The Norks are Suspected of Sinking South Korean Shipping.

[Shroom Man 777]

Oh, oh!

The Madman theory was a primary characteristic of the foreign policy conducted by U.S. President Richard Nixon. His administration, the executive branch of the federal government of the United States from 1969 to 1974, attempted to make the leaders of other countries think Nixon was mad, and that his behavior was irrational and volatile. Fearing an unpredictable American response, leaders of hostile Communist Bloc nations would avoid provoking the United States.

As Nixon told his White House Chief of Staff H. R. Haldeman:

"I call it the Madman Theory, Bob. I want the North Vietnamese to believe I've reached the point where I might do anything to stop the war. We'll just slip the word to them that, 'for God's sake, you know Nixon is obsessed about Communism. We can't restrain him when he's angry -- and he has his hand on the nuclear button' -- and Ho Chi Minh himself will be in Paris in two days begging for peace."[1]

On October 1969, the Nixon administration indicated to the Soviet Union that "the madman was loose" when the United States military was ordered to full global war readiness alert (unbeknownst to the majority of the American population), and bombers armed with thermonuclear weapons flew patterns near the Soviet border for three consecutive days.[2]

The administration employed the "Madman strategy" (as it was later dubbed by Haldeman) to force the North Vietnamese government to negotiate a peace to end the Vietnam War.[3] Along the same lines, American diplomats (Henry Kissinger in particular) portrayed the 1970 incursion into Cambodia as a symptom of Nixon's supposed instability.[4]

Nixon's use of the strategy during the Vietnam War was problematic. "First, while he would pretend to be willing to pay any price to achieve his goals, his opponents actually were willing to pay any price to achieve theirs. Second, Nixon had the misfortune to preside over a democracy growing weary and increasingly critical of the struggle."[5]

The madman strategy can be related to Niccolò Machiavelli, who, in his Discourses on Livy (book 3, chapter 2) discusses how it is at times "a very wise thing to simulate madness". The logic behind the strategy is commonly attributed to Thomas Schelling, whose books The Strategy of Conflict and Arms and Influence discuss "the rationality of irrationality" and how useful "the threat that leaves something to chance" can be. Kimball, in Nixon's Vietnam War, argues that Nixon arrived at the strategy independently, as a result of practical experience and observation of Eisenhower's handling of the Korean War.[5]

[Chris OFarrell]

Do you have any references we can read, or is this anecdotal?

It comes from several sources. THe biggest being a radio interview with Mike Chinoy, an expert on the North Koreans and China (he's visited North Korea 14 times) on the ABC. I'll see if I can find the transcript.
There was also some other news I saw on the BBC which backs up the idea that the PLA are wagging the dog somewhat and really annoying Clinton while she was there. Can't find it, but I can find a couple of other sources which point to it;

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/27/world ... tml?src=mv

EDIT.

http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2010/s2905170.htm is one of the radio interviews, can't find the other one where he goes on about the Chinse leadership...

[Edward Yee]

I am an unconventional free-thinker
You are strange and eccentric
He is batshit crazy.

Anyone have a way to cut the first one down to five syllables so that we can have a haiku?

Easy-peasy, my friend!

I'm a free-thinker.
You are strange and eccentric.
He's batshit crazy.

*Citizen Kane-style slow clap*

From the May 27, 2010 Wall Street Journal on the subject of PRC relations with China:

China's official views on North Korea have appeared divided, say the U.S. officials, who said they spent "hours" during their visit trying to gain China's insights into North Korea's recent actions and the mindset of its ailing leader, Kim Jong Il. "The Chinese seem frustrated" with Mr. Kim, said a senior U.S. official who took part in the talks.

Many Chinese analysts say they believe leaders in Beijing have grown exasperated with Mr. Kim, who embarasses them with his nuclear theatrics and has shown little inclination to copy Chinese market-led overhauls.

Beijing's differing views on the North appear to be based both upon the age of Chines officials and their place in government. One U.S. official said older Chinese officials with Mr. Kim's father, Kim Il Sung, remember him as largely predictable and responsive to Chinese influence. "He was more pliant," the official said they were told. Kim Jong Il, in contrast, appears to the Chinese as unpredictable and elusive.

