It is still unhinged, but not because of nuclear weapons. Ukraine, and now Iran, showed the whole world what happens when you don’t have a nuclear deterrence.
I think the unhinged rhetoric is, in part, a necessary partner of the nukes. Because you need to not only have nukes but have your adversaries believe that you won't hesitate to use them. If North Korea had nukes, but the US didn't believe they would use them, then they'd be getting the Iran, Syria, Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan, etc, etc, etc treatment.
The claim has always been made that attacking NK was off the table anyway, because they have obscene numbers of conventional artillery pointed directly at SK's capital and largest population centre, right across the DMZ; even the fastest decapitation strike wouldn't have prevented Seoul from getting flattened. Nukes definitely don't hurt but I'm not actually sure NK needed the bomb as an additional deterrent.
North Korea didn't acquire nukes to protect itself from the US, it got them to protect its regime from China. It began pursuing nukes in the 80s once its original safeguard against China, its alliance with the Soviet Union, started showing signs it would not be a viable long term strategy.
The anti-US spiel is just rhetoric. It helps save face when dealing with China, which it still utterly depends on, and it goes along with decades of internal propaganda lionizing China to its own people. Indeed North Korea wants heavy US military presence in the region, maintaining its status with regards to China as a strategically important buffer state which can act with plausible deniability instead of a resource rich neighbor with uncooperative leadership.
If North Korea only had conventional forces, what would stop China from installing a loyal puppet? The international community wouldn't lift a finger, threats to South Korea would only further alienate the regime, China could bring its full might to bear, the DPRK military would have no effective means to retaliate and would be more likely to turn on the regime than mount a credible defense, and North Korea's own people would probably welcome the change which would dramatically reduce oppression and increase prosperity. Nukes are the only way for a small number of regime loyalists to make such an operation too costly for Beijing to justify.
This is also why talks with the US have utterly "failed" for decades - there is nothing the US can offer that would provide the same security guarantee for the regime and the status quo is advantageous to the US for multiple reasons: justifying its large military presence in the region, justifying its efforts to develop and deploy ever more capable ballistic missile defense systems, and North Korea not being completely under China's control.
NK didn’t get nuclear weapons until several years after the invasion of Iraq, and it was probably longer still before they had a viable delivery system. The nukes clearly aren’t the only reason they’re left alone.
I mean, nothing unhinged here, nukes are only ever useful if other countries believe you will use them when attacked. Same thing for North Korea as the US, France, etc. (Well, nuclear war is unhinged, but...).
It’s good for them. That’s the point they’re making. All this shows that for many countries nuclear proliferation is the way to guarantee their safety.
The people arent being pppressed by the bomb, but by their leaders. The odea that the US would liberate all peoples from tyranical rulers is naive. The US routinely installs and supports tyrants who allign with their geopolitical goals. Pol pot, pahlavi, pinochet, marcos, suharto, seko, the banana republics. Nukes didnt enable those guys, the US did
Safety for whomever controls the nukes, whether autocratic (Iran) or democratic (Ukraine).
Russia would not have attacked Ukraine if they still had their nuclear weapons and Iran wouldn’t be under attack now if they had them too.
I’m not saying whether it’s goods or bad that any or specific countries have nuclear weapons, that’s beside the point. The point is that this attack sends the signal that the only way to guarantee your safety is to have them.
Maybe after the civil war, certainly not during it. If I had to pick where to live, I'd pick North Korea over Ukraine right now because it's a lot easier to live in a dictatorship than an active war zone. (This isn't me saying I want to live in NK, I don't).
But I'd also point out that a lot of what makes it really suck to live in the worst places in the world isn't often the government but rather the international relationships. Turkey has a particularly brutal government, but it's Nato and EU ally status means that the civilians enjoy modern trade and travel.
The worst times to be in NK was the 90s when there was an ongoing famine and the US refused to lift sanctions thinking it'd spark a civil war that overthrew the regime. It didn't.
>I'd pick North Korea over Ukraine right now because it's a lot easier to live in a dictatorship than an active war zone
You can live a perfectly normal life in Kiev. It’s not exactly an active war zone, you see luxury cars worth hundreds of thousands of dollars on every corner. You can buy bottles of Petrus in 24 hour supermarkets and eat decent food at countless fancy restaurants.
