
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Kougeru
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Except he knows he can use South Korea as a hostage. Nuclear strikes on North Korea would have affects all around that region, for decades or more. They could also easily attack nearby allies while the nuke heads toward them. Or even still hit us. You don't need 100 nukes to do insane damage. |
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Cutiebunny
 Posts: 1747 |
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Am I the only one wondering if truckloads of manga translated into Korean won't be used as a bargaining chip by South Korea?
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Mr. sickVisionz
 Posts: 2173 |
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I think he does understand that every super power on Planet Earth has a nuclear arsenal and that countries that gave up their nukes lost a lot of their say on the world stage. Nuclear nonproliferation would be a lot easier to sell if the planet didn't make those two points a reality. Also, the only country who has ever actually used a nuke to murder mass numbers of people out of anger (important to note that the US has dropped two bombs so even if someone else launches a nuke, we're still the #1 kingpins of atomic mass murder) is telling everyone that they need to disarm while said country refuses to disarm. |
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Zeino
Posts: 1098 |
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Since he read Dragon Ball, I wonder if he identified with Freeza...
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A Man named RJ
Posts: 47 |
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The absolute Savagery of Trump transcends time. I haven't seen somebody roasted this hard since I watched Barefoot Gen.
Out of Anger? Did you see how the Japanese fought in WW2 with how much trouble we had clearing out Okinawa? The people were under the honor-laiden demands of society, and would have fought to the death even the women and children. Had we invaded on the ground, every man, woman, and child would have died "protecting their homeland" - think Berlin 1945 but everywhere in Japan. Potentially millions of deaths,between both sides, and civilians and several destroyed cities here, versus around 129,000 - about 1/8th of the number. and it ended the war much quicker, and began Japan's insane economic recovery. If you want an IDEA of how insane Imperial Japan was? Before, and After the first Atom Bomb - a revolutionary single bomb that ends cities in an instant on Hiroshima, there was NOTHING from Hirohito, nothing from the leaders... nothing. the US asked for a surrender, they ignored it, and they tried to keep the war going. it took TWO WMDs and several fire-bombing raids on Tokyo to get them to surrender. Dont go around rewriting history all willie nillie. Reducing it to just being "out of anger". It's a disservice to everybody involved in the whole ordeal including Japan itself. |
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DeTroyes
 Posts: 520 |
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A Chinese friend of mine once told me that the general reaction of the rest of Asia to the US dropping the bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was a profound disappointment that we stopped at only two Japanese cities.
Imperial Japan's "Co-Prosperity Sphere" pretty much turned China, Korea, and elsewhere into Japan's slaves, and they were not nice about it; just look up the Rape of Nanking and other atrocities. Its hard for us to imagine now, at a time some 73 years removed from the events, but nuking two cities during what amounted to a complete, total, to-the-knife war was probably the lesser of many evils; it brought the war to a speedy end, and certainly avoided the even messier possibility of a partitioned Japan that might have happened had Stalin pushed forward in his plans to invade from the north. It wasn't a great solution, but it brought the suffering of the war to an end. But having said this, I think I wouldn't have nuked a city as the first target. Dropping a single "demonstration" device onto the rice fields south of Tokyo, with a warning that "next time, a city gets it.", would probably have been just as effective. |
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Matriel
Posts: 87 |
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I kind of feel like the book "Hiroshima" by John Hersey should be required reading for any leader of a nuclear power. It's the story of several survivors and their experiences after the attack and is very powerful. It talks of skin sliding off of people in glove-like pieces, a child dying in the arms of a survivor, and towering whirlwinds of fire. If the attack doesn't kill you, then you have the often life-ending or life-shortening and handicapping consequences of the radiation to deal with.
I'm positive that neither Kim Jong-un or Trump (and his one-upsmanship and frankly childish response to North Korea's words) have read this book. They're far too-quick to threaten each other with nuclear weapons. Edit: Forgot to post this story from a survivor. While not from the book, I found it doing a quick search. Last edited by Matriel on Tue Jan 02, 2018 11:41 pm; edited 2 times in total |
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Juno016
 Posts: 2387 |
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In terms of WWII, I think it's a bit hard to throw judgment, for or against. The cities were chosen strategically and were not done at the exact same time (Japan tried to call a bluff on the first to justify continuing the war, and we answered their doubt to stop it).
For the actual topic here, it throws a little more doubt on the leader's actual intentions, but I don't think it means he won't follow through. Despite being a leader, he's part of a deadly power struggle. If he sides with basketball or manga over what the regime wants for the country, he's risking assassination. So if the entire regime supports nuclear strike, he's probably on board as well. At the very least, it's not worth testing him. But at the same time, his regime and himself are playing a game of dares to emulate what other dictators seeking power have succeeded in doing in the past: as long as they're aggressive, the rest of the world's decisions revolve around what they do--not the other way around--and they have to keep up the threats to keep their growing interests satisfied and the regime protected. Worst case scenario, they could take the world (or a good chunk of it) with them if their regime is doomed. |
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Agent355
 Posts: 5113 Location: Crackberry in hand, thumbs at the ready... |
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Doubt they let average people in North Korea read manga (or any reading material of foreign origin) legally. Wonder what they'd think of Attack on Titan?
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DeTroyes
Posts: 520 |
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Kim is basically riding the tiger. His country is so screwed up that the only way to keep a lid on things and maintain control is through fear, and to maintain that fear he needs an external enemy (namely, us) to justify his actions to his own people. If he lets up on the fear he risks assassination or worse; if he grants his people greater freedoms, it will almost certainly weaken his hold on them and they will revolt. If he weakens the military, they will almost certainly replace him on their own, such is their power. His only choice is to keep on a bellicose path, and hope that he can scare his rivals into submission, scare the world just enough that they take him seriously and give him the things he wants, but not scare everyone enough that they decide the price of letting him stay in power is too high.
Just as an aside, I don't think it matters who the occupant in the White House is in this crisis; we would probably be arriving at the exact same situation we are in now if Clinton had won. Once you start riding the tiger, you have no choice but to hold on until the bitter end, because if you ever let go or are thrown off, you're dead.
I'm guessing Manhwa gets in, probably the same way most outside pop culture is smuggled its way past the gates. I do know that activists regularly send thousands of balloons into NK with DVD discs and memory sticks attached, usually of things like popular movies and South Korean tv dramas & comedies. While it may get you in trouble and perhaps sent to one of their penal camps, there is a widespread black market trade in outside television and movies in North Korea. Last edited by DeTroyes on Wed Jan 03, 2018 12:25 am; edited 1 time in total |
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