I'm not so thrilled about jumping ugly with North Korea.

1. They have nukes and they will use them even if it means national suicide. Kim Jong-Il is not altogether different from Emperor Kartagia of the Centauri Republic from Babylon 5, right down to the funny hair.

2. Even if the nukes don't hit us, they will hit South Korea and Japan killing millions of people, wreaking havoc on the world economy and creating anti-American animus in the region for centuries.

3. Even if we can engage in a land war against the DPRK, we will suffer enormous casualties as the brainwashed populace will fight us tooth and nail. There will also be significant 5th column action by DPRK agents in Japan and South Korea, as well as xenophobic protests and riots all over the South.

4. The domestic opposition to any war on the peninsula will be far more problematic than what we see today. We are going to see staggering amounts of casualties from this war significantly greater than we had in Vietnam and infinitely greater than the pinprick we are suffering now. This and the fact that the war will take time to prosecute will stimulate protest from the professional America-haters, as well as the Sucker Moms.

Agreed above.

I dunno about Emperor Kartagia (never did get into B5), but my anology is that the Norks are David Koresh and Waco Brach Davidians writ large. I think our going in would look much the same... writ large.

Since I am anonymous enough to be ice-cold about about it, the best thing to do would be to provoke the Kimster to attack. That would:

A) provide the pretext

B) remind a quarter billion Western and free Asian ninnies what tyranny is about.... AGAIN!!!

c) See the Norks eventually crushed, mostly by South Korea, as their army (set aside WMD) is essentially what it was in 1953.

'Course, ya might lose Seoul, but frankly, given your scenario, that's at the lower end of bad resulting scenarios.

And frankly again, if South Korea, with twice the population, 40 times the economy, and three inches taller in height due to Northern malnutrition alone, can't take the Norks, with US air and and naval help, then they would deserve their fate.

We (the world) might need to "lose" a free nation to wake up the staggeringly blind populations (a good half of them at least) to the realities of this world.

Bart:

What better nuclear deterrent than knowing that having them makes you a nuclear target?

Yeah, things could certainly go badly.

But that's what was said about Afghanistan and Iraq.

Jsmith,

There's badly and then there's badly. If we screwed up in Afghanistan, we just pick up our forces and leave. If we screw up in North Korea, we lose 100,000 soldiers, and Tokyo, Seoul, and San Francisco get nuked. That's a big difference.

Bosh. They wouldn't even get 'em off the launchpad.

The US aren't going to invade North Korea, so there won't be any 100,000 American casualties.

North Korea can certainly nuke Seoul, and perhaps Tokyo, but not San Francisco.
North Korea can aim nuclear missiles in the general direction of Hawai'i, but it'd be pure luck if they hit any populated areas.
North Korean missile guidence systems are only a step above SCUDs.