Opinion - The Korea Times

The Iron Lady's legacy for Korea

By Donald Kirk Memories and images of Margaret Thatcher and her legacy as displayed in the media this week evoke an obvious question: What would the Iron Lady have done about North Korea?The answer would seem clear. It’s hard to imagine the woman who dispatched troops to the Falklands in 1982 having much patience with Kim Jong-un. It’s easy to believe her patience would have run out long before the boy king ascended to the throne in Pyongyang. Surely she would have had a thing or two to say about his father Kim Jong-il.It’s not just Thatcher’s response to the Argentine takeover of the Falklands ―a small war for a tiny portion of the Earth ― that gives rise to this assumption. In her final days as prime minister in 1990 she advised President George H.W. Bush not to go “wobbly” about expelling the forces of Saddam Hussein from KuwaitHad she survived as prime minister, would she have also persuaded the first Bush president to fight all the way to the Iraqi capital of Baghdad rather than fall for a failed peace of aerial surveillance, no-fly zones

Apr 11, 2013By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

Waging rhetorical warfare

By Donald KirkNorth Korean rhetoricians and weirdo American politicos sound like they’re exchanging ideas and lines with each other. Kim Jong-un says he needs nuclear warheads “for self-defense.” Sound familiar? Isn’t that sort of like the National Rifle Association’s claim that everyone needs a gun to fend off the bad guys who also have guns?Seems either North Korea is borrowing lines from the NRA or the NRA is copycatting the DPRK. Both sides have a lot of sympathizers. Many people believe the NRA’s got the right idea in thinking that anyone should be able to buy an automatic weapon that can blast off 30-40 shots with one big trigger squeeze.And from what I read a lot of people think it’s quite understandable that North Korea has to have nukes when the U.S. does crazy things such as conduct war games every year. I’ve heard Donald Gregg, a very nice guy who was once U.S. ambassador to South Korea, justifying North Korea’s nuclear program on the grounds of self-defense.The basic principle is the same. You fire your weapon at me, a

Apr 4, 2013By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

War on another Asian front

By Donald KirkMANILA ― War planes strafe and bomb. Tanks shell enemy redoubts. The infantry move in under air and artillery support, spraying automatic weapons fire.Sound like a fantasy of the fighting that might break out across the demilitarized zone between the two Koreas?  Could this be the latest North Korean video of heroic forces wiping out the Americans and South Koreans? Or possibly one of those computer games that make war seem like a fun exercise for kids to who the staccato sound of gunfire and the sight of bodies falling like bowling pins is an all-consuming passion?Sorry, none of the above.It’s what happened when the Sultan of Sulu, a title that sounds like something out of the Arabian Nights, figured it would be nice to make good on ancient claims to Sabah, which happens to be the easternmost part of Malaysia, and ordered his ragtag band to move in from their hideouts in the southern Philippines and take over a village or two. The Malaysians, whose air force and army generally have little to do, suddenly had a real-live war on their hands. In a few days, whi

Mar 28, 2013By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

Looking back on Iraq

By Donald Kirk The anniversary this week of the opening salvos in the American “shock-and-awe” campaign against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq reminds us of the “axis-of-evil” speech delivered by George W. Bush in his state-of-the-union address on January 20, 2002, a year after he was inaugurated.No one would dispute Bush’s charge that North Korea was “arming with missiles and weapons of mass destruction while starving its citizens.” Bush signaled a hard line on North Korea when he said that “states like these, and their terrorist allies, constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world.”The problem, though, was Bush’s claim that Iraq had “plotted to develop anthrax, and nerve gas, and nuclear weapons for over a decade.” Then came the revelation that Saddam did not have a nuclear weapons program.I got to Iraq in June 2004 on the day the U.S. returned sovereignty to an “interim” Iraqi government. I heard the news on BBC as I was going from the Baghdad airport in an old Mercedes d

Mar 21, 2013By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

China, the forgotten signatory

By Donald KirkThere’s no mystery as to why North Korea is calling the Korean War armistice “null and void.” They want to replace it with a peace treaty with the U.S. ― a deal that would freeze out South Korea, which they consider a U.S. client, a flunky state that does not deserve the respect of any agreement that would make the South an equal partner.They figure, if they nullify the armistice, eventually the U.S. and others will come begging for another piece of paper that will turn out to be the long-sought treaty.There’s just one huge problem the North Koreans deliberately overlook, and it’s not about the need for the United Nations Command to recognize the North’s nullification of the deal. The problem is that China is also a signatory to the agreement, and China is not saying anything about nullifying it. The Chinese, as far as anyone can tell, are trying to figure out how to get the North Koreans to cool it and stop making trouble on their doorstep.No, the Chinese aren’t publicly holding the 1953 armistice over the heads of the Nor