Unfortunately, the freeze on inter-military relations due to a would-be arms sale to Taiwan means that the PLA isn't sharing its own take with the U.S. military, or presumably anyone else.

[recon20011]

Chinese Statement

[quote]
China 'will not protect' Korea ship attackers

Page last updated at 12:46 GMT, Friday, 28 May 2010 13:46 UK

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and South Korean President Lee Myung-bak in Seoul (28 May 2010) South Korea wants China to increase pressure on its old ally

China "will not protect" whoever sank a South Korean warship in March, Prime Minister Wen Jiabao has said.

"China objects to and condemns any act that destroys the peace and stability of the Korean peninsula," Mr Wen was quoted as saying after talks in Seoul.

South Korea has blamed the North for sinking the Cheonan with a torpedo.

Beijing is under pressure to take a strong stance against North Korea but so far has not accepted the findings of an independent investigation.

"The Chinese government will decide its position by objectively and fairly judging what is right and wrong about the incident while respecting the international probe and responses to it by each nation," said Mr Wen.

China has previously called for all sides to show restraint.

The BBC's John Sudworth in Seoul says Beijing's refusal so far to condemn its old ally has been a major source of frustration to South Korea and President Lee Myung-bak.

But some in South Korea will see Mr Wen's comments as a sign of a subtle and careful shift in position by the Beijing authorities, says our correspondent.

A spokesman for Mr Lee said Seoul was "fully concentrating on diplomatic efforts to hold North Korea responsible" for the 26 March attack on the Cheonan, which left 46 sailors dead.
Sanctions

South Korea says an investigation involving international teams has uncovered indisputable evidence that North Korea fired a torpedo at the ship.

Investigators said they had discovered part of the torpedo on the sea floor which carried lettering that matched a North Korean design.

Seoul has announced a package of measures, including a halt to most trade with North Korea and is also seeking action via the United Nations Security Council.

Pyongyang, which fiercely denies the allegations, has retaliated by scrapping an agreement aimed at preventing accidental naval clashes with South Korea.

It also warned of an immediate attack if the South's navy violated the disputed Yellow Sea borderline - the site of deadly naval skirmishes in 1999 and 2002.

On Tuesday, North Korea announced it would sever all ties with the South. It had also banned South Korean ships and planes from its territory.

Meanwhile, Japan has said it is tightening its already stringent sanctions against North Korea.

It said it was lowering the amount of cash which individuals can send to North Korea without declaring it from 10m yen (£110,000: £75,000) to 3m yen.

The parliament in Tokyo also passed a bill to enable the Japanese coastguard to inspect vessels on the high seas suspected of carrying North Korean weapons or nuclear technology, in line with a 2009 UN Security Council resolution.

The Associated Press news agency quoted the head of the Public Security Intelligence Agency as saying he had ordered officials to keep a closer eye on the some one million North Koreans living in Japan.

North and South Korea are technically still at war after the Korean conflict ended without a peace treaty in 1953. [/quote
Emphasis mine.
Unfortunately most people are going to believe that this is China's "strong stance" against North Korea, without bothering to read the part where China never actually mentions North Korean, and without knowing that China is still refusing to officially believe North Korea perpetrated the attack despite the international commission's findings.
I also find it interesting that the Japanese are now watching all North Koreans living in Japan.

[Starglider]

Lots of conflicting messages, as usual for NK;

North Korean Major General Pak Rim Su disputed the results of the international investigation into the sinking of a South Korean warship and said “any accidental clash that may break out in the waters of the West Sea of Korea or in areas along the Demilitarized Zone will lead to all-out war,” at a press conference today, according a KCNA statement.

South Korea sees no chance of the latest tension on the divided peninsula turning to outright war but is deeply concerned that the North may try terror attacks on civilians, a high ranking South Korean official said on Friday.

