Apparently it's an H-Bomb they tested... which is a gigantic step forward in North Korean nuclear capabilities. That's an unpleasant surprise.

"With the latest detonation, three of the North’s four tests will have occurred during the Mr. Obama’s term in office."

That's top drawer situational management right there. What's his response going to be? Another Line in the Sand? A stern letter in Kim Jong Un's permanent record?

Link to above quote, from the Obama-friendly New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/06/world/asia/north-korea-hydrogen-bomb-test.html?_r=0

What response would you make?

North Korea has nukes and there ain't anything we can do to change that.

Helping South Korea, Japan, and other East Asian countries with a missile defense network would be a start.

I'm fairly sure South Korea is too close for one of those to be effective.

Besides, they're hardly a guarantee. Look at how worried Israel is over Iran, and how many Hamas missiles got through, despite having probably the most significant missile defence system in the world.

Eh, no response is perfect, but that would at least have some practical effect as well as being a good show of support.

@KingCyrus, that wouldn't affect North Korea's nuclear testing, and it wouldn't have a practical effect on North Korea's ability to e.g. wipe Seoul off the map, and the ultimate solution would remain 'keep up the negotiations theater with SK/Japan/China and wait for NK's internal situation to change,' so I'm not sure what it's a start towards. Do you think there's a practical degree of missile defense at which we could acceptably initiate hostilities towards NK? I'm skeptical.

Perhaps.

It's debatable as to whether China would really let that happen though. That missile defence system would clearly not just protect against North Korea, after all. America needs to complete it's "Pivot to Asia" to start having that sort of muscle.

There's not really a lot that can be done about North Korea. Getting China involved in hitting it diplomatically is about the only thing that has any effect; given how totally isolated it is from everyone else.

Um shouldnt it be "during Chinas watch?".

@Letholigica,

If by acceptable you mean that the US would be safe, the answer is yes, that could practically happen now. If you mean SK and our other allies... Not too soon. However, missile defense technology is improving, and the possible capabilities of direct energy weapons could heavily influence it.

However, leaning on China would probably have the biggest effect at this stage in the game. I am sure that they do not want NK getting out of hand almost as much as we do.

Perfect example of how congress will blast a president when they dont act. and demand he go through congress when he does. Congress doesnt care about North Korea.

Honestly there's nothing we can do about NK, UN sanctions are limited in reach and hard to pass with the PRC on the security council. The best way to go about this is to condemn it globally, continue to work with our asian partners to build strong military defense and offense plans and wait for our technology to surpass nuclear weapons or for internal conflict to rip NK apart. There is only so far that propaganda and torture can take a regime.

The perfect response to North Korea would be to unilaterally (and I mean the entire fucking world) blow their doors open and establish a UN-led government before they can do anything about it.

The likely response is to sit on our asses and wait until fatty cakes in power there dies of malnutrition.

Unfortunately, NK has had 60 years to build up an arsenal with which to hold everyone nearby hostage. "Blowing their doors open" before they can respond would be very difficult.

If 10+ militarized nations came bearing down on McDonald's boy over there, he would curl up in a ball and suck his thumb.

He doesn't want to die any more than you or I do and I doubt he ignores how many leaders the West has taken out around the world that they don't like. What he takes away from all of those leaders being deposed is that they weren't aggressive enough. They didn't use the WMD fear tactics that he uses, which is why they so heavily publicize their missile launches. They're showing off what they're inching closer to having.

But they don't have it yet, so we should snip their balls now.

"But they don't have it yet, so we should snip their balls now."

What does that mean, from a real world point of view? Clearly a UN invasion is not an option, so what should America do?

I have to admit, the current policy of sitting on our collective arses has been pretty successful for many decades. Hardly anyone has died on our side, and people have become so used to North Korea's nonsense that no one is scared of it any more.

Invading would be problematic. NK can't throw a nuclear weapon more than a few feet, but it can (and has) buried them in numerous strategic locations that can be detonated if an invading army establishes a beachhead.

Why isn't a UN invasion an option? It's pretty much entirely American funded anyway and these long-range missile tests should be a hell of a lot more worrying to us than to South Korea and Japan. They're already in range.

