Why does the Kim Family Regime have nuclear weapons?

There are six purposes for the KFR’s nuclear weapons. 

The first is survival. We know from Hwang Jong Yop (1997) that the regime believes the US will not attack a nuclear armed nation but if there was a war on the Korean Peninsula they believes that if it did not have nuclear weapons that the US would use them on the north. So the first purpose is for survival. 

Second, nuclear weapons support its unification strategy which is three fold: subversion of the ROK, coercion of the ROK, and if necessary by force and nuclear weapons directly support the second two. And we should keep in mind that the KFR believes unification is key to its long term survival. 

The third is enhanced reputation and legitimacy - in the KFR mind nuclear weapons make it a power that should be treated like Pakistan and of course it is believed to enhance domestic political legitimacy the elite and with the people. 

Fourth they support the seven decade plus blackmail diplomacy strategy to conduct threats and provocations to gain political and economic concessions. 

Fifth similar to enhanced reputation it supports the regime’s “business” as a proliferator. It has proliferated nuclear technology to Syria (why did the the Israelis bomb the nuclear site in Syria? Although we have not seen much nuclear proliferation they are proliferating missile capabilities and developing those missiles with a nuclear capability makes them more marketable. 

Sixth is that if war does take place they will employ them and employ them quickly. The success of their campaign plan is dependent on rapid occupation of the peninsula before the US can reinforce it so I expect they will use nuclear weapons against Korean port facilities (e.g., Pusan) and the 7 UN based in Japan that are critically important ISBs for the flow of US forces. And if the alliance conducts a counter attack into the north I would expect they would use nuclear weapons on their own soil. A target would likely be an amphibious landing on the north’s east coast. 

So if we think about it there are a lot of reasons why the KFR believes nuclear weapons are in its interest and there is not much anyone can entice them with to give them up. Food aid? Diplomatic recognition and normalization? Security guarantees (like the US and Russia have to Ukraine in return for them giving up nuclear weapons)? There is no good reason why they should give them up. That is why I always say that the only way we will see an end to the nuclear program and the crimes against humanity being committed against the Korean people living in the north by the mafia-like crime family cult known as the Kim Family Regime is through the establishment of a unified United Republic of Korea (UROK) that is non-nuclear, economically vibrant, secure and stable with a liberal constitutional government determined by the Korean people. 

Of course that cannot happen until there is no more KFR. There are only four paths to this. 

Peaceful, which is most complex and hardest to achieve but should be the basis for all unification planning. 

Second is war because that will destroy the regime but of course we do want to expend the blood and treasure that will cost. 

Regime collapse- also complex and dangerous and could lead to war or at least some level of conflict that will cause huge suffering. 

And fourth is the outlier: internal dynamics lead to the fall of the regime that is replaced by new leadership that if nurtured and encouraged could seek peaceful unification. 

That is a long shot but it is also why we need to continue the strategic strangulation campaign (as the administration calls it extreme pressure) while we cope, contain, and manage the situation to allow internal dynamics to cause change (and of course all this must rest on a combined alliance military capability that can deter, defend, fight, and win). 

International Journal of Korean Studies Volume XIX, Number 2 · Fall/Winter 2014

Our latest edition of the Journal.  Each of the titles should be hot links below to access each article individually.  If not please go to the link below to access the entire journal and the articles.

http://icks.org/publication/index.html

International Journal of

KOREAN STUDIES

Volume XIX, Number 2 · Fall/Winter 2014

Publisher's Pages and Introduction of Contributors
A Window of Vulnerability: Rethinking the Defense of the Korean Peninsula Patrick M. Cronin and Moon-young Kim Jun	1
Be Careful What You Wish For - Security and Stability on the Korean Peninsula Major Bernard J. Brister	26
Proliferation and Illegal Foreign Sales: Ensuring Regime Survival Gordon G. Chang	53
Competition and Countervailing Power in the Imperialist Marketplace: The Case of Korea C. H. Park	80
US Strategic Interests and Future Role in the Peaceful Unification of the Korean Peninsula Sue Mi Terry	100
North Korea's Revolutionary Unification Policy Sung-Yoon Lee	121
Korean Reunification in the Context of Changing Triangular Relations Gilbert Rozman	138
China's Strategic Interests and Future Role Roy D. Kamphausen	153
Dean Acheson's Role in the Sino-U.S. Clash over Korea Revisited: Mistaken Beliefs and Sinister Purpose Taifa Yu	178
The International Journal of Korean Studies is copyrighted under U.S. law. ⓒ 2014 International Council on Korean Studies

Reading for Thursday April 16, 2015

LEAD) USFK commander voices need for THAAD deployment to S. Korea

Excerpt:

Scaparrotti is the one who brought up the need for a THAAD battery in South Korea for the first time in June. The proposal has since become one of the most sensitive defense and political issues in Seoul as China and Russia have expressed strong opposition to such a deployment.

