Archive for July 2007

Taliban Kidnap 18 South Koreans in Afghanistan

July 20, 2007 Korean Society, Religion 11 comments

They were members of a church group, and readers may recall other church groups from South Korea have also ventured into some very dangerous places.

Taliban gunmen abducted at least 18 members of a South Korean church group in southern Afghanistan, and a purported spokesman for the Islamic militia said Friday it will question them about their activities in Afghanistan before deciding their fate.

The Koreans were seized Thursday in Ghazni province as they were traveling by bus from Kabul to the southern city of Kandahar, said Ali Shah Ahmadzai, the provincial police chief.

“We are investigating, who are they, what are they doing in Afghanistan,” Qari Yousuf Ahmadi, a purported Taliban spokesman, told The Associated Press by satellite telephone. “After our investigation, the Taliban higher authorities will make a decision about their fate. Right now they are safe and sound.”

The South Koreans’ bus driver, released late Thursday, said there were 18 women and five men on the bus, Ahmadzai said. The Taliban spokesman said 15 women and three men were seized. The discrepancy could not be immediately clarified.  [AP, Amir Shah]

Let’s all hope these people get home safely, so we can ask them what the hell they were doing there.

See also: 

*  Would the Muslim world be so tense if this fatwa had gained wider acceptance?

Many Muslims believe that unmarried men and women should not work alone together–a stricture that can pose problems in today’s global economy. So one Islamic scholar came up with a novel solution: If a woman were to breast-feed her male colleague five times, the two could safely be alone together. “A woman at work can take off the veil or reveal her hair in front of someone whom she breast-fed,” he wrote in an opinion issued in May 2007.  [Foreign Policy]

I don’t really know if I want to touch that one, beyond imagining the lawsuits if anyone suggested that here.

*  I hate them even more than Illinois Nazis, but you can’t deny that they’re the terminus of a logical progression that has considerable cross-DMZ appeal.  Others have noticed, too.  Leaving aside the superficial question of fashion, these guys have an uncomfortable proximity to the mainstream of their society.

*  Rumors of Kim Jong Il’s failing health continue to spread among North Koreans.  In a society where news is so controlled, the mere propogation of rumor has a significance detached from their veracity.  That said, I hope the rumors are true that we’ll be rid of Kim Jong Il sooner rather than later.  As unpopular as I suspect Kim Jong Il to be in most segments of North Korean society, his death would be an irrecoverable loss to the regime’s ideological cohesion.

*  Michael Yon has a moving post about former enemies turning their guns on al Qaeda and experimenting with self-government.  They’re not laying down their arms; better, they’re agreeing to point them at the right people, put on uniforms, and become a part of their country’s still-rickety security structure.  The experiment is clearly fragile, and Iraq’s current leadership may not be up to the task.  A new round of elections may even be in order.  Still, this kind of Sunni participation in Iraqi self-government and its attendant restoration of security is an absolute prerequisite to any non-genocidal resolution of Shiite-Sunni differences. 

Update:

Those South Koreans who ventured into Taliban territory have inadvertently hastened the apocalypse by creating rare agreement between me and Joseph Steinberg, though his use of the word “traitor” is a predictable excess. Â My sympathy for these folks just declined by at least half.  It’s one thing to push against the boundaries of medieval intolerance, but it’s another thing entirely to throw yourself at its mercy and then expect to be ransomed out or exchanged for Taliban thugs who would go free to murder again. Â If the actions of these people were as courageous as I was willing to assume, then they assumed that risk.  Not surprisingly for Roh Moo Hyun, he speaks and acts as though he’d gladly pay ransom or meet the terrorists’ demands if could.  Roh thus helps to assure that there will be more hostages and beheadings in the future. 

Still, I can’t understand why some people seem so gleeful about this. Â Over at the Marmot’s Hole, the venom of some of the comments is just hard to understand without engaging in amateur psychology.  The hostages have quickly become surrogates for some pretty powerful anti-Christian sentiment.  What’s striking about the discussion is that the Taliban’s murder, kidnapping, intolerance, and ignorance never even became a subject.  It was lost among the venom directed at the victims.  I grant that these Koreans don’t seem to be adherents of an especially open-minded or intellectual strain of Christianity, and Christianity in Korea can seem annoyingly messianic to a non-believer (worst example:  an obnoxious attempt to convert my wife at her mother’s funeral).  In the comments below, I’ve conceded the possibility that the missionaries’ motives were more psychological than altruistic, depending on what they were actually doing there. 

