ROK Drop Open Thread – May 6, 2012

Tags: Open Threads

• Dreamboat Annie
  2:56 am on May 6th, 2012 1

  http://koreajoongangdaily.joinsmsn.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid=2951892&cloc=joongang|home|foreign

  Korean prostitution examined in Australia

  More than 1,000 Korean women are estimated to be involved in prostitution in Australia, a number that increased sharply in recent years, according to data from an Australian civic group. Some data say that about one-sixth of all women providing sex for money in Australia are Korean.

• Dreamboat Annie
  3:03 am on May 6th, 2012 2

  Has this been brought up? I’m not sure.

  Ron Paul Says Bradley Manning & Other Whistleblowers Should Be Protected

• tbonetylr
  3:23 am on May 6th, 2012 3

  Hidden tragedy of Afghanistan and Iraq wars: One U.S. veteran attempts suicide every 80 minutes…
  http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2057061/One-U-S-veteran-attempts-suicide-80-minutes-Hidden-tragedy-Afghanistan-Iraq-wars.html
  “But it is not just returning servicemen and women who are suffering. From 2005 to 2010, approximately one current service member attempted suicide every 36 hours, the study revealed.”

• tbonetylr
  3:26 am on May 6th, 2012 4

  American forces are broken

• Dave
  4:01 am on May 6th, 2012 5

  I first read this article on Seoul Craigslist and followed this link to read the rest of the story.

  http://www.koreaherald.com/national/Detail.jsp?newsMLId=20120504000531

  I find the police officers words very interesting. How can you have laws on the books if there’s no penalty for breaking them. It doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me.

  The majority of Korean drivers out there on the roads are breaking the law by watching TV while they’re driving. Heck, I’ve even seen police officers driving around watching TV.

  I did a little more research into this police officers words and found this link:

  http://elaw.klri.re.kr/

  You’ll have to switch to English at the top right of the page and create an account to view all of the statutes. The officers words are correct. There are laws on there that have no penal provisions for violating the written law. I’m a motorcyclist from America and I’ve always wondered why I can’t ride my Harley on the interstates here. So, I decided to look it up to see what the penalty is for violating this law. Well, come to find out that yes, there is a law on the books against driving “two wheeled vehicles” on expressways, then I go down to the penal provisions of the act and what do I find? Yep, not a penal provision that enforces the law. If I’m riding on the expressway, the police won’t do anything because there isn’t a penalty that can be levied against me?

  Doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, huh?

  Look for yourself, you’ll be amazed at what you find.

• Fanwarrior
  4:23 am on May 6th, 2012 6

  #5, that’s quite interesting. Are you sure the statute isn’t covered by something else? Like a general penalty that covers traffic infractions or the like?

• Dave
  4:59 am on May 6th, 2012 7

  Fanwarrior,

  I’m pretty sure. I’ve searched through the statutes (Acts) extensively and couldn’t find a penal provision for the article that talks about “two wheeled vehicles” on expressways. It’s interesting too, some of the things I’ve learned by reading their laws. A “motorcycle” is considered to have an engine size of 125cc or less. Above that, they’re called “two wheeled vehicles”.

  But what the officer says holds true. There are laws on the books that don’t have penal provisions. Why abide by them then? If nothing will happen to you if you’re caught, or in the case of the article mentioned, the police don’t even do anything about it.

  I challenge anyone to find the penal provision for violating the law against riding a “two wheeled vehicle” on an expressway.

  I couldn’t find it.

• tbonetylr
  5:17 am on May 6th, 2012 8

  Have you ever seen Harley’s or any motorcycle’s on the expressway? I don’t travel much but I don’t remember seeing any. The penalty/fine must depend on what province you’re in? Contact a Korean Harley club, they’ll know.

• keyinjpop
  7:46 am on May 6th, 2012 9

  http://www.allkpop.com/2012/05/japanese-av-star-aoi-sora-to-debut-in-korea-as-singer-actress

  Here’s hoping she has a good debut in S. Korea.

• Fanwarrior
  4:34 pm on May 6th, 2012 10

  I don’t know how well someone who does AV stuff will go over in Korea mainstream. They get upset if someone wears something skimpier than usual. Someone who has ample nude images and videos everywhere?
  Can’t see it..

• Leon LaPorte
  7:11 pm on May 6th, 2012 11

  7. The police can tell you to get off. There are penalties for disobeying the police.

• Dave
  7:51 pm on May 6th, 2012 12

  11. Ok, then you get off. Then what?

  You’re missing my point. How can you have laws on the books without having a penalty for breaking them?

