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Confronting an Unrepentant North Korea

By on 7.26.11 @ 6:08AM

Another day, another North Korean threat.

Just the other day the Kim Jong-il regime threatened to “wipe out” both the U.S. and South Korea if they started a war. Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned: “I’m not convinced that they won’t provoke again.” Another day, another North Korean threat.

The Korean Central News Agency constantly spews forth vicious epithets to little effect. But North Korea’s uncompromising policy makes any negotiated settlement seem unlikely.

The so-called Democratic People’s Republic of Korea is perhaps the world’s greatest tragedy, a misgoverned, impoverished, oppressed hellhole, with 23 million people subject to the whims of an unpredictable communist monarchy entering its third generation. At the same time, the DPRK is developing longer-range missiles and nuclear weapons, largely impervious to threats or rewards.

Regime change is the preferred strategy for some. But neither Kim nor his associates will voluntarily dismantle their system of oppressive privilege. War would be necessary, when even the costs of victory would be horrific.

Sanctions are the second best response for almost everyone, but so far the regime has been willing to allow the DPRK population to suffer whatever hardships result. Sanctions will not be effective without Chinese support. Yet China has been unwilling to take action to further cripple the North’s already decrepit economy.

That leaves diplomacy. However, years of torturous negotiations between the North and the U.S., South Korea, and Japan leave little reason for hope.

The blame does not fall entirely on Pyongyang — the allied powers have not always lived up to their promises. However, noted long-time Asian analyst Larry Niksch writes, “North Korea’s negotiating positions have hardened considerably since” the end of the Six-Party Talks in 2008. And the more advanced North Korea’s nuclear program, the less likely the DPRK is to sacrifice the fruit of its manifold efforts. Indeed, the impending leadership transition will deter any dramatic change in policy.

Yet the status quo seems untenable.

The U.S. is being pressed to provide humanitarian assistance to the North. The chief victims of the Kim regime are North Koreans. At least a half million people, and perhaps many more, died of starvation during the late 1990s. Despite espousing a philosophy of “juche,” or self-reliance, Pyongyang has regularly banged its tin cup around the world, collecting food assistance from China, the Republic of Korea, America, Europe, and the United Nations.

However, donors have tired of the North’s continued belligerence and diversion of food to the army and party elites. The ROK and U.S. cut off aid in 2008 and 2009, respectively. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently noted Washington’s continuing “serious concerns about monitoring” food distribution. The UN World Food Program has collected little money from other nations for similar reasons.

After a hard winter, floods, and outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease — on top of the inevitable failures of central planning — hunger again stalks the North Korean countryside. Official rations are being cut and, some claim, starvation looms. The DPRK took the unprecedented step of requesting that its 40 foreign embassies ask host governments, no matter how poor, for assistance.

In response, the WFP again is requesting donations. The European Union, citing “increasingly desperate and extreme measures…being taken by the hard-hit North Koreans,” agreed to send $14.5 million worth of food. Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter visited the DPRK and declared that to not assist the Kim regime — which, of course, is largely responsible for its people’s plight — was “a human rights violation.”

But the American and South Korean governments remain skeptical of Pyongyang’s claims. Some Western observers believe that the problem is no worse than in recent years. In fact, the Kim regime may be exaggerating the problem in order to stockpile rice for national celebrations planned next year. Seoul’s Unification Minister Hyun In-taek said “there seems to be some political motivation behind North Korea’s recent plea for food aid.” 

In any case, Washington has good reason to say no. The aid may be humanitarian, but Pyongyang would see it as a political concession. Worse, the food would strengthen the government. High-level North Korea defector Kim Duk-hong recently told the Wall Street Journal that food assistance “is the same as providing funding for North Korea’s nuclear program.”

While consciously attempting to wreck the regime by starving its people is a dubious strategy for both moral and practical reasons, Western governments should not bolster Pyongyang either. In fact, unconfirmed reports indicate that rations for the army have been cut and hunger has reached the army. Japanese journalist Jiro Ishimaru, who trains undercover North Korean reporters, observed that Pyongyang “used to put the military first, but now it can’t even supply food to its soldiers.” 

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About the Author

Doug Bandow is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute. A former Special Assistant to President Ronald Reagan, he is the author and editor of several books, including The Politics of Plunder: Misgovernment in Washington (Transaction).

Letter to the Editor View all comments (68) |

Have you considered| 7.26.11 @ 6:49AM

That's odd...I thought Jimmy Carter solved this whole problem for President Clinton in 1994.

