[quote=@Odin]
<Snipped quote by mdk>

That's the beauty of NK - don't have to be rich, just have to be in control. When your people are starving you don't need to pay them, you just give them something else, like food or privileges. I'm 100% positive that there are North Koreans crazy enough to go into a mountain that may or may not be leaking radiation to retrieve some assets. Just promise them some food.[/quote]

But for a nuclear program you need, like, engineers, specialized equipment, rare resources, processing facilities, time, etc. I get that the labor is cheap but the nukes aren't -- and even if they are, the equipment needed to research and produce them ain't. Without swathes of top secret intel, who knows, but it's entirely possible their program was EXTREMELY damaged by that one mountain collapse. If you had the resources to set the program up with redundancies and safeties, you would in fact be smart to do so -- but maybe they don't, even with the slavery.

[quote]I think you're giving the Kim's too little credit, though. It's a carefully orchestrated and engineered miracle that NK is still standing, almost 60 years after the Korea war (or more?). It's not all up to the Kims ofcourse, since they're advised by people who [i]do[/i] know what's up, but to say it's short-sighted and terrible... I don't know. They have survived where other countries in similar situations have fallen. For a longer time than any of them have been around. Short-sighted? I'd say they've been very good at maintaining the status quo from their underdog position for as long as they have.
[/quote]

I meant that as a joke, like, ha ha, kims are short and fat and wear glasses and are evil. BUT YOU'RE RIGHT THOUGH -- Jong Il was a goddamn genius, and Jong Un totally takes after his pappy. Anyway the family's more savvy than their advisers -- DPRK advisers get publicly blown to smithereens for disagreeing with the glorious leader, how much sway could they possibly have? [b]Kims are smart[/b]. Nobody plays the wildcard as long, as consistently, and successfully as they have without being [i]well[/i] ahead of the game.