8 ms·

A Lot of What You Know About North Korea Is Racist Nonsense

22 points by devy 9y ago

grecy 9y ago
I am traveling in West Africa right now, and the same applies to this part of the world. This place is very, very different from that portrayed by the Western Media. I was sitting in the Nigerian Embassy waiting for a visa, and an American tv show was on.. NCIS or something, and they had these American "heros" over in some African hell-hole saving the world.. of course they get attacked and then work hard to survive and find their way to some place. People are being dragged out of cars, men smashed in the face by the butt end of AK47s, women thrown to the ground. People's eyes show pure hatred - enough to actually scare me, even though I was just watching TV. The show was set in Mali, they were supposedly in Bamako. The kicker? I was sitting in Bamako that very moment, having spent over a month there already, walking around every day, on my own, perfectly safe and happy. I even walked around at night multiple times. People would say hello and invite me into their homes. The reality is that I met hundreds and hundreds of the kindest, friendliest and happiest people I have ever met in Bamako, yet millions of Americans are seeing realistic looking images that it's a complete hell hole. I have driven through more than 500 road blocks in 10 countries in West Africa, and I have never, ever seen anything remotely scary or threatening. Not even once. It's simply not true. It's fake. When Africans see super heros flying around New York saving us from Aliens they know it's not real. When Americans see African Hell holes on TV, they have no idea it's not real. They are being lied to en-mass and have no idea. (if it makes any difference, I'm white, and driving a not-cheap Jeep around Africa)
- mynameisvlad 9y ago
  I mean, you're comparing real life with a fictional TV show, what did you expect? People don't watch NCIS with the expectation that it's anything like the real world. I mean, even if you were going to criticize the show, you should probably start with its overly broad definition of the NCIS mission, or why they were in Africa in the first place.
  - grecy 9y ago
    The problem is the show is so life-like, and so realistic, people believe it. I believed it, and was actually a little nervous to walk out onto the streets of Bamako, which is pure nonsense. And of course, the news also does exactly the same thing. Slow news day - let's pick something bad that happened in one of the 54 countries in Africa to show people. Never mind there are literally a billion people who are extremely friendly, happy and peaceful. Think for a moment what your perception of the USA would be if you lived elsewhere, and the only news you ever got was the bad stuff - mass shootings, police violence, undrinkable water, fires, tornadoes, crappy education, high debt, more shootings, more violence, violence when the president is sworn in, etc. etc.
    - ptaipale 9y ago
      I don't find NCIS life-like or realistic at all. Particularly any of the plot lines related to computer technology. It's obviously a show, not depiction of realistic forensics or data mining procedures - starting from roles of people, their mode of operation and permissions to do things, and also how you would realistically build a UI for doing things.
      - grecy 9y ago
        I'm not even sure it was NCIS. I don't know what it was. There were a bunch of military people in uniform shooting people and getting shot at. No computers, etc. It was about as realistic as saving private ryan. Full on war.
    - thesmallestcat 9y ago
      Stupid people believe all kinds of things. Like that fantasy-world TV dramas reflect reality. But most are watching for the entertainment and are willing to suspend disbelief, I think.
- wyldfire 9y ago
  I've never been to Africa, so my perspective has likely been tainted by media and entertainment programs like the ones you describe. How often did you travel to rural parts of Mali? Is it as safe as Bamako? > ... I met hundreds and hundreds of the kindest, friendliest and happiest people... Over the years, I've learned that most people from most places are sane, regular people just trying to make their way in the world. People from Iran, North Korea, Russia, China, Afghanistan, Tibet, Venezuela -- they're just regular folks like you and me. They get up in the morning, go to work, try to have a good time with friends/family in the evenings. If we were to hold up a mirror and try to judge ourselves based on the outlandish things people do and say that end up being worth news coverage, I think we'd feel some dread about where we live too.
  - grecy 9y ago