Goodwine in Kiev will also put US luxury grocers to shame. Ukraine might be at war, but the quality of life is hardly bad.
> I'd pick North Korea over Ukraine right now because it's a lot easier to live in a dictatorship than an active war zone
To each their own. I wouldn't. In part because once you're in North Korea, you're not getting out. That isn't the case for Ukraine, Syria or any of the other war-torn countries.
It'd depend on my status. There are a lot of people who can't just get out of Ukraine or Syria. The average citizen in Syria had no means to just flee. I'd assume in my above scenario that I'm one of the masses that can't escape.
NK does actually allow people to leave, mostly to china and mostly after they attain a high social class. A decent number of tourists, including US citizens, go on tours of NK.
You're making the mistake of correlating these proxy wars with any later improvements in these countries' living conditions. War is always detrimental to quality of life.
> You're making the mistake of correlating these proxy wars with any later improvements in these countries' living conditions
...nobody argued the proxy wars were good for those countries. Just that if you're turned into a random local in one of those theatres, chances are you're better off a decade or two later than if you're turned into a random North Korean.
> If you had to live in gaza or north korea right now, which would you choose?
Me as me? Gaza. Because I'd get out. That's a bullshit answer, though, so I'll answer as a local. And there, it's honestly a coin toss because Gaza is possibly the shittiest war zone outside Africa right now. But if you said North Korea or Syria during its civil war? North Korea or Myanmar? I'm going with not Pyongyang.
The only one where I'd honestly choose North Korea hands down is Sudan, because that's the one nobody really gives a shit about which means it's going to go on forever.
> How would you get out? It’s impossible. Every exit is shut.
Of course it isn't, it's entirely porous to the IDF. I'm an American citizen. If I were teleported to Gaza I'd probably be fine. At material risk of being fucked up. But I'd take my chances there over being an American teleported to North Korea.
Any attempt to walk towards a controlled point or border will get you shot inside 2-3km. Your passport will be removed from your body before it is destroyed. You were never there.
Sure. And yes, it's risky. But there are two million people in Gaza and half a dozen to a dozen, on average, being killed each day. If I, literally I, were teleported into Gaza, my primary operational concern would be avoiding Hamas. (My primary operational goal, getting to an internet-connected device.)
War isn't glamorous. It's mechanized death and torture destroying communities, families, and loved ones. And when it's powered by foreign governments, it's worse. Because the two colliding sides are armed to the gills with the best weapons in murder along with mercenaries and no oversight.
Living in a dictatorship is hard but doable, There are literally generations of people that have survived and thrived in that sort of an environment. It's not preferable, for sure, but you still have your family, friends, and neighbors. None of them are trying to actively kill you. So long as you follow the rules, life in a dictatorship is generally predicable and the odds of the state making you specifically an example are low.
The only people who thrive in a dictatorship are its enforcers. And by the way a dictatorship needs quite a lot of them. That's how, decades after its fall, you get voices saying it wasn't all that bad, there were some nice things actually, or we should do it again.
And also your neighbors absolutely will sell you out.
I agree. A foreign powered civil war is worse than that.
Thriving in a dictatorship, even not as an enforcer, is possible. It's a worse life in general but still a life you can live.
Generally speaking, the only life that truly sucks in a dictatorship is if you become an enemy of the state. That doesn't generally apply to all citizens because, if it did, a dicatorship would quickly end in revolt. That is the theory behind strong sanctions. It's believed that if you starve a nation eventually the citizens revolt. The problem is it takes little resources to keep people happy, ultimately.
So if a dictatorship decides to invade a neighboring democratic country, the people there should not fight and let them take over, because war is worse than dictatorship, right?
A authoritarian regime starting wars isn't one I want to live in either. That's why I don't want to live in Israel.
Iran has had civil unrest over the last year, they weren't in the position politically to be doing much of anything to the "democracy" of Israel.
The entire reason for the US Israel attack on Iran is because of that civil unrest, not because Iran was a threat, but because both nations see an opportunity to install a puppet government that does their bidding.
