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July 15, 2006

Too Little, Too Late

There may be no better way to defeat a radical movement than to let it win an election. The radical is an inherently emotional creation, one ill suited to the objective analysis of facts that effective government requires. If democratic institutions can survive their tenure of office, they generally discredit themselves in short order. I can’t imagine a better illustration of this principle than watching a South Korean government with a 14% approval rating meekly promoting a military alliance and...

Categories An Alliance?/Anti-Americanism/NK Economics/ROK Military/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military
July 12, 2006

Sticker Shock: A Post-USFK South Korea Must Do Less for More

A few days ago, the Marmot linked this RAND report on South Korea’s Defense Reform Plan (DRP). The report starts with some alarming disclaimers: it could not access much of the ROK MND’s classified information on strength levels or weapons systems, and the author has no experience (!) analyzing defense budget requests. Nonetheless, the author was able to pull together enough knowable facts to convince me that the DRP will come unglued. How fast? Without a national emergency, I give...

Categories An Alliance?/Anti-Americanism/NK Economics/Technology/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military
June 28, 2006

It’s About Damn Time

… Korea started paying the cost of its own defense. Which is why the most dovish South Korean president ever is forced to seek a very large increase in defense spending: South Korea’s defense ministry said yesterday that it has requested a 9.9 percent increase in the defense budget for 2007. …. In a proposal submitted to the Ministry of Planning and Budget, the military seeks to secure 24.75 trillion won ($25 billion) for the coming year, up from a...

Categories An Alliance?/ROK Military/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military
June 26, 2006

Kim Jong Il Becomes a Liability for China

Wasn’t it just yesterday when the United States had finally begun to reduce the U.S. military footprint on Okinawa, after years of local residents’ demands? That was then. Tokyo and Washington will deploy advanced Patriot interceptor missiles in Japan for the first time, officials said Monday amid concerns North Korea may be preparing to test-fire a long-range ballistic missile. The U.S. and Japan reached an accord on the interceptors this month after reports of the possible test-firing became public, and...

Categories Activism/China/Geopolitics/Japan/NK Military/Taiwan/U.S. Military/WMD
June 23, 2006

Strange Doves (Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying About This Missile and Worry About Proliferation Instead)

“Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.” — Napoleon Bonaparte The day after Newt Gingrich called for destroying North Korea’s Taepodong II ICBM on the ground, former Clinton-era SecDef William Perry has made a similar call in a Washington Post op-ed. He is joined by Ashton Carter, who turns out to have been Perry’s assistant before he was Demi Moore’s. The latest to support this proposal is … Walter Mondale: “I think it would end the nuclear...

Categories Diplomacy/Geopolitics/NK Economics/NK Military/U.S. Military/WMD
June 21, 2006

Newt: Destroy NK Missile on the Ground

[Update: John Bolton has the quote of the week: “You don’t normally engage in conversations by threatening to launch intercontinental ballistic missiles ….”] National Review has two pieces today on North Korea’s satellite ransom theater possible missile test. The editors argue, as I did here, that the United States should shoot down the missile if the North Koreans launch it. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, no doubt motivated by a desire to make me look like a moderate, goes further:...

Categories NK Military/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military/WMD
June 20, 2006

The End of Sunshine?

[Update 6/20: As predicted, the North Koreans aren’t taking this well.] “We have the right to speak.” — North Korean government official, talking about South Korean politics Has international pressure has finally forced South Korea to abandon years of official apathy about the phobocracy that is North Korea? Finally, South Korea declares, it will ask the North to treat the lives of its people with a modicum of respect.

Categories Activism/Europe/Human Rights/Japan/Japan & Korea/Korean Politics/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military/Uncategorized
June 19, 2006

Please, Please, Please Test It!

Plenty of people have asked me if Kim Jong Il will test a long-range Taepodong II missile, and really, I have no more idea that anyone else this side of the Taedong. On one hand, the North Koreans are desperate for some attention. They’re running out of money and friends, and they’ve added liquid fuel to a rocket, that’s corrosive to the fuel and oxidizer tanks and is thus more than an empty gesture. On the other hand, North Korea...

