The West risks missing a chance at peace if it continues to treat North Korea’s change of heart with cynicism Could it be that Trump’s bombast over the airwaves cut through in Pyongyang in a way that conventional diplomacy had failed to do? The Independent UK, Mary Dejevsky@IndyVoices 16 Feb 18
“”…………The mixed messages about the North Korean skaters, however, highlighted – or so it seemed to me – something else: a reluctance on the part of the foreign policy establishment, including the media, to look good news in the face, especially when it has not been expected.
How long ago was it –in fact, a bare six weeks – that Kim Jong-un and the US President were trading very public, very macho, insults, culminating in Donald Trump’s memorable boast that his nuclear button was “much bigger and more powerful” than Kim’s and, what is more, “my button works”.
Even the most hardened pessimist would have to admit that between then and now there has been something of a mood swing. Less than three weeks after the “big button” exchange, North Korea suddenly acted on overtures in Kim’s New Year address to broach talks with the South, and even participated in the Olympics. The IOC delayed its deadline for entries, permitted North Korea’s participation, and the next thing we knew was that North and South were concocting a joint ice hockey team, the North’s nonagenarian de facto head of state was on his way to Seoul, and Kim announced that his sister – his sister – would be going to the opening ceremony, too.
Far from hailing these developments as the possible start of a North-South thaw, however, the Western response seemed – to me, at least, – both fearful and curmudgeonly. Kim Jong-un was suspected of the basest of motives. Might he not be deviously stringing the South along, it was asked, just waiting to demand all sorts of impossible concessions at the last moment that would cast the Seoul government as the villain if it refused?
And was Kim not also staging a vast military parade in Pyongyang on the eve of the official Olympic opening? Well, of course, he was. No self-respecting national leader, least of all an autocrat in the mould of Kim, can be seen to be weak in front of his own people. Shows of strength have a habit of going hand in hand with diplomatic U-turns.
As the North Korean nuclear threat vanished from the headlines, however, it was only to be replaced with another menace from the North. Kim’s very presentable little sister, Kim Yo-jong, was accused of stealing the limelight, diluting the world’s attention that should have been Seoul’s, and presenting an image of the North that was scandalously at odds with the cruel and earth-scorched reality. Don’t allow yourself to be fooled, was the message.
That she was received in Seoul at the highest level and filmed handing over an invitation to President Moon Jae-in to visit Pyongyang was also somehow seen as out of order, another trick to gain diplomatic advantage. Surely it would all turn sour even before the Olympic glow over the South had faded. The North Korean threat was still there.
Far from hailing these developments as the possible start of a North-South thaw, however, the Western response seemed – to me, at least, – both fearful and curmudgeonly. Kim Jong-un was suspected of the basest of motives. Might he not be deviously stringing the South along, it was asked, just waiting to demand all sorts of impossible concessions at the last moment that would cast the Seoul government as the villain if it refused?
And was Kim not also staging a vast military parade in Pyongyang on the eve of the official Olympic opening? Well, of course, he was. No self-respecting national leader, least of all an autocrat in the mould of Kim, can be seen to be weak in front of his own people. Shows of strength have a habit of going hand in hand with diplomatic U-turns.
As the North Korean nuclear threat vanished from the headlines, however, it was only to be replaced with another menace from the North. Kim’s very presentable little sister, Kim Yo-jong, was accused of stealing the limelight, diluting the world’s attention that should have been Seoul’s, and presenting an image of the North that was scandalously at odds with the cruel and earth-scorched reality. Don’t allow yourself to be fooled, was the message.
That she was received in Seoul at the highest level and filmed handing over an invitation to President Moon Jae-in to visit Pyongyang was also somehow seen as out of order, another trick to gain diplomatic advantage. Surely it would all turn sour even before the Olympic glow over the South had faded. The North Korean threat was still there.
