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Category: An Alliance?

July 23, 2006

And They Wonder Why Relations Are Deteriorating

Update: Ouch. You can clearly see how this administration has moved to the left from where it began. UniFiction Minister Lee Jong-Seok says the United States “failed the most” when North Korea launched its missile. You thought, perhaps, those whose main event exploded 45 seconds after launch? The rising superpower whose uncontrollable satellite managed to cement a U.S.-Japanese alliance? The government whose incalculably costly and increasingly unpopular appeasement policies were exposed as a worthless sham at the push of one...

Categories An Alliance?/Anti-Americanism/U.S. & Korea/WMD/WTF?
July 22, 2006

The Death of an Alliance, Part 45: An October Surprise?

[This is an updated post, originally published Saturday morning (22 July 06). An interview with the USFK Commanding general has partially confirmed what it asserts, so I’m supplementing the old post rather than starting a new one.] Jodi at The Asia Pages appears to be the recipient of some inside information that a dramatic reduction of the U.S.-Korean military welfare state alliance will be announced this fall, which coincides high-level security consultations scheduled for October. According to Jodi’s source, the...

Categories An Alliance?/ROK Military/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military
July 17, 2006

The Death of an Aliance, Part 43: Kim Won-Ung, Nutcase

The problem with identifying the most unhinged politician in South Korea’s ruling Uri party is a lot like trying to identify France’s most offensive armpit: at a certain point, extremity renders empirical comparison pointless. Still, I’m not sure anyone in the Uri party has built a more solid record than ex-GNP’er Kim Won-Ung, the only South Korean parliamentarian to have earned two of his very own “DOA” posts. His latest oral discharge is a ferocious denial that North Korea’s short-range...

Categories An Alliance?/Anti-Americanism/Appeasement/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military/WMD/WTF?
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

For the Bush Administration, the Moment of Truth

We learn today that China intends to veto a resolution that would impose binding sanctions on North Korea’s missile trade. Got that? No binding sanctions on a starving nation’s trade in … missile components. China and Russia introduced a resolution Wednesday deploring North Korea’s missile tests but dropping language from a rival proposal that could have led to military action against Pyongyang. Excuse me? Who said anything about “military action?” Unless they mean intercepting their nukes, missiles, and dope on...

Categories "United" Nations/An Alliance?/China/China & Korea/Russia/Russia & Korea/WMD
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
July 11, 2006

Don Kirk on North Korea’s Divide-and-Rule Coup; Plus, Why the T-Dong 2 Failed

Read it yourself, but I’ll tempt you with his strong close: These differences alone reveal the gulf between South Korea and the US. The North Korean missile shots have landed on target, widening the rift, deepening the discord, resurrecting the specter of the ancient Japanese foe. There may be ways to postpone a widening crisis, but no foreseeable way out.

Categories An Alliance?/Technology/U.S. & Korea/WMD
July 10, 2006

The Death of an Alliance, Part 42

China’s newest satellite won’t back sanctions against North Korea, after the North lobbed seven missiles into the Sea of Japan. The United States is actively supporting a Japanese-drafted sanctions resolution at the U.N. China is opposing it. The lines have been drawn, sides have been chosen. Seoul really didn’t even need to take part in this “camp diplomacy,” but it has. It’s yet another reason to ask: why do we provide the defense for a nation that’s neutral at best,...

Categories An Alliance?/China & Korea/U.S. & Korea/WMD
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 27, 2006

A Sheep Among Wolves

A top official from the National Security Council on Wednesday threw his weight behind a change in Korea’s geopolitical strategy away from what he called the “Cold War camp diplomacy” in East Asia, pitting a northern alliance of North Korea, China and Russia against the southern alliance of South Korea, the U.S. and Japan. “In future, Korea will break from the framework of confrontation and switch to open security cooperation,” the official said. “As a dynamic actor, Korea will play...

Categories An Alliance?/China & Korea/Geopolitics/U.S. & Korea
June 5, 2006

Hypocrisy Illustrated

If you want an ideal illustration of why I believe the political tide is turning in Korea, you couldn’t do better than this picture of this anti-free trade demonstration in Washington (Yonhap, via the Joongang Ilbo, now Korea’s best daily). It’s a real Where’s Waldo of illogic and double standards rooted in vitriol, and I’m compelled to warn you that if you stare at this picture too long, you will get a brain aneurism. Before we zoom in on this...

Categories An Alliance?/Anti-Americanism/NK Economics/U.S. & Korea/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 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 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...

Categories Abductions/Activism/An Alliance?/Anti-Americanism/Appeasement/Counterfeiting/Diplomacy/Drugs & N Korea/Europe/Famine & Food Aid/Human Rights/Inside NK/Islam/Japan/Japan & Korea/Korean Politics/News Links/NK Economics/Proliferation/Refugees/Terrorism/Iraq/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military/Uncategorized/WMD
May 14, 2006

Links of Interest

Richardson has already linked it, but I want to add is that this one could be very, very important to what happens in North Korea. The United States is considering economic sanctions on Chinese banks which have business transactions with North Korean companies allegedly implicated in the development or proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD), a news report said Sunday. ================= Rep. Henry Hyde, Chairman of the House International Relations Committee, has a message for President Junichiro Koizumi. Hyde,...

Categories Activism/An Alliance?/Anti-Americanism/Censorship/China/China & Korea/Defectors/Democracy/Diplomacy/History/Human Rights/Korean History/Korean Law/Korean Politics/News Links/NK Economics/North Korea/Refugees/U.S. & Korea/Uncategorized/Washington Views/WMD