Just as the disastrous failures of the first year of the occupation left the United States so deep in the hole it could never get out, the last two-and-a-half years of unrestrained North Korean proliferation have changed the equation in ways can’t be reversed now.
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September 22, 2005
WB: Appeasing North Korea
Comments
Spoiled Pygmy Tyrants?
It takes one to know one.
This is another great post by Billmon. The Korean news is of intense importance but not much has been heard of the negotiations for a while.
Has anyone connected the dots yet? The original blow-up over Korea started when the USA was represented in negotiations by John Bolton.
Posted by: hopping madbunny | Sep 22 2005 9:07 utc | 1
I’m not sure I see what changed, from the North Korean prospective, between 2000 and 2005. I tend to think the main change is the North Koreans understood that the Bushistas -at best- intended to deal with the Iraqi “threat” first and therefore were willing to overlook North Korean transgressions for a bit (I would point out here that that the Bushistas orginally intended to draw down American forces by 50% by December – i.e. their expectations in this regard proved wildly optimistic). IMHO they at best expected that the “example” of Iraq woud prove decisive, and even if it didn’t overthrowing North Korea would be, comparitively speaking, a cakewalk next to Iraq.
In any case North Korea’S trump cards are that it (a) has several thousand pieces of artillery ready to lob thousands of shells (some possibly armed with chemical agents) on Seoul, (b) that it has one or more atomic weapons ready for use, and (c) from a regime survival standpoint it has nothing to lose by pursuing either the (a) or (b) options.
In any case the prefered American response -to invade North Korea and overthrow Kim Jong II- was never realistically in the cards for China, Japan or South Korea. For this reason alone Americans had to -reluctantly- adapt to the reality that they couldn’t dictate North Korean policy to their vassals -oops I mean “allies”- or, as a result of facts on the ground in Iraq, persue a policy that had no support among regional powers.
Posted by: Lexington | Sep 22 2005 10:26 utc | 2
Well anytime N. Korea comes into the picture, I wonder what’s going on with Sun Myung Moon, Bush’s Korean sugar daddy, financier of the religious right with 1500 religious and political front organizations (most registered in the Caymen Islands) and his “man with a vision.” This crusty cult leader and his shifty second, Bo Hai Pak (founder of the S. Korean CIA and the Moonie administrator of the teen Abstinence Group Free Teens USA that got millions in faith based initiative money. Pak goes to local Moonie churches to teach them how to use FT USA to recruit new members)have played an interesting role in Bush Jr and Srs life. There are rumors that Bush used Moon as a go between with the “tyrant pygmy” a year or so ago. What is our bad boy up to? Here are a few links:
http://www.iapprovethismessiah.com/2004/08/rev-moons-submarines-sold-to-kim-jong.html
http://www.prospect.org/web/page.ww?section=root&name=ViewPrint&articleId=9868
http://www.consortiumnews.com/2000/101100a.html
And Moon describes here a trip to N. Korea:
http://www.tparents.org/Moon-Talks/sunmyungmoon91/SM911207.HTM
There’s more. of course, but that’s enough Moon Watching for now!
Posted by: Diogenes | Sep 22 2005 12:18 utc | 3
Seemed to me like the neocons were threatened by Korean unification as much as anything and have done their unlevel best to prevent it.
They’ve probably succeeded in delaying it a few years, but probably insured that it could be potentially more lethal when inevitably occuring.
Posted by: bcf | Sep 22 2005 13:16 utc | 4
Billmon is on fire these days; you can’t contradict what the great sage says. Reading upwards bcf has a very valid point, but China.
Posted by: Cloned Poster | Sep 22 2005 17:14 utc | 5
This is a great post, Billmon. I wish there were more comments on this thread. Sorry I don’t have anything intelligent to add at 4:30 AM.
@ Diogenes
Thanks for the excellent links. The nexus between religious leaders and contraband of weapons seems to be not so unusual as one might hope.
Posted by: Hannah K. O’Luthon | Sep 23 2005 8:54 utc | 7
The North Koreans, perhaps sensing an opening, immediately declared that the appropriate time was right now, and issued one of their by-now familiar bloodcurdling threats to incinerate the Korean peninsula if the Americans so much as look at them crosseyed.
Citation, please? Because until proven otherwise I’m calling it bullshit. The U.S. is the only country in the world to publicly proclaim its allegiance to “preventive” war.
Posted by: Eli Stephens | Sep 26 2005 6:04 utc | 9