Archive for October, 2005
Posted by joshua on October 31, 2005 at 2:20 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
You’d think most people “open-minded” enough to fork money over to North Korea would be the idea target audience for the regime’s propaganda, but the bad press keeps flowing in, most recently from the superb Yi Sun Shin blog:
Now, as for the Mass Games themselves, they were equally impressive and bizarre, spectacular and disturbing. As I watched with rapt attention at the near perfection of movement by hundreds if not thousands of performers on the field and their living backdrop in the opposite stands, I was thinking about the discipline, skill and commitment necessary to pull it all off – and wondering if that was really the best way to utilize the human capital in Pyongyang.
The display of regimented mass dehumanization appears to have convinced many that what they’ve heard about this regime is true. More here and here. The other theme that emerged from the media delegation that visited North Korea for Arirang is that the economy, reform, and infrastructure all appear to be crumbling as the regime shows a growing fear of opening windows to the outside.
But the question I’ve always had about Arirang is the extent to which it diverted manpower and resources from the more pressing need to produce food. We’re learning the answer to that question, too.
Posted by joshua on October 31, 2005 at 2:20 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
How many kids could you feed for one of these?
SEOUL, Oct. 29 (Yonhap) — Luxury Swiss watches have recently gone on sale at a new store in North Korea, a pro-Pyongyang newspaper in Japan said Saturday.
“Pyongje Co., a dealer for Swiss watch brands Longines and Tissot established in April, is selling their watches at a store in downtown Pyongyang,” Choson Sinbo said in its Internet edition.
North Korea had previously purchased watches in Switzerland for use as special rewards for Workers’ Party cadres and people of merit. Experts say the company is likely to serve as the official distributor of the watch brands in the communist state in the future.
The company is believed to have links with the Pyongsu (Pyongyang-Swiss) Joint Venture Co., a joint venture launched in July between Pyongyang Pharmaceutical Co. and Swiss drug company, Inter-Pacific Holding Corp.
Swiss watches are known to be greatly popular in North Korea, with 240 million South Korean won (US$230,000) worth of Swiss watches imported by the communist state in the first nine months of this year.
Just a reminder–the World Food Program appealed for new donations to feed 6.5 million hungry people in a country property, power, and privilege is strictly controlled by the regime. Someone will die so that someone else in North Korea can wear a Longines watch.
I can see it now: more signs of reform! Where else on earth would the news media be so credulous as to accept such a characterization? HT: DPRK Studies.
Posted by Joshua Stanton on October 31, 2005 at 12:24 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Welcome to the new, independent South Korea–the one that bravely sets its own policy direction without regard for how Yankee imperialists may view it:
The Foreign Ministry is hiring an American PR firm to put a positive spin on its U.S. policies in a nation that has been reading them as increasingly hostile.
The Foreign Ministry recently wrote to the parliamentary Unification, Foreign Affairs and Trade Committee asking for an extra budget of W1.2 billion (about US$1.2 million) next year to pay for the plan, which would take PR work off the hands of the Korean Embassy in Washington.
One wonders exactly how much of this money will go into the hands of the PR firm, and how much is intended for the–sorry–whores who would accept it. The idea here is to correct “misconceptions” about Korea’s diplomatic and security policies among Americans, and to take on the “urgent task” of improving Americans’ perceptions about Korea’s diplomatic and security policies. Presumably, they also intend to attack the spurious myth that South Koreans are anti-American.
“There are limits to what embassy staff can do to deal with U.S. opinion leaders like journalists, academics and lawmakers in a systematic way. Local PR firms know the internal situation in the U.S. best and have the necessary connections,” the ministry said. “We have to turn around U.S. public opinion about Korea’s diplomatic and security policies and relations to the U.S., and we are going to look for ways of countering smears and attacks against Korea.”
The firm would try to bring influential Americans on side to give Korea’s position in major U.S. newspapers, persuade broadcasters to report positively on the country and let experts speak for Korea.
Several comments come to mind. The first is that I now have another opening to flog these photographs:
The second is how sadly revealing this is of how Korea approaches American politics, and what that says about Korea’s own political system. Apparently, South Korea feels that “connections” can smooth over any damage that facts have already done. We saw this with the Tongsun Park scandal, and in ex-Ambassador Hong’s selection, and in his own abortive effort to attack some of the same widely-held American “misconceptions” before he was forced to resign over (ahem) an influence-peddling scandal.
