6.3 mag Earthquake detected in North Korea

[vorlon13]

Castle Bravo was the test with the drastically larger yield from what was expected. And it really wasn't an engineering oversight, it was the nuclear physics of the Li7 nucleus not being completely understood. The designers of the test had actually reduced (at considerable expense) the amount of Li7 in the device thinking it was a diluent of the expected reaction. As it turned out, it promoted the reaction.

Ivy-Mike was a proof of concept device, not an actual design that was viewed as desirable to weaponize. The goal was to 'burn' a cubic meter of liquid deuterium, and it did. With alacrity.

[Brian37]

Just because the majority of their population is poor does not mean the Kim family is poor. This is what most don't get, there is not one nation, friend or foe alike that have powers that invest in the global market. Kim family has global investments and just because the west sanctions them does not mean all their allies do. It is also a myth that Hitler's Germany or Stalin's Russia were anti market. Every nation takes in money and exports, to greater or lesser degrees.

I don't think Kim Jong Un is paying for this out of his own pocket.

I posted two or three videos showing that North Korea is capitalist, just not the type we think of in the west. In the west we have common law and anti trust laws and anti monopoly laws that prevent consolidation of wealth to one party/family/business. North Korea has a private sector, just not an openly competitive sector. 

The Kim family is basically running a Ponzy scheme and they keep their family/party wealth by "gift politics". What we call in America, "Pay to play through blind loyalty". The family doesn't give up personal wealth no, but they do have ways of exporting and importing and getting foreign money to do just enough to keep just enough of the population happy to avoid getting toppled. Force and fear and propaganda are used also in combo with the carrot sticks.

You can enjoy a good life by doing the bidding of the "Dear Leader". I wont say they have a huge upper class or middle class, those are very tiny, but just big enough to act as a heat shield to the Kim family and to pay their army.

Pynongpang is the hub of what we call our "middle class and upper class".  

We call Un a dictator, but over there they are seen as Royalty and they see the Kim wealth as something to be worshiped because they too, think ultimately like many gullible people here that the wealth will "trickle down".

No, it is not a free market or a people based open market like the west, but it does include the private sector and global investments.

[Thumpalumpacus]

Just paying another premium on their insurance policy.

[Brian37]

Just paying another premium on their insurance policy.

Yep, just like 45 sells just enough fear to get gullible morons to support him.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Castle Bravo was the test with the drastically larger yield from what was expected.  

"Castle Bravo weren't tests, they were trying to kill something!" John Goodman, "Kong: Skull Island".

[chimp3]

Best thing U.S. citizens can do is boycott Walmart. Hurt China in the wallet.

[Brian37]

Carrots And Sticks, By Brian37 (AKA Brian James Rational Poet on FB and @Brianrrs37 on twitter.
 
In room 39
The money does climb
To the top
Used to keep society in line
 
Over there 
They sell fear
"Gift Politics"
"Pay to play" here
 
They hate outsiders
Condem all rivals
Progaganda of nationalism
They keep their power
 
It's the same utopia
Of trickle down
Let the wealth do that they want
For they know what's best
 
Your dear leader
Will aid you in disaster
Loyalty is blind
Your orange master
 
That cant
Happen here
Is the refrain
Stated year after year
 
It has happend
In history before
When you remain silent
And wilfully ignore
 
One man 
Long ago
Sold the same utopia
Of abundant bounty
 
The sense of intitlement
That your skin tone dictates
White Germans, North Koreans
Infecting the states
 
Wealth is right
Just listen to them
No one understands you
They are your kin
 
Carrots and sticks
Is how they do it
Reward blind loyalty
Vilify any dissent
 
The only way
That is prevented
Is by raising your voice
"Eternal vigilance".
 

[Wyrd of Gawd]

NK is claiming this was a hydrogen bomb. Where are they getting the money for this shit?

Does a dictatorship early need money to build a nuke?  It's not like the workers are getting paid for their labor.

But there's a whole list of suspects who would gladly toss some money into the pot.  China, Russia, Iran, Israel, the Saudis, the Arab Gulf States, Pakistan, Afghan, Mexican, and South American drug dealers, the EU, the CIA, assorted Islamic terrorists or any combination of the above would gladly help fund the North Korean nuke program.  

The North Korean nuke and missile program illustrates the deficiency in the American education system.  In North Korea they teach the students advanced engineering on how to build nukes and ICBMs.  In the US the major issue is over which restroom the students can use.  Maybe we should hire the North Koreans to run our school systems?

[The Valkyrie]

Time for a Chinese nuclear test in Pingpong or whatever the NK capital is called....

[Wyrd of Gawd]

---

Of course he can get it from the people.   North Korea is not a giant peasant village.  It is still a full fledged nation state with its own research institutions, universities, factories, mineral resources,  transportation infrastructure, where the impoverished people work and able to produce things and occasionally invent new things.  Kim just need to make sure enough of that infrastructure is commanded to make things and invent things that goes into the bomb.

---

Well, the bad news is North Korean economy is currently not on the verge of starvation, at least not in 2017.  South Korea also estimated North Korean economy grew at the fastest pace in 17 years during 2017.   So it's ability to weather sanctions in the short term is probably as strong as it's been in a long time.

---

It would seem then that despite the growth of North Korea's economy it doesn't look to be benefitting anybody there besides Kim, Pyongyang, its military, and its nuke program.

---

Don't look now , but for once we agree. 

North Korea's capital isn't grim looking at all, but it is where the party loyalist live. 

The private sector exists even in North Korea, it is just that it is crony capitalism where the profits go to support the party and Kim Family. 




 
When you get to the middle age couple sitting at the table smiling, at the mark 32 second mark into the video look closely at the table, A CELL PHONE.

---

Nope. Pyongyang isn't grim looking at all. Looks to be very modern and upscale while the rest of North Korea lives in squalor and darkness. 



Every other nation around North Korea, China, Japan, South Korea is lit up at night. Shows how little Kim's world is. It doesn't expand much beyond Pyongyang. His nation starves while he gets fat.

Have you considered that the reason you don't see a lot of lights in North Korea at night is that maybe all of its industrial infrastructure is underground?