I've never portrayed our side as angels. However, if you decide to spit on my shoes, that still does not escuse me from smashing your face into the pavement. So yes, NATO countries do sometimes contravene international law, and often shamelessly and brazenfacedly at that. That said, it's still not an excuse for North Korea either. I do agree though that when our countries violate international laws too, it makes it harder for us to be taken seriously when we then preach international law to other countries. For that reason, it might be wise for our side to show some humility here. We're not exactly angels either.
"The skirmish began when Pyongyang warned the South to halt military drills in the area, according to South Korean officials. When Seoul refused, the North bombarded the small South Korean-held island of Yeonpyeong, which houses military installations and a small civilian population.
South Korea returned fire and dispatched fighter jets in response, and said there could be considerable North Korean casualties as troops unleashed intense retaliatory fire. The supreme military command in Pyongyang threatened more strikes if the South crossed their maritime border by "even 0.001 millimeter," according to the North's official Korean Central News Agency."
All the retaliatory fire took time, especially launching the jets. North Korea pulled a "Pearl Harbor" on S. Korea with the exception that S. Korea was better prepared, but not enough I guess since South Korean Defense Minister Kim Tae Young had to resign.
"Government officials in Seoul called the bombardments "inhumane atrocities" that violated the 1953 armistice halting the Korean War. The two sides technically remain at war because a peace treaty was never signed."
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/11/north-south-korea-exchange-fire-2-marines-killed/
Time Line for Attack
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2632995/posts
Even comes with comments.
Now if North Korea even asked the South to stop andthe South didn't, that just makes the South look even worse. Even then though, seeing that the exercise, though possibly harasin North Korean economic activity, was not a direct threat to life, I'd still say the North Korean response was excessive. Certainly North Korea could have brought the matter forward to the UN General Assembly, or as for more immediate responses, go out and conduct training of its own in the same waters. Suddenly the danger level would rise so much that unless the South was really stupid, it would then pull out and the North right after, thus avoiding casualties altogether. Sure the South may be the primary culprit here, but it's still no excuse for the North to respond on the scale it did.
1. China may have some influence on North Korea, but it certainly does not control it.
2. North Korea has little respect for China's friendly advice to it. Ergo point 1 above.
3. Though China is certainly fed up with North Korea, there are other issues at stake too. The last thing China would want would be a flood of North Korean reugees along their shared border. It also would not want a ful-out war breaking between SEATO and North Korea on so close by, especially with the threat of nuclear attack, even if not on its soil, close by enough that any wind could carry the radioactive dust clouds anywhere nearby, be it into Russia (already irradiated enough from Chernobyl), Japan, South Korea, or China itself of course. I'm sure Japan and South Korea are likely not nearly as hawkish about this as North Americans so far away from the potential battle front, for the same reasons as China. They may have different social systems, but make no mistake about it, not wanting to be irradiated is probably a fairly universal desire crossing all ideological boundaries.
4. A war so close by would undoubtedly hurt the Chinese economy, along with other neighbouring economies, and put Chinese and other regional shipping at risk.
5. China has had a very bad experience with foreing wars in the not so distant past, including the Opium Wars, foreign territorial acquisitions of Chinese soil and imposition of extraterritorial treaties onto China, and foreign involvement in the Chinese civil war. Needless to say, such a culture will be extremely sensitive to foreign military intervention on its border.
Should North Korea eventually push China too far, and China decides to give the nod to an international attack on North Korea, I can pretty well guarantee that there would be conditions. Among some I'd suspect would be:
a) a reassurance that the force will be given a clear mandate that cannot be altered. To take Iraq and Afghanistan as cases in point, first it was to capture Bin Laden and WMD's in Iraq, then it turned to nation-building with not WMDs in sight and Bin Ldden still at large. Clearly China will not take too kndly to such bait-and-switch tactics and would want absolute certainly that this won't happen. Therefore, a US-led mission or even SEATO-led mission would be out of the question. South-Korean-led? Maybe China would tolerate that on the grounds that at least they are Koreans and have a say in the destiny of their brethren to the North (especially seeing China's sensitivities over forein actions on another nation's land). UN-led? That might be acceptable too seeing that China itself is a member and therefore would have some say in how the operation is carried out.
b) So as to discourage the North from panicking and going all out on the nukes, as well as to avoid serious social disturbances along the Chinese-North-Korean border, while China might no longer back the North in any foreign attack as per Chinese specifications such as the ones above, it might still offer an olive branch to the leadership of its ally (or should I say quasi-ally or tolerated neighbour?) to seek refuge in China in exchange for a peaceful surrender to the invading force or some other deal so as to reduce the chances of the North going all out. Or that might even be anoffer made and then turned down by the North before China finally gives South Korea or the UN or some other body it trusts to launch an attack. ut I'm pretty convinced a SEATO-led or US-led force would be out of the question. It would likely have to be either a Soutn-Korean or UN-led force for China to agree to it. It certainly would not accept the risk of any kind of bait-and-switch war on its border.