What remains to be seen is if Russia sees a similar opportunity and we end up with another Syria.
Sorry if my answer seemed evasive. I was reading into your question something not stated
> the people there should not fight and let them take over, because war is worse than dictatorship, right?
No, I think the people should fight back, obviously. A country being actively invaded has a right to fight back. The war isn't their choosing and laying down arms is a mistake because captured civilians are rarely treated well after a war.
I'm specifically talking about an established dictatorship vs war. Specifically, as I said, a civil war which is a proxy war for foreign agents. Starting a war to end a dictatorship is bad. A dictatorship starting a war is bad. However, a dictatorship not starting wars is ultimately a better place to live vs anywhere under and active civil war.
The fact that NK possess nuclear weapons strongly discourages external players from attacking it. It does not in any way change the tools NK has at its disposal domestically.
If you're trying to say that had NK not had nukes we would bomb it for 'humanitarian purposes' or 'on behalf of its people' then I have a couple of bridges for sale.
> If you're trying to say that had NK not had nukes we would bomb it for 'humanitarian purposes' or 'on behalf of its people' then I have a couple of bridges for sale.
You think the US would just leave them alone as a communist, sovereign country without nukes, bordering china???
Theyve had the bomb for a while and south korea still exists and is thriving. I have seen alot of batshit insane talk from them, but no real negative consequences for any other country. So it hasnt really been a negative for anyone. I dont think theyll use it first either because they know theyll be glassed if they do
Now if they didnt have the bomb, i dont think they would have lasted this long. I think the US would have gone and "democratized" them to smithereens a while ago.
Nuclear weapons have a very brief transition from “everything is fine and nothing bad has happened” to “we’re completely fucked.” The fact that nothing has happened yet isn’t very reassuring to me with all the ways things can go wrong. The threat of retaliation certainly puts a damper on a first strike, but there’s always the possibility of a mistake, someone feeling backed into a corner, or not believing the consequences, or just going a little crazy. The more countries that have them, the more likely this becomes.
'productive talks and reasonable progress' is what diplomats almost always say in negotiations in order to maintain a reasonable atmosphere for possible further negotiations, this is not rocket science.
They also said the US demands are completely unreasonable, which you conveniently left out.
TL;DR Iran wants essentially symbolic enrichment so they could save face domestically, the US wants it to limit the range of its missiles so they could not reach Israel when Israel attacks.
I want to avoid linking particular sources because I know it's easy to call this or that biased etc. but it's easy to look up even in Israeli sources.
Iran shortening the range of its missiles to the point where they can no longer reach Israel is what Iran giving up all its offensive capabilities means given that the missile threat is the only meaningful response Iran can have to a preemptive Israeli attack.
Iraq was attacking its neighbors every couple of years, Iran is not.
Iran has shown that it is remarkably sane actually, given the aggression shown towards it by Israel and the US and has made a lot of efforts to reach a deal.
Remember, it was the US that exited the JCPOA and now it wants Iran to give up all its misses so that they would be defenseless.
I have no love for theocracies, but I do think the Iranian system is a lot better than the likes of Saudi Arabia, which we're buddy buddy with.
Oh and I guess the founder of Syrian branch of AQ and deputy head of ISIS running Syria is better that what was before too, in your book?
Oh yes, and the fact that Israel is just sitting there occupying millions of Palestinians, attacking Syria, Lebanon etc. despite a 'ceasefire' has nothing to do with why these groups continue to exist, I am sure.
Iran's funding for these groups is a part of its 'defense in depth' strategy since it doesn't have the capability to project power otherwise. I am not saying that it is the right thing to do, but I am also not that surprised that backed into a corner, they're trying to build regional proxies. It's not like the US and Israel are not doing the same in and around Iran.
But I like how these statements, like yours, are always made with zero context and hope for an uninformed audience to upvote them.
> Iran's funding for these groups is a part of its 'defense in depth' strategy
That's the rationalisation. Not a justification. Defence in depth was Hitler's rationale for invading Russia, is Israel's strategy for pacifying neighbors, and is Russia's excuse for invading Ukraine.
