|
CounterPunch
March 7,
2003
Bush, Nukes and
North Korea
What's So Funny
About Peace (Treaties), Love and Understanding
By RON JACOBS
In recent weeks, the war of words between the
U.S. and northern Korea has ratcheted upwards. Northern Korea
has kicked out inspectors for the international nuclear watchdog
agency IAEA, threatened war if the UN security council places
sanctions on the country, and withdrawn from the nuclear non-proliferation
treaty. In the meantime, the United States has moved more Weapons
of mass destruction, troops, aircraft, and sailors into the region,
contemplated a pre-emptive attack on the country, and pushed
for sanctions against northern Korea. Japan and southern Korea
are doing what they can to prevent events from getting out of
hand between the two belligerents by encouraging conversations,
making positive overtures to northern Korea's government, and
telling the Bush administration to shut up. So far, this strategy
has worked. One wonders, though, for how long.
In fact, as I write this, the papers
are running stories about North Korea's threatened pullout from
the 1953 armistice agreement signed by the U.S. and North Korean
military commands that ended the shooting war fifty years ago.
Their reason for doing this is the continued buildup of US forces
in region. They fear a surprise attack and understandably want
to be prepared. In the statement released by Pyongyang, the government
press agency noted the continued violations by the United States
of the armistice agreement's limitations on troop strength and
types of weapons. The United States, in its turn, considers Pyongyang's
recent nuclear moves as violations of various international treaties
it had previously signed. Both governments are probably correct
in these appraisals of their opponent's actions and motives.
The people of the region, meanwhile, are hoping that the tension
can be resolved without war, as happened in the past, most recently
in 1994. This hope is shared by the all of the world, especially
the recently elected government of southern Korea, the governments
of China and Russia, and the government of Japan. Most of these
capitals are involved in efforts to de-escalate the tensions.
It remains to be seen whether or not they will be successful.
I have often wondered (like any thinking
individual), why isn't there a peace treaty? Although some US
government documents state that it is North Korea who does not
want such a treaty, history tells us otherwise. It is Washington
that does not want a peace agreement. Washington and its client
regime sabotaged the political conference in 1954 that was to
have been a forerunner to a peace conference and Washington has
ignored most every other opportunity for such a conference since
then. This is despite Pyongyang's almost constant calls for this
conference. The only exception to the US lack of interest in
negotiating a permanent settlement that I can find occurred in
1994 when, after another near-war, the Clinton administration
began talks that resulted in agreements that were designed to
end Pyongyang's nuclear weapons project and help that country
overcome a drought-induced famine. Since Dubya took over in 2000,
however, the relations between the two capitols has slipped to
its worst state since 1968, when North Korea captured the U.S.
Navy spy-ship, The Pueblo.
If one investigates the history books,
s/he'll discover that the U.S. foreign policy in the 1950s had
one guiding principle: stop communism. The architects of this
policy defined communism as any movement that threatened U.S.
designs for empire. Oftentimes, this meant stopping democratic
movements that opposed European colonialism and American support
for that colonialism. This designation of national liberation
movements as communist was self-fulfilling. Why? Primarily because
the communist elements in these movements were the most committed
and ended up making the most sense to the populations in the
affected countries after less militant elements were co-opted
or killed by colonial armies and U.S. intelligence operations.
Since the containment of communist regimes
was the modus operandi of U.S. foreign policy during the period,
the United States considered it absolutely necessary that the
two largest communist nations-the Soviet Union and the People's
Republic of China-were contained militarily and economically.
Maintaining a military presence in Korea was essential to this
plan, and any peace treaty would have required the withdrawal
of all foreign troops from the Korean peninsula. Hence, a peace
treaty was the last thing the United States wanted. The best
solution for Washington would have been a total defeat and occupation
of the northern half of Korea, but the Korean conflict of 1950
- 1953 had proven that the political and human cost of such an
endeavor was more than the American population was willing to
pay. So, the next best strategy was the situation that has existed
on the Korean peninsula since June 1953. No war, but no peace.
Although the cold war has been over for
more than a decade, the same strategy of containment exists in
that region of the world. China, now communist in name only,
is still the greatest long-term military threat to U.S. hegemony
in the eyes of the Pentagon and Defense Department. If one looks
at where recent U.S. military bases have been built, s/he will
note that, when added to existing U.S. military presence in Asia,
these bases form an almost complete circle around the Chinese
nation. This is not an accident.
Of course, the Pentagon does not want
a war with China. These days it prefers smaller battles that
it has a good chance of winning-Iraq, Afghanistan, and perhaps
Colombia-but not with an equal combatant like China. In addition,
China has no desire for war. In today's world, this would probably
only occur if the argument over Taiwan became a military one,
although occurrences like the spy plane incident of 2001 have
sparked wars between other nations before. There are those in
the U.S. establishment, however, who would relish seeing their
fantasy of one Korea under the rule of the United States army.