One is entitled to wonder just what the strategy of this campaign will be, and whether it will identify Korea’s image problem in the United States correctly. That problem is not really with all Americans, since far too few concern themselves with the minutiae of U.S. foreign policy. Nor is the problem with all influential Americans and foreign policy activists; some, mainly from the so-called “progressive” left, have long called for a U.S. withdrawal from Korea. This wing of the Democratic Party is in a strongly isolationist mood and now exercises far more influence over the party leadership and nominating process than it did when Bill Clinton was nominated just over a decade ago. The person most identified with Democrats’ more hawkish alternative? Hillary Clinton.
That leaves South Korea to work on regaining the support of American conservatives, the alliance’s traditional–and now, alienated–base of U.S. support. This will require more than extraordinary effort (one hopes that even copious amounts of money will not suffice). As a bare minimum, it will require the South Korean government to act firmly against anti-American violence and discrimination directed at U.S. soldiers, the surest way to infuriate conservative voters. South Korea could easily do this without making any fundamental policy compromises.
The more difficult choice involves jettisonning the very policy foundations of South Korea’s current government–its refusal of most North Korean refugees who reach the doors of its embassies, its unconditional aid to North Korea, diplomacy that consistently undermines U.S. diplomatic positions, the dropping of North Korea as the South’s “main enemy,” and its indefensable diplomatic silence on the North’s horrendous human rights record. Those are facts, not misconceptions. A truly independent nation would confidently pursue the policies of its elected leaders without fear of foreign reaction. It reveals South Korea’s own sense of dependency that it instead attempts to portray these policies as things they are not.
The current image offensive, like the last one, suggests that Korea’s goal is to purchase enough influence in America to allow it to pursue two mutually contradictory goals: foreign policies that undermine U.S. interests, and a defense policy that depends on lavish subsidies from U.S. taxpayers and the psychological value of keeping its children exposed to danger and inhospitality on its own soil.
No doubt, some Americans–mainly to the left of center in the U.S. media and foreign policy establishment–are quite ready to be influenced by the South Korean government, but the facts of Korea’s policies will continue to erode South Korea’s image rapidly among U.S. conservatives as long as they continue to learn of those policies and the emotions that propel those policies.
It is not the existence of Korea’s anti-American mood or policies that alienates Americans, so much as it is the expectation that the U.S. will continue to subsidize them.
Update: GI Korea has more.
Posted by Joshua Stanton on October 31, 2005 at 12:15 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
The conservative main opposition party on Monday submitted a statement to the National Assembly urging the government not to abstain from voting on a resolution against North Korean human rights violations at the UN General Assembly. South Korea did not vote on three resolutions condemning abuses in the Stalinist country in the UN Human Rights Commission since 2003.
Grand National Party deputy floor leader Na Kyong-won told reporters the party’s lawmakers adopted the draft at a general meeting on Monday morning. Na called for an end to the government’s “cowardly” dodging of the issue.
Link.
Posted by Joshua Stanton on October 31, 2005 at 12:10 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Link. Photo cred: Chosun Ilbo.
Posted by Joshua Stanton on October 31, 2005 at 11:15 am · Filed under Uncategorized
First, I read this:
BERLIN (Reuters) - Iran is permitting around 25 high-ranking al Qaeda members to roam free in the country’s capital, including three sons of Osama bin Laden, a German monthly magazine reported on Wednesday.
Citing information from unnamed Western intelligence sources, the magazine Cicero said in a preview of an article appearing in its November edition that the individuals in question are from Egypt, Uzbekistan, Saudi Arabia and Europe.
They are living in houses belonging to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, the report said.
“This is not incarceration or house arrest,” a Western intelligence agent was quoted as saying. “They can move around as they please.”
Not the first time we’ve heard this. Now I read this:
[Iranian President Ahmedinejad] then said: “And God willing, with the force of God behind it, we shall soon experience a world without the United States and Zionism,” according to a quote published by Iran’s state news outlet, the Islamic Republic News Agency.
Link. More. At what point did we concede that it’s possible to do these things and still live?