    > How often did you travel to rural parts of Mali? Is it as safe as Bamako? No, it's not as safe. Certainly not for a white guy. I didn't go North, but a few friends did around the time I was there and had no problems. Regular ordinary people on the streets are very friendly, but there are bad dudes around up there for sure. Though my point is they were depicting Mali (and Bamako) as a hell on earth, and it's nothing, nothing like the show portrays. I drove through many military stops in the country, and they are basically the opposite of what the show portrayed.
  - ptaipale 9y ago
    > People from Iran, North Korea, Russia, China, Afghanistan, Tibet, Venezuela -- they're just regular folks like you and me Of course. However, the environment where they live may not be so regular. Of course it often surprises you when your expectations and prejudices aren't based on real experience, but crazy regimes make people also behave in crazy ways. Remember the idolatry around Pavel Morozov, for instance.
- maxerickson 9y ago
  Yeah, murder of the week television is pretty pernicious. Over here in reality, the 2500 member United States Naval Criminal Investigative Service investigates 30-50 homicides a year (over their entire jurisdiction), most of which will be the sort of stupid crimes that typify murder, not the fascinating puzzles shown each week on the TV. At least CSI, which started the modern explosion of such shows, was set in Clark County Nevada where murder is almost a daily thing.
- Grue3 9y ago
  Good thing you were in Bamako and not, say, in Timbuktu in 2012-2013 when it was captured by insurgents. Mali is hardly a good example of peace and prosperity.
  - grecy 9y ago
    That's exactly what I mean. You have this information about bad things that happened (true) and you project it onto an entire country, years after the fact. I could say "Lucky you were not in NYC in 2001... USA is hardly a good example of peace and prosperity" Which is the same nonsense you just said about Mali.
tcoppi 9y ago
This article ignores the fact that the stated goal of the NK Regime is reunification of the peninsula(under their rule, of course), and that they were the ones that started the war to achieve that goal in the 50s.
npiazza83 9y ago
He had me up until he dismissed fears of North Korea as a rational actor to be baseless. Just because they aren't "CRAZY" and won't nuke Japan for the hell of it doesn't mean I want them sitting on the UN security council. Day 1: Kim Jong Un in a partnership with Iran has announced that Juche is compatible with Sharia law and in a joint effort propose to bring these brilliant strategies to Europe...
scandox 9y ago
> The North Koreans are dangerous because they refuse to submit to our imperial authority and play ball with our global order. Like it or loathe it, this is the problem.
542458 9y ago
While it's true that the media overplays how volatile NK is (mostly by acting like saber-rattling has any reasonable chance of devolving into full-scale war), let's not act like their administration is ran by reasonable people either. Remember that according to KN Kim Jong-il's birth caused a new star to appear in the sky and the season to miraculously change from winter to summer, and never needs to defecate. This is also the same country that is home to some of the worst human rights violations in the world and keeps their dissidents in concentration camps. Painting them as innocent and reasonable feels like a bit of a stretch.
jrhurst 9y ago
"U.S. propaganda can dismiss North Korea’s legitimate concerns so easily because of the underlying racist assumption that these are a bizarre and simple-minded people that believe in things like unicorns. This feeds off of and into orientalist logic that sees East Asians as a nearly subhuman “other” that can’t be reasoned with and so must be handled with force." I don't particularly see this logic with Vietnamese, Chinese, South Koreans, Japan. At least in the particular context of military action. In fact, most of the articles I end up reading about Japanese, South Korean, or Chinese responses to what North Korea is doing at the current time. That said, I think there is a big role of racism to play when North Korea is used as a fear tactic during political cycles locally. But maybe everything is just about America and I'm wrong here.
- wyldfire 9y ago
  The "US propaganda" that I see and hear regarding PRK is almost always regarding the cult of personality of the Supreme Leader. I don't think I've ever seen anything that would lead me to believe that its people are simple-minded. The thing that puzzles me is, as in any dictatorship -- why does the military enforce the unjust rule? Is it that they don't see the plight of their people, they don't care, or they're enriched by the status quo and can't imagine disrupting it? Or something else entirely? And why do the Chinese continue to support this state? Is it because of a belief in the ideology? Or a perpetual bargaining chip with the US?