Creating weak neighbors is checklist-item one for any classical aspiring land empire. It's also tremendously destabilising to its neighbourhood. (It's not a coincidence that China and Russia are bordered by (a) shitshows or (b) countries militarily posturing against them.)
Ah yes, give any discussion enough time and Hitler inevitably gets to be whoever your opponent is.
Unlike Hitler, unlike Israel and unlike the US, Iran has not proactively attacked.
Hitler had no reason to fear attack from Russia, Czechoslovakia or France. Iran has every reason to fear an attack from the US and Israel, look at what is happening right now ffs.
Western governments provide funding and shelter for extremist Iranian groups like People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran and various separatists movements inside the country, so please spare me this Hitler nonsense.
> give any discussion enough time and Hitler inevitably gets to be whoever your opponent is
Because it fits. Nazi Germany was an aspiring land power. You can see the same effect in Imperial Rome and the Persian empires. (And, while America was conquering its own continent, on the peripheries of Manifest-Destiny America.)
> Unlike Hitler, unlike Israel and unlike the US, Iran has not proactively attacked
Of course they have. Its proxies are constantly proactively attacking everyone in their neighbourhood.
> Hitler had no reason to fear attack from Russia, Czechoslovakia or France. Iran has every reason to fear an attack from the US and Israel, look at what is happening right now ffs
Everyone has reason to fear attack from everyone. Defence in depth is a regionally-destabilising response to that security imperative. And by the way, Russia and Germany did wind up going to war with each other. Same as Iran and Israel, that same one whose anihiliation the former has been chanting for since its revolution.
Arguing Iran has been some peaceful country minding its own business is totally inaccurate.
At every step, for years, they've tried to de-escalate while Israel and the US launched direct attacks against them. Embassies bombed, that general in Iraq in 2020, last summer and now this. All of these attacks completely unprovoked except for the fact that they are friendly with Hamas and Hezbollah.
They are practically Gandhi in this story.
Looking forward, the problem with being irrationally hateful is that its irrational. What's the plan here? Persia will still exist, and its unlikely any future rulers will like Israel, given what's going on. So what's the win condition?
> Because it fits. Nazi Germany was an aspiring land power.
Look at the mass murder by Israel in Gaza. Or how the US just overthrew Venezuela and seized their resources, threatened to take Greenland, taunts Canada and suggests more countries are in their sights.
And now the two of them teamed up to bomb Iran, unprovoked, saying it's going to "annihilate their Navy" as their citizens run for cover.
And your conclusion is Iran is the one that resembles Nazi Germany?
> your conclusion is Iran is the one that resembles Nazi Germany?
In this strategic aspect, yes. So does Israel. So do Russia and China. They're all acting like land empires. And they're all pursuing a strategy that seeks weak, unstable neighbours.
It's a shitty strategy that does't earn one friends. The fact that it's theoretically coherent doesn't make it less shitty.
> by the way, Russia and Germany did wind up going to war with each other. Same as Iran and Israel,
Are you seriously arguing that Hitler was rational for preemptively attacking Russia because AFTER Hitler attacked Russia, Russia did not simply sit back and let itself be attacked but in fact started defending itself?
And are you arguing that Israel doing the same is rational because AFTER Israel attacked Iran, Iran launched some missiles towards Israel IN RESPONSE TO THE ISRAELI ATTACK, therefore proving Israel right that Iran is going to attack them?
> that same one whose anihiliation the former has been chanting for since its revolution.
Oh and Israel has been nothing but wishing them happy Ramadan?
The reason Israel does not want the current Iranian system to survive is because it sees it as the only possible threat to its eternal domination of the Palestinians and its ability to dictate its borders in the Middle East.
> Are you seriously arguing that Hitler was rational for preemptively attacking Russia because AFTER Hitler attacked Russia, Russia did not simply sit back and let itself be attacked but in fact started defending itself?
No. I'm saying Hitler's theory of attacking Russia was the same as Iran's simultaneous proxy wars with its entire neighbourhood. It's not theoretically wrong. Just antiquated, destructive and–in the trade-based modern world–increasingly counterproductive. (You're trashing and alienating your natural trading partners.)