Nor should the use by potentates – and not just potentates – of close relatives as personal representatives and trusted go-betweens – be discounted as a ploy. Rather than being designed to detract from the South’s Olympic show, Kim Jong-yo’s trip to Seoul might rather be seen as evidence of her brother’s serious intent and esteem.
And what might have changed the equation? How about the US Secretary of State’s low-key offer of direct talks without preconditions that he made in December? Repeated in Seoul by Vice-President Mike Pence this week (once he had done cold-shouldering the North Koreans for the benefit of the US audience back home), this is what first broke the deadlock. There have been concessions on all sides.
So while the doomwatchers see the Olympic thaw as, at best, a deceptive interlude before the nuclear stand-off inevitably resumes, I would argue, for more optimism. A basis has been laid for detente; there is a real chance now to step back from the brink. The risk now is less that the North is insincere, than that suspicion and cynicism everywhere cause this chance to be missed. http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/north-korea-war-nuclear-us-uk-europe-world-peace-conflict-a8212656.html
The North is increasingly close to developing a nuclear-tipped ICBM that can hit the continental US. Washington knows it cannot destroy all the country’s capabilities – so hawks are now arguing for a “bloody nose” strategy to warn Kim Jong-un off threatening the US (though he must know any attack would be suicidal). Seoul, just 35 miles from the border, would bear the brunt of any retaliation. A conflict could kill tens of thousands and potentially draw in other regional powers, including China.
“There’s a real concern that for the first time there is a US administration that could take unilateral action against North Korea without consulting the South,” says Professor Hazel Smith of the centre of Korean studies at Soas Univeristy of London. “People are pushing, virtually preparing, for a so-called ‘surgical strike’ – even though the majority of US and South Korean military planners argue that it would be risky to the point of likely catastrophe for the South, and US troops there.
“The Olympic initiative was never going to solve the nuclear question overnight, but I think it has stopped the mad escalation of the conflict that was going on.”
The task of Kim Yo-jong and the bevy of cheerleaders has been to normalise the image of a country that looks utterly abnormal to outsiders. ………
Kim has cemented his position, in part through tighter control. He purged and executed his uncle Jang Song-thaek; and he is believed to have ordered the killing of his self-exiled brother, Kim Jong-nam, a year ago. There have been repeated crackdowns on smuggled – especially South Korean – media.
On the other hand he has promised his people a return to prosperity, and though this has mostly been signalled by totemic projects such as a ski resort, there have been some broader economic shifts, such as an increase in marketisation, apparently producing modest improvements in the economy. And, in dispatching the Olympic delegation, and then inviting the South Korean president Moon Jae-in to visit him, he has shown he can reduce tensions as well as increase them.
Sending his sister was doubly inspired. A family member is a more intimate representative than a high-ranking official. And for a patriarchal culture, Kim Yo-jong and the cheerleaders are – by virtue of gender – not only charming and unthreatening but somehow morally elevated, detached from worldly, manly concerns of power (never mind that, in reality, Kim is at the heart of her brother’s regime). ……..
Is the North’s participation in Pyeongchang a first step to denuclearisation and eventual reunification? No. Events in Iraq and Libya hardened the regime’s beliefs that hanging on to WMDs is a matter of survival. The thaw may not even be a precursor to substantive reengagement with the South, or broader talks, let alone a breakthrough (although the North might freeze its programme if offered a cast-iron US security guarantee, it is hard to see that happening under Trump). But if the softening of the North’s image and approach make it harder for US hawks to strike, then Seoul – and the rest of us – should be grateful for those synchronised chants and armwaves. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/feb/14/what-north-koreas-week-at-the-winter-olympics-tells-us-about-the-nuclear-threat
Kim Jong-un’s rocket men: North Korea’s ‘key men’ behind nuclear weapons arsenal,Express UK MEET the Megaton Twins – the two scientists Kim Jong-un can thank for his terrifying nuclear arsenal, according to experts. Michael Madden, who works with the 38 North watchdog, said Hong Sung-mu and Ri Hong-sop were crucial to the weapons programme’s success. Feb 13, 2018
With their help, North Korea went from detonating suspected duds in 2006 to its current nukes, which are up to 18 times more powerful than the Hiroshima bomb.