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    > The thing that puzzles me is, as in any dictatorship -- why does the military enforce the unjust rule? Self-interest (in the most case, individual, on the part of each actor.) As in any dictatorship. > Is it that they don't see the plight of their people, they don't care, or they're enriched by the status quo and can't imagine disrupting it? They see the plight of their people, and don't want to join it, and even moreso don't want to be (along with potentially their family) killed when any one of the many co-conspirators they would need to do something about it turns out to be a regime loyalist who scuttles the plan before it kicks off. > And why do the Chinese continue to support this state? Because they don't want a united Korea, and even moreso don't want a US (and Japan)-allied united Korea on their border. The DPRK is an alternative focus for China's global and regional rivals attention.
thrw2009 9y ago
There is Russian article about this. Not sure how 'fake news' it is, but seems to have many details and numbers. https://eadaily.com/en/news/2017/04/12/nuclear-kim-armed-democracy-against-helpless-totalitarianism https://eadaily.com/en/news/2017/04/12/nuclear-kim-armed-dem...
carsongross 9y ago
Having resigned myself in most international matters to narrative collapse, a post-modern inability to determine the relative truthfulness, completeness or meaning of conflicting narratives, I offer only the following content: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4rfHAqs9EI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4rfHAqs9EI
pjkundert 9y ago
Stopped reading at "war-horny bigot like Trump". I'd rather invest time in an even-handed analysis of the situation...
ptaipale 9y ago
Media has its own image of things, yes. I've verified that in many places where what you see on the ground is substantially different from what you see on CNN. But so does this piece, when it is referring to the U.S. armed forces: "still technically at war with them and poised to invade at moment’s notice." Hardly poised to invade at moment's notice. There is no such capacity to attack quickly. The U.S. is there and together with South Korean forces, able to respond to fire, and perform limited airstrikes, but there is nothing that would realistically be useful for an actual invasion of North Korea. The article makes it a big thing that DPRK has no real capability to attack the U.S. using ballistic missiles. It does not make a big thing that DPRK loudly and repeatedly announces it has such a capability. Or that it has repeatedly used so-called unconventional methods, such as murdering people on the shopping concourse in other countries. [0] I don't consider it an exaggeration to expect that they might try things like packing a nuclear bomb in a freight ship that then attacks a coastal city of a perceived enemy. That is quite clearly the reason that it is considered as somewhat crazy, or at least unstable and unpredictable. I am not much worried about DPRK launching a nuclear attack against Western countries in the short term, but thinks like the recent threats against Australia [1], [2] don't make it any easier to accept them as harmless. Their Twitter feed [3] makes a rather disconcerting read. [0] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/14/kim-jong-un-half-brother-reportedly-killed-malaysia-north-korea https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/14/kim-jong-un-ha... [1] kcna.co.jp/item/2017/201704/news21/20170421-29ee.html [2] http://www.news.com.au/world/asia/north-korea-threatens-australia-with-nuclear-strike-over-us-allegiance/news-story/fa28ccb9eaaff6c02f5c12bdc19bc227 http://www.news.com.au/world/asia/north-korea-threatens-aust... [3] https://twitter.com/dprk_news https://twitter.com/dprk_news
- rendall 9y ago
  "Their twitter feed": DPRK_News is a parody account by Ken White of Popehat.
  - ptaipale 9y ago
    Right, thanks. In this case I can't tell difference between parody and the actual statements by DPRK News.
EGreg 9y ago
