North Korea: 2012-2016

[Dayuhan]

It seems the South Korean government is quite content to let their fellow Koreans in the north starve as long as it doesn't disrupt their economic miracle. With the exception a few Christian activist groups no one seems to care for the average North Korean.

I'm not sure lack of concern is the operative constraint. What would you want the South Korean government, or anyone else, to do to liberate the north?

The world will probably keep pumping just enough money into the DPRK to keep it on life support, of course that dooms millions of North Koreans to a terrible life under a corrupt regime. Definitely not advocating for U.S. intervention, at least directly, but hopefully their is a moral aspect to our policy objectives.

There's nothing wrong with a moral aspect to policy objectives, but all policy objectives, moral and otherwise, are constraint by a limited range of realistic policy options. Liberating the north and raising the population's standard of living to that of the south is a lovely and moral objective, but without a realistic strategy for achieving the objective, what's it worth

There is also the question about what happens if the DPRK does collapse. Does a failed state with weapons of mass destruction present a threat to regional security or is it over played?

Certainly it's a threat, but trying to force or impose an unwelcome change on a failed state with weapons of mass destruction also poses risks.

If anyone has a realistic proposal for a way to "fix" North Korea without a war (thought to be undesirable), I'm all ears...