And with the regime’s latest missile – the Hwasong-15 – theoretically able to reach Washington DC, their weapons are more threatening than ever.
Mr Madden said there were a number of people who’d contributed to North Korea’s nuclear weapons over the years.
A nuclear first strike of North Korea is ‘tempting’, says legendary U.S. diplomat Henry Kissinger as Kim Jong-un warns Trump is pushing towards war, Daily Mail, 2 Feb 18
Kissinger, 94, warned that North Korean denuclearization was vital
He said that relations with Kim Jong-un’s country have reached a key juncture
The U.S. must now choose between pre-emptive military action or increasingly tighter sanctions, he said
His warning came before North Korea warned that the U.S. is pushing the whole world towards a ‘nuclear war’
By Alastair Tancred For Mailonline and Afp 3 February 2018
Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger has said that the temptation to launch a pre-emptive strike on North Korea ‘is strong and the argument rational’.
He told a meeting of the Senate Armed Services Committee last week that North Korea poses the most immediate threat to global security, arguing that denuclearization of the regime must be a ‘fundamental’ American foreign policy goal.
The veteran diplomat was speaking before North Korea warned that the U.S. is pushing the whole world towards a ‘nuclear war’ in its latest letter submitted to the UN.
Former U.S. secretary of state Henry Kissinger), former secretary of state George Shultz, and former deputy secretary of state Richard Armitage, were testifng before the Senate Armed Services Committee on global security challenges
It said that joint military exercises between the U.S. and South Korea – coupled with American rhetoric in the Korean peninsula region – were bound to derail improving relationships between the two Koreas.
The Trump administration’s aims are ‘to provoke a nuclear war, which will undermine the improvement of inter-Korean relations and the easing of tensions,’ North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho said in the letter to U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.
Mr Kissinger said that relations between the U.S, and north Korea had reached ‘a fork in the road’ in which the Trump administration may consider pre-emptive military action or increasingly tighter sanctions against Kim Jong-un’s regime.
‘We will hit that fork in the road, and the temptation to deal with it with a pre-emptive attack is strong, and the argument is rational, but I have seen no public statement by any leading official,’ President Nixon’s secretary of State told members of the Committee.
Kissinger, who at 94 continues to advise on foreign policy matters, joined two other foreign policy heavyweights – former Secretary of State George Shultz, 97, and ex-Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, 72 — in testifying to the Committee about global security challenges.
The elder statesmen presented a picture of mounting international threats, including nuclear proliferation, Chinese authoritarianism, and Russia’s interference in US elections and its interventions in Eastern Europe.
After meeting with South Korean Vice Unification Minister Chun Hae-sung in Seoul, Joseph Yun also told reporters that he sees the resumed inter-Korean talks and easing tensions after the North’s decision to join the upcoming Winter Olympics as a “good opportunity” for denuclearization efforts.
“We want to open dialogue with North Korea, we want to have a credible dialogue, a dialogue that could lead steps towards denuclearization,” he said. “That is our goal and of course President Moon has also emphasized that goal too.”
Lessons of Seoul Games’ triumph over terror 30 years ago, NBC News, 28 Jan 18 byERIK ORTIZ, South Korea offering an olive branch. North Korea striking a defiant tone. And the world waiting to see if tensions rattling the Korean Peninsula could undermine an Olympic Games, with calamitous consequences.
That was the backdrop 30 years ago as South Korea prepared to host its first Olympics in the summer of 1988.
In some ways, the fears then are reverberating today — with potentially even more at stake because of North Korea’s nuclear ambitions.
But this year, as snow-capped PyeongChang — just 50 miles from the border with the North — prepares to host the Winter Olympics next month, foreign policy analysts say the lessons of the Seoul Games could show the region how to move closer to not only a trouble-free event, but a path to permanent peace.
