reply to post by Lostmymarbles
Very good points in your post, and I think this is one of the most concerning:
If you look at your equipment and electronics you'll notice a lot of it comes from the Asian countries who build almost all the components.
Without them we would be in the dark ages due to the fact that most US businesses outsource to other countries to avoid taxes and high pay in the US.
If Asian was to put an end to shipping electrical components, it would take years for the US to build such companies to overcome the loss of supplies
that Asia provides.
One of the reasons for the U.S. power after WWII was the fact that all their equipment (or at least, most of it) was built inside their own borders,
which are one of the few to not suffer an attack since it's existence.
In our days, while the main "toys" are built inside the U.S., with U.S. industrial power, that's just a shadow of what it used to be. Even those
production lines use parts coming from other countries, like you stated.
A severe cut of ties would be catastrophic to the U.S. .
For those thinking South Korea needs military support, know this, South Korea is one of a few countries where the military draft is still in
affect.
Also very important.
I think this is just a safety measure. Possibly South Korea has the wish to stop that measure, and just get going with their lives, disconnected from
the Korean war past. But since North Korea also has mandatory military service, they simply cannot risk being in a losing hand against North Korea.
Something along the same lines of thought that made (and still makes) the U.S. and Russia keep a stock of functional nuclear weapons, even thought
they signed the NPT.
And personally, Korean forces (both North and South) are pretty impressive. The South is a bit further in terms of military power, mostly due to their
superior equipment. Good soldiers + good equipment.
edit on 10-8-2012 by GarrusVasNormandy because: corrected text