But let’s keep some perspective here.  At worst, the missionaries practiced a far more benign form of fanaticism than their captors.  So why are the Taliban getting off without a scratch in this discussion?  One commenter actually compares them to bad weather.  What a neat trick the Taliban have managed here:  they are scoring propaganda points against the South Korean and Afghan governments without even being judged responsible for their terrorist actions.  Are these evil human beings, or were these missionaries kidnapped by wild bears that were hanging around their garbage cans?  And if the distinction doesn’t matter, then can we start euthanizing the ones we capture without a lot of fuss from the Human Rights Industry? 

A License to Stall

July 20, 2007 Appeasement, Diplomacy, Six-Party Talks One comment

If you read those breathless reports that North Korea was really, really ready to fully denuclearize, you can catch your breath now: 

“We had a big discussion about putting an overall deadline in,” Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill, the chief U.S. negotiator, told reporters after talks concluded today. “We had a consensus. Since we were not very successful in meeting the date in the spring, we decided that we should have working groups before we come up with a deadline. It’s a more careful approach.”

North Korea agreed with the U.S., South Korea, Russia, China and Japan on Feb. 13 to close its Yongbyon reactor, which produced weapons-grade plutonium, in return for 50,000 metric tons of heavy fuel oil and an additional 950,000 tons or equivalent assistance when it declares and disables all of its nuclear plants. This week’s discussions were aimed at setting a timetable for accomplishing those next steps.  [Bloomberg, Alan T. Cheng and Bradley K. Martin]

Translation:  let’s not set deadlines that we all know North Korea won’t meet.  That’s a license to foot-drag the tough issues — full disclosure, inspection, verification, and actual disarmament — into the next administration, until some perceived slight or the refusal of some obnoxious North Korean demand is seized on as an excuse to renege on everything.  Now let’s hear from the government we’re defending against this grave threat:

“Much of the talks this time focused on whether to set deadlines, if so the scope of the deadlines, and the targets to set within deadlines,” South Korean chief negotiator Chun Yung Woo said today. “However, this is a very difficult and complicated matter, so no one really expected this to happen and I think it will be hard to accomplish.”

That seems remarkably patient until you consider what a good thing the South Koreans have going for themselves.  We’ve created too many diplomatic and financial incentives for South Korea to oppose and undermine the realization of American interests.

In unrelated news, the North Korean people are still starving, and nobody still cares.

Ah, back to earth again.

Reminder: ‘Let My People Go’ Rally, Noon Tomorrow on the West Lawn of the Capitol

July 16, 2007 Activism, Human Rights, Religion One comment

The Korean Church Coalition picks up an impressive and somewhat surprising endorsement in advance of tomorrow’s rally. 

As always, you need not be present to win. Â If you have an Internet connection or a phone, you can pester your Senators, your Representatives, and your pals at the Korean and ChiCom Embassies:

Congratulations, Richardson!

July 16, 2007 Blogs & Blogging One comment

Look who’s not going to be posting very much for a while ….

And from the looks of things, well worth it.  Congratulations to the new dad and the lovely Mrs. Richardson on their 24-hour, 7-day, 120-decibel bundle of joy.

IAEA Confirms Yongbyon Shutdown

July 16, 2007 Diplomacy, Six-Party Talks, WMD 4 comments

After much speculation, the International Atomic Energy Agency has confirmed that North Korea has shut down its plutonium reactor at Yongbyon.  I have always expected North Korea to go through this part of the deal (full text here), as I expected them to let IAEA inspectors back into Yongbyon and the other facilities near it.  But to simplify arguments I’ve made here before, those things cost North Korea almost nothing:

  • It’s easy to kick inspectors out.  They’ve done it before.
  • It’s easy to restart Yongbyon.  They’ve done that before, too.  Opportune moments include election seasons and right after a new president is sworn in and ready to be tested.  I’ve heard what I’ll call well-founded rumors that the “shutdown” consists of little more than a strip of tape over each door.  It remains to be seen whether North Korea will permanently disable the facility.
  • Yongbyon is probably a worn-out wreck anyway. 
  • North Korea has probably reprocessed all of the plutonium in Yongbyon.  For that reason, it was probably fully prepared to shut this reactor down during a round of bilateral talks in Berlin last December, when the outline of this deal emerged. 
  • Remember that even this is three months late, and we should remember why.  We’re behind schedule because North Korea made a new demand that wasn’t part of the deal — the return of $25 million in laundered funds. 
  • North Korea gets to demand extra payoffs now, and although Chris Hill had suggested (and the deal says) that the immediate payoff at this “initial” stage would be a mere 50,000 tons of fuel oil out of a total of 1 million tons, we’re already upping the payday. Â The State Department is now renewing talk of removing North Korea from the terrorism list, despite the lack of progress on North Korea’s continuing terrorism against hundreds – perhaps even thousands – of South Korean, Japanese, and third-country abductees.  We agreed to begin discussing that removal, but the acts that led to North Korea’s placement on that list will probably be forgotten.

