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Monthly Archive: May, 2009

May 27, 2009

What? That Is Your Day Job? (Part 1)

I never was a fan of Lawrence Eagleburger, and I see no reason to become one now: VARNEY: Would you — do you believe that the U.S. and/or China should now seriously consider and plan for a military attack? EAGLEBURGER: I have believed that for some time. So, you’re — you’re call — you are asking the wrong person, I guess, because I have felt, as I say, for the better part of 10 years, that we could see this...

Categories Washington Views/WTF?
May 27, 2009

So Long and Thanks for All the Cash

I’ve seen a number of different estimates of how many South Korean taxpayer dollars Roh Moo Hyun sent to Kim Jong Il and his regime during Roh’s term in office.  Starting from this 2006 estimate of approximately $3 billion (based on an approximate average exchange ratio of 1,000 won per dollar) and extrapolating about subsequent transfers, a rough estimate of $4 billion seems fair. Now consider: Kim Jong Il, who never actually bothered to visit Roh and granted him just...

Categories North-South/Sunshine
May 27, 2009

And in Other News, The Korean War Is On Again

It would be too unfair to entitle this post, “Obama restarts Korean War,” even in jest, but on the other hand, we may now safely abandon all hope that his election would pleasure the world with a gentle warming sensation, release our tensions, and leave us in a state of affectionate post-coital afterglow.  The world does not work that way.  I knew we were in for something like this as soon as Obama threw Kim Jong Il below the fold...

Categories History/Korean History/Korean War/North-South
May 27, 2009

I Sense a Great Disturbance in the Force

This just had to happen:  Roh’s bodyguard has changed his story: It was confirmed that there was no bodyguard present when the former President Roh Moo-hyun committed suicide on May 23. Accordingly, police have launched a reinvestigation of what the former president was doing on the day of suicide. “It may be that the bodyguard sent by the Cheong Wa Dae was not present when the former president threw himself from “˜Owl Rock,’” an official of the Cheong Wa Dae...

Categories Korean Politics/Korean Society/The Fifth Column
May 27, 2009

S. Korea Studies Plans to Protect Its Citizens in Kaesong

HOW ABOUT, ‘STAY OUT OF KAESONG?’: A senior South Korean government official said when North Korea banned South Korean traffic to the industrial park late last year, the government began working out measures in preparation for the possibility of the industrial park’s closure. “Since last Friday when the North declared all incumbent regulations and contracts regarding the Kaesong Industrial Complex null and void, we’ve been mapping out concrete measures in preparation for various scenarios concerning the North’s possible close-down of...

Categories Sunshine
May 26, 2009

The Ryugyong Hotel: Still Worth Its Weight in Infant Formula

Presenting the worst building in the world, now with glass.  It looks … different.  Curtis Melvin writes that it’s now officially less ignored and more a source of pride in Pyongyang, but I still think it brings to mind Churchill’s famous reply to Bessie Braddock.  And then there are the persistent rumors that it’s structurally unsound.  So how much of the cavity space in this gargantuan concrete tusk will ever be occupied?  It’s not as if they’re feeding the North...

Categories NK Economics
May 26, 2009

Will we see a more proactive South Korea?

While I’m hearing a lot of commentary on what Obama should and shouldn’t do with his North Korea problem, I am curious as to what South Korea is thinking. I have been told by contacts in South Korea that these latest moves by the DPRK have not been able to break through the average South Korean’s desensitized shell. Indeed, South Korean headlines seem to suggest the South is just as obsessed with the nuclear test’s affect on the economy, if...

Categories North-South/South Korea
May 26, 2009

Bolton: Expel North Korea from the U.N.

[Bolton] urged Obama’s team to first put North Korea back on the list of state sponsors of terrorism following its removal in the waning months of the Bush administration.  Bolton also urged the UN Security Council to expel Pyongyang from the world body as a “persistent violator” of UN resolutions.  [AFP] The accusation is obviously true, and it could be justified for human rights reasons alone. North Korea has also consistently stolen U.N. development and food aid and refused to...

Categories "United" Nations
May 26, 2009

And Now, the Fallout

Kim Jong Il has followed yesterday’s nuke test by firing two more short-range missiles, as a rudderless world tries to decide how to respond.  When you consider each of these developments, ask yourself whether Kim Jong Il could reasonably have anticipated that it would happen.  So far, everything I see happening fits within the range of Kim Jong Il’s calculation of “acceptable consequences.” FOR ONE THING, KIM JONG IL IS PROBABLY BETTING that John Kerry and Nancy Pelosi don’t possess...

