Are you gonna bark all day, little doggy...

For the last 68 years give or take a few days it has always been near

Well Hiroshima and Nagasaki weren't they happened and their world ended and western science did that, the west is the only civilisation to have used these weapons and when we did we were shocked.

The little fission firecrackers that we set off in Japan were hideous, the things we have now are monstrous, does the US administration have the decency and restraint not to use these things today?

I hope so.

No, they, the Chinese, will have a massive radiation problem all over their country and they will be blaming the US for that and what will happen next?

Deterrents kind of worked, they are the backstop for any defeated western nation, like NK although with more potency we, the UK, could only hurt one or two specific targets sufficiently to claim any kind of victory but of course it would not be a victory, as our main target is Russia we would in fact be defeated and in a short while we would likely be a steaming pile of ash.

This is the reason that people ask what is the point of nuclear weapons and our only answer is if you piss us off a lot of you will die!

This is exactly what North Korea is saying and what it is attempting to achieve except that in global terms it has not shown any degree of maturity or understanding of the issues ever, nor is it likely to now that it has a big stick and the means to deliver it somewhere and probably not very accurately as inertial guidance systems are quite an art.

We, the west, should take the high ground and take the hit and the loss, whereupon we have the moral and legal grounds to retaliate, the reality is that the North Koreans could be obliterated, however so doing would kill many Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese, South Korean and North Korean citizens, that would be the immediate short term consequence of a nuclear war on the Korean peninsula, Filipinos would also die along with many other Asian people in the region, there would also be deaths in the west but statistically you might not notice them unless the conflagration was really large.

These weapons are obscene, nobody anywhere should ever use them, only the deranged think they provide safety, all they give you and me and everyone else is a binary choice, live or die, that's it.

My niece Rachael (my sister's youngest daughter) lives and works in Shanghai she has been in China for 5 years, she will be in the fallout zone, as I posted in the earth maps the fallout area is by no means certain but there are guaranteed distribution zones, all that is in question is the intensity.

Yeah I would, I know a lad here that worked in my local pub (not that I have been there for the last 6 months) he and his family spent a large part of their lives in Guam, I was very surprised to hear this by the way.

It does not matter where the target is, right now you can choose any location inside their claimed range some of those are European, or yes Guam or any other target in that region yes I am going to be very upset.

While the chances are that the Phils will not be too badly hit it is the luck of the draw and if you get unlucky and the wind is going the wrong way that week well my kids and yours are equally at risk!

Your economic points I agree with Boots, and one way or another the dictator will be removed, the only question is how painful the rotten tooth extraction will be.