The article is not wrong. We had a real chance to negotiate a roadmap towards a real peace agreement with NK, and end its nuclear program, but as usual the Republicans were against it. After all, if NK disarms then we don't get to bomb a country of "others" (Communists, Shiites etc.) who are against our ideological preferences. And that would be a shame. As usual the bonehead Repiblicans under Clinton, and later the disastrous George W Bush administration preferred to save a buck and reneg on the Agreed Framework, instead having their children spend 100 bucks and people's lives go up in smoke in what might be the first nuclear war since WW2. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agreed_Framework https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agreed_Framework "Soon after the agreement was signed, U.S. Congress control changed to the Republican Party, who did not support the agreement.[16][17] Some Republican Senators were strongly against the agreement, regarding it as appeasement.[18][19] Initially U.S. Department of Defense emergency funds not under Congress control were used to fund the transitional oil supplies under the agreement,[20] together with international funding. From 1996 Congress provided funding, though not always sufficient amounts.[11][21] Consequently, some of the agreed transitional oil supplies were delivered late.[22] KEDO's first director, Stephen Bosworth, later commented "The Agreed Framework was a political orphan within two weeks after its signature".[23] Some analysts believe North Korea agreed to the freeze primarily because of the U.S. agreement to phase out economic sanctions that had been in place since the Korean War. But because of congressional opposition, the U.S. failed to deliver on this part of the agreement.[24]" "As late as the end of 2003, North Korea claimed that it would freeze its nuclear program in exchange for additional American concessions, but a final agreement was not reached. North Korea withdrew from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 2003." However keep in mind that NK already helped Syria build a NUCLEAR WEAPONS FACILITY in 2006, which Israel had discovered and successfully destroyed. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Orchard https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Orchard
notacoward 9y ago
What a huge strawman. Most people do not, as the author claims, believe that North Koreans in general are irrational, stupid, warlike, etc. They believe that the North Korean leadership has most of those qualities, which is pretty well proven. Unable to counter that, the author chooses to "disprove" that which is never claimed. As jrhurst has already pointed out, this supposed "orientalism" doesn't seem to exist for Viet Nam, China, or even South Korea. I'm not going to say there's no such thing as anti-Asian discrimination or even outright racism in the US, but we don't fear nations that aren't led by provably-insane coddled children of past dictators,.
- JBSay 9y ago
  Assuming that your enemy is crazy is just intellectual lazyness. If you can't explain the behaviour of your enemy then it's probably because your understanding of his motives is lacking.
  - notacoward 9y ago
    Assuming that your enemy is crazy is intellectual laziness. However, there really are crazy people in the world. Some occupy positions of power. Do you deny either part of that? When the craziness is thoroughly proven it's not lazy to recognize it. You know what is lazy? Assuming that someone's not crazy, or assuming that an interlocutor is jumping to conclusions. Turn that lens on yourself first, not last.
    - awptimus 9y ago
      "Crazy" suffices to say that the behavior set is far outside of regular norms as to be unworkable with normal reason. It doesn't have to imply the actor is schizophrenic or anything. It doesn't matter if the actor, behaving rationally towards his ends, has ends that are absolutely incompatible with ours, or if he's acting irrationally. [edit: I mean it doesn't matter from a defense of his behavior standpoint. It's fine to call him "crazy" if his ends are absolutely unacceptable] I agree with the critique of the piece - no one thinks North Koreans are inferior as human beings. We think they've been fed a ubiquitous dose of propaganda their entire lives. We think that a dictator, so very isolated through years of behavior that necessitates (and invites) it, lacks any sense of acceptable end-states for his country. I also agree that it's misguided to dismiss him as actually crazy. One must treat him as a rational actor - moves you make will have moves he makes. There is rationality involved. May be shitty rationality, may be myopic rationality, but it's rationality. You move warships towards North Korea he's not going going to launch Rubber Ducks at you. That'd be crazy. He's not going to poop his pants and eat the feces on live television and announce he's a little princess.
rendall 9y ago
In the author's own words, in a comment to his own article: "I don’t claim to be an expert or even that well-read on the subject." In context, the "subject" he refers to appears to be "North Korea."