• Matt
  8:59 am on May 7th, 2012 13

  #5-and could you even get on the highways to “break” the law? I bet they’d stop you at the tollbooths…

• Casanova
  1:54 pm on May 7th, 2012 14

  South Korea clamps down on traffickers of ‘human-flesh capsules’

  http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2012/05/07/reports-south-korea-clamps-down-on-traffickers-of-human-flesh-capsules/?hpt=hp_t3

• MTB Rider
  10:08 pm on May 7th, 2012 15

  I think motorcycles would be stopped at the tollgates, and told to get off the expressway, or chased down (or just mailed the ticket) for running the gates. Not sure why Korea doesn’t allow motorbikes on the expressway, unless they are just trying to keep the delivery scooters from bogging down traffic. They could set a minimum cc engine size, say 450cc? Yeah, there are a few 250cc bikes that can get to and maintain highway speeds, but what are the delivery scooters? 50cc? 150cc? Got to set a buffer zone somewhere.

  I know there are many bikes on the highways; hundreds rolled past us while we were pedaling to Sokcho this past weekend. Harleys, Yamahas and Hondas, I think even a few BMWs.

• Tom Langley
  11:25 pm on May 7th, 2012 16

  I read a story about how the South Koreans are taking pills made from aborted & stillborn fetuses from Red China thinking that they are some miracle cure. The Red Chinese take the fetuses, dry them, & pound them to a powder & make pills. This is about the most disgusting thing that I have ever read. The SK authorities have seized some of these pills saying that there is dangerous bacteria in them.

• MTB Rider
  11:37 pm on May 7th, 2012 17

  So, I have to ask… What are people going to say when this (Ground up Baby Pills for Stamina) turns out to be an Urban Legend or a Hoax? It wouldn’t be the first time a reporter filled in his own details, or someone told a complete fabrication and supposedly skeptical reporters bought it hook, line and sinker.

  I’m going to wait a couple of days… Any Bets?

• MTB Rider
  3:14 am on May 8th, 2012 18

  Well, since mean old G. I. Korea deleted my comments because they had nothing to do with CSM King, I need to repost them here…

  The North Koreans hide their guns in UGFs, which I assume means UnderGround Facilities. They have big blast doors to protect the guns from counterfire. But to this sailor’s mind, wouldn’t that be counter productive in this modern age? We have missiles and GPS guided counterbattery fire; if the Norks were to start shooting with fixed emplacements, wouldn’t the US and S. Korea be able to just blow the doors off their tracks leaving the guns shut inside their defensive mountain?

  I mean, even semi-amateur sleuths can use Google Earth to find the North’s “non-existant” Political Prisons, you would think the military would have those gun emplacements calculated to the gnat’s arse, and have the counterfire solution already programmed in.

  Anyways, I’m asking because I honestly don’t know. But what I see makes me think North Korwa is still in the 1950′s with a few new tricks (GPS jamming at Incheon Airport, and some so far half-assed hacking attempts.) While they could cause a lot of hate and discontent for a few hours, the end result would be Suicide by Cop. The US and S. Korea would have to take down the North Korean regime if they did anything that over the top provocative.

  Sorry for any misspellings. I did this with my phone, and editing is a pain without a mouse and text that stays where itvis supposed to be.

• Hamilton
  4:22 am on May 8th, 2012 19

  #18 MTB,

  It’s a good question and the answer is in the nature of the UGFs, Nork vs ROK assets and time.

  Counter battery fire solutions are great if you know where everything is (we don’t), and you have sufficient assets that can fire back quickly and accurately (which we don’t).

  1. The Norks are very good at UGF building and they have them well covered by an Integrated Air Defense System that you have to take down first before your aircraft can drop PGMs or fire missiles. This takes time. PGMs and missiles are much more expensive by the way than the systems they are shooting against, limited in number and can be degraded by weather and other aspects you already noted.

  The UGFs as far as we can tell are very well built so single strikes don’t necessarily equate to kills and they pre-position engineer equipment to dig them out as required. This means kills are not necessarily permanent kills even when you can close an entrance.

  The UGFs are redundant with multiple firing positions and plenty of decoy positions that are actually usable as real firing positions (follow on forces, and scoot and shoot) so are hard to distinguish. This means you will strike a lot of empty targets, they learned very well from the Serbs and they have a lot of manpower to dig with. (*SS fire one volley and move to the next UGF. Counter battery radars take time to calculate where fire is coming from and then even more time to send data to guns if they are ready and have the range.)

  2. For assets, the Nork Guns and rocket launchers are cheap and they have a lot of them. (crews are cheaper and all systems are easy to repair) With the exception of ROK/US MLRS (limited numbers) the Nork systems tend to out-range ROK and US systems although they are much less accurate.

