DBWI: No Korean Nuclear War?

In the mid-late 1990s and early 2000s both Koreas were in a period of tension, which had led to South Korea, which had been holding elections which were won by hardliners, starting to develop a nuclear program with the full approval of the US. In 2006, North Korea tested their first nuke, and in 2009 South Korea tested their first nuke as well.

Tensions came to a head in 2015 following a terrorist attack committed by a group based in Pyongyang in South Korea which ended with the death of their president, which ended up with the Korean War being resumed. North Korea nuked Seoul, Busan, Incheon and Daegu, but also decided to hurt their other enemies, Japan and the US, by nuking Tokyo and Guam. South Korea nuked Pyongyang, Chongjin, Hamhung and Kaesong. The war was over, but the Korean Peninsula devolved into anarchy and the world economy was severely crippled.

But what if it the war had not happened?
 
Donald Trump was poking fun at Kim Jung Un the entire time leading up to the war. I'm willing to bet that if the war never broke out, he could have perhaps won the Republican primary and beaten Clinton, and then he would have probably continued tweeting about Kim as president.
 
Well, Walmart would probably still be around (yes I know technically they still are but that's not my point, when's the last time you seen them with actual filled shelves?). My god the collapse of global trade was a gut punch. Not to mention how price of electronics went through the roof.

Like seriously, the end of the Korean Conflict (technically it was only a ceasefire back in 53, and this was technically a resumption of the same conflict) will be remembered as the war that ended globalization and the post cold war new world order (much like WWI ended the previous interconnectness of the late victorian era). I'm not seeing any of the usual players trusting international trade for a while even after they crawled back into some kind of stability.

Oh yeah, and gas prices would be somewhere reasonable, like seriously I can't believe that I miss the days where gas prices were only south of $4 a gallon...

Like whatever problems a world without this damn war would have would still be about 100 times better.

Fuck it, this is really emotional, so I'm gonna stop before I blow a fuse or something, but seriously, you're really stirring up a lot of emotions with this WI...
 
Donald Trump was poking fun at Kim Jung Un the entire time leading up to the war. I'm willing to bet that if the war never broke out, he could have perhaps won the Republican primary and beaten Clinton, and then he would have probably continued tweeting about Kim as president.

OOC: Seriously? The POD is around 1995 and Trump still runs for president as a Republican, and Hillary runs for president as a Democrat as well?
 
Japanese pacifism would still be intact. While I wouldn't say Japan has completely gone back to Showa Era militarism, and they are still allied to the US, but the fact is all those nuclear strikes and North Korean commandos striking industrial and political targets has essentially shattered Japan's post-WWII culture, and led them to believe that they just can't completely depend on the US alliance and a small military. They need their own deterrent, both conventional and nuclear. Japan already has one 50,000 ton carrier afloat, and another ship of the class in the yards, and if the leaks are to be trusted, a 75,000 ton class is currently in the design stage. And all of those will be carrying fifth-generation aircraft of indigenous design and manufacturing.

On a more global note, well, tensions would be lower in the region, since as might be expected, large-scale Japanese rearmament is causing the Chinese to scream in outrage...not that they can do much about it. America's inability to deter or protect key regional allies and trade partners (Japan and South Korea) was a major humiliation, and while they're generally leaving defense to the Japanese (who are the only other nation apart from America and Russia with functioning ABM systems), deterrence-wise American IRBMs and GLCMs are aimed straight at China from Okinawa and Taiwan, with nuclear warheads known kept in the same bases in hardened bunkers, and the official policy is that any hostile moves towards either Japan or Taiwan would be met with immediate tactical nuclear strikes all across East China.

All well and good, but tensions are high, even more so with negotiations underway between Vietnam, America, and Japan on stationing more IRBMs and GLCMs plus giving the IJN - yet another source of outrage for the Chinese that is swelling Japanese nationalism and monarchism born of the near-annihilation of the Imperial Family during the Tokyo nuclear bombing - basing rights in Vietnam. Plus, American 'peacekeepers' occupying the islands of the West Philippine Sea, and possible extension of the Japanese missile shield into a Pan-Pacific system with Taiwan, Vietnam, and the Philippines...