Supporters say the advanced missile defense unit is necessary to meet ever-growing missile and nuclear threats from North Korea, while opponents claim mid- and lower-altitude missile interceptors are enough as the North is unlikely to attack the South with such high-altitude missiles.

Regarding North Korea's nuclear and missile capabilities, Scaparrotti said he assumes the communist nation has the capability to deliver a ballistic missile with a nuclear warhead.

"They claim to have a capability to deliver a nuclear-tipped ballistic missile. They paraded it and they've shown it to us. But they haven't tested it," he said."But I, as a commander, I have to be prudent and assume that they can deliver one and act on that basis."

What he did not say is that a good commander has to be prudent and ask for what he needs to accomplish the mission and defend his forces.  There should be no criticism of him or his requests to deploy THAAD.

http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/national/2015/04/16/26/0301000000AEN20150416000251315F.html

2015/04/16 02:54

By Chang Jae-soon

Study pans use of '360-degree reviews'

Excerpt:

Some military officials said identifying toxic leaders is not the challenge at hand.

"Most people have worked for a toxic leader at some point, and it wasn't a secret. Everybody knew who was a jerk. The question is: What was done about it?" an unnamed official told Rand researchers. "You could find them; then what? What did we do about it? Doesn't the culture determine what happens at that point? Do we need 360 or do we know?"

http://www.militarytimes.com/story/military/pentagon/2015/04/15/360-reviews/25784447/

A Nuclear Turning Point

Excerpt:

But on closer inspection, what is truly puzzling is that anyone supports the agreement at all. In striking this deal, the Obama administration abandoned a decades-old mainstay of U.S. nonproliferation policy, and opponents are right to reject it. The United States has always opposed the spread of sensitive nuclear technologies—uranium enrichment and plutonium reprocessing—to all states, including its own allies, and it is a mistake to make an exception for Iran.

Conclusion:

Defenders of the accord have argued that there was no viable alternative short of war. But this is not true. If the United States had given Iran a choice between, on the one hand, continued international isolation, increased economic sanctions, and, all else failing, military strikes on its nuclear facilities and, on the other hand, a zero-enrichment deal that lifted sanctions and provided other face-saving goodies, including nonsensitive nuclear technologies, Iran would have eventually chosen the latter.

Instead, we gave up the game. Iran out-negotiated us. We abandoned a clear international standard we had established in order to meet Iran halfway in its unreasonable demands. What we have to show for it is not a historic deal, but the death of a 70-year-old bipartisan pillar of American foreign policy.

The longstanding, bipartisan nonproliferation standard is dead.

Matthew Kroenig

April 20, 2015, Vol. 20, No. 30

http://www.weeklystandard.com/print/articles/nuclear-turning-point_914660.html

So who are today's Adams and Mahan?

Four years later, in Realities of American Foreign Policy, Kennan wrote that the chief threat to the security of the United States was “the association of the dominant portion of the physical resources of Europe and Asia with a political power hostile to ourselves.” Such a threat to U.S. interests, he noted, could only emanate from certain regions of the globe “where major industrial power, enjoying adequate access to raw materials, is combined with large reserves of educated and technically skilled man-power.”

Such geopolitical reasoning, Kennan wrote in American Diplomacy, was scarce among Americans in 1898 when the U.S. went to war with Spain and as a result acquired the Philippine Islands. He credited two Americans of that time with understanding international realities: Brooks Adams and Alfred Thayer Mahan. Adams, Kennan noted, “sensed the ultimate importance of the distinction between sea power and land power” and grasped “the danger of political collaboration between Russia, Germany and China,” while Mahan, “was charting new paths . . . which led in the direction of a more profound appraisal of the sources of American security.” He called their efforts in this regard “an isolated spurt of intellectual activity against a background of general torpor and smugness in American thinking about foreign affairs.”

