The American Spectator

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Ben Stein's North Korea

1.2.03 @ 12:01AM

A HOLIDAY HIT
Re: Steve Hornbeck's 'Twas Just Before Christmas:

Wonderful! And what's truly amazing is that someone who once wrote for Politically Incorrect's host (nameless here, forevermore) could pen something as bitingly observant of our Democratic hopefuls. I can't help but wonder what he wrote that "BM" would say on the air!
-- Bob Johnson
Bedford, TX

CRISIS OF EVIL
Re: Ben Stein's Iraq and North Korea in Cahoots?:

Yes, a diversionary tactic by a valued member of the Axis of Evil (N. Korea) to confuse American strategists and commentators as we prepare for war on the most proximate threat (Iraq). Exactly the thought I've been mulling since Pyongyang started acting up, only Ben wrote it first and wrote it more cogently. That illumination needs to get out, especially to such as the editors of the L.A. Times, who can't get beyond the sophistry that Korea merits more urgent attention. If the Bush administration understands this, that would explain the downplaying of the "crisis" in its weekend media outings. Baghdad first. Then we take care of the peninsula's playboy potentate.
-- K. E. Grubbs Jr.
Irvine, CA

Ben Stein, bless him, is thinking like a lawyer when he asks whether Iraq and North Korea are in cahoots. Perhaps he wonders, as do many thoughtful folk, whether there is an evidentiary basis, a paper trail perhaps, supporting the prosecutorial theory that the two states conspire against us. He, and they, need not trouble themselves with this question.

In geopolitics, as in jazz, coordinated actions by multiple parties do not require sheet music. The actions of states on the global chessboard are driven by interests. Whether or not North Korea and Iraq have ever exchanged memos or taken meetings to plan the current gambit against the United States, they are perforce acting in concert since they have a common, overwhelming interest: victory. It is entirely unnecessary for there to have been explicit planning, or for there to be ongoing conferencing for cahoots to be cahoots. Jazz musicians improvise exquisitely, each responding to the others, anticipating melodic and rhythmic ploys with no explicit forewarning. Bees build architectural marvels, in concert, with not a single feasibility study or planning memo. Likewise, our enemies and adversaries.

The axis of evil is real. There may never come a day when somebody can produce the sort of documentary evidence of this conspiracy that would satisfy an Orange County jury -- there may well be no such material.

There are, however, and, sadly, will be many more smoking guns. Of course Iraq and North Korea are in cahoots, and it matters not a whit if these cahoots are de facto rather than de jure. From our point of view, there is no difference, nor is there any other point of view that is of any interest to us in this matter.

Bravo, Mr. Stein. Shout it loud, shout it often.
-- Paul Kotik
Plantation, FL

Good work, Ben. You got the attention of Army planners. Your article was carried on the West Point alumni site -- wp-forum. The collaboration you suggest is too obvious to be ignored. They (Iraq and NK) have vital interests at stake. They would be irresponsible Bad Guys not to be talking to each other. They read the tea leaves. They read George W's press releases. I like the line of the Administration: "We are not negotiating; this is not a crisis; bad news, but no reason to negotiate and reward a reckless tyrant." Pretty good stuff.

The problem I see, is the point you make. Let's not try to do this one on a shoestring. We need to increase the number of good guys on the ground. We need an increase in end strength -- total folks in uniform. The Democrats took a number of peace dividends: creeping inflation not met with pay increases, reductions in medical benefits, cuts in maintenance and training costs, cuts in the training base, reductions in strategic reserves, ammunition accounts depleted and not replaced, and back to back deployments of troops in uniform. Combat training subjects in some cases replaced with sensitivity training and "How to Be a Good Peacekeeper," etc. Wore the "pigs" down to a frazzle. I'll bet Hillary and Bill got some big laughs over that payback.

Keep up the good work! I read your column regularly in TAS. Happy New Year!
-- Andy O'Meara
Retired Army
Fredericksburg, VA

Ben Stein makes an interesting suggestion (that Iraq and North Korea are in strategic collaboration).

But I must question his assertion that the U.S. should substantially increase its military spending. The U.S. presently spends about 3% of GDP on defense; that is, about $300 billion. The combined total GDP of Iraq and North Korea is only about $80 billion. Iraq is still massively crippled from the Gulf War (they haven't replaced any of the tanks, planes, helicopters, and cannon lost then). If the U.S. cannot squish both regimes like bugs, then we have problems, but the problems are not the budget.

Oh, and one nit to pick: U.S. defense spending was 10% of GDP during the 1950s, but dropped to 5.4% by 1975, and was only 6.4% in 1986, at the height of the Reagan build-up. Now the USSR, which was our great foe, is dead and buried. We don't need the scale of military force we had then, or the budget we had then. Military spending is like any other government spending: it takes from the people, and even when administered scrupulously, it corrupts and distorts the economy.
-- Rich Rostrom

Letter to the Editor

topics:
Law, Military, Iraq, Africa, North Korea