Of Idiots and Idealogues

IDIOCY IS TO BE EXPECTED FROM IDEOLOGUES.

North Korea, or the easier to write, DPRK, is the last communist country on earth. And it one of the last few absolute monarchies. The DPRK shares this unique distinction with only had handful of fundamentalist Arabic countries. So it combines the worst forms of government. We have Kim Il-Sung (the father), Kim Jong Il (the son) and now Kim Jong-Un (grandson). In the DPRK, Kim Il-Sung has nearly mythic status. Many in the country, some by force but many by choice, see him as the “Father” of North Korea. Then came the “Son” Kim Jong Il, and the heavier, shorter, but probably much more shrewd “Son” Kim Jong Un. In only a somewhat crude metaphorical, and irreligious for the religious, terms, we have two pieces of the Christian Trinity.

THE WHOLLY SPIRIT?

The official state doctrine of the DPRK is Juche. Juche literally means self-reliance, but it is composed of three linked doctrines:

1. Political Independence.
2. Economic Self-reliance.
3. Self-reliance in Defense.

Many scholars have suggested that juche completes the DPRK “trinity.”  It functions as the “holy spirit” that animates the many North Koreans. Call juche what it is, but it has generally worked. The nation is independent of a larger block of mutual defense partners. It engage is some trade, but it hangs on even as the sanction screws are cranked down. But number three is the salient.

In the mind of the North Koreans, they did not lose the Korean War. And in fact, the war has not really ended. There is only an armistice agreement in place. And the war ended three years after it began, the 38^th parallel. 

The highly militarized regime has a million-man army. It is a defensive fortress. It has the 38^th parallel lined with artillery pieces. More than 11.000 are aimed at Seoul. In a shooting war Seoul would suffer hundreds of thousands of causalities. A conventional war up the peninsula to Pyongyang would be fought hill by hill. Fortified position by position. Corpse by corpse.

COOLER HEADS???

The DPRK has been in-artfully cranking out belligerent babble for quite some time.  It has been the policy of America (and all Western nations) not to lower itself to responding to the lunacy. No longer. Kim keeps his place on orange alert all of the time. Militarist propaganda is everywhere. The military is worshipped. And its members are well paid and well treated, relative to the masses. 

Over the years, tensions have ebbed and flowed between the DPRK and the west. Trump has matched Kim’s belligerent mistranslations with two am tweets. The US and most advanced nations would not trade taunts, but Trump is all thumbs. In a most minuscule and certainly unforeseen way, and ever the “business man,” Trump has leveraged “egging on” economies of scale. North Korea likely employs hundreds of bureaucrats to figure out new ways to call American leaders capitalists running dogs. Trump does it solo and without a stipend. But we all digress…

WHY ALL THIS BARKING BACK?

There is an Arab folk saying that says “When dogs bark, don’t bark back.” That thought could be rephrased as “don’t stoop to their level.” Or maybe, “that remark is beneath contempt.” Or maybe do anything but feed the DPRK mouth machine. 

Stunts and chest pounding keep Kim firmly ensconced in power. A bowl of rice a day, a bed on the floor of cold two room apartment and a bicycle to ride to and from the munitions factory. But the is very effective method to what looks like to many America is “madness.” Kim has two goals and they are linked. Stay in power and survive to dictate another day. He has achieved the first and the second seems highly likely. 

When the PDRK got nukes, it got tenure. The history of the last 20 years makes it clear that nukes are necessary for rouge regimes to remain in power. Since the fall of the USSR, Russia can no longer maintain the independence of its former client states. After the first Gulf War, Saddam abandoned both his hamstrung nuclear program and his chemical weapons. Mohammar Qaddafi in Libya similarly gave up his quest for weapons of mass destruction. Both men were later overthrown and pulled out of holes to be executed. 

IRAN AND THE KIM BOYS GOT THE MESSAGE…

One of the pillars of juche is an independent self-defense.  Nuclear weapons are the way to assure that self-defense will work and assure the states’ existence. An analogy can be drawn to seemingly inapposite places-Israel and Iran. 

Both Israel and Iran are non-Arabic countries in a predominantly Arab region.  Israel has the US as a strong ally, but does not want to draw directly upon it for its defense. And the last thing the US would wish to do is intervene militarily for Israel. 

Iran has no strong ally that it can call upon. It occupies a very strategic position but is militarily surpassed by US forces. It could obstruct the Straights of Hormuz for a short time, but the narrow passage would soon be reopened and Iran would pay a severe price. 

Israel has a core principle that it won’t rely upon other countries for its defense. To that end, it has nuclear weapons, probably around 100 of them. Iran does not currently have nuclear weapons, but its program is on hold because of an agreement with the US that lifted sanctions.  

MUZZLE THE MUTTS…

Ego and idiocy has no place in measured diplomacy. The facts on the ground must guide the policy choices and implementation. It should not be left to idiots or ideologues. 

THERE ARE NO NUCLEAR DEFENSES OVER THE DESERT OF THE REAL!

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