TOBY PETZOLD

Anybody care to explain why it’s so damned important that the United States enter into another round of bilateral talks with North Korea?

Is it because that’s what Clinton and Carter did?

Hmm. Well, only a partisan liar or someone completely ignorant of history would suggest that those efforts succeeded.

Bush’s sexpartite strategy is superior for the simple reason that it takes into account the reality of the dynamic in East Asia: North Korea is China’s responsibility. By including the other regional powers, the onus is placed squarely on Beijing to demonstrate their commitment to becoming a partner for peace and commerce in the region.

The idea that the United States is the only obstruction to peace with the North Koreans is just weird. Demanding that we, alone, must negotiate with the Kimchi Pot is to completely ignore the fact that he is Beijing’s proxy in maintaining the tension between our allies and a totalitarian regime where extreme political repression, concentration camps, and famine are the rule.

China just wants to keep deferring the day that the two Koreas are united. They don’t want to see a successful pro-American country sitting so closely to their own. They want to squash that just like they do Taiwan and any other incovenience in their sphere. 

If these reports that North Korea has successfully tested a nuclear weapon prove true, there is only one country thats reaction matters.

China is the reason why the Kimchi Pot is even still in power. China abides his nuttiness because it annoys Japan and South Korea and us. If the Chinese cut their comrades off at the knees (viz., in the Security Council tomorrow), then we’ll know their attention’s been gotten. If not, then we’ll know that the Chinese intend to continue using North Korea for their own regional agenda. 

So here comes the real test. 

I couldn’t believe this, either. William J. Perry, writing in the Washington Post yesterday:

[…] if North Korea persists in its launch preparations, the United States should immediately make clear its intention to strike and destroy the North Korean Taepodong missile before it can be launched. This could be accomplished, for example, by a cruise missile launched from a submarine carrying a high-explosive warhead. The blast would be similar to the one that killed terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in Iraq. But the effect on the Taepodong would be devastating. The multi-story, thin-skinned missile filled with high-energy fuel is itself explosive — the U.S. airstrike would puncture the missile and probably cause it to explode. The carefully engineered test bed for North Korea’s nascent nuclear missile force would be destroyed, and its attempt to retrogress to Cold War threats thwarted. There would be no damage to North Korea outside the immediate vicinity of the missile gantry.

Is this the advice of the President’s other critics who say that he should have paid more attention to the Kimchi Pot than Iraq?

I can’t wait to hear what Bill Clinton and Madeleine Albright think of this idea.