I may mis-remember, but I thought NK agreed to halt nuclear development in return for alms.

Oh ya, we later found out that they lied, and continued their development that culminated in underground nuclear testing in the 2000s.

Also, as the U.S. Is Broke, it makes no sense to borrow from China to give to NK. Let China support them directly, or let them starve due to their own collectivist failure.

Pulling NK's chestnuts out of the fire simply enables them...they need a 12 step plan IMO.

A. C. Santore| 7.26.11 @ 9:41AM

Can no-one muzzle that [expletives deleted] clown, Jimmy Carter, the walking, talking human violation.

A. C. Santore| 7.26.11 @ 9:45AM

Oh, and while we're at it, Bill Richardson, too. Fuzzy-brained enablers, both of them.

Occam's Tool| 7.26.11 @ 6:18PM

I worked for Richardson for about a year. ASSSSSSSSSSSHOOOOOOOOLLLLLLLLEEEEE!

Occam's Tool| 7.26.11 @ 6:11PM

Let them starve. Perhaps they will rebel.

The Clintidote| 7.26.11 @ 9:01PM

Yep. And when is it time for Liechtenstein or Monoco or Norway to step up? Let them pour THEIR money into this dump. The USA is done with handouts; we've got our own problems with socialist morons.

If the Norks aren't willing to start shooting these clowns in the head, or smashing them with shovels, they obviously don't care enough. Let them starve.

And the last thing we need are millions of these incompetent, brainwashed drones unleashed upon the world as refugees. They've had decades to get a clue and revolt.

Alan Brooks| 7.26.11 @ 9:07PM

Maybe Kim is waiting for us to go bankrupt?

Timothy L. Pennell| 7.26.11 @ 7:05AM

Absolutely.
When the Romans laid SIEGE, to an enemy, they didn't give them FOOD and FIREWOOD.
The North Koreans need to be STARVED out. They need to be FROZEN out.
They need to reach the point that it's Better to DIE, fighting for FREEDOM, than to keep living under their conditions.
COLD TURKEY.
That's the only way.

Mark in LA| 7.26.11 @ 10:18AM

Another dime store novel comment. The north will start a war with the south if starvation gets too bad and the blame directed (real or imagined) at us or the south. The idea that the citizens of the north with pick up arms and overthrow the government is pure fantasy. Hell, that wouldn't even occur here as long as the army is siding with the government.

We in the US need to get out of Korea and maybe they will find a way to unite which will solve all our problems. If it means giving the family of nitwits who run the north "royal family" status in a united democratic Korea then so be it. We in the US want a divided Korea just as much as the Chinese so we have a need to continue to place troops there. Don't kid yourself our government is not about freedom and peace any more than the other paradises like the USSR and China.

Occam's Tool| 7.26.11 @ 6:19PM

Incidentally, were the Israelis allowed to do that in Gaza, the Palis would cave and come to heel toot sweet.

POST American| 7.26.11 @ 7:32AM

Korea, and the, as ever, 'forgotten' Korean War,
and NOT the done-to-death WW2, is fast emerging as the
most pivotally relevant event of the last century.

As the Globalist-RED China sellout and TREASON
op is now UNDENIABLE, true historians, genuine
observers, will find much to ponder in the details
of the betrayal of allied victory, 60 odd years ago
----TODAY.

A. C. Santore| 7.26.11 @ 9:56AM

The stated goal of the U.S. in Korea was to stop N.K. and return the two Koreas to the status quo ante.

We did that. Only the Supreme Allied Megalomaniac wanted to take North Korea, invade Red China, nuke'em all into radioactive dust, and become President of the U.S.

If by "betrayal of allied victory" you mean that we threw away that result, which was intended, then you miss the point that we did not throw it away, but rather that the North Koreans took advantage of it.

To their continuing detriment, I might add.

And so we continue to dance to their piper.

PCC| 7.26.11 @ 7:38AM

Regrettably, the article fails to mention the single most effective measure that has changed the DPRK's behavior in the past: financial sanctions. Without access to international bank accounts, the regime cannot reward its supporters. Start with the banks in Macau and Hong Kong.

JimH| 7.26.11 @ 7:56AM

If the West actually stood for anything, the Dear Leader's family would not be shopping in Europe and his children would not be going to school in Switzerland. The best resolution likely involves some combination of cruise missiles and sniper teams.

Pecos Pete| 7.26.11 @ 8:01AM

Communism works! I'll bet the usual trolls won't have any comments on this article.