North Korea will add other new demands because (a) it wants the payoffs, (b) it knows that we’ll pay, and (c) it needs to stall because it doesn’t want to make any other concessions.  Raising and accelerating unagreed demands for its payday is a classic tactic from the North Korean playbook. Â It is now demanding the lifting of sanctions, something that should not happen before it fully discloses the extent of its other nuclear programs and weapons.  It is calling for the U.S. and Japan to end their “hostile policy” and saying that continuing complaince depends on us.  It is also demanding direct talks with the U.S. military, although it has never agreed to talks with the South Korean military that would substantially reduce the conventional buildup around the DMZ.  Those talks would be an obvious vehicle to link compliance with this agreement to a U.S. troop withdrawal from South Korea.  And although I don’t think we should have ground forces in Korea, those are not the circumstances under which we should reduce or remove them. 

If I’m right, this is the last act of compliance we’ll see from North Korea under this deal.  And because the deal is so vague about sequencing and substance, who is to say that North Korea’s demands are contrary to the terms?  What separates what North Korea has given up so far and what it hasn’t is that from Kim Jong Il’s perspective, Yongbyon is expendable.  His existing bombs, his uranium enrichment program aren’t.  The deal doesn’t even mention the delivery systems North Korea could use to deliver those weapons, or chemical and biological weapons (also unmentioned).  Those include not just missiles, but tunnels North Korea could probably use to drive its weapons right into Seoul, or right up to Osan.  

For the Bush Administration and Kim Jong Il alike, the trick now is to preserve the illusion of progress as the disabling of Yongbyon is made permanent or semi-permanent, and as the United States makes a new round of early concessions while North Korea obfuscates on full disclosure.  For North Korea, the object is to achieve as many concessions as it can from the United States on conventional forces, money laundering, terrorism, trade, diplomatic relations, human rights, and sanctions.  By causing the United States to shift key positions and policies, it will make it all the harder to reassert those positions again in reaction to continuing North Korean misdeeds.  North Korea has already racked up some depressing and impressive gains, and it will probably win more before this administration is over.

If Jack Pritchard Doesn’t Believe Jack Pritchard, Why Should We?

July 14, 2007 Media Criticism, Six-Party Talks, U.S. & Korea, U.S. Politics, Washington Views, WMD 4 comments

Jack Pritchard probably comes to his role as South Korea’s main policy mouthpiece honestly, through a shared belief that the next ten years of unrequited aid really will change North Korea into a peaceful, bucolic, union-free garment district.  Pritchard is President of the Korea Economic Institute, which works Washington’s Korea-watching and policy-making crowds through its regular sponsorship of social and academic dinner events.  I’ve been to a few myself, and though I seldom agree with what I hear there, the speakers are always interesting and the food is good.  The KEI makes no secret of the fact that it acts at the direction of the South Korean government; it is registered with the Justice Department under the Foreign Agents’ Registration Act.  This is just one of the legal ways foreign governments help their friends and influence Washington in the direction of their interests.  And even if Pritchard doesn’t share that specific intent, his political alliances are an important part of how you should should evaluate his arguments. Â 

Now that the Bush Administration’s North Korea policy has become a Jack Pritchard fantasy, Pritchard rolls out this supportive gesture:  ”Failed Diplomacy: The Tragic Story of How North Korea Got the Bomb.” Â Pritchard’s critique should be familiar by now:  Bush failed to engage Kim Jong Il sufficiently and didn’t offer enough “carrots,” therefore it’s Bush’s fault that Kim Jong Il stalled his way through five presidential terms and two decades of diplomacy while working with persistent determination toward the construction of a nuclear arsenal.  I haven’t received my free advance copy yet, but the title gives you a pretty good idea that Pritchard’s most convincing points are made unintentionally.  The first of these is that there’s no pleasing some people.  If you ever become President, remember that your critics won’t stop blaming you just because you give them everything they want.  Bush is now paying Kim Jong Il all the bribes and blackmail Pritchard has demanded since he stomped away from the State Department during Bush’s first term. Â Bush is doing bilateral talks, signing treaties that skimp on timelines and verification, overlooking the greatest human rights atrocities since the Khmer Rouge, helping Kim launder his dirty money, and acceding to North Korea’s predictable noncompliance, now at three months and counting.  The fuel oil is flowing, and with all the aid North Korea is getting from the South, it’s hardly worth asking Congress for more.  Bush is reportedly even considering a fast track to a peace treaty, or even diplomatic relations. Â 