And I'm drawing analogy between (a) "Iran has every reason to fear an attack from the US and Israel, look at what is happening right now" and (b) the nonsense argument "that Hitler was rational for preemptively attacking Russia because AFTER Hitler attacked Russia, Russia did not simply sit back and let itself be attacked." In both cases, retaliation is being used to justify the preceding (note: not initial) aggression.
> Oh and Israel has been nothing but wishing them happy Ramadan?
If your neighbour is developing ballistic missiles and explicitly calling for your anihilation, you're not going to "simply sit back and let [your]self be attacked."
> reason Israel does not want the current Iranian system to survive is because it sees it as the only possible threat to its eternal domination of the Palestinians and its ability to dictate its borders in the Middle East
Iran isn't a material threat to Israel's power projection into Gaza and the West Bank. Its ballistic missiles and nuclear programme, on the other hand, are an existential threat to Tel Aviv/Jerusalem. And yes, it's a regional competitor to Israeli (and Saudi and Emirati) hegemony.
> Iran's simultaneous proxy wars with its entire neighborhood
Except that's not happening and is complete BS. It also assumes these proxies have no agency and would not have acted on their own.
> It's not theoretically wrong. Just antiquated, destructive and–in the trade-based modern world–increasingly counterproductive. (You're trashing and alienating your natural trading partners.)
Guess what would allow Iran to peacefully trade with Israel. The end of Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories.
The reason Iran cannot simply ignore that occupation is because it would loose the moral high ground in the Shia/Muslim world. And having that moral high ground (i.e. its support for the Palestinian cause) is also part of its power projection strategy.
> If your neighbour is developing ballistic missiles and explicitly calling for your anihilation, you're not going to "simply sit back and let [your]self be attacked.
Given that Israel does indeed have ballistic missiles and is explicitly calling for for the annihilation of Palestinians, or even 'Arabs' in general, does that in your mind justify October 7th?
> Iran isn't a material threat to Israel's power projection into Gaza and the West Bank.
Not Iran itself, but Israel insists that Iran support for 'proxies' is. Maybe not to Israeli power projection, but to its security at least.
Iranian government massacres its own civilians whenever they dare to demand change. Iranians are also largely secular compared to citizens of most Arab states, and hate their government. They're also mostly Shia, which makes it hard for likes of ISIS and Al Qaeda to gain ground there, as Shias are enemies to Sunni extremists.
I believe there's a much better change of democracy / sane regime in Iran, than there ever was in Iraq and other Arab states.
Mossad was literally bragging that it is handing out weapons in Iran recently, but yes, Iran always 'attacks' for no reason and should not do anything no matter what happens right?
Same as the Gaza and Lebanon ceasefires where one side stops attacking and the other (Israel) keeps bombing?
Netanjahu is old and wants to secure his 'legacy' by being credited for dismantling Iran, knowing Trump will back him both because he's been fed BS and because the Israelis have enough kompromat to sink him. There's no 'rational' justification for this attack, only madness and huge egos.
What kompromat would even affect Trump at this point? He's been proven to be deep in bed with a literal pedophilic cabal of elites, what on Earth else could they have on this guy that would affect anything?
The problem with that argument as I see it is that a lot of jobs can be described that way if you want.
And it's not just these; i.e. video generation is getting better every other week too. It's not yet good enough to produce full length movies but it's getting there and the main component that seems to be missing is just more control over the generated output, but that'll come too.
You might say these movies will be AI slop and you'd be right, but then that'll be enough for most people who just want to see a lot of shit blow up on screen and superhereos fighting other superhereos.
You will still have a niche for 'real actor' films, but it will become a niche.
Is it just me or are the 'open source' models increasingly impractical to run on anything other than massive cloud infra at which point you may as well go with the frontier models from Google, Anthropic, OpenAI etc.?
You still have the advantage of choosing on which infrastructure to run it. Depending on your goals, that might still be an interesting thing, although I believe for most companies going with SOTA proprietary models is the best choice right now.
It's because their target audience are enterprise customers who want to use their cloud hosted models, not local AI enthusiasts. Making the model larger is an easy way to scale intelligence.
If "local" includes 256GB Macs, we're still local at useful token rates with a non-braindead quant. I'd expect there to be a smaller version along at some point.