North Korea is the best example of a ruling class. King O would fit very well as their dear leader.

Mr ED| 7.26.11 @ 8:10AM

I am always mystified how those of reasonable intelligence on the Right always "take the bait" and engage in finely grained discussions about how to solve problems that were specifically manufactured to irritate, confuse and plauge the inhabitants of the free world. North Korea is a totally dependent client state of the Communist Chinese and, while the North Koreans may do things not forseen by their Chinese masters from time-to-time, they still serve their purpose admirably and are regarded by their Chinese masters as a useful client state. You can't cure an illness by treating the symptoms, and taking the actions of the North Koreans as anything but serving the greater goals of their Chinese masters is both stupid and foolish.

If you want to bring an end to the North Koreans perfidy you need to take a more broad approach.

Publically offering nuclear and other serious military "assistance" to Taiwan is the way to bring the North Koreans to heel. Assuming that dealing directly with a Chinese vassal state can have any positive effect is just silly.

WRTolkas| 7.26.11 @ 8:21AM

Excellent comments Mr. Ed. China is the key to open the locked kingdom.

Bill S| 7.26.11 @ 8:19AM

We should bomb their nuclear sites NOW!!!

David| 7.26.11 @ 9:09AM

When diplomacy fails, we can always try assassination. Topple enough whackjobs and North Korea just might get the message.

Mark in LA| 7.26.11 @ 10:31AM

Catch a South Korean or American sniper in North Korea and start a war - yeah what a great idea. I am sure nobody out of the ordinary will be noticed in a police state. Of course I forgot, these operations never get botched up and, just like in the movies, the sniper will take cyanide and the equipment will be untracable back to us.

David| 7.26.11 @ 11:59AM

So you prefer to beg, plead, please, and whine to resolve the problem, given that diplomacy and bribes have failed.

Liberals - Weakening the world for a better tomorrow.

Mark in LA| 7.26.11 @ 12:27PM

I don't see you going to the various sniper wanna-be schools and taking it upon yourself to assassinate other undesirables?

Continue on with your fantasy world beliefs.

Dave Williams| 7.26.11 @ 12:46PM

...only the US, I'm afraid. Being powerless dweebs themselves, libs have a morbid attraction for strength in exotic foreign leaders. Wasn't it Madeleine Not-At-All-Bright who said something along the lines of "It's good that the USSR is strong, so as to maintain a balance of power."?
Wake up, folks....these morons are DANGEROUS!

TrueBlue| 7.26.11 @ 4:50PM

All these fancy leaders over there have big houses, shouldn't be that hard to see in the middle of the rest of their rag-tag cities. Who needs to send in sniper teams? Just drop a bomb on a few of them, the survivors will get the idea.

Someone threatens us with war we need to stop backing down, take out the people on top and make sure their cronies get the point they do NOT want to mess with us. We don't need to drop troops in there, and NK doesn't have the capability to get over to us. Put the South Koreans on high alert in case of a land counterassault (which I DOUBT would happen after the head was chopped off), and call it a day.

Yea yea, evil warmongering I know. But a verbal threat of war is just as good as a declaration of war IMO. Hit them before they really do get froggy.

Occam's Tool| 7.26.11 @ 6:12PM

TrueBlue, you are Truely Correct.

Louis Jenkins| 7.26.11 @ 9:17AM

Starvation is an excellent tool to be used by those without morals. Look at the headlines though-US dollar not equal to 4 cents of the 1900 US dollar. N. Korea is a basket case. Let the Chicoms lend aid, after all, they're reaping the benefits of trade with the US. They love having a rogue state next to them and love the mayhem they create. When we've lost our usefulness to the Chicoms they'll do the same towards us.

Occam's Tool| 7.26.11 @ 6:13PM

I have no morals towards the NKs. Besides, I do not paln a Blockade, I just plan not to feed them myself.

ncatty| 7.26.11 @ 9:30AM

You have to admit that Kim is a pretty good golfer. How many holes in one did he score on his first round, 11 wasn't it?

Jack Squat| 7.26.11 @ 10:13AM

The Chinese prop-up the North Koreans as a wedge against US influence in Asia.

The North Koreans are a symptom; the Chinese Government is the disease. Treat the disease, and the symptoms will go away.

We need a Reagan-type leader who is willing to acknowledge and confront the Chinese threat in the same way that Reagan confronted the Soviets: by unleashing the strength of the American economy.

