[CSMONITOR] Kim Jong-un isn't the first North Korean leader to use threats for political gain. But the West doesn't really know what of make of him because of his youth and the uncertainty that shrouds the country.| Submit your comments on this article |
| China-Japan-Koreas |
| Kim Jong-un: Can US trust North Korea leader to act rationally? |
| 2013-04-04 |
| [CSMONITOR] Kim Jong-un isn't the first North Korean leader to use threats for political gain. But the West doesn't really know what of make of him because of his youth and the uncertainty that shrouds the country. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #8 "How much different is Chicago insider politics different from Pyongyang, other than fewer bodies disappearing?" The "fewer" are in Pyongyang, right? |
| Posted by: Barbara 2013-04-04 20:33 |
| #7 An astute observation P2k (#6), which raises the question of who is the badder a**, Chicago or Pyongyang? One merely cannot count bodies: a lower number could reflect a more astute assessment of true threats. What I see as a downside is that 0bama truly cares for no one but himself: he pretends to care ONLY when it serves to advance himself. |
| Posted by: Ptah 2013-04-04 12:20 |
| #6 Kim Jong-un: Can US trust North Korea leader to act rationally? Given that the US elected a leader who lacks certain qualities to act rationally, why expect the Nork leader to act rationally? Who has the thinner skin? How much different is Chicago insider politics different from Pyongyang, other than fewer bodies disappearing? |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2013-04-04 10:28 |
| #5 Unfortunately the current regime is not alone in its meekness. It was, afterall, GWB that told us all to go shopping after 9/11. There is so much that is wrong with our current society with regards to establishing a confident foreign policy that I don't really know where to start. All we get, and have gotten for a while, are individual reactions to individual incidents couched in the most PC understated way we can, putting forth the least effort we can. There is no sign of a strategic vision or even controlling principles which constrain and drive responses. |
| Posted by: AlanC 2013-04-04 07:43 |
| #4 NKOR has been a strategic liability to the PRC for many years now. It requires subsidies and the saber rattling upsets the export economy of the PRC by keeping US interest rates low (because in times of saber rattling rich people buy more T bonds). Of course some of the folks in the PRC figure it is worth it to insult the US but, assuming the monied interests in China have the real power, NKOR will be getting leashed and leashed hard within the next month. |
| Posted by: lord garth 2013-04-04 07:31 |
| #3 must have a will to not only engage and punish, but to win, to destroy, to vanquish once and for all. I'm not at all certain the current regime possesses such a will. You do read domestic news, Besoeker? |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2013-04-04 04:59 |
| #2 To prevail over North Korea the United States must have a will to not only engage and punish, but to win, to destroy, to vanquish once and for all. I'm not at all certain the current regime possesses such a will. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2013-04-04 03:24 |
| #1 Is North Korea actually acting less rationally right now than it has for the last decades? Or is North Korea just reacting to the provocative weakness that the US' reaction to 9/11 put on display? Appeasement of and submission to Afghanistan (or Egypt for that matter) are being witnessed by the whole world. Even if this approach makes sense in a narrow context, the actions of a global power necessarily have global consequences. I don't know how I could rationally argue for the proposition that the West and the US is not a pushover and a doormat and that even a massive attack on the West will not be rewarded (let alone punished.) The reaction to 9/11 has established a dangerous precedent. |
| Posted by: Elmerert Hupens2660 2013-04-04 03:02 |