Categories NK Military/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military/WMD
June 19, 2006

The Congo Question, The Heart of Darkness, and Accountability

The enforcement of standards of civilized behavior is what distinguishes us from our enemies, and today, we must again make that distinction plain. The Army has charged two soldiers and an NCO with murder in Iraq, based on an alleged incident that took place just last month. A three-star general ordered the investigation after following up reports about it. We eagerly await a John Murtha coverup allegation. The case will now proceed to an Article 32 investigation, a cross between...

Categories "United" Nations/Terrorism/Iraq/U.S. Law/U.S. Military/Uncategorized
June 5, 2006

The Death of an Alliance, Part 41

I don’t know how much deader you can get than this: In a seismic shift in an alliance that has held since the Korean War, the military plans to scrap Korea-U.S. Combined Forces Command by 2012, it emerged Sunday. Wartime operational control of Korean forces will also return to the country, probably by 2011, since it now rests with the commander of the U.S.-led CFC. According to a military source, plans to abolish the CFC are clearly stated in the...

Categories An Alliance?/Anti-Americanism/ROK Military/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military
May 29, 2006

Korea Diary, 29 May 06

A Cold Wind in the North: North Korea has cancelled its visa waiver program for some Chinese visitors, and China has reciprocated. Like every other effort to explain what the North Koreans are up to, it’s speculative. The Joongang Ilbo’s writer speculates that it’s about North Korean fears of excessive Chinese economic influence, which makes sense, whether or not it’s the reason for this move. Another possible explanation — purely speculation and entirely my own — is that North Korea...

Categories China & Korea/Diplomacy/Human Rights/Korean Politics/Korean Society/NK Economics/Refugees/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military
May 21, 2006

The Battle of the Hump, Part 4: The Fiaola Ricefield War

The lastest example of the Washington Post’s awful Korea coverage is certain to leave you less informed than before you read it. Anthony Faiola manages to distort the Battle of Camp Humphreys into a conflict between peaceful, bucolic peasants and Uncle Sam’s evil puppet. Faiola apparently found one of the few local residents in attendance — there are just 70 of them among thousands — a sympathetic-sounding 90 year-old woman. It makes a better story to tell it this way...

Categories An Alliance?/Anti-Americanism/Korean Law/Korean Politics/Korean Society/Media Criticism/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military
May 19, 2006

Daily NK President Talks to TKL about the New Right and North Korea

Recently, Newsweek’s BJ Lee reported on the emergence of South Korea’s New Right. One of the persons prominently featured in the article was Han Ki-Hong, President of the Daily NK, an online newspaper focusing on conditions in North Korea (DO NOT MISS their latest report on North Korea’s growing border control problems). The Daily NK differs from the South Korean papers in that it primarily focuses on events in the North. More remarkably, its reporters are often North Koreans reporting...

Categories Anti-Americanism/Appeasement/Diplomacy/Geopolitics/Human Rights/Korean Politics/North Korea/Six-Party Talks/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military
May 17, 2006

The UniFiction Church Choir

Progress at Last! The last seven years of the Sunshine policy have finally secured a legacy Roh can campaign on. Goodbye “sea of fire,” hello, “deluge of fire!” I’d like to see those neocon skeptics deny that “deluge” beats “sea” any day of the week! This from the lovable North Korean site “Within Our Race” (a rough translation). ================ Who Stopped My Peace Train? My money is on this not being the last obstacle that bars the path of Kim...

Categories An Alliance?/Anti-Americanism/Appeasement/Blogs & Blogging/China/China & Korea/Diplomacy/Europe/Human Rights/Humor/Satire/Japan/Japan & Korea/Korean Education/Korean Law/Korean Politics/Korean Society/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military/Unintended Humor/WTF?
May 16, 2006

Korea Diary, 17 May 06

If you need an even better illustration of the idiocy of the Tokdo distraction, read this moving story about the families of two hostages, one Japanese and one South Korean, who married during their captivity in North Korea. Yokota expressed gratitude that his son-in-law was a South Korean. “I am so lucky to have a South Korean son-in-law, not a North Korean. I am so happy that I can hope that our families may meet one another again. He said...

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