Why is doing nothing acceptable? People are dying at a horrendous rate. Human rights violations in North Korea go beyond anything we see in other places. Some moral world we live in where we economically sanction genocidal maniacs but we go in and blow the roof off of countries in the Middle East that didn't do anything wrong until we started meddling.

Why would you have to put boots on the ground, Octavious? We're at a point in technology where we don't have to put boots on the ground. A few goggles in the air would do the trick.

lol are you like 9 years old or something bo_sux?

Maybe bo wants seoul and its millions of people to die when NK decides to throw everything it has in response?

Lots of analysts and security experts are now saying that this wasn't an H-bomb at all, by the way.

"Why isn't a UN invasion an option? It's pretty much entirely American funded anyway"

Is that true? If so, maybe that's one of the reasons why UN sucks so hard

American funding, European management. I.E. lots of money is spent to get nothing done.

2013 table:

US: 22 %
Japan: 10.8 %
Germany: 7.1%
France: 5.6%
etc.

So, though US pay an important deal, it's rather far from 'entirely'

It says something when the US provides almost 1/4 of the funds for an organization of more than 180 members when very few Americans even like the UN. Forget Planned Parenthood, let's defund the UN.

The more dangerous option for North Korea is a coup where an even more radical element takes over. So far this guy has been a juvenile whiney dipshit. He has carried on his fathers meaningless legacy of talking big but doing very little. This is all just for attention, but what if we get some arrogant far more sinister type in there instead? With H Bombs?
China needs to get involved and potentially take the royal family out if it gets bad. China could responsibly seize the country with sheer military might in a matter of hours preventing Nuclear weapons from falling into anyones hands. Then North Korea would just be another Chinese expansion zone which might even have improved quality of life under Chinese rule.

The North Korean Premier is either a lot more switched on than most people give him credit for, or is a figurehead for a far more competent leadership. The idea that North Korea is run by a "juvenile whiney dipshit" is poorly thought out fantasy.

Principians, there is a difference between normal budget and "peacekeeping" (ie military) budget.

@Soc Dis ... do you really think they're suicidal? The kid's not dumb. He's not throwing a Diplomacy game.

The North Korean leadership expect to be executed if they fail. They've been brainwashed their entire lives. They would use everything they had if we attacked them.

The UN is simply a convenient organisation for the United States to organise it's communication and control of it's many client-states, vassals, and "allies". Russia and China etc. are also at the party, because as has been mentioned, uncle sam is pickin up the bill :)

I'll echo HR's statement, with the added statement that, yes I do think they're suicidally stupid.

It would be nice if the UN were evenly funded by each of its members. Like Chaqa said, the funding ratio is ridiculous.

I guess we'll agree to disagree on the suicidally stupid aspect. The guy's a halfway genius as far as modern dictatorial pricks go.

Evenly funded; no.

Proportionally funded, yes.

But the peacekeeping budget is the one that was quoted above; not the actual diplomatic apparatus budget.

Yeah, proportionally. But it's not.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-01-06/how-scientists-know-the-north-korea-blast-probably-wasn-t-an-h-bomb

Comparisons with previous tests shows it wasn't that powerful or an H-bomb. So this isn't an upgrade in power. The greater worry is range with their missiles.

This is the difference between North Korea and say Libya. Having working nuclear weapons means the rest of the world isn't likely to do more than talk. That's why Iran wants to join the club so it can get away with more.

When it comes to the normal budget, the US contributed $654 million for 2015. Which is a drop in the ocean.

USA: $654 million
Japan: $322 million
Germany: $212 million
France: $166 million
UK: $154 million
China: $153 million
Italy: $132 million
Canada: $88 million
Spain: $88 million
Brazil: $87 million
Russia: $72 million
Saudi Arabia: $26 million
India: $19 million
UAE: $17 million

Does seem to me that whilst the budget has recognised Russia's GDP is pretty crap now, China is definitely underpaying. As is India, and possibly the gulf arab states. And Japan is more likely to be overpaying, given it's no longer the world's second largest economy and has been stagnant for such a long time.

Hydrogen bomb ???
Sounds more like Kim the murdering thug lit up an after dinner fart.