One imagines that they are secretly hoping for some kind of incident
that could be used as a rationale for attacking Pyongyang's army.
It is these ultra-right elements that seem to have the ear of
Dubya these days. One can assume that it is these men and women
who are encouraging the bellicose statements towards Korea as
they simultaneously push our nation towards a war with Iraq.
So, why doesn't the United States want
a peace treaty with North Korea? Why are they willing to risk
another bloody war with that country's military? The reason is
simple: because any peace agreement would require that the United
States remove all of its forces, weapons, including its weapons
of mass destruction (which include nuclear weapons) from the
southern half of the country. This action would limit Washington's
ability to bully other governments in the region. In addition,
it would end one more rationalization Washington likes to use
for its marriage to the defense industry and the accompanying
transfer of public funds to that industry in the name of what
passes for national security in the warfare state. It seems to
me that if Washington were truly interested in national security,
it would want peace with Pyongyang, not war. In that case, a
peace treaty with Pyongyang is a no-brainer.
Ron Jacobs
can be reached at: rjacobs@zoo.uvm.edu
Yesterday's Features
Ann Harrison
No
Lock Up for Medical Marijuana Advocate Jeff Jones!
Gary Leupp
A Very
Fine Thing: Turkey Stands Up to Bush
Winslow T. Wheeler
Inside
the Pentagon's Pork Factory
Chris Floyd
Swing
Blades: How Rumsfeld Filled His Pockets with Pyongyang's Nuclear
Loot
Uri Avnery
Sharon's Sleight of Hand
Ron Lare
UAW Local
600's Opposition to War
David Krieger
Meanwhile, Back at the Security Council
Ralph Nader
How MSNBC Sabotaged Donahue
Anthony Gancarski
Somebody Blew Up Donahue: a Response to Ralph Nader
Harry Browne
The
Curse of Bono
Website of the Day
Squat
Net
Keep CounterPunch Alive:
Make
a Tax--Deductible Donation Today Online!
home / subscribe
/ about us / books
/ archives / search
/ links /
CounterPunch Available Exclusively
to Subscribers:
- CounterPunch Special:
The Persecution of Gershon Legman by Susan Davis: Smut, the Post Office, Commies
and the FBI;
- Reeling Democrats: Is Pelosi the Answer?
- Gandhi v. Hitler: the Secret Race for the Nobel
Prize;
- Sullying Mario Savio's
Memory;
- Lynching Then and Now;
- Earn While You Learn: Chris Whittle and Child Labor;
The Case of the Pompous
Professor;
- The Class Struggle in
Boston: All that
Effort, But What Did They Get?
Remember, the CounterPunch website is
supported exclusively by subscribers to our newsletter. Our worldwide
web audience is soaring , with about seven million hits a month
now. This is inspiring, but the work involved also compels us
to remind you more urgently than ever to subscribe and/or make
a (tax deductible) donation if you can afford it. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe
Now!
Or Call Toll Free 1 800 840 3683
home / subscribe
/ about us
/ books
/ archives
/ search
/ links
/
|
February 28,
2003
Alexander
Cockburn
Meet
the New Yorker's Chief Hack: Jeffrey Goldberg
Saul Landau
Now
It's Personal
Michael Neumann
A Plea for Hysteria
Karima Bennoume
The UN: Tool for Peace or War?
The Black
Commentator
The Rev. Sharpton and the Soul of the Democrats
Jennifer Loewenstein
Don't Turn Off the War
Richard Levins
Cuba's Biological Weapons: Why the World Needs More of Them
M. Shahid Alam
Is This a Clash of Civilizations?
Clay Conrad
Juries
and Judges: What's Relevant?
Ben Tripp
Speaking in Tongues: a Guide to Gibberish in the Age of Bush
Eliot Katz
To Declare Preemptive War is to Declare a Bankrupt Imagination
Kurt Nimmo
Paying Through the Nose to Kill Iraqi Kids
Matt Vidal
George W. Bonaparte
Mark Zepezauer
Why the Right Hates America
Mickey Z.
The Anti----War Talk I Never Gave
Jerry Kroth
Jung and the Space Shuttle Revisited
Shyam Oberoi
Chronicle of a War Foretold
Ron Jacobs
What If the Firebombing of Baghdad Were a Nightclub Fire?
Poets' Basement
Eliot Katz and Jim Cohn
Website of
the Weekend
Defense
Tech
Read
Whiteout and Find Out
How the CIA's Backing of the Mujahideen Created the World's Most
Robust Heroin Market and Helped to Finance the Rise of the Taliban
and Osama bin Laden
Whiteout:
CIA, Drugs & the
Press
by Alexander
Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
|