I hope the genius who thought that Agreed Framework 2.0 would burnish President Bush’s legacy by mollifying its critics is paying close attention. Â There’s no better example of how pointless it is trying to please determined enemies, especially at the cost of losing your friends. Â Do you suppose Condi was naive enough to think that principle would move Pritchard to close ranks with Bush and defend him against John Bolton? Â Things don’t work that way here. Â Maybe Pritchard resents that he didn’t have the privilege of negotiating our latest diplomatic failure, but hardly anyone doubts that he could have. Â 

As for Pritchard’s main charge, it’s technically true, especially when we speak of Bush’s Pritchardian diplomacy of the last five months.  That’s probably not what Pritchard means, however, so we have to negotiate a logical obstacle course.  Just in case Pritchard doesn’t point them out, let me help. Â For one thing, don’t read the book’s cover too carefully, because a long arm can reach into the memory hole and pull out a New York Times report informing us that North Korea actually ”got the bomb” when it tested a plutonium device in Pakistan in 1998.  You don’t hear much mention of that now, probably because it’s pure kryptonite for those who would defend the merits of the first Agreed Framework.  By the time Bush took office, we suspected that North Korea had a crude nuclear capability, and certainly couldn’t assume that it didn’t.  We also knew that it had tunnels it could use to drive its nukes right into downtown Seoul. Â In a 2002 interview, the head of South Korea’s National Intelligence Service said,

“North Korea is suspected to have already secured 7-22 kilograms (15-48 pounds) of plutonium before the inspection by the International Atomic Energy Agency in May 1992, and produced one to three primitive nuclear bombs.”  [Newsmax] 

As early as 1994, this article in Time asked, ”Does North Korea have the bomb, and if it does, what should be done about it?” By the time you’re asking the first question, it’s a lot harder to answer the second.  Even then, we had to “assume North Korea already has two crude nuclear devices, as those who are paid to know such things assume.”  We can kibbitz about the number of bombs or how well they were miniaturized, but it’s flat-out dishonest to say that North Korea “got the bomb” during Bush’s term.  Indeed, we should have done much more to limit the number and quality of those bombs.  Each bomb is a new danger, and I don’t defend the sufficiency of Bush’s efforts to confront that danger.  But it’s flat wrong to say that North Korea went nuclear during Bush’s term, or because Bush didn’t go back to what didn’t work the first time. 

Fom a policy perspective, the real possibility that North Korea could set off even a “crude” nuke in Seoul has been a show-stopper since Clinton’s first term. Â If you’re absolutely determined to overlook Kim Jong Il in your search for someone to blame, then it would be at least at accurate to point the finger at Pritchard, who was a senior State Department official during the Clinton Administration.  If the policies he supported then worked so brilliantly, we wouldn’t still be talking about the same reactor we were talking about then (as of today, the North Koreans claim to have shut Yongbyon down; they’ve done it before, only to restart it later). 

The really curious thing about Pritchard’s entire line of argument is its woebegone acceptance that North Korea’s nuclear status is now irreversible.  If that’s so, Pritchard is unintentionally conceding the obvious:  North Korea can’t be disarmed by diplomacy alone.  Think about it:  if Jack Pritchard really trusts Kim Jong Il to keep his word, let us inspect his facilities and verify his disarmament, and live in peace with his neighbors, what is Pritchard so worried about?  If Bush is doing what Pritchard has been demanding for years, we’ll have Peace in Our Time, right?  His tone unwittingly answers for him. Â North Korea won’t live up to its terms of this deal, won’t allow meaningful verification of its compliance, and won’t give us bankable reassurance that it won’t (to borrow Brad Sherman’s expression) sell nukes on e-bay.  So if even Jack Pritchard himself doubts that our regime-sustaining bribes can pry the nukes from Kim Jong Il’s clutches, what are we getting for our money?  Pritchard isn’t stupid.  He knows that the North Koreans lie, cheat, and murder without compunction.  He can’t believe that diplomacy alone can solve this problem.  He’s just too unimaginative and conflicted to see the alternatives.