To that end, it's time to entice business, especially manufacturing businesses, back home to the USA with aggressive anti-tax policies that make it profitable to do so. There's no reason that plastic toys or backyard grills made in China can't be made here. This might help to win over unions and get them to accept concessions that nonetheless create millions of jobs for blue-collar workers.

Our energy policy needs to be based on self-reliance, and exploitation of our available resources in the Gulf, Alaska, the Rocky Mountains, Texas, Louisiana, and the Dakotas. This would drive down the world price-per-barrel of oil, and enable us to shrug off the reliance on OPEC. It would also create LOTS of jobs.

Finally, government "revenues" (which always go up when taxes go down) would enable research and development into the military-industrial sector, creating MORE jobs.

The end result? The downfall of the Chinese Communist dictatorship...and with it, North Korea.

It's really not that hard; we have Reagan's blueprint.

Mark in LA| 7.26.11 @ 10:27AM

Reagan's blueprint was NAFTA and the destruction of millions of manufacturing jobs. I doubt all those companies with Chinese factories are willing to let the Republican party take their property without a fight.

I see that the old lies just have a never ending life. The idea that Reagan's massive wasteful defense spending brought down the USSR is another ridiculous big lie. The USSR like all many large empires collapsed from within. Once Gorbachev decided that the Red Army was not going to shoot the people to save the USSR, the whole rotten system had to come down.

Clint| 7.26.11 @ 11:31AM

The Saudis stopped protecting oil prices, and Saudi Arabia quickly regained its share in the world market. During the next six months, oil production in Saudi Arabia increased fourfold, while oil prices collapsed by approximately the same amount in real terms. As a result, the Soviet Union lost approximately $20 billion per year.
In its efforts to keep up with the American defense build-up, the Soviet Union was compelled in the first half of the 1980s to raise the share of its defense spending from 22 percent to 27 percent of GDP, while it froze the production of civilian goods at 1980 levels.
Demonstrated U. S. technological superiority over the Soviet Union and its ability to expand the arms race into space, helped convince the Soviet leadership under Gorbachev to throw in the towel and bid for a de-escalation of the arms race.
Add on Soviet Afghanistan failure.

Doctor Right| 7.26.11 @ 12:18PM

You're absolutely ignorant of history.

Reagan forced the Soviets into bankrupting their economy with defense spending. Unlike a lot of leftwing "experts", Reagan had been on record about the fragile nature of the Soviet economy, and knew how to bring them down.

Reagan also made quite clear in Libya, Central America, and Grenada that the era of American passivity in the face of Soviet expansionism was over. This was something the Soviets had never seen, and they had no response.

Additionally, Gorbachev and the Russians were scared to death of SDI, and made all kinds of overtures to Reagan to get him to abandon the program, but he refused.

You don't know much, so there's no point in arguing with you.

Mark in LA| 7.26.11 @ 1:04PM

How many campesino "communists" did our bought and paid for dictators murder. Maybe you didn't notice all the goodies we got for effort like MS-13, the CIA running drugs into this country, and all the "refugees" who are still in this country on welfare and were given a defacto amnesty.

The same simple minded thinking that the USSR just had to be "fomenting" all the revolutions in every third world hell-hole. Why, the USSR the thinking goes, the people would have been just happy with their mud huts, no schools, and no hospitals while the rulling elite play in Monte Carlo with the money Washington sends them for "fighting communists". Of course, the USSR needed these places for a "staging area" for its planned invasion of the US or the rest of Latin America. Forget the fact that the USSR already had ballistic missile submarines that could attack us at any time and the from closer range. Common sense and intelligence has no place when talking about the Reagan record.

Of course, who can forget Grenada, where we fought bravely against construction workers hired by Britian's Plessy corporation. Guided by obsolete maps the "endangered" students were found two days later. Lets not forget the helicopter crashing into the hospital killing 9 soldiers because the operation was such a F-up. But hey, the real point was to make everybody forget what an idiot Reagan was for putting Marines in Beirut after shelling the place, so I guess it was a success since you didn't mention it.

George True| 7.26.11 @ 2:35PM

Mark in LA: What a load of hooie! You not only don't have a clue what you are talking about, you also bring up all kinds of things that are entirely irrelevant. Who gives a crap if the military had old maps of Grenada, or if a helicopter crashed??? What the hell does that have to do with ANYTHING we are talking about?!

The recently deceased KGB defector Yuri Besmenov revealed that 80% of the KGB's budget was used for destabilizing democratic governments around the world, a process that often takes decades, but which they were committed to 100% for the long term. There was a logical reason we were fighting this process in Latin America and elsewhere. Learn some actual history, moron, instead of coming here and regurgitating the standard leftist claptrap.