U.S. Marines fighting in Seoul

Image Credit: U.S. Navy

George Kennan’s Geopolitics of the Far East

A worldview based on “unsentimental calculations of the balance of power” and an understanding of human nature.

http://thediplomat.com/2015/04/george-kennans-geopolitics-of-the-far-east/

By Francis P. Sempa

April 15, 2015

Top diplomats from S. Korea, U.S., Japan hold cooperation talks

Excerpt:

The meeting appears to reflect the urgency the U.S. sees in the need for improvement in Korea-Japan ties, which have been badly strained for years, due mainly to Tokyo's attempts to whitewash its wartime atrocities and colonial occupation, especially its sexual enslavement of women for its troops during World War II.

• Yonhap News Agency

onApr 16, 2015 @ 10:40 AM

http://www.globalpost.com/article/6518251/2015/04/16/top-diplomats-s-korea-us-japan-hold-cooperation-talks

PACOM House of Representatives Armed Services Committee, Prepared Statement

Extensive overview of the situation and threats in PACOM.

By Commander, US Pacific Command, ADM Samuel J. Locklear, III | April 15, 2015

http://www.pacom.mil/Media/SpeechesTestimony/tabid/6706/Article/585175/pacom-us-house-of-representatives-armed-services-committee-prepared-statement.aspx

Lippert doubts North’s sincerity

But what he could not diplomatically say is that he is not at all surprised by the regime's insincerity.

Also note his comments on Korea-Japan historical issues and the US "role."

http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid=3003154&cloc=rss%7Cnews%7Cjoongangdaily

The Politics of Rebalance: The Future of US Leadership In Asia

With the recent survey by the GOP that national security issues eclipse economic issues does that mean Asian issues will become an election issue?  Having some "contextual intelligence" would be a good thing for the next president.  But I wonder if we will ever hear the phrase contextual intelligence during the campaign - even if national security issues dominate I doubt contextual intelligence will resonate on a bumper sticker or in sound bites - e.g.,  "I have more contextual intelligence that candidate X"

Excerpt:

In crafting policy on Asia, the next U.S. president – Democrat or Republican – will require “contextual intelligence,” an essential presidential leadership skill Joseph Nye defines as “an intuitive diagnostic skill that helps a leader understand change, interpret the outside world, set objectives, and align strategies and tactics with objectives to create smart policies in a new situation.” Candidates’ level of contextual intelligence on four critical areas – Asian security, trade and investment, civil society, and China – as we previously posited in these pages may serve as a bellwether of whether pragmatic or ideological politics will drive the future of U.S. Asia policy.

Image Credit: U.S.-Japan Council via Flickr.com

How will U.S. presidential candidates frame the future of U.S. policy towards Asia?

http://thediplomat.com/2015/04/the-politics-of-rebalance-the-future-of-us-leadership-in-asia/

The Iran Pact Is Not A Model For Dealing With Reclusive North Korea

Excerpts:

However, this is not the case. North Korea is very different from Iran, and is unlikely to fit in with such a plan.

The major difference is to be found in Iran’s political structure. Iran is clearly not a democracy in a strict sense, but it is still a country in which popular opinion actually matters. The Iranians can vote and their elections are generally free and fair, though participants have to act within certain established restrictions. There are competing political parties in Iran, and Iranians can protest against government policy at rallies, as well as creating political and social associations.

...

Unfortunately, the situation in North Korea is very different. To start with, North Korea is not a country in which popular opinions have any real significance. The country is run by a small group of hereditary elites. This elite group would probably not mind if its people were better off, but its ability to hold on to power does not depend on popular support. North Koreans do not vote, or rather vote in elections where the sole candidate always wins 100% of all votes. No independent political organizations exist. The media’s only interest is in the alleged greatness of the current government and its current policies. Participation in anti-government rallies is suicidal.

HOME | COMMENTARIES | PARALLEL THOUGHTS

http://www.rfa.org/english/commentaries/parallelt-thoughts/iran-korea-04152015093311.html

A commentary by Andrei Lankov
2015-04-15

Sunday Night Reading

Special Operations Command Central Multi-Method Assessment of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant

https://info.publicintelligence.net/SOCCENT-ISIL-Assessment.pdf

March 8, 2015

https://publicintelligence.net/soccent-isil-assessment/

US security strategy and its implications for the PH

[CIRSS Commentaries] 'It is within the Philippines’ interest that the United States continue to play a leadership role in the world stage'

http://www.rappler.com/world/specials/85882-us-security-strategy-implications-philippines

Interesting tactical combat arms analogy for strategic thinking.