  For the ROK and US 7th AF just do a Wikipedia search on Order of Battle and you can work out that with the number of AC that will need to be assigned early on to IADS there are not enough AC left to then play whack a mole with the mess I described above and sort it out quickly. That’s without considering the Nork SOF and TBM assets that will slow sortie generation down including the Nork Air Force that will put up a spirited but very short fight. Even short fights will push the timeline back and the death toll from LRA up.

  3. Finally we come to time which is accounted for throughout. Even a single un-molested gun can put out a horrendous amount of 1960-70 tech fire into Seoul in a few hours let alone the probable days it will have. How many fires can the Seoul City Fire department handle at one time. Wait until you have panic in the streets, I’m sure whatever that small number is it will inch down considerably. Quantity has its own quality. This doesn’t work well in tanks or AC of inferior quality but still works pretty respectably with artillery and infantry.

  All of this adds up to a heck of a threat to Seoul the Political, Economic and Cultural heart of South Korea. Can NK win the long fight? No. Can they kill the SK economy and cause a horrific number of civilian casualties? Yes. Can they force SK to call uncle and give up the fight early? Probably not with the current administration, I’m not so sure if NMH II is in charge.

• kangaji
  7:36 am on May 8th, 2012 20

  The pill article is coming out of the Korea Times. CNN should know not to cite tabloids.

• JoeC
  8:14 am on May 8th, 2012 21

  As the U.S. military draws down with possible involuntary separations, consider this — Australia Wants You.

  The U.S. Air Force website lists the annual base pay for an E-5, staff sergeant, with six-years’ service at $31,946. An O-3, captain, with six years’ service makes $63,263.

  By comparison, a newly promoted E-5, corporal, in the Australian air force makes $57,277, when converted to U.S. dollars, while newly promoted O-3, flight lieutenant, takes home $66,417.

• Hamilton
  3:21 pm on May 8th, 2012 22

  #21 Prices and taxes in Australia are a lot higher than in the US.

  Just watch how the Australian and New Zealand officers/NCOs that come in to Korea for exercies throw down at the PX or Dragon Hill Lodge.

  I’m not entirely sure that increase in pay will translate into a significant net haul when all is considered. Also you would have to learn their dialect and that could take some time.

• JoeC
  10:18 pm on May 8th, 2012 23

  Richard Lugar, a long time senior statesman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, falls to to Tea Party.

  Lugar’s most significant role in Asia, that I recall, was he led the 1986 observer delegation to the Philippines that pronounced the Marcos election fraudulent and made an opening for the People’s Power Revolution that resulted in the overthrow and exile of the Marcoses and the election of Cory Aquino.

• kangaji
  7:34 am on May 9th, 2012 24

  Also Australians only get paid medical compensation benefits after they retire and not a 20 year retirement. Also the Australian population is not as supportive of the military as the US population.

• kangaji
  8:03 am on May 9th, 2012 25

  Kim Jong Un: The Dear Enviromentalist?

  http://www.kcna.co.jp/index-e.htm

  Also they want to improve road infrastructure (build highways?) apparently.

• kangaji
  8:09 am on May 9th, 2012 26

  http://www.dailyherald.com/article/20120412/news/704129597/photos/EP2/

  It needs it…

• The Man
  7:23 am on May 11th, 2012 27

  Does anybody know what to make of this?

  Sheriff Joe makes a pretty good case that Obama’s selective service card is somewhere between irregular and a careless forgery.

  http://www.wnd.com/2012/05/sheriff-joe-demands-obama-draft-registration/

• Glans
  10:21 pm on May 12th, 2012 28

  Weary warriors favor Obama, according to Margot Roosevelt writing for Reuters from Columbia, South Carolina.

• GI Korea
  11:19 am on May 13th, 2012 29

  @28 – I read the original Reuters article before you posted this comment and decided not to post it because it just more political silly season nonsense. Basically the Reuters journalist or more appropriately Democratic partisan came to a conclusion that veterans were for President Obama by talking to a I’m sure a few carefully selected retired soldiers.

  Look at this statement in the article:

  If the election were held today, Obama would win the veteran vote by as much as seven points over Romney, higher than his margin in the general population.

  Where did this margin come from? The author doesn’t say, she just throws that statement out there was no backing.

  The author also makes the statement that, “only 32 percent think the war in Iraq ended successfully”. First of all what was the poll question and who conducted the poll? Also are we to assume then that the other 68% are going to vote for President Obama?

  Maybe a majority of US military members currently support President Obama but this article sure doesn’t prove it and is just another example of the decline of journalism in America.

 

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