This N. Korea standoff is a tough situation. I cannot help but wonder if satellite weaponry exists that the U.S. could use to laser beam their dear leader? [Edited for clarity]
A bit like the UK plan to assassinate Hitler in 1944 which was cancelled as "he was by then considered to be such a poor strategist that it was believed whoever replaced him would probably do a better job of fighting the Allies"
> Thornley also argued that Germany was almost defeated and, if Hitler were assassinated, he would become a martyr to some Germans, and possibly give rise to a myth that Germany might have won if Hitler had survived. Since the idea was not only to defeat Germany but to destroy Nazism in general, that would have been a highly undesirable development.
Hitler was an eloquent and persuasive person who effectively represented/exploited Nazi philosophy. There were certainly (secret) critics of his policies and goals, but he was not some kind of sorcerer with a spell over the German population as if, on his assassination, the Axis powers would shake their heads and blink their eyes and say "wait a minute, are we the baddies?"
The same applies even more to modern politics because modern states are not as totalitarian in their removal of critics - they must therefore have stronger supporters. You cannot blame only Donald Trump or Theresa May or Xi Jinping or Angela Merkel or whoever your opponents figurehead may be; they have huge political parties behind them and are backed by huge numbers of constituents who identify with their message. There are surely strong effects from having these leadership positions, but you also need to reach their base with your message.
From what I know by 1944 pretty much everybody around Hitler knew that their cause was lost. I doubt anybody else would have had the power to continue. And yes, he had a spell over the people around him when you read biographies.
Obviously we will never know but I think at the present taking out Kim Jong Un should be worth consideration.
By that point the Allies (actually originally just Roosevelt, with the others following along) had insisted on unconditional surrender:
"those Germans — and particularly those German generals — who might have been ready to throw Hitler over, and were able to do so, were discouraged from making the attempt by their inability to extract from the Allies any sort of assurance that such action would improve the treatment meted out to their country."
Seoul is near the DMZ, probably closer than San Jose and San Francisco. One would have to take out their entire chain of command to prevent a retaliatory conventional artillery strike on the US bases near the DMZ and Seoul.
That's possible. Based on all the border incidents since the end of the Korean War though it looks like the North Korea side is on a hair trigger to respond.
I was supposing a hypothetical laser attack because it wouldn't be detected like a missile strike would. Therefore, the political need to respond immediately with all out war would be lessened, and maybe take less precedence than the power struggle.
If satellites were not (for good reason!) extremely conservative, I can see a way to turn spy satellite into a deniable blinding weapon for about $10 of parts.