Now, in fairness, Pritchard is also saying that it took Bush too long to see things his way, and here, Pritchard has a point.  Bush could have made the decision to buy Kim Jong Il off, or he could have decided to address the problem’s root cause and end Kim Jong Il’s misrule through the determined application of political subversion and economic strangulation.  The problem is that he didn’t decide.  Instead, he dawdled until the end of 2005 with a diplomatic formula that didn’t work any better than Clinton’s, and made a few encouraging statements about human rights that had no perceptible impact on policy but did give Bush’s critics and the Rodong Sinmun something to talk about. Â For a brief period, we actually tried cutting Kim’s financial lifelines.  This actually worked, but this is Washington, and since when do we stick with things that work?  I can’t help wondering how much better it would have worked had the people in Seoul who sign Pritchard’s paychecks not undermined it with massive and unconditional aid payments to Kim Jong Il.  And if you’re wondering how Seoul can afford both Jack Pritchard and Kim Jong Il, never forget that its source of walking-around money is a massive U.S. defense subsidy, along with the huge collateral boost our presence gives to South Korea’s balance of payments.  Pritchard may not have agreed with that U.S. policy, but he can’t deny the ferocity of the conflict between American and Korean interests.  South Korea, though Jack Pritchard, now decries the very failure it worked so hard to secure, which is a pretty disingenuous thing to do. 

Pritchard is right that the Bush Administration wasted most of the political capital it could have used to end the North Korea crisis once and for all.  But if not even Jack Pritchard really believes that a Jack Pritchard policy can disarm North Korea, it’s hard to believe that our mistake was not doing enough of it, or not doing it soon enough. Â A better argument may be that the legacy of Jack Pritchard’s policies and the connivance of his allies hobbled Bush with challenges to which he proved unequal.

Law Enforcement Will Be Compromised, Part 2

July 13, 2007 Appeasement, Money Laundering, Six-Party Talks One comment

Law enforcement will not be compromised.

““ Chris Hill, Feb. 27, 2007 

[Update:  Welcome Wall Street Journal readers.] 

The latest refutation of this whopper of diplomatic mendacity is an extensive new investigative report on North Korea’s criminal enterprises from Time (thanks to a reader for forwarding).  The report suggests that our State Department’s incomprehensible decision to return $25 million of Kim Jong Il’s criminally derived funds, now under GAO investigation as a possible violation of our own money laundering laws, has reprieved a beleagured criminal enterprise run directly by the North Korean government out of a well-guarded building in downtown Pyongyang.  New readers and seasoned North Korea-watchers alike will find much of interest in it, including a few things to keep you awake when you’re not worrying about al-Qaeda “chatter:”

According to [former Illicit Activities Initiative head David] Asher, the big worry among U.S. and Asian intelligence officials is that “the [North]‘s growing ties to organized-crime groups and illicit shipping networks could be used to facilitate weapons-of-mass-destruction shipments.” Later this year, the U.S. is expected to go to trial in New Jersey on a case targeting alleged members of a Chinese organized-crime gang accused of moving counterfeit currency, illegal narcotics and contraband cigarettes from North Korea into the U.S.–in addition to at least $1 million in illegal weapons such as pistols, machine guns and rocket launchers. The question that worries officials from Washington to Tokyo to Seoul is, Asher says, “What could be next?”  [Time, Bill Powell and Adam Zagorin]

You may recall the dramatic arrests in August 2005 that are leading to this trial.  Time also interviews defectors who worked on North Korean government poppy plantations used to grow opium. 

According to several defectors who say they were involved in the narcotics trade, government trucks transport the opium harvested in North Hamgyong province to a factory outside Pyongyang run by Raemong Pharmaceuticals, a government-owned firm. A North Korean defector who claims he was a key middleman in the narcotics business alleges that Raemong is mainly a normal drug company. But, he says, it also converts opium into heroin headed abroad.

North Korea has used several methods to get its drugs to market. According to Asher and other diplomats, those methods include having its diplomats carry drugs like crystal meth in their luggage as they head for overseas posts. (Asher says North Korea requires that its missions abroad be self-financing, meaning they need to earn enough money to stay afloat without help from Pyongyang.) In the case of heroin, say sources in law enforcement and intelligence, more traditional methods are typically used. Ships flying international flags head for nearby ports–in particular, Vladivostok in Russia’s far east and Hong Kong–where organized-crime groups take over. A former senior law-enforcement source in Russia says the criminal groups “do business with agents of the North Korean government just as they would with any other criminal gang.”

Eventually, Japan ran out of patience with North Korea’s dope-dealing, but now, North Korean drugs are hitting Chinese streets, and the article points to indications that China’s patience is wearing thin, too. Â The idea of deliberately profiting from the poisoning of “outsiders” reminds you of the racist ethic of Don Corleone, who approved of selling drugs as long as the goombas only sold them to blacks.  Unfortunately and inevitably, some North Koreans have also become addicted, as I’ve noted previously.

You can see an aerial image of one of those poppy fields here — it’s in a forced labor camp that holds tens of thousands of men, women, and children.  It’s yet another illustration of why North Korea’s human rights atrocities and lesser crimes are inseparable from our own national security interests.  It’s more than a matter of simple vertical integration. Â All rely on a common criminal state of mind, and all require complete secrecy.  That secrecy could not coexist with even a minimally effective inspection or verification regime, and any agreement with North Korea that lacks effective inspection and verification rights is patently worthless. 

