Kim Calls GWB's Nuke Bluff
Well, the regime of certified nut-job Kim Jong Il has now announced to the world - to the surprise of precisely no one - that they have nuclear weapons - something the Bush Administration has said is "unacceptable". The North Koreans have also announced that they are pulling out of the 6-nation talks the Bush Administration had clearly hoped would deter the Stalinist regime from acquiring nukes - so much for the value of multilateralism.
To sum, Kim has called Bush's bluff - probably figuring that there is little to nothing we can do about it.
So what, if anything, should we do about it?
At least one libertarian-leaning organization has been saying for months that we need to get back to the concept of "deterrence". But will deterrence work with against an isolated, collapsing Marxist regime that seems to have no problem starving it's own citizens to death?
We can talk all the live-long day about thanking the genius-trifecta of Bill Clinton, Jimmy (I never met a Marxist I didn't like) Carter and Madeline Not-so-bright for providing the DPRK with the nukes in the first place (but they promised they wouldn't make weapons, honest!), but that's not the issue here.
The issue is that we have about 48-thousand troops stationed in South Korea right now, seemingly as nothing more than a trip-wire (or speed bump) if Kim decides that his best route to a decent meal is through Seoul.
George Bush has already demonstrated why you shouldn't play Texas Hold 'em with a Texan - because when he thinks you're bluffing, the Texan goes "all-in". I'm not entirely sure that's an option here, however. We are already stretched painfully thin with our ongoing excursions in Southwest Asia, and the ROK - the people most threatened by a nuclear-weaponized neighbor to the north - seem to be rather nonplused by these events. Thus, there seems to be little justification for our moving militarily against Kim - especially when he could certainly reach Japan and possibly the mainland of the US (thanks again to Clinton) in a retaliatory death-agony strike that could result in the immediate deletion of possibly 1-million people.
That said, there is more than a little bit of our national prestige on the line. Having now said repeatedly that we would not allow North Korea to acquire nuclear weapons, can we now allow them to openly flout their acquisition of same with impunity? What sort of message does that send to the more dangerous and equally ambitious Iran?
Paraphrasing that great American poet Tone Loc, we got us a "Big Old Mess" on our hands here.
To sum, Kim has called Bush's bluff - probably figuring that there is little to nothing we can do about it.
So what, if anything, should we do about it?
At least one libertarian-leaning organization has been saying for months that we need to get back to the concept of "deterrence". But will deterrence work with against an isolated, collapsing Marxist regime that seems to have no problem starving it's own citizens to death?
We can talk all the live-long day about thanking the genius-trifecta of Bill Clinton, Jimmy (I never met a Marxist I didn't like) Carter and Madeline Not-so-bright for providing the DPRK with the nukes in the first place (but they promised they wouldn't make weapons, honest!), but that's not the issue here.
The issue is that we have about 48-thousand troops stationed in South Korea right now, seemingly as nothing more than a trip-wire (or speed bump) if Kim decides that his best route to a decent meal is through Seoul.
George Bush has already demonstrated why you shouldn't play Texas Hold 'em with a Texan - because when he thinks you're bluffing, the Texan goes "all-in". I'm not entirely sure that's an option here, however. We are already stretched painfully thin with our ongoing excursions in Southwest Asia, and the ROK - the people most threatened by a nuclear-weaponized neighbor to the north - seem to be rather nonplused by these events. Thus, there seems to be little justification for our moving militarily against Kim - especially when he could certainly reach Japan and possibly the mainland of the US (thanks again to Clinton) in a retaliatory death-agony strike that could result in the immediate deletion of possibly 1-million people.
That said, there is more than a little bit of our national prestige on the line. Having now said repeatedly that we would not allow North Korea to acquire nuclear weapons, can we now allow them to openly flout their acquisition of same with impunity? What sort of message does that send to the more dangerous and equally ambitious Iran?
Paraphrasing that great American poet Tone Loc, we got us a "Big Old Mess" on our hands here.
posted by Doc J | 7:12 AM
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