SO, WHAT TO DO ABOUT KOREA

Hopefully we can all agree on the following facts, I doubt it, but we have to start somewhere.

1.       Kim Jung Un is rational.  He may be weird but he’s rational.  Why?

2.       Kim Jung Un’s primary goal is his own survival and the survival of his regime.

a.       He will therefore not initiate hostilities because the response would be the end of him and his regime.

3.       Negotiation is not an option.  We’ve been down this road 4 or 8 times depending on who you believe and it’s obvious that all have failed based on where we find ourselves today.

a.        Clinton built light-water nuclear plants to replace their fission plants  to help them meet their energy needs and

b.       George Bush didn’t like the idea of continuing to give aid when they determined that North Korea was cheating on its commitments.  So we stopped and Korea continued and perhaps accelerated their nuclear weapons program.

Shortly after January 20, Trump got the Xi’s nose out of joint by taking a call from the President of Taiwan.  I thought this was great.  While I don’t like Trump’s personality, I thought the one positive aspect of it would be in dealing with foreign leaders, ok, with the possible exception of Putin who he can’t seem to bring himself to criticize.  He doesn’t seem to have a problem insulting our allies.  But I digress, no need to go down that rat hole.

For the last 40 years we’ve been diplomatic with a regime that has been anything but diplomatic.  They are rude, insulting, bellicose, liars, cheaters and untrustworthy.  These are Donald’s kind of people, you know, kinda like the New York real estate business and associated thugs.

To recap, North Korea isn’t going to strike first no matter what President Trump says, IMHO.  Let’s see if Donald’s approach works.  If it does, we will all be eating a lot of crow.  If not,  many of us will die.  What’s new? This is what governments have been best at for 4000 years.