We'd have an excuse to pull troops from the morass that is now Afghanistan. And if China doesn't behave and split off from N. Korea once and for all, we can invalidate some of their U.S. Treasury holdings. http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE66M10I20100724?feedType=RSS&feedName=topNews
I wouldn't be so quick to point fingers. Imagine the good ol' US of A's army sinking one of South Korea's ships on purpose. That then gets reported by the media as NK's doing, thus giving the US an excuse to act with (further) aggression towards NK. A similar scenario would be a few weeks ago's G20 meeting in Toronto, Canada. They had cops dressed up and masked as anarchists, who then went on to smash windoows and torch police cars. Of course, when you look at the pics of the anarchists, they were all wearing tough "police boots". With this "demonstration", the Toronto police gained an excuse to arrest the protesters. Police officers dressed up as anarchists smashing up windows: I'm sorry protesters (and anarchists), but why are you wearing the same boots as the cops?