Mark in LA| 7.26.11 @ 3:14PM

What "democratic" governments were there in Latin America that we supported. We toppled or helped to topple most of them. What we put in were all right wing dictatorships who didn't mind murdering their citizens. The idea that we stood for freedom and democracy was and is a joke.

Nick| 7.26.11 @ 11:54PM

Mark in L.A.,

Are you Phil Donahue?

Because you sure spout all the same lies that Phil likes to spew.

Occam's Tool| 8.11.11 @ 10:37PM

Dear Mark:

I actually worked with one of those endangered students---he was a senior resident of mine. Note I don't put endangered in quotes, as he was very grateful to Ronnie for saving him. He was a superb doc.

I'd take an eyewitness to history over a Liberal jerk's view any time.

Drunken Sailor| 7.26.11 @ 12:24PM

And just a FYI, NAFTA talks began under George "H" Bush (a compassinate conservative) not under Regan. As Dr. Right pointed your fallacies out below it appears you got zero facts correct. Return to go, do not collect $200

Mark in LA| 7.26.11 @ 12:46PM

Drunken sailor - Reagan proposed NAFTA while campaigning in 1979. The Reagan and Bush administrations were one and the same when it came to trade policy. The same back-room people, the same hate American business first people in charge. The big lie campaign to create guest workers was started under Reagan and signed into law under Bush.

Reagan could not get Mexico to join in a free trade deal due to Mexican pride about their sovereignty so he negotiated the Canadian-American Free Trade agreement which was signed under Bush. When Mexico was about to have another economic disaster under Salinas, they decided to join into the free trade agreements and NAFTA was negotiated. We probably bribed them with money to fix their economic crisis to join.

You need to understand facts and history not just dates on a calendar, not me.

The notion that the USSR collapsed after 70 years of existence and the defeat of the Nazi's simply because some dufus ramped up defense spending on worthless unnecessary projects like the A-10, Divad gun, B-1 bomber, the C-17 overruns, and the useless SDI money pit shows simple minded thinking at its best. The USSR didn't officially desolve until the moron left office but according to you people - he gets all the credit.

What about the 110,000 Americans dead in Korea and Vietnam. What about the trillions spent before Reagan came around. It's no wonder the Republican leacdership thinks it can crap all over you and laughs at you behind your backs. You really are dumb as rocks stupid and you continue to vote Republican. On second thought, I have been mulling a second thesis:

Many of the posters are just shills for the Republican Party. Either they are paid to spout RNC divel or they are low level party hacks hoping to move up in their ass-licking carreers. They post their nonsense, usually without any facts, just barking and making assertions in the hopes that other dimwits who call themselves conservatives will join in the minute they see the word "liberal". They also hope to shout down anybody with facts because they know that the Reagan and Republican record cannot stand up to facts. Well what is it? Are you just simple minded morons or Republican party ass-licks or both?

Drunken Sailor| 7.26.11 @ 12:56PM

Got all the Huffington post and Daily Ko's talking points down pat don't you? Paid Republican shill? Not hardly, as they have been part of the problem since "H" Bush and the Compasionate Conservative I mentioned earlier. Last I checked it was the Democrat side that was the most prolific in Astroturfing. In fact, you guy's main man Axelrod made a good living at it. What amazes me is how you can not see that Regan increased our defense spending, knowing that USSR would respond it kind. He also knew they could not keep up and would bankrupt themselves. Which they did.

Mark in LA| 7.26.11 @ 1:15PM

You act like Reagan had some kind of "plan". What utter nonsense. He ramped up defense spending because it was corporate welfare. Nobody knew when the USSR was going to collapse. It collapsed because it was held together out of fear. When Gorbachev gave the people no reason to fear anymore, the thing unraveled.

Do you believe everything you are told - don't you have any ability to think. Do you really think a police state can't continue if it has the army on its side? One the one hand you are talking about North Korea which no amount of hardship on the people is enough for it to change and on the other hand you insist that raising defense spending just a little is enough to topple a country as rich in natural resources and farmland like Russia. "Bankruptcy" doesn't mean squat if a country can feed, cloth, house, and defend its people. Do you realize how stupid putting these two together makes you Reagan worshipper's look?

