Ready? Aye, Ready!
Those foreigners who have managed to slip into North Korea latterly, have described the situation in the country as dire. North Korea has isolated itself utterly from its neighbour, and with its emphasis on acquiring nuclear power and building its armed forces and outfitting it with the latest firepower, it has impoverished even further its population, now living in squalid want.The World Food Program, fully cognizant of the problems in that bleak state, has predicted that up to 40% of North Koreans, out of the 23-million population, present in urgent need of food from outside sources. This has been a cruel, hard, long and food-depleted winter for North Koreans barely managing to survive the hardships they have so long been subjected to.
South Korea's 'sunshine' policy practised by its former government has been replaced by the current administration with a more pragmatic, tough approach, where it insists on some kind of reciprocation; aid for guarantees of a more balanced relationship, a lot less sabre-rattling. South Korea's president, Lee Myung-Bak insists that Pyongyang abandon its nuclear weapons program.
Which has brought a response uncomfortable in its trajectory: "If bellicose U.S. forces and South Korean puppets dare wage aggression against us wrapped in the foolish delusion, we will explode our might ... and ruthlessly destroy the invasionary forces", thunders an official statement published by the country's Central News Agency.
The country's delusional paranoia has become so deep-seated a pathology of self-imposed fear of its sister-country that it issues dire threats with anticipated regularity. The threats may seem febrile and impotent, but North Korea is well armed and exhibits the mad tenacity of collective psychopathy.
Even if Kim Jong Il becomes completely physically incapacitated, it does not seem likely the country will submit to pacification in the near future.
His youngest son has been tipped to become his designated heir to succeed him in governing the country. It could be hoped that his European education might mitigate against his adopting his father's rigidity, but that may very well prove unlikely. The country's persistent insistence on its right to nuclear weapons endangers the stability of east Asia, with Japan in particular, exceedingly nervous.
China's support of North Korea and its leadership puts that emerging superpower at loggerheads with the interests of the other, vulnerable countries in the region, fearful of an out-of-control, nuclear-armed nation of psychological misfits. The country's most recent bellicose threats of war-readiness ensures the region stays on tenterhooks of apprehension for the future.
North Korea's are no mere idle threats. Her launching of long-range missiles capable of carrying nuclear war-heads represent an indelible indication of just how dangerous this world is, and increasingly becoming. We are haunted by the trio of Iran, Pakistan, North Korea; inextricably bound by their nuclear availability, all three presenting as inchoate, globally threatening merchants of death.
Labels: Political Realities, Technology, Troublespots, World Crises
posted by Pieface @ Saturday, February 21, 2009
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