Categories "United" Nations/Diplomacy/Proliferation/WMD
May 26, 2009

In ‘The New Ledger:’ Holding China Accountable

Here’s a quote: Afer the 2006 nuclear test, John Bolton pressured China into voting for U.N. Security Council Resolution 1718, which seemed to impose tough sanctions on North Korea. A detailed study by the economist and North Korea expert Marcus Noland later revealed that China also undermined the very sanctions it voted for in Resolution 1718 with increased cross-border aid and trade. China also instructed its banks to free up the movement of North Korean assets. Most recently, China blocked...

Categories China/Proliferation/WMD
May 25, 2009

Nuclear Groundhog Day in North Korea

[Welcome to the readers coming in from the Wall Street Journal, Gateway Pundit, Ed Driscoll, Patterico, and Little Green Footballs, and thanks to the authors of those sites for linking.] Well, all I can say is, thank God Christopher Hill’s ingenious diplomacy disarmed North Korea in time: “The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea successfully conducted one more underground nuclear test on May 25 as part of the measures to bolster up its nuclear deterrent for self-defence in every way as...

Categories Proliferation/WMD
May 25, 2009

Fifth Column Update: Pyongyang Orders a Hot Summer for Seoul

I certainly don’t believe for an instant that North Korea’s infiltration of the South was suspended during the DJ or Roh administrations; rather, I think stories about that infiltration were less likely to be leaked or reported under the former left-wing administrations unless they were just too newsworthy to suppress.  But if North Korea’s agents had ever gone to ground, they’ve come back up to prepare for the summer riot season: The North Korean regime recently ordered officials and organizations...

Categories Refugees/The Fifth Column
May 24, 2009

Meet the New Boss, Part 2: Kim Jong Un Makes First Appearances in North Korea’s Official Mythology

Only in a place like North Korea could a major development in a king’s succession be signaled in a kindergarten.  The Daily NK reports that they’re teaching the kids a new song in Pyongyang: In Pyongyang elementary schools, teachers have been teaching their students “The Song of General Kim Jong Woon.   A Japanese source released a rumor to Daily NK on Thursday, “On the 6th, in a few elementary schools in Pyongyang, students learned “˜The Song of General Kim...

Categories Kremlinology
May 24, 2009

Dr. Hwang, I’ll Need Ten Copies of Lavrenti Beria by Next Week

Via a reliable source — though it’s third-hand information — I’m told that William Stanton is still very much in the running to become the next de facto U.S. ambassador to Taiwan (head of the American Institute on Taiwan).  Stanton’s recent comments about Laura Ling and Euna Lee (“stupid,” “a distraction from the bigger issues” — and this to a delegation of congressional staffers, no less) tell us about all we need to know about his suave diplomatic skills.  He’s...

Categories Diplomacy
May 23, 2009

Some Final Thoughts on Roh Moo-Hyun

Even though most indications were pointing to an unhappy ending to the former president’s legacy, I was still shocked to hear the news of Roh’s death. His presidency, beginning with the elections that got him inaugurated, served as a constant backdrop during my time in South Korea, which correlated with his term. I arrived in Korea just after the conclusion of the World Cup. Tensions were high in relation to the unfortunate tank incident involving the U.S. military and South...

Categories Appeasement/North-South
May 22, 2009

Roh Moo Hyun Dead, an Apparent Suicide

Update 2:   Here’s a translation of Roh’s suicide note. “I’m indebted to too many people. The pain that I caused to so many people is too great. The pain in the coming days is unfathomable,” Roh said in the note disclosed by police. “Due to my frail health, I cannot do anything. I cannot read or write. Don’t be too sad. Don’t blame anyone. Life and death are identical parts of nature. It’s fate,” the note said. It also...

Categories Korean Politics/Sunshine
May 22, 2009

The Banality of James Church

The pseudonymous author is asked to perform his only apparent talent for an interviewer:  writing dialogue between fictional North Korean bureaucrats — here, as based on Church’s assumptions about the ongoing captivity of Laura Ling and Euna Lee.  Judging from what Church wrote for this interview, I wouldn’t call Church a bad writer or an especially good one.  I suspect the final revelations about Ling and Lee, if we ever have them, will be unkind to some of Church’s assumptions,...

Categories Media Criticism/WTF?
May 21, 2009

OFK’s 15 Minutes: We’re in the Wall Street Journal Today

This blog is mentioned in a front-page story in the Wall Street Journal about Google Earth and North Korea. Curtis Melvin, who has done vastly more study of North Korea on Google Earth, deservedly gets the most ink, but it’s nice to see this humble blog get mentioned: Joshua Stanton, an attorney in Washington who once served in the U.S. military in South Korea, used Google Earth to look for one of the country’s notorious prisons. In early 2007, he...

Categories Blogs & Blogging/Google Earth