Front sight post needs to be raised a click, but much better otherwise.
Seriously–nobody elected the man, and post-9/11, we’re more than entitled to take him at his word, as we should have with bin Laden. For the love of God, just off him now, before we end up spelunking for his bristly ass all over and under the Zagros Mountains. He probably doesn’t have the bomb yet, nobody would miss him, he has no political legitimacy, as one one who lives for total control over the lives of people who didn’t consent to said control, it’s a pretty tenous argument that he deserves to share our oxgyen supply.
International law? Please. Since when has Iran’s regime followed it? Since when have we, when our nation’s security was at stake? Who’s going to protect this country–Hans Frigging Brix? Kofi Annan? Jacques Chirac? The U.N.’s controlling shareholders want a multipolar world, which is diplospeak for terrorists killing Americans and keeping the latter’s power divided. It will dither long beyond the day Iran tests The Bomb, just as it and the U.S. administration of the day dithered over North Korea until it had The Bomb. The last thing we need is another pathological regime with nuclear weapons, and I really don’t give a squeaky fuck if pasty-faced genetic dead-ends at The Guardian disagree.
Off him now.
And if another one tries to build The Bomb, off him, too. Be public, honest, and brazen. Do it from the air or use local talent, but do not introduce American troops. Deny nothing except our sources and methods. Request advance approval from absolutely no one. Make no claims of sure-fire evidence of this-or-that. Simply state, after the fact, that we are taking no chances in today’s world. Proceed to blockade Abadan and every other Iranian port. Offer the Iranian people our full support to topple and hang every last fascist mullah, provided the oppo holds free and fair elections in one year. If the Iranian Army attacks civilian demonstrators, call in air support and drop weapons to the opposition, but do not introduce troops under any circumstances. No new deployments for the 101st. No supplemental appropriations. No messy exit strategies. Just a few dead people that no one will ever miss.
Posted by joshua on October 31, 2005 at 11:10 am · Filed under Uncategorized
Posted here. Part I, here. Thanks again to Dr. Vollertsen for being so generous with his time.
Posted by joshua on October 31, 2005 at 7:15 am · Filed under Uncategorized
The conservative main opposition party on Monday submitted a statement to the National Assembly urging the government not to abstain from voting on a resolution against North Korean human rights violations at the UN General Assembly. South Korea did not vote on three resolutions condemning abuses in the Stalinist country in the UN Human Rights Commission since 2003.
Grand National Party deputy floor leader Na Kyong-won told reporters the party’s lawmakers adopted the draft at a general meeting on Monday morning. Na called for an end to the government’s “cowardly” dodging of the issue.
Link.
Posted by joshua on October 31, 2005 at 7:10 am · Filed under Uncategorized
Link. Photo cred: Chosun Ilbo.
Posted by joshua on October 31, 2005 at 6:15 am · Filed under Uncategorized
First, I read this:
BERLIN (Reuters) - Iran is permitting around 25 high-ranking al Qaeda members to roam free in the country’s capital, including three sons of Osama bin Laden, a German monthly magazine reported on Wednesday.
Citing information from unnamed Western intelligence sources, the magazine Cicero said in a preview of an article appearing in its November edition that the individuals in question are from Egypt, Uzbekistan, Saudi Arabia and Europe.
They are living in houses belonging to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, the report said.
“This is not incarceration or house arrest,” a Western intelligence agent was quoted as saying. “They can move around as they please.”
Not the first time we’ve heard this. Now I read this:
[Iranian President Ahmedinejad] then said: “And God willing, with the force of God behind it, we shall soon experience a world without the United States and Zionism,” according to a quote published by Iran’s state news outlet, the Islamic Republic News Agency.
Link. More. At what point did we concede that it’s possible to do these things and still live?
Front sight post needs to be raised a click, but much better otherwise.
Seriously–nobody elected the man, and post-9/11, we’re more than entitled to take him at his word, as we should have with bin Laden. For the love of God, just off him now, before we end up spelunking for his bristly ass all over and under the Zagros Mountains. He probably doesn’t have the bomb yet, nobody would miss him, he has no political legitimacy, as one one who lives for total control over the lives of people who didn’t consent to said control, it’s a pretty tenous argument that he deserves to share our oxgyen supply.
