“Begging for War”

Nobody is happy about madman Kim Jong-Un’s growing nuclear and missile capabilities. His goal: to be recognized as a serious nuclear power. Achievable, just as the United States lived with a hostile Soviet Union and angry People’s Republic for decades. Trump’s goal: to de-nuclearize North Korea. Unachievable absent war.

Boom, a probable NK H-bomb test on September 3^rd. Landslides were triggered, and a 6.3 tremor was felt across the border into China. And China is finding measurable radioactive fallout on its own territory. Except for Kim Jong-Un, nobody thinks the North’s having nukes and ICBMs is a good thing. Even as China doesn’t want a US ally (SK) directly on its border, a stubborn and recalcitrant North Korea is pulling the United States deeper into the region, directly the opposite of China’s desire to replace the United States as the regional power. That the little stubborn rodent is Kim Jong-Un happens to be the leader of a “fellow” nuclear power makes his unwillingness to play ball with China that much more difficult for the PRC. Not to mention that to most of the world powers, Washington is making this situation so much worse.

Few nations in the world believe that Donald Trump’s tweetstorms and rhetoric against Kim and the North are doing anything but making Kim show The Donald the North means business. Nuclear war in the region, even against the United States, is a spark away from happening. Looking at the rhetoric, which could unleash a nuclear holocaust exposing Taiwan, the PRC, Japan and South Korea in first position to be hit with death and destruction, world powers have, for the most part, stated directly or unofficially that Donald Trump’s rhetoric that has now shifted to become the main factor escalating the tensions, forcing little-Kim to respond with more tests. The negativity towards Trump’s inflammatory statements run particularly high in those “at risk” Asian nations.

On September 5^th, UN Ambassador, Nikki Haley called for the Security Council to pass more severe sanctions after the North’s massive new nuclear test (hydrogen bomb?). Cut fuel supplies, she demanded. Haley also admonished the North that being a nuclear power comes with the responsibility not to threaten to use that force and saying that Kim is “begging for war.” Pyongyang’s delegation to an economic forum in Russia's Far East answered with this statement: "We will respond to the barbaric plotting around sanctions and pressure by the United States with powerful counter measures of our own." More tests. More provocative acts. More missiles. Or something much worse?

While Americans are justifiably outraged at these explosive developments, global reaction – uniformly condemning Kim’s military build-up and tests – suggested that, given Kim’s personality, it was Donald Trump’s words that were in fact “begging for war.” Trump’s bluster is so uniformly despised at the UN, Haley was so completely unable to muster support at the Council, that the United States was forced to table its request for those additional sanctions against the North. The United States is still pressuring to increase those sanctions. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin has gone so far as to prepare a detailed list of potentially targeted industries, financial institutions, individuals that he believes should be targeted… including some in China itself.

It is pretty clear that Kim Jong-Un feels the need to demonstrate how powerless the U.S. really is after Trump’s angry rants. “North Korea's ambassador to the UN in Geneva, Han Tae-song, said his country's recent ‘self-defence measures’ were a ‘gift package addressed to the US… The US will receive more gift packages from my country as long as it relies on reckless provocations and futile attempts to put pressure on the DPRK (Democratic People's Republic of Korea),’ Reuters news agency quoted him as saying.” BBC.com, September 5^th.  Pretty clear what is emboldening Kim.

Trump’s has even threatened his ally in the South, accusing them of “appeasement” and threatening trade barriers. He went so far as to suggest that even China could be cut off as a US trading power if they do not stop all economic contact with the North. While both sets of threats angered the recipients of that wrath, these are actions that no US experts think could remotely be carried out. Making empty and unachievable threats has seriously undermined the President’s credibility almost as much as the contradictory and conciliatory remarks from high-ranking Trump officials.

Himself a victim of US sanctions, Mr. Nasty, Russia’s Vladimir Putin, was beyond candid on US efforts further to isolate North Korea: “Although he condemned the North's test as ‘provocative,’ Mr Putin said: ‘Sanctions of any kind would now be useless and ineffective… They'd rather eat grass than abandon their [nuclear weapons] programme unless they feel secure. And what can establish security? The restoration of international law. We should promote dialogue among all interested parties.’… Citing a ‘humanitarian aspect,’ Mr Putin said millions of people would suffer under tougher measures, adding: ‘Sanctions have been exhausted.’” BBC.com. We seem to be trapping ourselves into a corner where our remaining choices go from bad to horrible. We are bumbling amateurs flailing in world of awful consequences.

Korea’s nuclear options, beyond a direct attack on US soil, include one scenario that would instantly bring the US economy to a halt: a nuclear blast in outer space above the United States that would generate enough force from a resulting EMP: “There’s little surprise that North Korean state media has been lauding the power of Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP)… This is where the gamma radiation of a high-altitude nuclear blast interacts with the ionosphere — a blanket of electrons and electrically charged particles surrounding the Earth — to send a series electromagnetic pulses spearing into the ground below… Once this burst of radiation strikes the ground it can induce strong currents — particularly in electrical cables and phone lines. This can overload and destroy electrical networks, as well as cause delicate circuit boards to fuse… An entire economy can be brought to a standstill in nanoseconds.” News.com.au (News Corp.), September 5^th.

Given the primitive state of the North’s infrastructure, a US blast above them would not have remotely the same impact (as the above image shows). But what if we decide to shoot down a North Korean “test” missile? Does that provoke the unthinkable? And if we try and shoot down a missile and fail, is that worse? South Korea has just consented to an increase in our anti-missile deployment within their borders.

What is viable? What can we do? For more strategies that we could follow, take a walk back to my August 1^st A Man without a Foreign Policy – Korean Nightmares blog and see. But pretending we can convince Kim Jong-un to abandon his sophisticated nuclear/missile program, when that is the only thing – in his mind – keeping him from being invaded by the United States, is sheer folly. I do not want to hear about the “Tweet that started a nuclear war”… if there is anyone left to read the tweet.

I’m Peter Dekom, and we seem unable to create major foreign policies that are realistic and that actually generate positive results, even where it is a matter of our survival.