I do wonder how much data Western intel agencies have to work with on NK. Their military comms security must be pretty awful, since so much of their gear is completely obsolete. The high level traffic is probably all heavily encrypted with imported tech though - US attempts to block export of strong encryption in the 90s failed miserably of course. As for Humint, the regieme must be extremely hard for outsiders to penetrate, but the conditions should be pretty good for recruiting natives.

Also a theory for the professionally paranoid;

This is timed to take the heat off of Iran and their nuke program. Remember NK, Iran, Pakistan, Syria, Hizbolah and Hamas are all tightly interwoven to oppose the west. They are all taking turns flaring up to divert attention from Iran long enough so Iran can get the bomb.

Anyone in a position to do informed speculation on this?

[ShadowDragon8685]

Starglider, for what it's worth, I'd actually suspect that NK's comms security is probably about as tight as a homophobe's arsehole. No way known to man to tap into dedicated hardlines short of literally tapping into them, and that would be really hard inside a hostile militarized nation, and hundreds of thousands of miles of copper wire, whilst not cheap, are almost certainly within NK's means.

I wouldn't bet my bass on humint being a lot better. Remember that NK's a brainwashed "us vs. them" state. For one thing, it would be pretty hard to even get someone with the potential to be flipped alone in such a way as to not immediately throw suspicion on them, and if they got caught they could pretty much expect the regieme to get literally medieval on their asses.

[recon20011]

Also a theory for the professionally paranoid;

This is timed to take the heat off of Iran and their nuke program. Remember NK, Iran, Pakistan, Syria, Hizbolah and Hamas are all tightly interwoven to oppose the west. They are all taking turns flaring up to divert attention from Iran long enough so Iran can get the bomb.

Anyone in a position to do informed speculation on this?

I'm not really in any good position for informed speculation, but you could theoretically rationalize NK's actions at flaring up tensions now to gain leverage (and concessions) at negotiations and they could be helping Iran develop nuclear weapons, don't they sell Iran all sorts of other military hardware anyways? Wouldn't it be in NK's best interests to keep one of its customers in business?

[Sea Skimmer]

Starglider, for what it's worth, I'd actually suspect that NK's comms security is probably about as tight as a homophobe's arsehole. No way known to man to tap into dedicated hardlines short of literally tapping into them, and that would be really hard inside a hostile militarized nation, and hundreds of thousands of miles of copper wire, whilst not cheap, are almost certainly within NK's means.

That's not completely true. While no remote means exists to intercept fiber optics, it is possible to remotely intercept signals sent over copper wire. The wires actually act as low power transmitters which can be picked up by very specialist aircraft or space sensors. This also allows for cable taps to be placed without actually being on the cable. The main limitation of remote intercepts like this is that they work better the longer and the fewer the wires in a given cable. But more important cables tend to be dense bundles, and the signals can also be encrypted which makes it much harder to pick up enough signal to make sense of it. So I'm not saying this is likely to tell us much about the Norkish hoards, but landlines are not immunity to remote sensing.

Also you can also intercept copper wires through sticking conductors in the ground; though this doesn't work more then a few miles from the other sides ground wire, and depend greatly on local soil conditions (wet = better). They used to do it all the time in the world wars to spy on the other sides field telephones, I'm sure someone is still doing it to spy across the DMZ and listen in on orders issued to North Korean outposts.

I'm not really in any good position for informed speculation, but you could theoretically rationalize NK's actions at flaring up tensions now to gain leverage (and concessions) at negotiations and they could be helping Iran develop nuclear weapons, don't they sell Iran all sorts of other military hardware anyways? Wouldn't it be in NK's best interests to keep one of its customers in business?

Iran's entire ballistic missile program is based off weapons and information imported from North Korea, though absurdly a lot of the North Korean program was based off SCUDs from Egypt. They also have some other North Korean weapons, but not many. Aside from missiles North Korea mainly sold them ammunition and spare parts for Soviet weapons they captured from Iraq. Iran for its part is North Korea's main source of oil. Stopping that oil traffic is likely going to be the goal of any future UN resolution on North Korea.