There’s also much interesting information about North Korea’s cigarette counterfeiting and smuggling, estimated to be one of North Korea’s largest sources of income. Â One major transshipment hub turn turns out to be Subic Bay in the Philippines, the former home of a U.S. Navy base and many infamous, barely remembered acts performed while on shore-leave.  This story tends to evoke less public interest because nobody likes tobacco companies, but consider how much North Korea must be learning about how to smuggle other things through U.S. ports. 

Now that America aborted a highly successful effort to cut the tentacles of this network, crime is back to being good business for North Korea and its co-conspirators.  According to David Asher, “Given that North Korea and its élite need hard currency, we can expect them to continue criminal activity to earn that money. The major problems associated with it will almost certainly continue.”  The article doesn’t end on very optimistic note, either:

[R]ight now the U.S. appears focused on getting a nuclear deal out of Pyongyang, no matter what sort of activities it might have to overlook in the process. For Kim and his cronies in Bureau 39, that means business is only going to get better.

So just who does Chris Hill think he’s fooling, besides the members of Congress he lied to?

Some Anju Links:

*  Life Imitates “Team America” Again:  If North Korea finally lets in IAEA inspectors, it looks like they’ll all be confined to Yongbyon and the associated facilities nearby. 

*  Our Latest Faint Hope:  If North Korea really does open a large new English-language university, connect it to the internet, and allow it to have student exchanges with other countries, it could lead to dramatic changes in North Korean society.  That’s why it won’t happen as long as Kim Jong Il is alive.

*  Speaking of Faint Hopes and Other Things:  Recent photos of Kim Jong Il show that he’s lost weight and hair [ht: Richardson].   

*  Four North Korean refugees have jumped the wall into the Danish Embassy in Hanoi [GI Korea].

*  Used Japanese cars and other goods continue to trickle into North Korea, despite earlier reports that they would be banned.  So view this report that North Korea has banned noraebang (karaoke) with skepticism.  When Kim Jong Il gets over his hangover, it may be forgotten.

Korean Church Coalition Joins N. Korean Human Rights Movement, and an Appeal for a Condemned Man

July 12, 2007 Human Rights, Religion, Resistance 13 comments

[Update:  Barack Obama endorses the rally and its cause with a nicely written letter.  Read it here.  Of course, it would be great to think that Obama will be as persistent and passionate on this issue as Sam Brownback, who introduced this resolution in the Senate.  That's two presidential candidates, one from each party.  In a particularly bipartisan gesture, one prominent Republican staffer even sent me a copy of Obama's letter(!).  If the KCC turns out a good crowd tomorrow, their debut will have been an unqualified success.  Finally, at the bottom of this post, I'm appending the text of a speech by Rep. Frank Wolf (thanks to his staff for sending).  Though not directly on point to this rally in all of its many particulars, it's a long series of reasons not to buy Chinese, the majority of which I agree with.  The point here is that for these and other reasons, one gets the clear sense that the mood in Congress is turning against China.]

This move could — I repeat, could — infuse significant new momentum into this movement, which I don’t mind saying it sorely needs at a time when we don’t have the rapt attention of either political party.  The KCC claims to represent 3,000 pastors and their churches, which is a lot of people. Â 

The KCC’s contribution will face its first test on July 17th in Washington.  At 9:45 a.m., it will hold a press conference at the National Press Club, followed by a noon rally on the Capitol’s West Lawn.  They’ll conclude the day’s events with a prayer vigil at Pilgrim Church, Burke, Virginia at 7:00 p.m.  There will be other rallies in Tokyo on August 13th, and in Seoul on August 15th.  Here are some excepts from two press releases that were sent to me:

KCC announces formation of Jericho Institute, which will launch the “LET MY PEOPLE GO” Banner and 50 States Resolution project. Â 

Irvine, CA ““Korean Church Coalition (KCC) for North Korea Freedom announces formation of Jericho Institute, which will launch the “LET MY PEOPLE GO Before 2008 Beijing Olympics” Banner and 50 States Resolution campaigns. Â  These campaigns are intended to bring awareness to all 50 states and the world, the inhumane treatment of the North Korean refugees within China’s borders by the Government of China, and demand that China adopt a policy to allow the North Koreans within its borders be granted Refugee Status and be allowed to leave to a third country before the 2008 Beijing Olympics. [....]

