What To Do About North Korea?

The easy answer is that the Bush administration should stop its “axis of evil” type rhetoric, stop blowing situations completely out of proportion and start doing what is human i.e. humanitarian relief, not because of international politics but because it is right. The not-so-incidental benefit over the long term would be a scaling down of tensions. We DO NOT have anything to fear from North Korea except of course if we encourage greater instability in an already unstable country by inciting a coup or some other ill-advised reactionary act. Hopefully our hubris and ignorance won’t (again) get us into even more trouble with North Korea (and/or Iran).

The U.S. doesn’t have the individual power to occupy a country like Iraq - there isn’t a chance in hell of a unilateral U.S. success in North Korea. The only way that North Korea will come out of the stone ages is if the people are dealt with separately from their government and the solution is carried out multilaterally. In a nutshell, with Bush’s horrendous international credibility and fiery rhetoric not becoming of a U.S. President, there is NO possibility of him leading the U.S. to any successes not only in North Korean but anywhere in the world.

In the eyes of the world we have been made to be impotent, isolated and a country to fear for its ability to destabilize already tense situations. Bush has also made us weaker by strengthening the positions of our competitors, especially China and through his obstinance with appointing Bolton to the U.N., a man who makes a mentally-ill guy walking the streets cursing passerbys look diplomatic, which needless to say has even further eroded international faith in the competence of this adminstration.