I really don't have anything to say about Joshua's post this morning. (Just go read it.) Except that the Bush Administration's policy on North Korea (whatever that policy was) is in tatters.
Their policy is in tatters at a time when making the case for Iraq could be so easy if they used North Korea in the right way, as I wrote here. Instead their arrogance leaves the perception that the war in Iraq is about oil. Amateurs, I tell you.
Not only is it in tatters but it seems this administration is willing to appease the North Koreans. Yeah, I know, them is fightin' words, as we say down here in South Texas.
But here is the reality folks: they've gone from we'll "talk" but not "negotiate", to we'll "negotiate" but never "compromise."
Howzat?
And the increasing talk, as Joshua reports," of pulling out the 37,000 [American] troops," leaves me breathless. I'd call that appeasement on a grand scale. How does that make the security of North East Asia any more stable? Why even bring it up? Amateurs, I tell you.
Jeez, I never even considered this kind of result when I wrote my Korean primers, one and two.
Some other things are bothering me about this whole episode, as well.
This is not liberal bias at the Times, either. You can find it here in yesterday's State Department briefing. So you can't use that excuse.
What the Bush administration just said, for those of you who cannot speak diplomatese, is "if you dismantle your nuclear projects we'll give you aid."
Sounds like Clinton's policy to me.
Folks, no matter what kind of Ari babble we hear out of the White House or flacking and shilling we hear from Mr. Boucher at State that is what we call a quid pro quo.
Period.
So, it now seems that this Administration has been lying about Clinton's role in Korea for two years smearing his administration in the process, they've irritated one of our best allies, they've voiced the possibility of pulling out our 37,000 troops, thus destabilizing North East Asia and have wrecked our credibility. Not bad for two years.
If conservatives want to call this a "success" as they invariably will, then what Clinton did was genius.
Posted by Sean-Paul @ 01/08/2003 10:15 AM
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or maybe someone read a creative suggestion on OxBlog from one of the readers on how to redeploy troops...;-)
White House plans to pull our 37,000 troops out of South Korea can best be explained in the immortal words of Eric Cartman on South Park: "Screw you guys - I'm going home".
Posted by: John Isbell on January 8, 2003 05:56 PM