The Noon rally will be attended by KCC representative from every state in the United States.  The Korean American Community will not stop praying nor rest until freedom for all North Koreans is finally won. Â Â 

You may be tempted, especially if you’re not religious, to dimiss the significance of this.  That would be a mistake.  On the opening night of Yoduk Story, the Korean churches played a large part in filling Strathmore Hall.  In retrospect, that event was one of the movement’s greatest moments — the others being North Korea Freedom Day 2004 and the 2005 Freedom House conference.  On each of those occasions, the politically powerful attended mostly to lend token support to the cause, but along the way, they saw its power, too.  Although that power proved insufficient to keep the Bush Adminstration from selling the North Korean people down the river, the KCC enters the fight just in time to help set the agenda for the 2008 election.  With its strong old-country connections, it might also wedge some of the South Korean churches into the fight, too.

‘For Years, the Korean Americans have sat in the sidelines and watched as the Government of China sat and watched the many Chinese criminals kidnap and sell the North Korean girls as sex slaves and others as slave laborers and treat the North Koreans in China as Criminals.’  

‘On behalf of the millions of Korean Americans who reside in this great country, let me clearly and firmly state that We Will Stand By and Watch no More.’  

‘Since the formation of KCC, one message came through with a consistent and moral clarity, from the prayers of millions of Koreans in the United States and around the world:  “Let the North Koreans go Free”’. Â  Statement by Peter I. Sohn, President, KCC

The KCC will be highlighting the role of states with early presidential contests:  Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina.  Let’s hope they’re judicious enough to know which politicians mean what they say.

Another Christian organization that has been an important part of the movement is the Voice of the Martyrs.  With a large, motivated network that’s mainly dispersed in The Real America (like, say, where I come from), VOM’s main impact has been to organize such grassroots activism as letter-writing campaigns.  Today, they’re asking for letters and prayers on behalf of a condemned man:

Son Jong Nam, an underground Christian in North Korea, has spent more than a year in prison, awaiting public execution. He risked his life returning to North Korea to preach the gospel and VOM contacts believe he is still alive, although contact is limited. Â [Voice of the Martyrs] 

More here.  Other organizations are also appealing to North Korea to save Son Jong Nam, including this religious broadcasting site, which has much more biographical information and information about Son’s activities.  NK Missions and Christian Solidarity Worldwide, the latter having impressive diplomatic connections (including some access to Ban Ki Moon), are also appealing for Son to be spared.  CSW tells us that it was one of those regular rations of brutality that turned Son against the regime:

Mr Son Jong Nam was born in Sadong, Soryongdong, Pyongyang and served his full military term as a non-commissioned officer at the Security Protection Headquarters from October 1975 – May 1983. On 20th January 1998 Mr Son’s sister-in-law was investigated by the secret police while pregnant. During the interrogation she was kicked in the stomach and she miscarried. Mr Son brought the matter before the Central People’s Committee, but he was put under pressure for his actions and told to leave. This led to his disillusionment with the regime and his decision to leave North Korea followed shortly afterwards.  [NK Missions]

Men like these are dissidents whose courage vastly exceeds those with far more coffee-house appeal.  Let’s be very clear:  Son is as good as dead, and the best we can probably do for him is to honor his courage with our remembrance.  The life we still might save is two or three arrests away, and only if enough of us show our rage this time and the next.  The underground Christian network is the only resistance movement North Korea has, and by all accounts, it’s spreading its revolutionary roots faster than the regime can dig them out.  You can’t resist a system as brutal at that one unless you believe in life after a very miserable death.

I wonder how much irreparable harm it would do to our great breakthrough in relations with Kim Jong Il if one of our diplomats — or maybe even that great Korean humanitarian, Ban Ki Moon — would politely ask him to spare this man’s life.  The odds of that are lower than Son Jong Nam’s odds of attending his son’s wedding. Read more

China Attacks Dissent in America and It Expands Its Power to Intimidate the Neighbors

July 11, 2007 Censorship, China, NK Military, U.S. Military, Washington Views 3 comments

Strategy Page says they are, and that the FBI is so busy looking for terror cells that China can get away with it:

In the past year, many copies of the Epoch Times have been stolen and destroyed, and editorial staff have been physically attacked by men who appear to be Chinese. Editorial offices have also been attacked, often at night, to make it look like a burglary.

China has also been putting pressure on Chinese language newspapers in the U.S. to publish more pro Chinese government material. This often involves threats by people, it turns out, who are working for, or sponsored by, Chinese embassy staff.  [Strategy Page]

Sounds like we need a bigger FBI and fewer Chinese consulates.  I’ve often suspected that China asks its minions — paid and otherwise – watch and comment on blogs, too.  Maybe one of them will stop by to add credence to that theory.

See also:  I missed this story last week, but Richard Lawless has given his farewell address, raising concern about North Korea’s new short range missiles and the alarming expansion of China’s military power.