[Starglider]

The wires actually act as low power transmitters which can be picked up by very specialist aircraft or space sensors. Also you can also intercept copper wires through sticking conductors in the ground; though this doesn't work more then a few miles from the other sides ground wire, and depend greatly on local soil conditions

Thanks for confirming that, I suspected as much. It sounds like the kind of thing the NSA could throw major supercomputing power at to improve the noise rejection / signal extraction.

[Sea Skimmer]

Thanks for confirming that, I suspected as much. It sounds like the kind of thing the NSA could throw major supercomputing power at to improve the noise rejection / signal extraction.

They certainly can, but you will always be limited by the quality of the recording and the targeting of collection antenna wavelengths. if they aren't good enough, you wont get anything for that days work. The collection platforms can't save everything they pickup initially, a satellite is limited in down link bandwidth and even a big EP-3 Aries can only carry so many hard drives.

As far as I can tell our ELINT aircraft need to use long trailing wire antennas they don't talk about much in ordered to gain the capability to do that kind of intercept. They also use the wires for more normal sorts of things, besides the more obvious hull mounted sensors. US spy satellite meanwhile simply have huge 100 meter dish antennas . It seems we used this capability to spy on the Soviets for most of the cold war, mainly on the phone lines running across Siberia.. I really don't know when it might have first been possible from an aircraft, just that all and all this is very possible under good atmospheric conditions and it worked by the 1960s at the latest. No idea at all on how well it works now with digital phone lines.

[ShadowDragon8685]

Skimmer, I can sum up my reaction to that thusly:

I'm suddenly very, very scared... Can you insulate the copper wiring from that by, say, wrapping the whole cable in a copper mesh to act as a faraday cage?

[Isolder74]

Skimmer, I can sum up my reaction to that thusly:

I'm suddenly very, very scared... Can you insulate the copper wiring from that by, say, wrapping the whole cable in a copper mesh to act as a faraday cage?

You can but it is very expensive and makes splicing the cable very complicated. Think about similarly designed shielded speaker cables and the increase in cost that goes with them. In a long distance cable that extra cost can add up really fast. Most of the time it isn't done as the wires that went into making the shielding could have been used to carry more signals so they are used for that instead.

[Ace Pace]

Skimmer, I can sum up my reaction to that thusly:

I'm suddenly very, very scared... Can you insulate the copper wiring from that by, say, wrapping the whole cable in a copper mesh to act as a faraday cage?

Why are you scared by the fact that world governments can listen in to communications?

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

You can shield cables by simply using coaxial cables. However, you would have to use very good cables and they are expensive. Shielding good for GHz signals are like tens of dollars for a meter.

[Starglider]

I'm suddenly very, very scared... Can you insulate the copper wiring from that by, say, wrapping the whole cable in a copper mesh to act as a faraday cage?

The IT industry is slowly moving to that; 10 gigabit ethernet already prefers category 7 cable to work reliably on runs longer than a patch cord, and if we ever go to 40/100 gigabit over copper category 7/7a will be the only option. However it isn't so relevant in first world countries as all long distance communication is carried by optical fibre - also end-to-end strong encryption is cheaply available to everyone.

[Sea Skimmer]

Skimmer, I can sum up my reaction to that thusly:

I'm suddenly very, very scared... Can you insulate the copper wiring from that by, say, wrapping the whole cable in a copper mesh to act as a faraday cage?

Sure you could, and burying the cable would help avoid long range intercepts, but both measures cost real serious money. The North Koreans already mostly have a buried telecommunications system, least nuclear EMP or bombing easily kill it, but burying cable also means you cant do proper maintenance. Especially when you are North Korea, and thus cant afford fuel for backhoes to dig up the wires nor lots of replacement wire in the first place. As a result the North Korean phone system is shitty at best since so much of it is broken. This is one of the main reasons why they finally allowed cell phones into the country a few years ago. Building up a cellphone network is much easier then replacing all the wires. I'm sure the military keeps its own links creeping along.

[ShadowDragon8685]

Skimmer, I can sum up my reaction to that thusly:

I'm suddenly very, very scared... Can you insulate the copper wiring from that by, say, wrapping the whole cable in a copper mesh to act as a faraday cage?

