Fool Me Twice Shame On Me
What do you say for “fool me twentyleven”?
By streiff Posted in Foreign Affairs — Comments (7) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Wu Da Wei (center) joins hands with U.S. Assistant Secretary of State (and object of desire to women throughout China) Christopher Hill (right) and North Korea's Vice Foreign Minister Kim Kye Gwan (left) for the ritual pre-coital singing of Kumbaya.
We are informed today that North Korea has either "agreed to end its pursuit of nuclear weapons" or "shut down its main nuclear reactor and eventually dismantle its atomic weapons program" or "take steps towards nuclear disarmament" or most accurately "agreed to a deal to begin to close down its nuclear program in exchange for $300 million in energy and financial aid".
The terms of the agreement, according to CNN are:
-- North Korea agrees to shut down its main nuclear reactor within 60 days
-- The country will receive an initial 50,000 tons of fuel oil or financial aid
-- It will receive another 950,000 tons for irreversibly disabling the reactor
-- Another meeting of the nuclear envoys is scheduled for March 19
Shutting down Yongbyon is all well and good but here we must take a leap of faith and imagine that they haven’t used the past decade or so to construct another facility, or series of micro-facilities that have escaped detection.
How any of this reaches the level of justifying the ledes of several major newspapers is beyond me. As far as can be discerned from what we know about the agreement North Korea’s nuclear weapons and its nuclear weapons programs aren’t addressed. There doesn’t seem to be a prohibition on Pyongyang opening a new facility or continuing the production of nuclear weapons with existing plutonium at Yongbyon once the reactor is shut down.
I hate to be cynical but I’ve seen this picture before. Let me go out on a limb here and predict the only part of this agreement that will actually happen is North Korea walking away with $300 million in aid.
« So Tell Me, Mr. Immelt, Why Are You Killing American Servicemen? — Comments (30) | "A Two-Hour Speech/A Two-Hour Speech . . ." — Comments (5) »
Fool Me Twice Shame On Me 7 Comments (0 topical, 7 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
but we do not.
Thanks for an excellent entry, Streiff.
"During my lifetime, all our problems have come from mainland Europe, and all the solutions from the English-speaking nations across the world." - Thatcher
and I suspect the next president will make yet another "deal" with NK.
NK signs a piece of paper, gets lots of goodies, and continues its nuclear ambitions for 5 to 7 years then Shampoos, Rinses, & Repeats!
Since NK and PajamaBoy™ in particular aren’t as territorially or regionally ambitious as Iran. This may be a lopsided compromise we can live with in order to more effectively focus our attention where it needs to be? Iran!
Founder and contributor to The Minority Report and Senior writer for The Hinzsight Report
Hadn't thought of it
(It may be too optimistic a defense, since I'm not sure we'll ever take decisive action against Iran, despite Bush's statements to the contrary, but it's still an interesting defense...)
"During my lifetime, all our problems have come from mainland Europe, and all the solutions from the English-speaking nations across the world." - Thatcher
Did President Bush have a breakdown after the election or something?
Run like Reagan!
Rumor has it he first asked for ONE MILLION DOLLARS...
And I'm not sure it could've come at a worse time for US foreign policy.
Moreover, it's made it clearer than ever how to go about getting aid when you need it: hold a gun to the head of the wealthy nations as none of them have the stomach to withstand it.
Some time ago, when Bush was a different (stronger, better) president, he said that relying on Saddam Hussein's word for our security was not an option. That's a sound philosophy -- it acknowledges the reality that there's no such thing as trusting some people...at least, not when WMDs are at stake. And on that list of people not to be trusted are the late Saddam Hussein and the not-so-late Kim il Jung.
I imagine this deal will hold -- until such time as NoKo blows through the aid they've wrested with this scam. And then we'll be back here again. Their nuclear program will pick up where it was left off (if it will even actually be left off) and they'll resume missile tests.
They say that one definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. That would mean that one definition of sanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting the same result.
Considering that this is now twice that we've forked over cash to get them to cease and desist (which necessarily means that they've twice pursued nuclear weaponry), who are we to call Kim il Jong insane?
Maybe it's the other way around after all?