“What we’ve done is said to the Chinese, “˜Look, we’ve got a pretty good idea what you’re doing and where you’re taking your strategic nuclear forces over the next three to four years. This is a huge commitment of resources on your part. It will dramatically change the situation between the two countries. We need to start talking about this changed situation now.’ … To date, that has met with pretty much silence.

Lawless also was critical of China for not reciprocating U.S. offers to allow official visitors to view significant military facilities. He cited the example of China’s top naval officer being given “unprecedented access to everything that he asked for” during a visit to the United States this year.

“Nowhere near that level of reciprocity was being discussed or offered” by the Chinese in the planning for a visit by Adm. Michael Mullen, the top U.S. Navy officer. Mullen ended up not making the trip and has since been nominated by President Bush to be chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

“So I guess the key word here is disappointment,” Lawless said.  [MSNBC]

I’m obviously very sad to see Lawless go, but It’s not exactly clear to me what Lawless expects here.  If he wants to count their submarines and measure their aircraft carriers, that’s what we have the CIA for.  If we let the Chinese tour the Seventh Fleet, it’s an alarming lapse of discretion, because China sees itself as our competitor and potential enemy.  We should view China the same way.  Clearly, China is expanding its power, both economically and militarily.  I’m all for making the public aware of the rising threat and preparing for it, but I see little point in trying to negotiate it away.  It looks like yet another manifestation of the idea that you can talk people out of anything if your offer is generous enough.  It’s an idea we’ve tried before, without success.

Also, a little more about the new North Korean missile:

The missile is designated the KN-02, or Toksa, and is a derivative of the SS-21 missile of the former Soviet Union.

“As this system, this particular system, approaches operational status and is deployed in large numbers, you have for the first time in the North Korean inventory” a highly accurate missile “whose only purpose, given its range, is to strike the Republic of Korea,” Lawless said, using South Korea’s official name.

Here’s more on the SS-21; pictures here.  It’s highly mobile, like the SCUDs we had so much trouble finding during the first Gulf War, and has a range of 120 kilometers.  Although it’s designed to carry a conventional warhead, it’s potentially nuclear capable, and the North Koreans are experts at modifying old Russian blueprints.  Plus, the scariest potential use against South Korea might be bioweapons, of which we suspect the North Koreans have a sizeable stockpile. 

Will this latest threat awaken South Koreans from their secular faith in the nationalist dogma that no fellow Korean would really harm them? Â This and other stories will awaken a few, but not enough to sway national policy away from feeding the beast or cutting its own military … no matter who wins the next election.  What will awaken South Korea is the idea that it’s responsible for defending its prosperity — the realization that Americans won’t be in the fight with them when the toksas and nodongs rain down.  It’s another argument for breaking the cycle of dependence, forcing Seoul to face the threat, and getting the rest of the Second Infantry Division out of harm’s way. Â We can watch the development of South Korean attitudes as that realization sinks in, and that will afford us the luxury of making a calculated assessment of whether South Korea can become a viable ally again.  Then we will know whether we should reduce the alliance to a skeletal structure — along the lines of our alliance with the Philippines or Thailand — or reorder it around a combined force of South Korean boots on the ground, and U.S. air, naval, space, and intelligence assets operating from stand-off range. 

‘Before she was executed, my mother looked at me.’

July 10, 2007 Human Rights, The Camps 4 comments

I’ve been blogging about stories like this for three years, and I still can’t believe human beings are capable of some of the things that my rational minds knows they’re fully capable of:

On Nov. 29, 1996, 14-year-old Shin Dong Hyok and his father were made to sit in the front row of a crowd assembled to watch executions. The two had already spent seven months in a North Korean prison camp’s torture compound, and Shin assumed they were among those to be put to death.

Instead, the guards brought out his mother and his 22-year-old brother. The mother was hanged, the brother was shot by a firing squad.

HT to the Marmot.  Camp 14 may have been the one propaganda-free zone in North Korea.  Shin had never even heard of America, Pyongyang, or Kim Jong Il.  The place was an enigma within an enigma. 

See also:

Sticking with our depressing theme of humanity at its worst and how evil triumphs over good with the consent and invitation of the latter, here is the single most horrific, depraved thing I’ve ever heard, including everything I’ve read about Cambodia or Nazi Germany.  It was done in the name of Islam, by al Qaeda.  My strong recommendation is that you give this Michael Yon post a miss unless you have a very strong stomach.  I wonder if this will draw the kind of outrage in the Middle East that Abu Ghraib drew.  Place your bets.  Coming (back) to a neighborhood near you, probably sometime before 2010. 

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