International law? Please. Since when has Iran’s regime followed it? Since when have we, when our nation’s security was at stake? Who’s going to protect this country–Hans Frigging Brix? Kofi Annan? Jacques Chirac? The U.N.’s controlling shareholders want a multipolar world, which is diplospeak for terrorists killing Americans and keeping the latter’s power divided. It will dither long beyond the day Iran tests The Bomb, just as it and the U.S. administration of the day dithered over North Korea until it had The Bomb. The last thing we need is another pathological regime with nuclear weapons, and I really don’t give a squeaky fuck if pasty-faced genetic dead-ends at The Guardian disagree.
Off him now.
And if another one tries to build The Bomb, off him, too. Be public, honest, and brazen. Do it from the air or use local talent, but do not introduce American troops. Deny nothing except our sources and methods. Request advance approval from absolutely no one. Make no claims of sure-fire evidence of this-or-that. Simply state, after the fact, that we are taking no chances in today’s world. Proceed to blockade Abadan and every other Iranian port. Offer the Iranian people our full support to topple and hang every last fascist mullah, provided the oppo holds free and fair elections in one year. If the Iranian Army attacks civilian demonstrators, call in air support and drop weapons to the opposition, but do not introduce troops under any circumstances. No new deployments for the 101st. No supplemental appropriations. No messy exit strategies. Just a few dead people that no one will ever miss.
Posted by Joshua Stanton on October 30, 2005 at 12:43 am · Filed under Uncategorized, Japan
It may at first seem counterintuitive that an increased threat from North Korea has resulted in a reduction of U.S. troops in the region. North Korean nuclear antics, although not solely responsible, have helped Japan embrace constitutional changes that will allow it to take a more active role in regional security. One result, and again this is an issue with more than one side, is that 7,000 U.S. Marines will be leaving Okinawa, Japan.
UPDATE, 30 October: The U.S.-Japan agreement also includes, “…the construction of a new generation of radar equipment in Japan as part of a missile defense system.”
UPDATE, 31 October: From the Dong-A Ilbo, ‘China Promises North Korea $2 Billion’:
According to the Hong Kong newspaper, China’s aid will be aimed at reviving North Korea’s heavy industry… “The stronger alliance between the U.S. and Japan increases the ‘strategic value’ of North Korea. And to China, the stability of the North Korean regime is ever more important. This is why China decided to extend financial help to the North,” according to a source in Beijing. (emphasis added)
Posted by Joshua Stanton on October 30, 2005 at 12:29 am · Filed under Six-Party Talks
From the NYT: ‘N. Korea Says U.S. Pressure Hurts Talks.’
Posted by Joshua Stanton on October 29, 2005 at 5:10 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Even at the risk of their lives, still they come.
Thirteen North Koreans sought refuge in a Korean school in Qingdao, China on Thursday and are asking South Korea for asylum. On Oct. 11, eight North Korean refugees entered the same school and were safely handed over to the South Korean consulate.
A Foreign Ministry official said 13 defectors — nine women and four men — entered the Qingdao Ewha International School at around 11:30 a.m. saying they wanted to go to South Korea. The official said Seoul was negotiating with Beijing to move them to the consulate and then on to South Korea.
Posted by Joshua Stanton on October 29, 2005 at 3:54 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Realignment of U.S. Forces in Japan Proceeds in Relative Calm:
The United States and Japan agreed on a plan today to relocate a major American air base on the southern island of Okinawa, removing the biggest obstacle to talks on the redeployment of American troops across the country.
According to the plan, the Futenma Marine Corps air base, located in the city of Ginowan, will move to an existing United States base, Camp Schwab, in a less-populated area of the main Okinawa island.
The agreement will allow United States and Japanese officials to go ahead with broader talks this weekend in Washington over the realignment of American troops in Japan. Both sides are hoping to reach an overall agreement on the reorganization of United States forces before a visit to Japan by President Bush in mid-November.
Posted by Joshua Stanton on October 29, 2005 at 3:52 pm · Filed under Uncategorized
Japan to Host U.S. Nuclear Carrier:
The United States will base a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier in Japan for the first time starting in 2008, the United States Navy said Thursday, after Japan, the only country ever hit with atomic bombs, dropped long-standing resistance to the move.
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