Drunken Sailor| 7.26.11 @ 2:01PM

"Increasing defense spending just a little" Are you kidding me? You libs kill me. but you do explain a lot to. I never understood how your devotion to Socalism has never been killed even after so many examples of it not working. People like you make it clear to me, you simply think no one else has done it right and you can do it better.

The difference in my argument of NK and Russia is simple. For now NK still has it's military behind it thus it maintains power with a Iron Fist. USSR lost it's military backing when they could no longer afford it. USSR could not maintain the military and eventually died. Starve NK and they will follow the same as they are currently being propped up by China. No one was propping up USSR but the peasants under their thumb.

Mark in LA| 7.26.11 @ 3:27PM

I am not devoted to socialism. I am devoted to showing you morons how your stupid simple-minded nonsense right from Rush's ass is so stupid only people as dumb as you can believe it. The Russians could no longer afford their army and that's why they USSR disintegrated, right? Man that is stupid. The army was a conscript army and costs nothing. Just how do you think they paid them, in dollars or euros? No idiot, they paid them in rubles and they could print as much of them as they wanted to just like we print as much dollars as we want.

Nobody in the USSR was starving. The USSR had plenty of natural resources. How does a country like that which is completely self-sufficient go bankrupt? Oh you mean they can't pay some bank back that they borowed money from and the bank must have demanded that the government change, right? The leadership of the USSR realized that giving up power was the only way to make the bankers happy!

Think, for possibly the first time in your life: WE ARE BANKRUPT AND HAVE BEEN SINCE AT LEAST THE TIME REAGAN'S TRIPLING OF THE NATIONAL DEBT. We have probably been bankrupt since Nixon closed the gold window. Yet here we are printing money and going on about our business. But somehow the USSR was different from all the other bankrupt countries like Mexico, Brazil, and Argentina. What complete and utter stupidity.

Doctor Right| 7.26.11 @ 3:37PM

"The army was a conscript and costs nothing."

WTH are you talking about?!?!?!

Soldiers have to be fed. Soldiers need clothes. Soldiers need weapons. Soldiers need to be transported. Transportation requires fuel.

Do you think that's FREE??? Just because they're conscripted???

Not only are you ignorant of history, you don't know the first thing about economics.

Doctor Right| 7.26.11 @ 3:40PM

Oh, and here's another colossal jewel of stupidity:

"...and they could print as much of them (rubles) as they wanted..."

LOL! Yeah...that's how to run an economy, right??? Just print money!!!

Hey, Einstein...the more money you print, the less each bill is worth. That's called "inflation". Print enough, and each ruble/dollar/peso eventually becomes worthless.

That's how economies collapse.

Duh.

Mark in LA| 7.28.11 @ 10:43PM

I would be ashamed to have made such a stupid comment in light of all the money we in the US have been printing, yet we are still here with an army?

Occam's Tool| 7.26.11 @ 6:18PM

I see. So the nuclear subs, ballistic missiles, and advanced tanks and jets cost nothing. Food, uniforms, bullets, and guns cost nothing.

Mark, you ARE a Californian, aren't you. Why I left, folks.

Mark in LA| 7.28.11 @ 10:54PM

Another moron equating money with stuff. The stuff is created because people go to work and build things not because there is money. Money only exists as a medium of exchange. In a real wartime situation like the USSR in WWII you are paid in little more than food and clothing and the idea that those on the front lines have it worse. Do you really think the USSR paid their workers then? If they did it was probabaly a token amount so the people could buy a bottle of vodka or two every now and then. In peacetime you allow some freedom and money facilitates that. Its stupid to think that a government runs out of money and cannot get things done when the farmland is prosperous and the mines asre producing and the factories are producing. The farms, factories, and mines are taxed just like here with the phoney money the government produces. Why would the USSR be any different than us or any other country?

Occam's Tool| 8.11.11 @ 10:39PM

The USSR wasn't self sufficient, and its ecology was collapsing, along with its population.

Doctor Right| 7.26.11 @ 3:33PM

Reagan DID have a plan, you pathetic moron.

You can read about it yourself, if you're interested. Of course, you're a leftwinger, so intellectual curiosity is not your strongest quality, but his letters and radio broadcasts, where he describes the inherent flaws in communism IN DETAIL are public record.

And if you think SDI was "useless", you're in a minority that does NOT include Mikhail Gorbachev, who was ready to scrap ALL of the USSR's intercontinental ballistic missiles as an enticement for Reagan to abandon the program, but Reagan refused.

So tell us, smartass...If it was "useless", why did it scare the crap out of Gorbachev??

