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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Karen Lawrence who wrote (53507)	10/20/2002 7:12:07 PM
From: Nadine Carroll	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

So you wanted us to suspend sending food to North Korea so that the North Koreans would have starved to death Millions have starved in North Korea anyway, Karen, because their government wished them to starve. Aid workers concluded that the whole famine was government-induced. The only way -- I repeat, the only way -- to keep North Koreans from starving is to overthrow the regime.

To: Karen Lawrence who wrote (53507)	10/20/2002 10:09:55 PM
From: KLP	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Karen, couple of things. Biden gave that speech in March 2001, your article says. That's two months after Bush took office. What I am saying is that the House Members knew this in 1999, if not before, and there is a similar report for 2000 that was presented in 2001. Re Bush and his surprise.... I think you will see, IF you read the WHOLE article (link posted several times) you will see that North Korea was working on a nuclear capability...it had the missiles and part of the nuke capability. Very similar to Iraq today. They have part of the capability today as well. To our knowledge, they don't have all the components. As yet. As for your last comment, guess I should just consider the source. If you haven't noticed, the leadership of North Korea has been taking the money the US has sent, used the money for other than food for the NK citizens, and hasn't given them the food we sent either. Please do read the link I sent. You are bright, and am surprised you have not. There are things in that report that any citizen, no matter their political stripe, will learn. And perhaps start to wonder what in the heck has been going on for the last 10 or so years....

To: Karen Lawrence who wrote (53507)	10/20/2002 10:42:37 PM
From: Hawkmoon	Respond to of 281500

Biden gave Bush the heads-up about north Korea. Bush apparently did nothing. Well, Biden has been known for his plagiarism, so it shouldn't be any surprise that George Tenet ALSO warned Clinton about N. Korea back in 1999.. foreigncorrespondent.com And what did Clinton do?? Nothing... But let's put the semantics aside here for a moment Karen.. N. Korea is not in a geo-economic position to threaten anyone with it's nuclear weapons. It has no oil.. doesn't not have the ability to blockade sea lanes, and it has an 800 pound gorilla called China to the north which is probably not particularly amused that Kim Jong Il now has nukes on their border. We also don't have to worry about a major demographic trend on the Korean peninsula that threatens to wield millions of potential "martyrs" for their cause. And Bush did something that many democrats were decrying.. placing N. Korea on the "axis of evil" list.. The bottom line is that N. Korea's leadership is trying to "up the anty" in their negotiations for economic assistance. But they are about to find out that none of their neighbors are nearly susceptible to their nuclear blackmail and political subversion as are nations in the Persian Gulf. Believe me.. were N. Korea in such a geo-economic position, I would be far more concerned than I currently am... I still stick by my belief that NK will be willing to disarm... if the "price is right"... And one other thing they have done is put themselves in a position where they are "all or nothing".. To be required to dismantle their nuclear program without obtaining anything in return will prove to be a disabling loss of face for Kim Jong Il, and possibly result in a regime change there as well, but possibly for the worse. So Kim Jong Il may be putting himself out there on the line and intentionally daring the US to run the risk of his own overthrow and a complete end to all negotiations possibly for years until a new regime asserts itself. The question is whether we'll be willing to help him save face by offering him a deal in exchange for intrusive inspections, or whether we'll make him sweat it out for awhile. But once again... we can't compare the threat posed by N. Korea to the one posed by Saddam. But fortunately, I think we're seeing Saddam's regime starting to crack a bit... First the "unanimous election" and now releasing all of his political prisoners... They are all signs that he's been put in a position where he's being forced to curry favor with his people, and other rivals. And once he shows weakness, the others will line up to swoop in and destroy him. Hawk