Mar 14, 2013By DonaldKirk

Donald Kirk

A slam dunk for N. Korea

By Donald KirkThis just in ― Dennis Rodman wasn’t quite Kim Jong-un’s first choice as his guest for fun and games in Pyongyang. There was actually a move afoot to invite Michael Jordan, but there was a catch. The idea was that he would have gone with the blessing of the White House as a show of gratitude that would have put off plans for the North’s third underground nuclear test.Can anyone believe the deal would have been that simple? An informant who professes to know a thing or two, who’s been to North Korea a few times, swears the North was serious.The White House, of course, would hear nothing of it for obvious reasons ― for the U.S. to agree would mean recognition of the North, acceptance of the North’s nuclear program as a bargaining tool, and would open the way to deal after deal, threat after threat until the U.S. had acquiesced to all the North’s demands, including, no doubt, withdrawal of its 28,500 troops from the South and abrogation of the U.S.-South Korea alliance.All that reasoning does sound plain and simpl

Mar 7, 2013By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

North Korea on the line

By Donald KirkPyongyang’s claim to have called General James Thurman, commander of U.S. Forces Korea, to warn him about "a grave situation” on the Korean Peninsula inspires speculation about what the general and his caller from the North might have talked about.North Korea did not say who made the call, but let’s say it was Kim Jong-un himself. We understand the kid learned French and maybe German during his years as a student in Switzerland but not that much English. Also, no doubt the connection via the hotline across the DMZ at Panmunjeom was a little shaky, but eventually the call was patched through to Thurman at his headquarters in Yongsan.Here, exclusively, is what they might have said to one another ― with interpretation by one of the Supreme Leader’s aides.SL: General, we’re so glad to have gotten through to you at last. As you know, I’m a general too so let’s just make this general-to-general.Thurman: That’s affirmative, general, sorry to have delayed coming on the line, but when we confirmed it was you, I knew to take the cal

Feb 28, 2013By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

Droning on ― and on and on

By Donald Kirk           When Kim Jong-un and the North Korean propaganda machine hint they’ve got startling new weapons for striking terror into Americans thousands of miles away, they may not be talking about just their long-range missiles. How about drones, possibly the most talked about new death-dealer in the inventory of modern killing machines?     We keep hearing about drones spreading death and destruction among friends as well as foes, among the bad guys and good civilians on both sides of the Afghan-Pakistan frontier, but they don’t yet seem to be the weapon of choice on the Korean Peninsula. That’s not going to go on much longer, though.     If these instruments of terror are good to go in the rest of the world, we may be sure they’ll be good for use on both sides of the demilitarized zone. Has there ever been a modern weapon that wasn’t eventually deployed in North and/or South Korea? South Korea’s already clamoring for drones, the spy-in-the-sky kind, and we may be sure North Korea is devel

Feb 21, 2013By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

Feeding N. Korea's nukes

By Donald KirkThe fields of North Hwanghae Province in southwestern North Korea looked lush and green when I was there in July.One of the North Korean minders helpfully explained why the farmers there had it pretty good. They divided their crops between the state and themselves. The more they grew, the more they got to eat. Oh, and you couldn’t miss tall stalks of corn growing around the houses, right up to the walls and windows. Those were "private plots” ― evidence that North Korea wasn’t so rigidly communist after all.Of course, nobody in his or her right mind would go away thinking North Korea was doing all that well. We’ve heard enough horror stories to be aware of the skills of minders and tour guides in misleading visitors. Still, a glance from the tour bus did seem persuasive. Some people believed North Korea might really be doing OK. A guy from the International Crisis Group who was on the trip gave a briefing at the Seoul Foreign Correspondents’ Club in which he intimated as much.OK, you could say we were shown the bread basket of North Korea,

Feb 14, 2013By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

Inside man on North Korea

By Donald KirkA dazzling array of manipulators and operators, swindlers and do-gooders and odd-balls parade across the stage of the Asian drama, some long enough for star billing, others relegated to bit roles, maybe 15 minutes or less of fame, before fading into obscurity. Get to know them a little, and you find they’re all different, all with stories.Among the more intriguing players in the drama has to be Tony Namkung, who’s accompanied so many biggies to Pyongyang that you realize he’s a lot more than a featured performer. The pictures tend to show him in the background, a few steps behind or beside those with top billing.On two recent missions to Pyongyang – those of Google Chairman Eric Schmidt and of The Associated Press Vice President John Daniszewski – the captions sometimes did not even identify him. He too, however, is a star, never more so than when he’s arranging for talks with North Koreans, angling for the release of captured Americans, or, lately, smoothing the way for the AP to operate on a highly circumscribed basis out of an

Feb 7, 2013By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

Read more

The Iron Lady's legacy for Korea

Waging rhetorical warfare

War on another Asian front

Looking back on Iraq

China, the forgotten signatory

A slam dunk for N. Korea

North Korea on the line

Droning on ― and on and on

Feeding N. Korea's nukes

Inside man on North Korea

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