Take Away Their Mercedes

In the print edition of Newsweek dated February 23, 2009 (p. 26), they added a a picture depicting North Korea's missiles to this article. The photo caption read, "TOYS FOR TYRANTS: The North's missiles." But as anyone familiar with the Korean language can see from the words inscribed on the missiles, they are South Korea's missiles, not those of North Korea. This is because the phrase "Dae Han Yook Gun" is translated as "The Republic of Korea Army," not as "The Democratic People's Republic of Korea Army." For this name, the North Koreans use "Chosun" instead of "Dae Han." Second, it needs to be noted that the military uniform shown in the picture belongs to the Republic of Korea Army, not to the North Korean Army.

I am not sure whether this mistake has resulted from Noland's lack of proficiency in the Korean language or not. I sincerely hope that that is not the case, because if he does not understand Korean, he is not likely to provide valid arguments over North Korea's "bad behavior." Unfortunately, however, there are many "experts" who do not understand the language of the country they are analyzing. I hope that Noland is not one of them.

As a "would-be" expert on North Korea, I just need to raise one question: Is the North Korean regime "irrational" in terms of survival strategy? My answer is a definite no. This is largely because the notoriously cruel regime knows what they are doing. They are keenly aware of their geopolitical strengths and weaknesses and take advantage of the presence of its "big brother" to ensure their very survival. Strategically speaking, China needs North Korea to survive and maintain "good" relationships with it. In a sense, the North Korean regime is a shrewd player in the arena of international politics, which requires "experts" to stop thinking ideally and begin thinking "outside the box" and coming up with more realistic ways of controlling the enigmatic regime. Only then can they provide plausible methods to contain and civilize the North Korean regime. If that happened, that would contribute to the peace and stability of the international community as well as on the Korean Peninsula.

It is not a political metaphor at all. Rather literally does NK look like a beggar and furthermore a robber who is endlessly annoying the whole neighorhood in a village, namely northeast Asia.
The only thing it's able to do and besides, even quite well-sadly- is maybe to extort neighboring countries and get the money spent on stuff for the Dear General. There're a few beggar states , forgive my French,all around the world or euphemistically 'failed states' whose economies largely depend on foreign aids . NK is, of course, one of them. But by contrast to other 'failed states', on top of begging, NK has always been enjoying extortion at once. The delinquency of that sort makes me sick. Obviously NK is a poor neighbor but that's not a big deal. We can help and get along with the poor nearby. But should the poor neighbor repeatedly and deliberately menace me for money or other titbits, the situation would grow completely different and unacceptable.

So far NK has begged its neighbors to the extent that they can be tolerant. But at this juncture an excuse of that sort doesn't seem to be righteous any more. Still we can put up with its begging in the name of charity, humanitarian relief, or something so. But nonetheless the degree to which it threatens its neighbors is going too far these days.

It is time for countries concerned with NK to show harsh discipline to this spoiled neighbor.