The 1988 Games were “a major missed opportunity for South Korea,” said Sergey Radchenko, a global fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars in Washington who has studied North Korea’s role in the Olympics. “They missed the opportunity to engage with the North.”
So what’s different this time around?
High-level talks between the North and South this month led to an agreement to not only have their Olympic athletes march together for the first time since the 2006 Winter Games in Torino, Italy, but to form their first unified Olympic team.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un provides guidance on a nuclear weapons program in this undated photo released by North Korea’s Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) in Pyongyang September 3, 2017. KCNA via REUTERS
Kim Jong-un has blown family cash on missile tests and has no money left to run North Korea
KIM Jong-un has reportedly spent almost an entire “slush fund” left to him by his dad on missile testing, leaving little money to run North Korea. The Sun News Corp Australia Network, JANUARY 27, 2018 KIM Jong-un has nearly blown the entire “slush fund” he inherited from his dad on nuclear tests, it has been claimed. Trigger happy Kim has staged a series of pricey nuke trials since taking over as leader after the death of his father Kim Jong-il in 2011.
Did you stop for a second and ask yourself why the North Koreans hate the American government? Could it (maybe) be that the North Koreans hate the American government’s foreign policy?
The Intercept has provided some startling facts about America’s terrible unconstitutional entry into a foreign Civil War on the other side of the globe in 1950:
How many Americans, for example, are aware of the fact that U.S. planes dropped on the Korean peninsula more bombs — 635,000 tons — and napalm — 32,557 tons — than during the entire Pacific campaign against the Japanese during World War II?
How many Americans know that “over a period of three years or so,” to quote Air Force Gen. Curtis LeMay, head of the Strategic Air Command during the Korean War, “we killed off … 20 percent of the population”?
Twenty. Percent. For a point of comparison, the Nazis exterminated 20 percent of Poland’s pre-World War II population. According to LeMay, “We went over there and fought the war and eventually burned down every town in North Korea.”
Every. Town. More than 3 million civilians are believed to have been killed in the fighting, the vast majority of them in the north.
How many Americans are familiar with the statements of Secretary of State Dean Rusk or Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas? Rusk, who was a State Department official in charge of Far Eastern affairs during the Korean War, would later admit that the United States bombed “every brick that was standing on top of another, everything that moved.” American pilots, he noted, “were just bombing the heck out of North Korea.”
Douglas visited Korea in the summer of 1952 and was stunned by the “misery, disease, pain and suffering, starvation” that had been “compounded” by air strikes. U.S. warplanes, having run out of military targets, had bombed farms, dams, factories, and hospitals. “I had seen the war-battered cities of Europe,” the Supreme Court justice confessed, “but I had not seen devastation until I had seen Korea.”
How many Americans have ever come across Gen. Douglas MacArthur’s unhinged plan to win the war against North Korea in just 10 days? MacArthur, who led the United Nations Command during the conflict, wanted to drop “between 30 and 50 atomic bombs … strung across the neck of Manchuria” that would have “spread behind us … a belt of radioactive cobalt.”
North Korea Wins Olympics Trip, But Discord Remains Over Nuclear Weapons, By David Tweed and Kanga Kong, Bloomberg,
South Korea talks stumble over call for denuclearization
Both sides agree on North Korea participating in Olympics
………as the day wore on, and South Korea proposed talks on ending North Korea’s nuclear weapons program, the mood appeared to sour. Ri issued a “strong complaint” that Seoul dared to even raise the possibility of denuclearization at such an early stage. The subject is likely to arise again Wednesday when South Korean President Moon Jae-in holds a press briefing.
North Korea’s participation in the Winter Games starting Feb. 9 brings potential benefits to the troubled Korean peninsula, which has been divided for more than 70 years. Kim Jong Un gets the opportunity to ease the global pressure on his isolated regime, while Moon can bet on a more peaceful Olympics and claim a victory in his push for dialogue.