...that madman Kim's not only turned Korea into a charnel house, he's turned East Asia into a ticking bomb.
 
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We should also not ignore the anti-Korean riots in Japan that broke out following the war. Japan accepts Korean refugees, though the amount of anti-Korean sentiment coupled with anti-Korean criminal groups there has made it a death trap and as such very few Korean refugees go to Japan.
 
It seemed incredible to me and many others that 70 years on, nuclear weapons would again be used in North East Asia and of course apart from the destruction of Tokyo, Japan was ravaged by fallout from the strikes in Korea.

I remember the fear and anxiety here in the UK though no one seriously thought we were looking at World War 3 there was a lot of panic and some evacuated London and other big cities even though David Cameron urged us all to be calm. He did well and in spite of winning the election no one is talking about EU Referendums or anything like that.

The spike in oil prices hit us first in the winter of 15-16 and petrol went up to £3 per litre despite George Osborne pledging to cut fuel duty. There were real problems and Osborne had to put together an Emergency Budget in early 16 but he increased defence spending claiming the "new reality" meant we couldn't rely on America. Perhaps but Putin had his hands full with refugees crossing the North Korean border and fallout over Vladivostok. Indeed, we all remember the horrific pictures sent by Alex Crawford from Busan that winter - the snow, the devastation, the children...the relief effort raised £300 million from the British public which is something of which we can be proud.

Economically, the recession or depression is upon us - GDP fell 3.2% in the fourth quarter of 2017-18 and most construction work has stopped leaving thousands of EU workers to go home to try to make the best of it but the impact across the British economy has been brutal with house prices in freefall.

It's been worst for the Japanese and South Koreans living in the UK who have lost family and friends whether in Tokyo, Busan or wherever.

Cameron is finished of course - no one will thank him for austerity or the hard times and Corbyn's Labour party is 20 points ahead and swept London in the elections last week. Corbyn is an unconvincing figure but we can't go on as we are - things have to change.
 
We should also not ignore the anti-Korean riots in Japan that broke out following the war. Japan accepts Korean refugees, though the amount of anti-Korean sentiment coupled with anti-Korean criminal groups there has made it a death trap and as such very few Korean refugees go to Japan.

It's not just Japan though. There were 50,000 US troops stationed along the former DMZ. 50,000 troops that never went home.

Anti-Korean sentiment is strong in the USA, though admittedly, unlike in Japan there aren't anti-Korean riots and such in the US. Or at least, not as common as in Japan.
 
It's not just Japan though. There were 50,000 US troops stationed along the former DMZ. 50,000 troops that never went home.

Anti-Korean sentiment is strong in the USA, though admittedly, unlike in Japan there aren't anti-Korean riots and such in the US. Or at least, not as common as in Japan.

And let's not forget about China or Russia, the former has recently announced that they would be accepting no more Korean refugees, while the latter has far-right groups holding anti-Korean demonstrations. Duterte in the Philippines is also anti-Korean, and Taiwan is only accepting South Korean refugees.
 
For all that Kim claimed he did what he did for the sake of his people, all he's succeeded in doing is destroying their country, and poisoning the world's perception of them.
 
I blame China for not keeping North Korea on a short leash.
The PRC never had much influence over the DPRK since the sino-soviet split, during the cold war the DPRK was more of a soviet satellite while post cold war they were basically the rabid dog in the front yard that nobody was sure who's was it. The bastards were completely out of control by the early 2010s, which is probably why they decided to take as much of the world in flames when they decided to go out on a bang.
 
Wonder if John Kasich would still have gotten elected president.

Anyways there's been an upswing in doomsday survivalist groups and organizations.
 
Wonder if John Kasich would still have gotten elected president.

Anyways there's been an upswing in doomsday survivalist groups and organizations.

Can you blame them? East Asia is a ticking bomb, Russia is all but holding Eastern Europe hostage to keep NATO from expanding its missile shield or indeed, its membership into that region of the continent, and the Middle East smolders on as usual.
 
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