Disclaimers, Mission Statement, and Comment Policy
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this blog are those of the post’s author alone. Everything you read here is based on open sources or sources we know through our private associations. The views expressed on this blog are not the views of any other organization, entity, agency, or company. In fact, we don’t even necessarily speak for each other, although we do generally agree on a few fundamentals.
On Diplomacy: The most accurate way to predict the behavior of people and governments is to examine how they’ve behaved in the past. In the past, North Korea has negotiated in bad faith, shown little respect for human life, broken its agreements, and violated international customary law without hesitation. Regimes lacking respect for human life are seldom as interested in preserving life by maintaining peace as they are in maintaining power by threatening war. Regimes like this begin by killing their own people; once they feel able, they eventually turn on their neighbors. North Korea will continue to be mortal threat to its own people and its neighbors as long as it is ruled by such a regime. Diplomacy cannot alter these fundamental realities, and supporting the regime financially can only extend and exacerbate them.
North Korea will not reform gradually as the result of quiet diplomacy or financial incentives. The rulers of North Korea understand that they will be deposed if they relax their grip on total control of the population.
On the U.S.-South Korean Alliance: Alliances are based on shared interests and values. Extending the reign of a democidal regime is inconsistent with the interests and values of the United States. The United States should not indirectly extend the reign of the North Korean regime by giving military and financial support to governments that do so directly. The presence of U.S. military forces in Korea should depend on both U.S. national interests and political conditions of Korea. If South Korea chooses to support the North Korean regime, it should be prepared to do so without the support of U.S. taxpayers.
On Proliferation: North Korea admits to having nuclear weapons and has been caught transferring uranium hexafluoride to Libya, then a known supplier of terrorists, through the A.Q. Khan network. It has sold missiles to Syria, Yemen, Pakistan, and Iran. It produces and traffics in illegal drugs and counterfeit currency. The danger that the North Korean regime could supply weapons of mass murder to terrorists makes it a grave threat to the rest of the world.
On Making North Korea a Fit Place for Its People: North Korea will only change when its government reflects the will of its people. North Korea’s people want most of the same things people everywhere want: self-determination; freedom of expression, religion and association; food and clean water; good education for their kids; marriage and families; some frivolous entertainment; and the satiation of their intellectual curiosities. They want all of these things without fear of Thought Police, firing squads, or labor camps.
The North Korean regime has intentionally deprived the North Korean people of the fundamental necessities of life so that it could build a gargantuan army and nuclear weapons. Somewhere between 50,000 and 300,000 North Koreans want those the necessities of life so badly that they risked their lives, crossed over to China, and live like fugitives. We believe that many others, who cannot leave, also wish not to live under Kim Jong Il’s reign. We want what they want.
On Accomplishing Regime Change: Invading North Korea could cost millions of lives. It would only play toward North Korea’s strengths–a massive conventional military sewn together by xenophobic propaganda.
We believe that the liberation of North Korea should be accomplished by the North Korean people with the political and material support of free nations everywhere. This requires us to help North Koreans build a clandestine opposition movement inside their country. This process will not be quick, easy, or bloodless. It is still the best remaining alternative, and there is reason to hope that it can undermine the loyalty of portions of the North Korean military.
On Restoring Democracy and the Rule of Law: Members of the regime must be held responsible for their crimes against humanity only after being tried in free North Korean courts, in accordance with internationally accepted judicial procedures. There must be no collective punishment, vengeance against family members, or punishment without trial.
On Reunification: After a brief period during which essential conditions of survival are restored, the Koreas should reunify under democratic rule. South Korea and its allies must immediately and urgently plan for this contingency. It will require a careful balancing of economic freedom and protection of the North Korean people from economic exploitation.
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James J. Na “¢ Joshua “¢ Richardson
Bravo and break a leg or three!
Dear Contributors,
Congratulations on your new endeavor. I would like to get down to business by assessing your general assumptions in order to intelligently assess the policies you may suggest on this blog.
