Right-wing war hawks keep on poking the North Korean regime with a stick hoping that they'll react.

[Better Believe It]

It's now becoming clear that the South Korean regime will continue and escalate its military "exercises" to please its domestic and foreign right-wing cheerleaders. This is a dangerous brinkmanship game of "chicken" they are playing with the north.

The North Korean Stalinist regime was persuaded by Russia and China to not retaliate against the previous South Korean war games.

We lucked out last time but I'm not so sure that will happen again.

So now the South Korean regime, apparently assured of U.S. government support so far, is becoming more reckless by upping the ante in this high stakes gamble by launching the biggest war games conducted since the end of the last Korean war!

I'm not so sure that calmer heads in the north will prevail again and follow the advice of China and Russia. North Korea military leaders may now be convinced that inaction on their part will only encourage bolder and more adventuristic military actions by the South Korean government.

And war hawks in the United States from both major parties will support a full scale outbreak of war in Korea!

They are the same ones that supported the invasion/occupation of Iraq and war against Afghanistan.

If the right-wing South Korean regime isn't worried about a resumption of a far deadlier Korean War and its likely nuclear escalation they will continue their military "exercises", especially if the Obama administration encourages them to proceed with little game of "nuclear chicken".

It appears that President Obama may be ignoring good advice:

Why we need talks with North Korea
By Donald Gregg, Armonk, N.Y.
The writer was U.S. ambassador to South Korea from 1989 to 1993 and made five trips to North Korea from 2002 to 2008.
Washington Post
December 22, 2010

New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson (D) ended a five-day visit to North Korea this week, trying to help defuse the crisis between Washington and Pyongyang "North Korea makes gestures toward calm after South's drills," news story, Dec. 21. He reported conciliatory gestures on the part of North Korea, but based on my experience eight years ago and what I see from the Obama administration, which apparently is not even interested in debriefing Mr. Richardson, the visit may have been for naught.

Michael Green, a tough National Security Council staffer in the Bush administration, says the Obama administration has been harder on North Korea than he and his colleagues were. But the need for direct talks outweighs any evil acts that the North Koreans may have perpetrated. I wish that President Obama and his advisers would recognize that and listen to the messages Bill Richardson brought back.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/22/AR2010122204973.html

President Obama has the power to stop this descent into insanity or he can ignore wiser leaders at his own peril and the peril of our nation.

Of course, if the North Korean military responds this time to South Korean military operations, that will all but guarantee the resumption of a full scale Korean war. South Korea has promised massive retaliation and that means the full scale resumption of the Korean war.

Such a resumption would necessitate a massive military mobilization with a resumption of the draft in the United States to fight not only world-wide terrorism but now the "communist menace" from North Korea and perhaps even China at some point!

Being on a "war footing" would pretty much give the current and future U.S. governments all the more excuse to crack down on progressive individuals and organizations in the name of "national security" and "defending the Homeland". A new "anti-red" witch-hunt would be unleashed, led by Republicans and "moderate" Democrats.

A Korean war would result in patriotic calls for great economic sacrifices by working people and the elderly in order to finance hundreds of billions, if not trillions of dollars in new U.S. war funds that would be required to "win" the Korean war.

And we'd see a giant bi-partisan lurch to the right to "defend the homeland" by both major political parties.

The Democrats and President Obama certainly wouldn't want to be pictured by Republicans as being "soft on communist aggression" or "subversives" at home who oppose U.S. military interventions around the world.

So before any progressives get too anxious, excited or even pleased about the prospect of a renewal of the Korean war because they don't like the North Korean dictatorship and for those who seem to get almost giddy with South Korean tweaks of the "great leader" in the north, they need to look at the big picture and what such a war will mean at home .... and for all Koreans and much of the world.

This is serious shit, not a little war "game".

And flippant "funny" drive-by remarks detract from a serious discussion of this matter.

Of course, perhaps that's the real intention behind such "funny", nationalistic, militaristic and gung-ho "patriotic" comments.

Distraction, not civil discourse and debate.

Here's just one example published today of the lying right-wing militarist propaganda we are seeing in the media:



LYONS: 'Axis of Evil' spins closer
Rogue nations prepare to target the U.S. homeland
By Admiral James A. Lyons
Retired Navy Adm. James A. Lyons was commander in chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet and senior U.S. military representative to the United Nations.
December 22, 2010

In his State of the Union address of January 2002, President George W. Bush coined the phrase "Axis of Evil." However, in his second term he apparently forgot about it. President Obama may never use this term, but make no mistake: The Axis of Evil is alive and well. Iran, North Korea and now possibly Venezuela are on the verge of obtaining nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them.

On Nov. 12, North Korea revealed that it may have in operation 2,000 centrifuges, which have the capacity to produce enough highly enriched uranium to make the plutonium necessary for a number of nuclear weapons every year. In reality, we don't have sufficient intelligence to know the North's actual nuclear potential. However, we do know it has been working for more than three decades to acquire both nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them - of course with China's help.

We do know that North Korea acquired from Russia the technology to make an intermediate-range nuclear missile, the BM-25 Musudan, with sufficient range to strike Okinawa and probably Guam. According to the revealed WikiLeaks documents, U.S. intelligence learned that North Korea had sold at least 19 of these missiles to Iran.

In late November, North Korean dissident sources made another startling revelation. According to one defector, North Korean dictator Kim Jong-iI had ordered a new program to build nuclear-warhead-armed torpedoes and mines, which could be operational by 2012. Based on past practice, I am confident once they are operational, they will be sold to Iran and possibly others.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/dec/22/axis-of-evil-spins-closer/

[Kaleva]

1. South Korea's big ass X-mas tree will be the start of WWIII

:)

[HEyHEY]

2. I don't know about "Keep poking" but this latest round is too far.

[GSLevel9]

3. A new war is just what Obama needs to beat Shrub's body count. nt

[white_wolf]

4. Oh another war?!

That's the best news I've heard all day. Why just think if we keep this up, then I can beat the people of the Middle Ages in the "Who saw the most wars in their lifetime game.' :sarcasm:

[Rochester]

5. I wouldn't care if I knew that we could stay out of it and just be spectators, but...

...I know that the odds of that happening are virtually zero, so let's keep the peace.

[no_hypocrisy]

6. One thing certain: We won't be able to borrow from China to fight N. Korea.

[Better Believe It]

7. If United States troops are sent into North Vietnam along China's border we know what they will do.

[NoPasaran]

8. "If United States troops are sent into North Vietnam along China's border we know what they will do"

Isn't it a little early in the morning to be smoking crack?