22 points by devy 9y ago

I am traveling in West Africa right now, and the same applies to this part of the world. This place is very, very different from that portrayed by the Western Media. I was sitting in the Nigerian Embassy waiting for a visa, and an American tv show was on.. NCIS or something, and they had these American "heros" over in some African hell-hole saving the world.. of course they get attacked and then work hard to survive and find their way to some place. People are being dragged out of cars, men smashed in the face by the butt end of AK47s, women thrown to the ground. People's eyes show pure hatred - enough to actually scare me, even though I was just watching TV. The show was set in Mali, they were supposedly in Bamako. The kicker? I was sitting in Bamako that very moment, having spent over a month there already, walking around every day, on my own, perfectly safe and happy. I even walked around at night multiple times. People would say hello and invite me into their homes. The reality is that I met hundreds and hundreds of the kindest, friendliest and happiest people I have ever met in Bamako, yet millions of Americans are seeing realistic looking images that it's a complete hell hole. I have driven through more than 500 road blocks in 10 countries in West Africa, and I have never, ever seen anything remotely scary or threatening. Not even once. It's simply not true. It's fake. When Africans see super heros flying around New York saving us from Aliens they know it's not real. When Americans see African Hell holes on TV, they have no idea it's not real. They are being lied to en-mass and have no idea. (if it makes any difference, I'm white, and driving a not-cheap Jeep around Africa)

mynameisvlad 9y ago
I mean, you're comparing real life with a fictional TV show, what did you expect? People don't watch NCIS with the expectation that it's anything like the real world. I mean, even if you were going to criticize the show, you should probably start with its overly broad definition of the NCIS mission, or why they were in Africa in the first place.
- grecy 9y ago
  The problem is the show is so life-like, and so realistic, people believe it. I believed it, and was actually a little nervous to walk out onto the streets of Bamako, which is pure nonsense. And of course, the news also does exactly the same thing. Slow news day - let's pick something bad that happened in one of the 54 countries in Africa to show people. Never mind there are literally a billion people who are extremely friendly, happy and peaceful. Think for a moment what your perception of the USA would be if you lived elsewhere, and the only news you ever got was the bad stuff - mass shootings, police violence, undrinkable water, fires, tornadoes, crappy education, high debt, more shootings, more violence, violence when the president is sworn in, etc. etc.
  - ptaipale 9y ago
    I don't find NCIS life-like or realistic at all. Particularly any of the plot lines related to computer technology. It's obviously a show, not depiction of realistic forensics or data mining procedures - starting from roles of people, their mode of operation and permissions to do things, and also how you would realistically build a UI for doing things.
    - grecy 9y ago
      I'm not even sure it was NCIS. I don't know what it was. There were a bunch of military people in uniform shooting people and getting shot at. No computers, etc. It was about as realistic as saving private ryan. Full on war.
  - thesmallestcat 9y ago
    Stupid people believe all kinds of things. Like that fantasy-world TV dramas reflect reality. But most are watching for the entertainment and are willing to suspend disbelief, I think.
wyldfire 9y ago
I've never been to Africa, so my perspective has likely been tainted by media and entertainment programs like the ones you describe. How often did you travel to rural parts of Mali? Is it as safe as Bamako? > ... I met hundreds and hundreds of the kindest, friendliest and happiest people... Over the years, I've learned that most people from most places are sane, regular people just trying to make their way in the world. People from Iran, North Korea, Russia, China, Afghanistan, Tibet, Venezuela -- they're just regular folks like you and me. They get up in the morning, go to work, try to have a good time with friends/family in the evenings. If we were to hold up a mirror and try to judge ourselves based on the outlandish things people do and say that end up being worth news coverage, I think we'd feel some dread about where we live too.
- grecy 9y ago
  > How often did you travel to rural parts of Mali? Is it as safe as Bamako? No, it's not as safe. Certainly not for a white guy. I didn't go North, but a few friends did around the time I was there and had no problems. Regular ordinary people on the streets are very friendly, but there are bad dudes around up there for sure. Though my point is they were depicting Mali (and Bamako) as a hell on earth, and it's nothing, nothing like the show portrays. I drove through many military stops in the country, and they are basically the opposite of what the show portrayed.
- ptaipale 9y ago
  > People from Iran, North Korea, Russia, China, Afghanistan, Tibet, Venezuela -- they're just regular folks like you and me Of course. However, the environment where they live may not be so regular. Of course it often surprises you when your expectations and prejudices aren't based on real experience, but crazy regimes make people also behave in crazy ways. Remember the idolatry around Pavel Morozov, for instance.
maxerickson 9y ago
Yeah, murder of the week television is pretty pernicious. Over here in reality, the 2500 member United States Naval Criminal Investigative Service investigates 30-50 homicides a year (over their entire jurisdiction), most of which will be the sort of stupid crimes that typify murder, not the fascinating puzzles shown each week on the TV. At least CSI, which started the modern explosion of such shows, was set in Clark County Nevada where murder is almost a daily thing.
Grue3 9y ago
Good thing you were in Bamako and not, say, in Timbuktu in 2012-2013 when it was captured by insurgents. Mali is hardly a good example of peace and prosperity.
- grecy 9y ago
  That's exactly what I mean. You have this information about bad things that happened (true) and you project it onto an entire country, years after the fact. I could say "Lucky you were not in NYC in 2001... USA is hardly a good example of peace and prosperity" Which is the same nonsense you just said about Mali.