Conclusion:

Which brings me back to headspace and timing. To echo General Mattis, we need a renewed global strategy, not unlike that with which we countered the Soviet Union. Maybe we didn’t always make the best decisions (oh hey, Southeast Asia, didn’t see ya there), but it was a strategy and everyone knew where we stood on it. We need to align our strategy with realistic and achievable goals for the military. Once our headspace and timing is correct, we can hear the words, “Enemy troops in the open, 400 meters” and engage, without the fear of it all blowing up in our faces.

https://medium.com/point-of-decision/headspace-and-timing-fe89f176eb0

From John Schindler at his XX Committee Blog.  An interesting perspective and some common sense advice:  Think strategically, Take intelligence seriously, Fight corruption hard, Quantity has a quality all its own, But quality counts too.

Conclusion:

To sum up, the Russo-Ukrainian War is Kyiv’s to win, if it approaches the future wisely. The last year has been one of defeat after defeat for Ukraine, sometimes needlessly. Vladimir Putin has opted for war against Russia’s vast neighbor, the second biggest country in Europe, and this is now a conflict that Russia cannot win without a massive invasion and mobilization that would be politically and economically toxic to average Russians. Therefore the initiative has passed to Kyiv, if it has the strength and honor to use it. That will require thinking strategically, turning the espionage tables on Moscow, and building the right military machine for the war at hand. All this can be done, but every day that Kyiv does not change course is a further indication that the Poroshenko government does not really want to win.

How Ukraine Can Win

http://20committee.com/2015/03/08/how-ukraine-can-win/

March 8, 2015

Imagine if someone proposed a modern day Morale Operations branch. We have many adversaries who are well versed in such operations and conducting them quite effectively )just look at the controversy over the contracting of the Lincoln Group or the Transregional Web Initiative and just the employment of Propaganda, Psychological Warfare, and Psychological Operations in general - we are so afraid of these concepts we had to change the name of PSYOP to MISO - we do not have the political stomach to conduct these kinds of operations).   Perhaps since it would be such a political lightning rod (and likely an impossibility) to re-create such an organization that maybe we should create an "Anti-Morale Operations branch" and have it focus on exposing those operations and explaining exactly what the adversaries are doing in this area.  Excerpt:

Betty was one of the few women assigned to OSS Morale Operations (MO). “Eventually I was introduced to the MO group in Washington and then I was informed what my duties were.”

The MO branch was in the business of creating rumors that our foreign adversaries would believe. In other words, black propaganda. Betty worked for the Far East division, while the other MO branch serviced Europe. “They taught us how to utilize material tailored for specific targets in the Far East. We had to learn to disseminate the material, a mix of truth and fantasy; we were taught how to get rumors started, for example.” It was at this point that Betty learned basic tradecraft, the same time-honored skills taught to intelligence officers today, skills that served her well in a post-war career at the CIA.

“The group was mostly made up of newspaper men, radio people, artists, cartoonists, and some writers,” said Betty. “Mainly it was the media. That was what the OSS wanted for a quick production start.” Betty’s team included several artists from China, as well as captured Japanese soldiers who were artists in civilian life and willingly offered their talents to the Allied cause.

“Spy Girl” Betty McIntosh Turns 100 Years Old

https://www.cia.gov/news-information/featured-story-archive/2015-featured-story-archive/201cspy-girl201d-betty-mcintosh-turns-100-years-old.html

Excerpt:

America is bitterly divided over the threat of Islamic extremism partly because we are now bitterly divided over almost everything. But the impasse also reflects disappointment with the initial responses by presidents from each party.

George W. Bush's domestic antiterrorism architecture has largely survived, with some reassessments by Obama. But the disillusioning results in Afghanistan and Iraq discredited Bush's vision of a "global war on terror" powered by U.S. military force. Obama understandably recoiled from those failures. But even some Democratic thinkers believe he has overcorrected, both by downplaying the depth of the radical threat and by overly limiting America's role in responding to it.

THE LONG WAR

Sustainability should guide America’s strategy against Islamic extremism.

BY RONALD BROWNSTEIN

http://www.nationaljournal.com/political-connections/the-long-war-201503

Syria to West: Accept that Assad is here to stay

BY SAMIA NAKHOUL AND LOUIS CHARBONNEAU

HTTP://IN.REUTERS.COM/ARTICLE/2015/03/07/MIDEAST-CRISIS-SYRIA-IDINKBN0M304720150307

African Training Exercise Turns Urgent as Threats Grow

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/03/08/world/africa/african-training-exercise-turns-urgent-as-threats-grow.html?smid=tw-share&_r=0&referrer=