Gee...why is Obama so DESPERATELY trying to compare himself to Reagan, lately?

You're a complete and utter ignoramus.

Drunken Sailor| 7.26.11 @ 4:00PM

You naild it DR. I give up as it is obvious his head is buried in the sand. Guess it never occured to him that even natural resource rich countries can go bankrupt if the goverment controls all the resources and where they go, how they are used, etc. and mis-manage that. Apparently he had no idea that the goverment of the USSR was corrupt. Apparently the Russian I have spoken to were not starving, they just did not know how to provide for themselves. Apparently the Russian Immigrant I used to drink beers with, who served in the red army, and used to swap stories with was mistaken. He left his home country for the US when the USSR ran aground for nothing.

Mark in LA| 7.28.11 @ 10:59PM

You guys always make up lies. Gorbachev never said he would give up all missles only the short range ones in Europe. Why do you feel the need to lie all the time and of course your butt-buddy stupidly thinks you are the one with the facts.

http://www.nytimes.com/1987/04.....gewanted=2

Occam's Tool| 7.26.11 @ 6:15PM

Please Mark, enlighten me on why the Soviets fell. Was it due to the good will of the KGB?

John II| 7.26.11 @ 9:43PM

The Soviets fell, Occie, because they evinced the murderous proclivities of Lenin and Kim, the corrupt mindset of contemporary academia, and the economic sophistication of Mark.

And now back to "Viva Villa" (1934), in which Pancho Villa (played by the great Wallace Beery), the Hollywood liberator du jour of the thirties (along with Mussolini and Stalin), solves the economic problems of Mexico by printing gobs and gobs of worthless paper money with his own portrait on each bill.

Meanwhile, I am waiting patiently for the image of George Washington to be replaced by that of Professor Obama. Perhaps after 2012 we may consider improving relations with the orient by trading Professor Obama for Kim's chubby son. The Professor would be much happier in North Korea, and Kim Jr. could learn something useful such as the restaurant business.

Occam's Tool| 7.27.11 @ 4:55PM

I knew that, John, of course---I just love the half-witted "logic" chains of Lefties.

Occam's Tool| 7.27.11 @ 4:55PM

You DO Rock, John II.

Mark in LA| 7.28.11 @ 9:42PM

Well Occam you usually seem to have a brain. On this one you are as dumb as the rest. Do you think there was absolutely no Soviet Army, that it was completely dissolved. Did you ever actually read a story that said the Red Army was disbanded prior to the end of the USSR? No, you didn't so why accept the idiocy of these morons as having any value when clearly they don't even pass the 10th grade level of intelligence. Will be disband the army if we have to make budget cuts if the debt limit is not raised?

This is what happened. The Russian Federation in 1991 declared its independence from the Soviet Union. Gorbachev had a choice to make, either order Soviet tanks into Moscow (as some Soviet generals wanted) and bring Russia to heal or watch the whole thing unravel. Russia was the main source of wealth in the USSR with the Ukraine second. If Russia went, so went the USSR. Lenin in his stupidity wanted to give some sort of credence to the USSR as a voluntary organization of separate states when really it was just the old Tsarist Russian Empire. However, in this incarnation there was a pretense of independent Soviet Republics such as our states. Keep the USSR would have meeant Soviet tanks in Russia with Russian officers and men pointing their guns at Russian tanks with Russian officiers and men. The Red Army never had done what the PLA in China had done and kept the army in areas other than their homeland. That way Uyghurs wouldn't be ordered to shoot Uyghurs. Han Chinese would shoot them. Even if the Soviet command could have gotten non-Russian regiments to send to Russia you would have had Ukrainians shooting Russians to defend a USSR that the Ukrainians have always wanted to be out of. There was no way Gorbachev could keep the USSR together without the Russian Federation so he dissolved it.

Occam's Tool| 8.11.11 @ 10:41PM

The point being made, Mark, was that Reagan challenged them to a battle they could not win---and he won.

Read Deathride by John Mosier--the Soviet Unon was always a third world country with a first class military. It still is 3rd world---I had friends who adopted from Kazakhstan---horror stories.

Drunken Sailor| 7.26.11 @ 10:30AM

NK is China's junkyard dog. Let them feed their own beast or put them down. They will feed the dog because if they do not and the NK Military joins the ranks of the hungry they can kiss the country goodbye. China has problems of it's own with a propped up economy. NK should be added to their list, break their banks and let the peasants of both countries lance these boils for the greater good of all.