tcoppi 9y ago

This article ignores the fact that the stated goal of the NK Regime is reunification of the peninsula(under their rule, of course), and that they were the ones that started the war to achieve that goal in the 50s.

npiazza83 9y ago

He had me up until he dismissed fears of North Korea as a rational actor to be baseless. Just because they aren't "CRAZY" and won't nuke Japan for the hell of it doesn't mean I want them sitting on the UN security council. Day 1: Kim Jong Un in a partnership with Iran has announced that Juche is compatible with Sharia law and in a joint effort propose to bring these brilliant strategies to Europe...

scandox 9y ago

> The North Koreans are dangerous because they refuse to submit to our imperial authority and play ball with our global order. Like it or loathe it, this is the problem.

542458 9y ago

While it's true that the media overplays how volatile NK is (mostly by acting like saber-rattling has any reasonable chance of devolving into full-scale war), let's not act like their administration is ran by reasonable people either. Remember that according to KN Kim Jong-il's birth caused a new star to appear in the sky and the season to miraculously change from winter to summer, and never needs to defecate. This is also the same country that is home to some of the worst human rights violations in the world and keeps their dissidents in concentration camps. Painting them as innocent and reasonable feels like a bit of a stretch.

jrhurst 9y ago

"U.S. propaganda can dismiss North Korea’s legitimate concerns so easily because of the underlying racist assumption that these are a bizarre and simple-minded people that believe in things like unicorns. This feeds off of and into orientalist logic that sees East Asians as a nearly subhuman “other” that can’t be reasoned with and so must be handled with force." I don't particularly see this logic with Vietnamese, Chinese, South Koreans, Japan. At least in the particular context of military action. In fact, most of the articles I end up reading about Japanese, South Korean, or Chinese responses to what North Korea is doing at the current time. That said, I think there is a big role of racism to play when North Korea is used as a fear tactic during political cycles locally. But maybe everything is just about America and I'm wrong here.