You have suggested the wisest solution — at this point — is for outside sources to assist malcontented North Koreans to subvert the regime; you suggest this subversion on the assumption Asian cultures have basic human aspirations similar to Western peoples; and therefore, such cultures are intrinsically open to obtain these goals through an alternative political system other than North Korea’s current system. ( Note: this was the same reasoning provided for the over-throw of the Saddam Hussein’s regime… but, hasn’t born out to be overwhelmingly true.) Furthermore, you suggest illegal North Korean cross-border traffic between North Korea and China as a reliable indicator of political discontent without considering most traffic simply economic opportunism.
My question: If North Korea is truly the world’s largest cult, and the recognized fact that nothing is more impenetrable than the human mind slammed shut with quasi-religious bliss. Do you recognize that for cults — often – no reasoning, nor emotional appeal to alternative values can get through its armor of self-proclaimed joy?
Recognizing that most Muslims aspire to theocratic rule, why do you think North Koreans seek anything other than it’s traditional mode of authoritarian communitarianism under the rule of a shaman king(Kim Jung Il)?
You may appeal to the firing squads, the hunger, the misery, ect. … but, history has proven cults actually relish these miseries as proof of their special choseness: miseries that steel them against the outside world — galvanized by a firm conviction of they are a special-elected people.
Again: Why do you believe an outside assisted regime-subversion strategy can successfully de-program a mega-cult?
Thank you.
Silly Sally (yes, I’ll use your normal moniker, now);
Your understanding of the “dynamics of cults†sounds like something out of an intro to psych textbook for college freshmen. First you’re trying to compare North Korean people controlled by the state to those who willingly leave ‘reality’ to join cults – not a good foundation to begin from. Second you ignore the reality of what has happened and what is happening as North Koreans learn the truth; the majority calls for the Kim Jong-il regime to be taken down, by any means necessary.
Using your obviously vast knowledge of cults, it should be plain to you that positive rumors of the world outside North Korea is imperialist fabrication, or greatly exaggerated – as has been pounded into those peoples heads.
==> It will take more information over more time, but the information that has seeped in so far has indeed influenced some to leave.
As far as manufactured intelligence from defectors; wow, no one in the intel community ever thought of that before. I guess they haven’t been comparing notes on what North Korean defectors have said all this time. Thanks for the keen insight there.
You’re kind of going in circles here by repeating your idea of how cults are supposed to work. If that were correct, then defectors in the South would not want the Northern regime to fail – but they do. Think on that for awhile.
If I may chime in, I do not think this statement holds, in the first place.
Silly Sally — post only under one name, or don’t post. Thanks.
The cult thing Col.Higgens mentions isn’t that far off based, and in my opinion will be a major glitch with the Korea Liberator’s subversion theory advocated. I wonder if the issue can be better addressed than what I see above?
When I see North Korean spectaculars in auditoriums filled with synchronized flashcards, singing, and dancing etc. I don’t get the feeling they are calling for Kim Jung Il’s downfall. Looks like a big happy church full of positive thinking.
Actually, when you see all that what you’re seeing is the privileged social class of those allowed to live in Pyongyang, where food and electricity are most steadily supplied. And you’re seeing performers who know that screwing up could mean that they and their families lose the privilege of living in Pyongyang – they could be moved to the countryside at best, gulags at worst. There is a word for what we’re allowed to see in most cases; acting.
Jeff, you label people who think outside info will help as being programmed cultists? What the hell are you smoking?
It sounds to me like you’ve swallowed the Bruce Cumings crap about how North Koreans basically love their slavery. Yeah, and they enjoy being tortured and starved to death in gulags too, right?
Do you live in South Korea? If so, isn’t it totally obvious that Koreans love freedom? As I said previously, what were all the demonstrations for in the past, if not for increased freedom?
Great statement there. I agree with your agenda 100%.
Madeleine Albright?
Oh, you mean this woman?