The frustrating issue dealing with North Korea isn’t its nuclear weapons or even it’s conventional arsenals. The sad fact is that their massive population, with their horrifically low standard of living, represent a huge threat whenever the North finally falls. The closest historical model is of course the reunification of Germany. To this day, West Germany still is subsidizing the East half. Not only that, but the long term effects of rapid reunification had a down turn on the entire European economy. But East Germany had the highest standard of living among the Soviet States. Furthermore, the population of West Germany was much larger than the East. Add in the fact that while the East German government was repressive…it was a holiday trip compare to the extensive and intrusive brutality that occurs in the North. With North and South Korea, the economic disparity is so much more severe and the population involve in the North is close to the population in the South. The massive influx of refugees that would occur could destabilize not only South Korea, but also the border area in China and Japan (all of which already have substantial Korean populations). This in turn would lead to a huge chilling effect to all the Asian economies as South Korea is one of the largest ones. This in turn would have drastic consequences for the global economy which sure as heck isn’t firing on all cylinders as it stands.

So the entire point of all this jibberish is that neither China, nor South Korea under the previous administration’s “Sun Shine” policy, want the North to continue to exist as they current do, but rather increase the standard of living there so as when the country does eventually fall, it does not result in a cataclysmic immigration problem that effects far beyond the borders of the North. Its frustrating in that Kim Jong Il basically is holding his people hostage and uses them as an economic threat to get what he wants.