wyldfire 9y ago
The "US propaganda" that I see and hear regarding PRK is almost always regarding the cult of personality of the Supreme Leader. I don't think I've ever seen anything that would lead me to believe that its people are simple-minded. The thing that puzzles me is, as in any dictatorship -- why does the military enforce the unjust rule? Is it that they don't see the plight of their people, they don't care, or they're enriched by the status quo and can't imagine disrupting it? Or something else entirely? And why do the Chinese continue to support this state? Is it because of a belief in the ideology? Or a perpetual bargaining chip with the US?
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > The thing that puzzles me is, as in any dictatorship -- why does the military enforce the unjust rule? Self-interest (in the most case, individual, on the part of each actor.) As in any dictatorship. > Is it that they don't see the plight of their people, they don't care, or they're enriched by the status quo and can't imagine disrupting it? They see the plight of their people, and don't want to join it, and even moreso don't want to be (along with potentially their family) killed when any one of the many co-conspirators they would need to do something about it turns out to be a regime loyalist who scuttles the plan before it kicks off. > And why do the Chinese continue to support this state? Because they don't want a united Korea, and even moreso don't want a US (and Japan)-allied united Korea on their border. The DPRK is an alternative focus for China's global and regional rivals attention.

thrw2009 9y ago

There is Russian article about this. Not sure how 'fake news' it is, but seems to have many details and numbers. https://eadaily.com/en/news/2017/04/12/nuclear-kim-armed-democracy-against-helpless-totalitarianism https://eadaily.com/en/news/2017/04/12/nuclear-kim-armed-dem...

carsongross 9y ago

Having resigned myself in most international matters to narrative collapse, a post-modern inability to determine the relative truthfulness, completeness or meaning of conflicting narratives, I offer only the following content: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4rfHAqs9EI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4rfHAqs9EI

pjkundert 9y ago

Stopped reading at "war-horny bigot like Trump". I'd rather invest time in an even-handed analysis of the situation...

ptaipale 9y ago

Media has its own image of things, yes. I've verified that in many places where what you see on the ground is substantially different from what you see on CNN. But so does this piece, when it is referring to the U.S. armed forces: "still technically at war with them and poised to invade at moment’s notice." Hardly poised to invade at moment's notice. There is no such capacity to attack quickly. The U.S. is there and together with South Korean forces, able to respond to fire, and perform limited airstrikes, but there is nothing that would realistically be useful for an actual invasion of North Korea. The article makes it a big thing that DPRK has no real capability to attack the U.S. using ballistic missiles. It does not make a big thing that DPRK loudly and repeatedly announces it has such a capability. Or that it has repeatedly used so-called unconventional methods, such as murdering people on the shopping concourse in other countries. [0] I don't consider it an exaggeration to expect that they might try things like packing a nuclear bomb in a freight ship that then attacks a coastal city of a perceived enemy. That is quite clearly the reason that it is considered as somewhat crazy, or at least unstable and unpredictable. I am not much worried about DPRK launching a nuclear attack against Western countries in the short term, but thinks like the recent threats against Australia [1], [2] don't make it any easier to accept them as harmless. Their Twitter feed [3] makes a rather disconcerting read. [0] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/14/kim-jong-un-half-brother-reportedly-killed-malaysia-north-korea https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/14/kim-jong-un-ha... [1] kcna.co.jp/item/2017/201704/news21/20170421-29ee.html [2] http://www.news.com.au/world/asia/north-korea-threatens-australia-with-nuclear-strike-over-us-allegiance/news-story/fa28ccb9eaaff6c02f5c12bdc19bc227 http://www.news.com.au/world/asia/north-korea-threatens-aust... [3] https://twitter.com/dprk_news https://twitter.com/dprk_news

rendall 9y ago
"Their twitter feed": DPRK_News is a parody account by Ken White of Popehat.
- ptaipale 9y ago
  Right, thanks. In this case I can't tell difference between parody and the actual statements by DPRK News.