Sure you could, and burying the cable would help avoid long range intercepts, but both measures cost real serious money. The North Koreans already mostly have a buried telecommunications system, least nuclear EMP or bombing easily kill it, but burying cable also means you cant do proper maintenance. Especially when you are North Korea, and thus cant afford fuel for backhoes to dig up the wires nor lots of replacement wire in the first place. As a result the North Korean phone system is shitty at best since so much of it is broken. This is one of the main reasons why they finally allowed cell phones into the country a few years ago. Building up a cellphone network is much easier then replacing all the wires. I'm sure the military keeps its own links creeping along.

How does the cost of digging up cable matter? I'd think one of the advantages of being North Freaking Korea is that labor is as cheap as you feel like making it - round up a few hundred peasants, hand them spades and tell them to get to work and be thankful for whatever pittance Dear Leader sees fit to bestow upon them. Sure it'd take awhile, but it would be cheaper than backhoes and fuel.

[Sea Skimmer]

How does the cost of digging up cable matter? I'd think one of the advantages of being North Freaking Korea is that labor is as cheap as you feel like making it - round up a few hundred peasants, hand them spades and tell them to get to work and be thankful for whatever pittance Dear Leader sees fit to bestow upon them. Sure it'd take awhile, but it would be cheaper than backhoes and fuel.

Except the population is starving, have you missed that little fact about North Korea post 1992? Starving people do not dig you hundreds of miles of ditches through rocky soil.

[Sky Captain]

US spy satellite meanwhile simply have huge 100 meter dish antennas .

Now that sounds interesting. I'm wondering how they make the unfurling system work reliably on such large size. Rockets have something like 5 - 6 m diameter cargo fairings at most so it must be one hell of an operation to safely extend that antenna.

Also why those spysats aren't among the brightest man made objects in the sky. 100 meter antenna is larger then ISS. Or are they painted with some paint with really good light absorption properties although then overheating from the sunlight would be a problem..

[Sea Skimmer]

Well antenna isn't a solid dish, its more a wire frame. That's why its able to expand to be so big. And they do reflect light, people can and do look at these things with telescopes which is how we get sketches like the one below.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/sys ... rumpet.jpg

Stealth satellites exist, the US orbited at least a few of them, before deciding they cost too much, supposed close to five billion each. Whatever stealth system they use does work, the payloads of the launches were lost to civilian observers who can normally follow everything that gets put up. One of the methods they may use, know of only because it was patented, was a big inflating cone balloon, which would deflect radar and absorb and deflect light. Just about every last thing about them including mere existence is of course classified.

[Alan Bolte]

Also why those spysats aren't among the brightest man made objects in the sky. 100 meter antenna is larger then ISS. Or are they painted with some paint with really good light absorption properties although then overheating from the sunlight would be a problem..

Orbital altitude is part of it. The ISS orbits at an altitude of less than 350 km, while many recon sats would be in geosynchronous orbits, so you add about two more zeros. With elliptical orbits that can of course vary widely, but most of them probably still wouldn't come anywhere near as low as the ISS.

[Edward Yee]

Now this here is interesting, from a Nork spokesman:

KCNA said the Obama administration was using the episode to appear strong ahead of mid-term elections, to scare Japan into keeping U.S. troops on Okinawa and to justify its policy of "strategic patience" designed to "degrade the environment for international investment" in North Korea.

"Fourthly, it became possible for the U.S. to put China into an awkward position and keep hold on Japan and south Korea as its servants," it said.

[Thanas]

Yeah, that is just about as blatant as one can be with introducing conspiracy theories. "Obama staged the whole thing to appear tough". Right.

[recon20011]

I wonder if the fact that the North Koreans said that will prevent it from becoming a popular idea in the US. I suppose we'll find out soon enough.

[Edward Yee]

It wouldn't be the first time that a POTUS has been accused of wagging the dog, one of the only times I can recall a public accusation thereof by another country's government though... the interesting part for me though is the boldfaced part where one country accuses another of trying to put another in an awkward position... don't see that one often, oh no.