This guy is North of bat shit crazy.
A lot of talk, hand wringing and gnashing of teeth of late—all because of the little fat man-child in charge of North Korea. He fires missiles towards his neighbors with impunity. He sets off nuclear bombs with abandon. And he blusters about our national impending doom. He claims he can fire off a nuclear-tipped missile at our soil. Can he? Will he?
A year or two ago, had he the capability, I believe he definitely would have. Obama was the guy he could have tested and made blink. I believe had he done so, B Hussein would have tried to convince the nation that we could absorb the damage, swallow the loss of say, Seattle, and the hundreds of thousands of casualties in dead and wounded. I truly do not believe B. Hussein would have retaliated. He would have turned the Muslim cheek.
Now though, with Trump in office, it is a whole new situation. Trump isn’t one to simply absorb body blows or body bags. Kimmy, however, has heard years and years of lip service and tough talk to the contrary. It is only natural for the fat bully to doubt that his favorite punching bag on the playground has either the willingness or resolve to defend or fight back.
So, how did we get here? How did we come to this desolate place of fighting a catastrophic war, or accepting a lunatic with nuclear arms and trusting that he won’t use them? We’ll have to go back over 50 years and start placing blame at the politicians of old—both reviled, and revered.
1956. The Soviets begin training North Korean scientists, giving them the “basic knowledge” to initiate a nuclear program.
So, if we knew that then, why did not Ike (President) bomb them or threaten the Russians to stop? Tricky Dick Nixon was VP then, and he wasn’t exactly a peace dove. Charles Wilson was the SecDef. Allen Dulles was CIA Director. This is all 3 years or so after the Korean War stopped. I say stopped, as basically both sides just stopped shooting. The undeclared war was never brokered to a peace treaty, rather just an armistice. We are still technically at war with the DPRK. Could war weariness in the aftermath of WWII have spurred on this yellow stripe of spineless back down?
1962. Their primary nuclear facility—Yongbyon opens.
Kennedy is President. Johnson another slobbering war monger was VP. John McCone was the CIA Director, and Robert McNamara, the statistician, and synonym for dereliction of duty was the SecDef.
1981. The Israelis bomb and destroy the nuclear reactor at Osirak, Iraq.
Using then current date F16 fighters, the Israelis fly through enemy airspace and successfully eliminate the first real non-conventional existential threat to their very existence. Reagan was President and Bush 41 was the VP. Admiral Stansfield Turner was the CIA Director and Casper Weinberger was the SecDef. If ever a blue print was laid out for us, this was it. They showed us it could be done (unilateral and decisive action) and they did it. Bear in mind that nuclear reactors do not go up quickly and that ole’ H.W. Bush was the CIA Director from 1976-1977, probably when the plans were set and construction begun.
1989. Satellite imagery confirms that the DPRK is in the early stages of building a nuclear bomb even though additional construction at Yongbyon continued since its inception.
Reagan and George H.W. Bush were President in this time, so both Bush and Dan Quayle were VP. William Webster was the CIA Director and Darth Vadar himself, Dick Cheney was the SecDef, as well as Frank Carlucci.
1994. The Agreed Framework days.
It was an agreement between the US and the DPRK, born of the Clinton Administration. The design was to freeze their nuclear ambitions and refinements in exchange for fuel oil, economic concessions (read: bribes), and well as a normalization of relations between the two nations. Also part of the deal and the crown jewel for the DPRK, was to be bilateral talks between just the US and DPRK to formally end the Korean War. The DPRK has long sought just such an agreement so that they could then propagandize the war as between just the US and the DPRK rather than the DPRK and the United Nations and its coalition. And since it would be a treaty, they could claim to have fought the US to a draw. The DPRK was secretly enriching uranium while “following” the rules of the Agreed Framework as this was not specifically forbidden.
This puts Slick Willy, Algore, CIA Director James Woosley, SecDef Les Aspin (famous also for denying tanks and Specter gunships to the US forces in Somalia leading to the horrific losses at Mogadishu and “Black Hawk Down”) directly into the mix of complicity. It bears mentioning that SecState Madeline Albright was involved as well. She was once reported as seen trotting along after Kim Jong-Il begging him to return to talks after he walked out.
The DPRK famously followed and violated the Agreed Framework, repeatedly announcing their intention to withdraw from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty unless the US provided more and more concessions. The DPRK finally and formally withdrew from the NPT in 2003…the Dubya Bush years.
2002. In October, Assistant SecState James Kelly tells DPRK that he has evidence of their uranium enrichment which is against the spirit (but not the letter since we are bad deal negotiators) of the Agreed Framework pact.
14 November. Bush threatens to halt oil shipments if the DPRK continues their nuclear ambitions.
4 December. DPRK rejects calls to open Yongbyon for inspections.
12 December. DPRK states that the oil shipment cessation from the US leaves them no option but to restart their nuclear reactor.
22 December. Following the IAEA inspectors not removing cameras and other inspection equipment, the DPRK does it for them.
2003. 10 January. DPRK withdraws from the NPT. SecState Colin Powell tattles to the toothless UN Security Counsel.
28 January. Bush warns DPRK that “the world will not be blackmailed.”
February and March. DPRK fire two missiles near the land mass of Japan.
9 April. The UN Security Counsel fails to condemn DPRK from withdrawing from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
24 April. In a meeting with Chinese officials it is stated that DPRK has nuclear weapons.
12 May. DPRK scraps a 1992 agreement with South Korea committing to keep the Korean Peninsula free from nuclear weapons.
9 December. DPRK agrees to “freeze” (not dismantle) its nuclear program in exchange for a list of concessions from the US. If the US does not agree (comply/capitulate) the DPRK states it will not enter into any future talks. US says no to freezing, DPRK must dismantle.