But the long-term dilemma remains: North Korea sees its nuclear weapons — and the ability to use them against the U.S. — as the only thing protecting against an American invasion. At the same time, U.S. President Donald Trump views Kim’s rapidly expanding nuclear arsenal as an intolerable threat, one that must be eradicated by war if necessary.
North and South Korean ties linked to resolving nuclear issue: Moon Jae-in, SBS News 2 Jan 18, South Korean President Moon Jae-in says the improvement of inter-Korean relations is linked to resolving North Korea’s nuclear programme, a day after the North offered talks with Seoul but was steadfast on its nuclear ambitions.
“The improvement of relations between North and South Korea cannot go separately with resolving North Korea’s nuclear programme, so the foreign ministry should coordinate closely with allies and the international community regarding this,” Moon said in opening remarks at a cabinet meeting on Tuesday.
Moon’s comments contrasted with those of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, who said on Monday that Seoul should stop asking foreign countries for help in improving ties between the two Koreas.
“This shows the Moon administration is looking at the situation from a very realistic, rational point of view,” said Jeong Yeung-tae, head of the Institute of North Korea Studies in Seoul.
“It also shows resolving North Korea’s nuclear issue has a bigger priority (than improving inter-Korean relations).”RELATED
‘The nuclear button is always on my table’: North Korea leader Kim Jong-un’s warning
Moon’s comments came after a New Year’s Day speech by Kim who said he was “open to dialogue” with Seoul, and for North Korean athletes to possibly take part in the Winter Games, but steadfastly declared North Korea a nuclear power.
he South Korean president requested the ministries of unification and sports to swiftly create measures to help North Korea participate in the upcoming Pyeongchang Winter Olympics.
North Korea SHOCK warning: US military action only option to DESTROY Kim’s nuclear arsenal, Sunday Express, AURORA BOSOTTI, 31 Dec 17, NORTH KOREA will not give up its nuclear arsenal unless the United States military intervenes to “pre-emptively destroy” it, former US UN Ambassador John Bolton said.
North Korea has refused to heed calls to stop its nuclear development programme and continues to fuel fears of World War 3 within the international community.
Mr Bolton warned that military action from the US would be the only possibility to ultimately end Kim Jong-un’s threat campaign.
He said: “I think we are going to come down to a binary choice. That is the use of military force is one possibility to pre-emptively destroy North Korea’s nuclear and ballistic missile capabilities. Or we allow North Korea to have nuclear weapons.”
Mr Bolton warned Pyongyang would not give up its weapons as it nears full nuclear capability.
The former US ambassador told Fox News: “There’s zero chance that after 25 years of pressure, this close to the finish line, they are going to give it up.
“It’s not going to happen.”
North Korea was hit with a swathe of new sanctions after defying orders to terminate its nuclear development programme and conducting several missile tests – threatening both Japan and the US overseas territory of Guam…..
RUSSIA has warned North Korea and the US are on course for an explosive war of a level “never before seen in human history”. US President Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un could stumble into a nuclear war of “unprecedented scale”, warned Vladimir Putin’s top diplomat Oleg Burmistrov.
Russia’s so-called ambassador-at-large predicted the start a war could be “unprovoked” and said the US it is “playing with fire” in goading North Korea.
Moscow has repeatedly called for calm in the region as Trump and Kim’s fiery war of words stoked the conflict to horrifying new heights in recent months.
Burmistrov called on the world to do “everything possible” to prevent the war that would spiral into the first use of nuclear weapons since World War 2.
North Korea is feared to be plotting another missile test before the end of the year – with US “missile sniffer” plane Cobra Ball taking flight yesterday amid Kim’s threats.Burmistrov told Sputnik: “[It could be] the catastrophe of the scale, never before seen in human history.
“We are talking not only about a major military conflict but also about a conflict that potentially has a nuclear component.
“Now we are in the face of a major military conflict, which can become a reality if the military solution plan is implemented.
