[Norman Arbuthnot]

Russians could be 'trusted' with nukes because while commies they were rational.

We really didn't have any choice but to trust the Russians from the early 1960's onward. We came darn close to blowing each other up on a few occasions. We are lucky it didn't come to that.

Dr. Evil over there in NK is acting rationally, in his own perverse way. He's gambling, that's for sure, but this is time to do it. It is obvious that the NK's don't believe that we can handle two large scale high intensity ground wars at the same time and probably believe that we wouldn't hit them with a pre-emptive nuke strike. A conventional strike that takes out their nuke facilities is very possible, but that entails a high degree of risk because Seoul is vulnerable to a counter-strike and they don't even have to get across the DMZ to do that. Sure, we take them out, but at what price? They are betting that we will cave before putting SK at risk. That may be a risky bet, but Kim may figure he's next, after Saddam, so he has little to lose in the end?

Any way you cut it, we are in a difficult position.

[John Valentine]

So are they.

They cannot make good on their threat to the South without total destruction of the North.

The problematic questiuon is what happens if they continue their peace offensive with the now appeasment happy South while proceeding apace with crating and adding to a nuclear weapons inventory.

The 64 dollar queston is: "Will we allow it?"

I think we have to make it totally clear to BOTH Koreas that the answer to that question is a solid NO. NAd that any attemt to push the issue will result in a the military eliimination of the North's potential nuclear capability.