EGreg 9y ago

The article is not wrong. We had a real chance to negotiate a roadmap towards a real peace agreement with NK, and end its nuclear program, but as usual the Republicans were against it. After all, if NK disarms then we don't get to bomb a country of "others" (Communists, Shiites etc.) who are against our ideological preferences. And that would be a shame. As usual the bonehead Repiblicans under Clinton, and later the disastrous George W Bush administration preferred to save a buck and reneg on the Agreed Framework, instead having their children spend 100 bucks and people's lives go up in smoke in what might be the first nuclear war since WW2. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agreed_Framework https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agreed_Framework "Soon after the agreement was signed, U.S. Congress control changed to the Republican Party, who did not support the agreement.[16][17] Some Republican Senators were strongly against the agreement, regarding it as appeasement.[18][19] Initially U.S. Department of Defense emergency funds not under Congress control were used to fund the transitional oil supplies under the agreement,[20] together with international funding. From 1996 Congress provided funding, though not always sufficient amounts.[11][21] Consequently, some of the agreed transitional oil supplies were delivered late.[22] KEDO's first director, Stephen Bosworth, later commented "The Agreed Framework was a political orphan within two weeks after its signature".[23] Some analysts believe North Korea agreed to the freeze primarily because of the U.S. agreement to phase out economic sanctions that had been in place since the Korean War. But because of congressional opposition, the U.S. failed to deliver on this part of the agreement.[24]" "As late as the end of 2003, North Korea claimed that it would freeze its nuclear program in exchange for additional American concessions, but a final agreement was not reached. North Korea withdrew from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 2003." However keep in mind that NK already helped Syria build a NUCLEAR WEAPONS FACILITY in 2006, which Israel had discovered and successfully destroyed. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Orchard https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Orchard

notacoward 9y ago

What a huge strawman. Most people do not, as the author claims, believe that North Koreans in general are irrational, stupid, warlike, etc. They believe that the North Korean leadership has most of those qualities, which is pretty well proven. Unable to counter that, the author chooses to "disprove" that which is never claimed. As jrhurst has already pointed out, this supposed "orientalism" doesn't seem to exist for Viet Nam, China, or even South Korea. I'm not going to say there's no such thing as anti-Asian discrimination or even outright racism in the US, but we don't fear nations that aren't led by provably-insane coddled children of past dictators,.

JBSay 9y ago
Assuming that your enemy is crazy is just intellectual lazyness. If you can't explain the behaviour of your enemy then it's probably because your understanding of his motives is lacking.
- notacoward 9y ago
  Assuming that your enemy is crazy is intellectual laziness. However, there really are crazy people in the world. Some occupy positions of power. Do you deny either part of that? When the craziness is thoroughly proven it's not lazy to recognize it. You know what is lazy? Assuming that someone's not crazy, or assuming that an interlocutor is jumping to conclusions. Turn that lens on yourself first, not last.
  - awptimus 9y ago
    "Crazy" suffices to say that the behavior set is far outside of regular norms as to be unworkable with normal reason. It doesn't have to imply the actor is schizophrenic or anything. It doesn't matter if the actor, behaving rationally towards his ends, has ends that are absolutely incompatible with ours, or if he's acting irrationally. [edit: I mean it doesn't matter from a defense of his behavior standpoint. It's fine to call him "crazy" if his ends are absolutely unacceptable] I agree with the critique of the piece - no one thinks North Koreans are inferior as human beings. We think they've been fed a ubiquitous dose of propaganda their entire lives. We think that a dictator, so very isolated through years of behavior that necessitates (and invites) it, lacks any sense of acceptable end-states for his country. I also agree that it's misguided to dismiss him as actually crazy. One must treat him as a rational actor - moves you make will have moves he makes. There is rationality involved. May be shitty rationality, may be myopic rationality, but it's rationality. You move warships towards North Korea he's not going going to launch Rubber Ducks at you. That'd be crazy. He's not going to poop his pants and eat the feces on live television and announce he's a little princess.

rendall 9y ago

In the author's own words, in a comment to his own article: "I don’t claim to be an expert or even that well-read on the subject." In context, the "subject" he refers to appears to be "North Korea."