Hawaii-based troops close Philippine counterterror mission

http://www.stripes.com/news/pacific/hawaii-based-troops-close-philippine-counterterror-mission-1.333265?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+starsandstripes%2Fgeneral+%28Stars+and+Stripes%29

North Korea’s nuclear 

ambitions

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/north-koreas-nuclear-ambitions/20

15/03/07/70059198-c1d1-11e4-ad5c-3b8ce89f1b89_story.html

By Editorial Board March 7 at 8:07 PM

Expert: U.S. should shift Korea policy focus to unification from nuclear problem

2014/09/19 04:43

http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/national/2014/09/19/39/0301000000AEN20140919000300315F.html

By Chang Jae-soon

WASHINGTON, Sept. 18 (Yonhap) -- The United States should render full support for South Korea's efforts for unification with North Korea because unification is the only long-term solution to the North's nuclear and other problems, a U.S. expert said Thursday.

David Maxwell, associate director of the Center for Peace and Security Studies at Georgetown University, made the point during a security forum in Washington, stressing that the United States should shift the focus of its Korea policy from the nuclear problem to unification.

"The only long-term solution to the North Korean nuclear problem and human rights atrocities that are being perpetrated on a daily basis by the Kim family regime is the unification of the Korean Peninsula," the professor said.

"It is time for the United States to embrace Korean unification and offer full support to the Republic of Korea to achieve unification," he said during the Seventh Seoul-Washington Forum co-hosted by the Brookings Institution and the Korea Foundation.

Talk of unification has gained traction in South Korea after President Park Geun-hye made a strong case for the cause in her New Year's news conference, saying the event would be a "bonanza" for Korean people and she would try to lay groundwork for it.

Maxwell said that the United States should first make a visible effort to support Park and her unification plans, and then have its "national security apparatus that deals with Korea to be focused on unification, not just the nuclear problem."

   "Under the context of focusing on unification, we will be able to at least [keep] the nuclear problem managed until unification occurs. And the third focus has to be on that U.S. national security apparatus assisting South Korea in developing and carrying out its unification strategy," he said.

Maxwell said that South Korea and the United States should look beyond "deterrence, defense and the nuclear program," which they have focused on for decades in dealing with North Korea, and work together toward unification.

"Through active preparations in supporting unification policy, I think there is a better possibility of bringing about change (in North Korea), rather than the current strategic paralysis," he said.

(END)

A trip to the DMZ (and a T-shirt to prove it): Korea divided on a solution

The key excerpt (and Hahm Chaibong can always be counted on to make provocative remarks):

There’s a sense of abandonment in a nation that has historically suffered when the world turned its back. Hahm Chaibong, president of the Asian Institute of Policy Studies, notes insecurity across the region. China and Japan are in an ongoing dispute over the East China Sea — “not a very comforting scene for us” — while the US is “preoccupied”. Japan has its hands full trying to rebuild its economy; China is “rather nonchalant” about North Korea’s nuclear ambitions. ”For us, we seem to find ourselves in a very similar situation again,” Hahm Chaibong told Crikey from the institute’s palatial study centre in the middle of Seoul.

There are still more than 28,000 American troops stationed on the Korean peninsula. But the symbolism of a transfer of control in the DMZ from the United Nations (a force always led by an American general) back to South Korea in 2015 has many nervous. It’s already been delayed from 2012, and theSouth Korean government has pleaded for even more time. A taskforce will report next year on how ready the South is to take control.

Hahm Chaibong said: ”Why are we battling with a system that has stood us in such good stead for such a long time? Are we not sending the wrong signal again? Any sense of weakening of US commitment to the region, to the Korean peninsula — why are we tinkering with this command structure?

“Secretary Kerry is not interested in Asia, doesn’t know about Asia … What we see now is this rapid diminution of American interest in the region. It’s part of the leadership there.”

So if the North is off the leash and the South is on its own, what should the Park government do? Hahm Chaibong’s view is chilling: South Korea should nuke up, too. Nobody serious in government will talk about it, but hardliners like Hahm Chaibong are lobbying. “I think we should start seriously talking about it so people know we’re serious about it,” he said.

He cites an unsourced figure of 70% support among Koreans to nuclearise its munitions; others Crikey spoke to didn’t believe it was nearly that high. A government official who asked not to be named rejects the notion out of hand and insists diplomatic options aren’t exhausted. The official was more confident that the attitude of the Chinese is changing. “Momentum is growing,” the official said.

