All aboard the U.S invasion force!

North Korea has been doing this same exact thing for 60 years, its only hyped up in the media right now. And if NK were to drop a nuke ANYWHERE, they would be bombarded by the US and other countries. They're not stupid, they know what would happen if they nuked the US or South Korea.

We would totally wipe that country off of the map. It would not even be North Korea. It would just be "that pile of radiation".

nothing is going to happen, if they do its the end of NK

Well, we would be able to do it, but we wouldn't. For one too many innocent lives would be affected. Something like a stray tank round or missile strike that kills ten or twenty civilians is easier to keep getting out of the news, a nuclear strike isn't. We wouldn't do it, not because of the innocent blood on our hands, but because of the fallout from the UN or from our own people. Secondly, if trace amounts of radiation arrived here from the Japan reactor, imagine how much fallout would arrive here from even one of our lower yield nukes? (Many times the power of the A-Bombs we gave to Japan.) Besides, if we wanted to level the country, why drop expensive nuclear weapons that pose a large risk to our safety, when we could use conventional bombs and missiles which are cheaper, and can do just as much damage in a large strike. Maybe more if done strategically. Finally if we did drop a nuke, Kim Jong-Un would probably just eat it.

Nukes are sloppy, imprecise, and unnecessary. We have much better ordnance for a retaliatory strike.

If we get hit by a nuke. North Korea will be nothing more than a mile deep, mile wide, crater in the ground.

Not gonna happen.

Doubt, convential bombing(which could still turn all of NK into a parking lot) would be the "best" option, NK is to close to China and South Korea.

[quote]"Hit" implies that they have a delivery system that is related to the old triad (Bombers, ICBM, SLICBM). For a state such as NK to deliver an atomic (not nuclear, they have not demonstrated anything approaching thermonuclear capability), I would think that since they do not have a typical delivery system, that they would consider an atypical method that wouldn't require ballistic missile tech, cruise missile tech, intercontinental bombers or submarines. They don't have a reliable delivery system and they don't have miniaturization technology approaching that of long-term "club members" that would allow them to make a small enough (yet powerful enough) device that could reach our targets. They are most likely at the stage where their devices are of the size, weight and technology of Fat Man and Little Boy but have no way to get them from there to here. So, put it in a lead lined cargo container, ship it all over (like playing a shell game) and eventually have it arrive in a port or airport, or on a train or a truck that puts the container and device in whatever city they want. Then a phone call to the cell-phone attached to the detonator..... and we've got a mushroom cloud in ANY city on the planet. It's low tech, but cheap and feasible. We didn't think of airliners as flying bombs until 2001 and I suspect that most nations don't see cargo containers as rolling bombs until someone uses them as such (well, they have, we've just not paid too close of attention). Multiple embassy/compound bombings and Oklahoma City should remind us of what a truck with fertilizer/fuel oil can do. Imagine something the yield of Hiroshima or Nagasaki on a train, or a semi, or stacked in the container yard of a port. Scary to you? It scares the everloving crap out of me. As to our response? If you think that the US's reflexive and emotional reaction to 3 buildings and 3,000 deaths in the years after 2001 was mindless, overwhelming and deadly? I would imagine that if there was a mushroom cloud over where a US city used to be, that the country would be screaming for blood and vengeance, not calm and rational response. I could easily see the President (yes, even this one) simply go on television and tell the rest of the world "Sorry guys, but we know who's been making these threats, stay out of this, we're going to deal with it. Oh, and if you're a non-hostile nation in and around the Korean peninsula? Do yourself a favor and duck!"[/quote] Easily the best comment in the thread.

The US has said time and time again that they will retaliate with nuclear weapons if they are used on us.

Well, there would be plenty of parking in N Korea, that's for sure. Count on our response to be fast and brutal. We would likely bomb the country flat. I don't think we would even need nukes to do it. We may not use them, just to give the S Koreans some new real estate. But, yes, nuke the US and expect nukes in return.

Why would we even waste a nuke on them? Drop a whole bunch of cheap firecrackers on them and we'll be good. Saving dem nukes for the Russians >:)

If North Korea sends a Nuke towards us, our wall of nukes we send back would intercept it.

If North Korea nukes the United States, South Korea becomes an island. But in all seriousness, I can't say. I guess we'll wait and see, though from what I've gathered I doubt North Korea even with their nukes has the potential to harm the US at this point.

If they shot a missile it would get shot down within minutes of launch - Even if it was aimed at S.Korea. If North Korea wants to deliver a Nuke they would have to smuggle it in the country and pull a 24.

If they launched a nuke, it would begin a nuclear disaster which many people will die. I used to live in Guam and I am at ease living in the states now, Guam IS the closest U.S territory to NK

No, We will almost surely "be the bigger country" even if they launch a missile, it would not make it to the US. it would be shot down in minutes. This isn't like the cold war. In the cold war the thread was Russia launching *Everything* which would have been 1,000+ nukes. *Everything* for NK is 3 to 4 nuclear devices max. And in reality their technology most likely would not work in the first place.