“And we need to do everything possible to prevent this from happening.” Putin’s top man suggested US war drills in the region may be “testing” North Korea and looking for grounds to impose a total economic blockade on Pyongyang.
He described the region as a “powder keg” as military forces continue to march into the Korean Peninsula.
The ambassador added: “The situation on the Korean Peninsula is characterised by an unprecedented level of tension, there is a growing danger of slipping into an armed conflict, unprovoked, but which may begin due to accidental circumstances.”
Burmistrov has previously visited Pyongyang to discuss the nuclear crisis and has also hosted meetings with North Korean officials in Moscow. This week, Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov met with US secretary of state Rex Tillerson to discuss North Korea.
Despite separate tensions between Moscow and Washington, the two came to an agreement that they would “never accept” a nuclear-armed Kim.
North Korea is believed to be gearing up to launch a space rocket, which experts have warned could be a cover for another weapons test. Kim should be expected to carry out at least one more launch before the end of the year, North Korea expert Michael Madden told Daily Star Online.
Pyongyang is believed to have long-term ambitions to launch a nuclear missile into the heart of the Pacific.
The four are among 30 former residents of Kilju county, an area in North Korea that includes the nuclear test site Punggye-ri, who have been examined by the South Korean government since October, a month after the North conducted its sixth and most powerful nuclear test, Unification Ministry spokesman Baik Tae-hyun told a news briefing.
At least four defectors from North Korea have shown signs of radiation exposure, the South Korean government says, although researchers could not confirm if they were was related to Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons programme.
The four are among 30 former residents of Kilju county, an area in North Korea that includes the nuclear test site Punggye-ri, who have been examined by the South Korean government since October, a month after the North conducted its sixth and most powerful nuclear test, Unification Ministry spokesman Baik Tae-hyun told a news briefing.
They were exposed to radiation between May 2009 and January 2013, and all defected to the South before the most recent test, a researcher at the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute, which carried out the examinations, told reporters.
They were exposed to radiation between May 2009 and January 2013, and all defected to the South before the most recent test, a researcher at the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute, which carried out the examinations, told reporters.
North Korea has conducted six nuclear bomb tests since 2006, all in tunnels deep beneath the mountains of Punggye-ri, in defiance of UN Security Council resolutions and international condemnation.
The researcher cautioned that there were a number of ways people may be exposed to radiation, and that none of the defectors who lived had lived in Punggye-ri itself showed specific symptoms.
A series of small earthquakes in the wake of the last test – which the North claimed to be of a hydrogen bomb – prompted suspicions that it may have damaged the mountainous location in the northwest tip of the country.
Experts warned that further tests in the area could risk radioactive pollution.
After the September 3 nuclear test, China’s Nuclear Safety Administration said it had begun emergency monitoring for radiation along its border with North Korea.
How Cheney and His Allies Created the North Korea Nuclear Missile Crisis, December 28, 2017, By Gareth Porter, Truthout | News Analysis, The Trump administration has been telling people for months that the crisis with North Korea is the result of North Korea’s relentless pursuit of a nuclear threat to the US homeland and past North Korean cheating on diplomatic agreements. However, North Korea reached agreements with both the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations that could have averted that threat, had they been completed.
Instead, a group of Bush administration officials led by then-Vice President Dick Cheney sabotaged both agreements, and Pyongyang went on to make rapid strides on both nuclear and missile development, leading ultimately to the successful late November 2017 North Korean intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) test.
The record shows, moreover, that Cheney and his allies derailed diplomatic efforts to curb North Korean nuclear and missile development, not because they opposed “arms control” (after all, the agreements that were negotiated would have limited only North Korean arms), but because those agreements would have been a political obstacle to fielding the group’s main interest: funding and fielding a national missile defense system as quickly as possible. The story of Cheney’s maneuvering to kill two agreements shows how a real US national security interest was sacrificed to a massive military boondoggle that served only the interests of the powerful contractors behind it………http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/43048-how-cheney-and-his-allies-created-the-north-korea-nuclear-missile-crisis
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