“It’s a taboo subject as far as the government is concerned, but they’re fully aware this debate is taking place,” Hahm Chaibong said of the nuclear option. “But it’s only to show the extent to which we’re going to go to change the status quo, which is the world leaving North Korea to develop its nuclear weapons.” That, Crikey points out, is a scary thought. “I’m trying to scare you,” he snapped back. “I’m seriously trying to scare people, especially the Chinese.

A trip to the DMZ (and a T-shirt to prove it): Korea divided on a solution

JASON WHITTAKER | NOV 15, 2013 12:49PM | EMAIL | PRINT

HTTP://WWW.CRIKEY.COM.AU/2013/11/15/A-TRIP-TO-THE-DMZ-AND-A-T-SHIRT-TO-PROVE-IT-KOREA-DIVIDED-ON-A-SOLUTION/

Opinions in South Korea are sharply divided on what to do about its nuclear neighbour. Crikey visited the no-man’s-land between still-warring nations to examine whether diplomacy is still an option.

“WELCOME TO THE JSA!” It’s the exclamation mark combined with the scrolling LED sign that encapsulate the deadly farce. Some 160,000 tourists annually visit the Joint Security Area, the gateway between North and South Korea that almost never opens, one of the most dangerous places on earth and conversely among the safest.

Similarly, the South Koreans Crikey met on a recent study tour. This is a nation still at war, alert if not alarmed. Everyone wants to talk about the “reunification issue” — and opinions are sharply divided on a solution — but it’s front of mind like traffic for Sydneysiders and coffee for Melburnians: conversation without urgency.

The bus winds through the landmine-filled countryside of the 4-kilometre-wide Demilitarised Zone, across booby-trapped bridges, from the JSA to the border. In the hills of the North we’re pointed to Kijong-dong, a sound-stage of a town built for show with barely any residents that the military tour guide only refers to as “Propaganda Village”. But the matching town on the South, Daeseong-dong, is as much of a sham: it’s a tax haven for farmers who are allowed to dodge compulsory military service as an incentive to keep them there.

What you quickly learn is there’s plenty of propaganda on both sides.

At least the South isn’t executing its own citizens. A local newspaper reported this week that 80 people had been executed by the Kim Jong-un regime — for watching foreign films. At the border, we’re warned against sudden movement and venturing too far from the guards (handsome men with clenched fists in dark sunnies, apparently chosen for their looks). The logistics are risible — the main negotiation hut straddling the invisible border is locked on the North side and filled with South Korean guards for our visit; it’s reversed when tourists visit from the North — but nobody is laughing.

North Korea is changing — but not fast enough for its neighbour. Kim Jong-un has banished the seven generals who carried his father’s coffin, and a regime that for decades put the military first is now interested in economic development. Tourism has opened up, and more industrial parks are popping up on satellite images.

“[Kim Jong-un] spent two-and-a-half years in Switzerland as a boy in boarding school,” Young Hie Kim, the editor-at-large and diplomatic correspondent for South Korean national daily JoongAng Ilbo, explained toCrikey. “There, unlike many North Koreans, he has come to realise what democracy is, what a democratic way of life is, and how well-to-do the outside world is, even South Korea. So in his mind, even when his father was still alive, I think he thought that the economy is our way. So as soon as he had a chance he is shifting from military-first to economy-first.

“But he has no money.” And that’s the key. If the regime wants foreign investment it will have to agree to resume talks. And under centre-Right President Park Geun-hye, the South Korea line is firm: there’s no negotiation while nuclear programs remain in place.

The fear of many in South Korea is that the United States is losing interest. Young Hie Kim believes while secretary of state Hillary Clinton was focused on south-east Asia, her replacement, John Kerry, is more interested in the Middle East, while President Barack Obama is distracted by domestic issues. The much-heralded “Asia pivot” has made another deviation, according to Young Hie Kim.

There’s a sense of abandonment in a nation that has historically suffered when the world turned its back. Hahm Chaibong, president of the Asian Institute of Policy Studies, notes insecurity across the region. China and Japan are in an ongoing dispute over the East China Sea — “not a very comforting scene for us” — while the US is “preoccupied”. Japan has its hands full trying to rebuild its economy; China is “rather nonchalant” about North Korea’s nuclear ambitions. ”For us, we seem to find ourselves in a very similar situation again,” Hahm Chaibong told Crikey from the institute’s palatial study centre in the middle of Seoul.

(Continued at the link below)

HTTP://WWW.CRIKEY.COM.AU/2013/11/15/A-TRIP-TO-THE-DMZ-AND-A-T-SHIRT-TO-PROVE-IT-KOREA-DIVIDED-ON-A-SOLUTION/