Citizen Jerry| 7.26.11 @ 10:51AM

Sadly, like in cases of playground diplomacy, the bully will keep terrorizing the cowed until someone who's tired of being cowed steps up and knocks the bully on his keister.

J.C.Eaton| 7.26.11 @ 12:09PM

Sometimes, the best thing to do is: nothing. Someone above implied that to not send food aid to NK is immoral. I don't agree. A moral conundrum is a choice between the lesser of two evils. Not helping others, when we have the capacity to do so may be" sinful", but as the author pointed out, there is utterly no chance that our well-intentioned aid would go to those who should benefit from our charity, but rather the army which props up these monsters. Doing nothing is clearly less deleterious in the long-term than "helping". Talking with them has produced exactly what? Perfidy and duplicity. Without Chinese and perhaps Russian assistance this kakascacy would crumble. Let it. In any event, the State Dept. is incapable of competent and favorable negotiation with ANY nation. Much less with these miserable bastards.

diviz| 7.26.11 @ 12:58PM

set up some massive warehouses of rice and grain in south korea and then blow up any vehicles that come down to get it. World's biggest rat trap

Nina| 7.26.11 @ 8:21PM

Correct me if I'm wrong and this may sound silly, but wasn't there a time when we really did have "007s" around? Sneaking into foreign countries to "eliminate" problematic ego maniacs rising to quickly to their own glorified pedestal until...Clinton was it or was it Carter? Cuz WE all know how wonderfully truthful these countries are with us, stopping nuclear arms, no violating human rights, no secrets here! Maybe we should get our own secret "agents' back into business and annhialate the nutjobs who take money from us supposedly to feed their people but in reality letting them starve to death or freeze. That's how they keep them from rising up, they have no strength or heart anymore, their souls are taken by a power hungry freak...BUT the libs all believe in kumbya and dancing "I'd like to teach the world to sing..." crap! In all wars, unfortunately, there is collateral damage.

POST American| 7.26.11 @ 10:24PM

----------------------FURTHER-------------------------

AS Hollywood and media relentlessly program
tech worship, EUGENICS and RED China 'friendly'
themes---NOTICE, they've BALKED any
treatments of the 20th, 30th, 40th, 50th
and now 60th Anniversaries of the
cosmically relevant KOREAN WAR.

All this as MILLIONS continue to suffer and
die, and as 5000 American soldiers remain
'missing', even in light of the periodic reports
of travelers of 'aging westerners' glimpsed
deep inside the North Korean hinterlands.

Osamas Pajamas| 7.27.11 @ 12:16AM

North Korea is headed toward a "Jonestown Massacre." The ostensibly brilliant Chinese will derive zero benefit from this and possibly instead they will reap damage they would rather have avoided.

Ron| 7.27.11 @ 2:06PM

Now I know why I cannot stand LA..."placate, provide for, etc."

Mark, it DOES NOT WORK!!! Appeasement never, ever works. Psychologically, it simply emboldens and empowers the opposing party to attempt to gain further concessions. Look at pre-WWII. Appeasing Germany did nothing but embolden the Third Reich to demand more concessions, until Great Britain realized Germany and the Nazi party were not going to be the nice guys that Hitler promised. In addition, the South sure as shooting does not want to have to totally support the North with the South's surpluses for God knows how long while the North rebuilds. If you are old enough, you might remember what a horrendous mess East Germany was before reunification. The infrastructure (roads, water, sewer, buildings, public and private) were crumbling, there were still whole villages that had not been rebuilt due to shortages of money and materials that had been diverted to the East German government for it's own use. While reunifying North and South Korea may seem the solution, it would not be if Lil' Kim and his family are left in charge.

Mark in LA| 7.28.11 @ 9:52PM

Ron are you that stupid that you don't even bother to read what is written. The British have a royal family as do the Spanish and neither one of them has any political power. Did you not understand the part about it being a democracy? The leadership in NK just wants to play. They don't give a damn about running the country. Let them spend their time in Macau and Monte Carlo on the South's dime if that what it takes to unify the country.

What the hell does Gernamy have to do with anything? The German governmnet wanted reinification. The German people wanted it. It just cost more than the average guy in the west thought it would so there is alot of grumbling there. The average Korean wants reunification. It 's only the governments that do not. Its stupid to talk about the costs of reunification as compared to the costs iof maintaining a valueless defense posture.

Gazza| 8.5.11 @ 3:06AM

Wow, this must be the birthing chamber of right-wing trolls. I always wondered where the Rethuglican nut-jobs came from.

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