27 December. Reversing itself, the DPRK enters into 6-party talks (DPRK, Russia, China, US, Japan, South Korea)
2004. In October 2004, former SecState Albright confessions that she knew the DPRK was cheating on the Agreed Framework by enriching uranium.
2005. 5 October. A US envoy directly threatens the DPRK, saying, “They can have a future, or these nuclear weapons, but not both.”
6 October. DPRK detonates its first nuclear weapon.
Again, George W. Bush is the President, Dick Cheney is the VP. The SecDef is Donald Rumsfeld, and the CIA Director is Michael Hayden. None of these gentlemen are slouches. (Despite the now historically apparent lack of spine.) The world is a witness to a psychopath joining the nuclear club with barely so much as sputtering objections at the United Nations. No military strikes were conducted. No naval embargoes were sailed. No serious military reinforcements planned or enacted. Were they distracted by their invasion of Iraq? Did they take their eye off this particular ball? Or were they merely incompetent boobs woefully inept and not up to the task? The next year, the Israelis again were there to show the world the correct answer to those questions.
2007. The Israelis bomb and destroy a nuclear reactor in the desert of Syria.
Using a team of Special Forces on the ground to laser designate the target, a cluster of F15 and F16 aircraft and a flying ELINT (electronic intelligence) aircraft, the Israelis crossed into Syrian airspace, spoofed their anti-aircraft system, and destroyed a reactor that the US had known about for years since shortly after construction had begun. The SF team even brought back pictures and soil samples to verify destruction and radioactivity of the target debris.
The Israelis had evidence suggesting the Iran had added financing to the project; as much as 2 billion dollars. Evidence suggested that as many as ten DPRK soldiers were killed in the raid. The US declined to conduct the attack or even provide support to the Israelis fearing world and Arab reactions. The Israelis believed that so long as they did not overtly brag about their actions, Syrian President Assad would not retaliate. The Israelis kept quiet and Syria quietly buried the site.
It is later revealed that the design and technology, even layout of the reactor facility in Syria matched almost exactly to that of the Yongbyon reactor in DPRK.
I could go on for pages more detailing the overt and blatant actions of the DPRK and the subsequent meek and useless reaction from the world and the US. The simple fact remains. They now have nuclear bombs. They have proven capable of missile technology that can reach all of our Pacific region bases, if not portions of the continental US. They just recently detonated their most powerful device giving credence to their assertions that they have graduated from fission bombs (atomic) to fusion bombs (H-bombs.) It really is just a matter of time before they develop the expertise to marry an H-bomb warhead to a missile with enough range and sophistication to survive re-entry, such that they can deliver untold destruction to our soil.
There is an old saying something about, “Tis’ better to die on your feet, than to live on your knees.” That is something the Israelis understand. They do not fear political fallout or sour poll results. They already know that probably 80 percent of the world already hates them, and that the UN will condemn them with every resolution brought forward to do so. Israel does not care about perceptions or resolutions from spineless bigots. The Israelis will preemptively attack to protect themselves. They know they if they were to choose life on their knees, the blade for their neck swiftly follows.
Quite the opposite, the US does care about world opinion and perception. We want to be liked and don’t understand it when others show that they do not. We’d rather people have favorable opinions of us that to be feared, even respected. We turn the other cheek to insults and attacks so often as to make even our enemies dizzy. We do not take strategic unilateral actions like the Israelis do. We fire off missiles now and again, but those are limited in both scope and results. We burn enormous amounts of energy trying to build multinational coalitions so as to make others feel equal to us and included in world decisions. When all along, at the core of things, the world wants strong American leadership since they can’t do it themselves.
Our options:
- Do nothing. Accept North Korean having nuclear weapons, continually threatening us and our allies. They will continue to expand their nuclear and missile knowledge, eventually resulting in their definitive ability to strike the US mainland in its entirety. They will continue to threaten their neighbors and continue to fire missiles to both intimidate and to learn.
- Sanctions. This has not worked in nearly thirty years. China is the DPRK’s largest trading partner, with nearly 90% of their imports and exports. While China doesn’t especially enjoy their antics, they do reap some benefit from the angst it causes us. So, China is not going to cut off trade. Any nation that does, China will likely pick up their slack. Sanctions can also have an unintended effect in that the DPRK, strapped for cash, oil, (pick your resource) may decide to export their nuclear technology to other anti-American nations (like Iran). They may do this even if we select option 1.
- Limited military strike. As surgical as our weaponry is, we cannot hope to decapitate the regime and destroy all of their tactical and strategic military forces in one fell swoop. If our bombs fall, Kimmy will strike Seoul, South Korean, with whatever he has left. Basic artillery, through nuclear weapons, the city will cease to exist, killing millions of people. Keep in mind, he doesn’t have to marry a warhead to a missile. He has a fleet of slow, wooden Russian aircraft that are so antiquated as to not show up on radar. They can fly a warhead over the border at treetop level. He just has to get close to Seoul to destroy it.
- Assassination. Reports in the news have Seal Team 6 training South Korean operators in this type of mission. Again, like dominoes falling, even if successful, the remaining military leadership will launch retaliatory strikes against the South. They will likely strike Japan, Guam, and really try to prove they can hit us with a missile.
- Full scale attack. China has already stated they will respond if we attack first. Would they? Not knowing the answer is enough to keep our leadership from acting largely at all, let alone decisively like this.
Don’t look at me. I don’t have the answers either. Our window for acting without real risk of repercussions ended decades ago. I just repacked my bug-out bag for when Kimmy sets off an EMP over us and knocks us back to the 1800’s.