Quote:
Originally Posted by astralis
"iran is developing nuclear weapons-->iran has crazy, irrational leaders-->iran, then, upon getting nukes, will irrationally use them-->thus we must get rid of the leaders, or at the very least get rid of the nuclear capability."
what i meant by using the north korean example was to show the following corollary:
"north korea has nukes/is developing nukes--->kim jong-il, with both past words and actions, shown himself to be more irrational than a-jad-->however, even kim has not used nukes/we have not got rid of kim/we have not got rid of his nuclear capability-->as of right now we don't seem much concerned."
what's the difference, then, between the case of iran and north korea? according to these threat factors, kim jong-il is nuttier, and actually has the capability (unlike iran). so why the difference in our actions regarding each country?
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Interesting point. The best answers I can come up with is one: we have allies who are far more engaged with the North Korean issue than we are (South Korea and Japan), and have far more to lose than we do. And two, the North Koreans (probably) already have nukes, and it is therefore far more problematic to dispose of their nuclear capability with little loss than it is to pre-empt the Iranian acquisition of nuclear weapons.