I know the conventional (ie media driven) thinking is that N Korea is 'so powerful as to render war unthinkable', but surely their kit and manpower, abundant though it may be, is of the same vintage or older than Saddam's Million man army we gently turned into fertiliser in 1991? Surely their SAM array is similary susceptible...or have they got up to date S-300 type stuff?

My point being - and God knows we don't need another war - that they probably can be contained pretty comprehensively, and that a stiffening of western resolve (rather than rewarding bad behaviuor) doesn't necessarily spell the apocalypse? I always wondered (other than the bitter fact that they are exporters of WMD and instability) whether NK was in the same bracket as Cuba - just ignore and wait to implode.

Idle thinking here.