Listen
To Those "Or Elses"
By Eric
Margolis
September 04, 2017 "Information
Clearing House"
- Old Chinese saying: ‘when elephants battle,
ants get crushed.’ Think of the current crisis
on the Korean Peninsula in which the government
in Seoul has been all but ignored.
South
Korea’s newly elected president, Moon Jae-in,
keeps insisting that the US must not launch war
against North Korea without South Korea’s
agreement.
President Donald Trump and the US media appear
not to have heard Moon’s pleas, or are simply
disregarding them.
Amazingly, six decades after the end of the 1950
Korean War, South Korea’s 650,000-man active
armed forces and 4.2 million-man reserves remain
under the command of a US four-star general.
This neo-colonial arrangement was supposed to
have ended years ago, but successive
conservative South Korean governments maintained
their nation’s acceptance of Washington’s Asian
Raj. So does Japan.
The
most recent South Korean rightist leader, Park
Guen-hye, was ousted for alleged corruption and
is now in jail awaiting trial. Many of South
Korea’s rightists are Protestant Christians – as
was the US-backed Korean War leader, strongman
Syngman Rhee. South Korea’s Christians are
ardently anti-Communist and support war against
North Korea. Whatever happened to turn the other
cheek?
President Moon, an anti-war moderate leftist,
keeps calling for a peaceful solution to the
present crisis. Most South Koreans back him. As
I’ve found on my many assignments in Korea, most
Southerners shrug off the threat from North
Korea – or even laugh it off. They certainly
don’t want a full-scale war on their front door.
The 1950-53 conflict left at least 2.5 million
Korean civilians dead and most of the
peninsula’s major cities bombed flat by US
B-29’s.
North
Korea, by contrast, constantly harangues South
Koreans that their nation is a US ‘puppet’ and
‘colony’ run by traitors. Pyongyang insists that
North Korea is the authentic Korean state while
the South is a mere US/Japanese colony. Many
young South Koreans absorb such claims; some are
even proud of North Korea for standing up to the
mighty United States even though South Korea’s
economy is 45 times larger than that of
threadbare North Korea.
Kim
Jong-un’s bombastic challenge to President Trump
is emboldening Korean nationalists. Many point
to the fact that North Korea developed nuclear
weapons and delivery systems on its own while
South Korea was stopped from doing so by US
pressure in the 1970’s.
At the
same time, North Koreans are jumping for joy
that their nation just launched a medium-range
missile over Japan that panicked and humiliated
the much hated Japanese. The missile launch came
on the anniversary of Japan’s takeover of Korea
as a colony in 1910. Imperial Japan exploited
and humiliated the proud Koreans, treating them
as sub-humans. Koreans have never forgotten.
Many long for revenge.
That’s what Kim Jong-un is doing.
The
second North Korean missile to fly over Japan
makes painfully clear that Japan must have
nuclear weapons to defend itself, something this
writer has been urging for years.
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Otherwise, the world’s number three economy is
utterly naked to its foes, who include North
Korea and China. Emphasizing the point, this
week air raid sirens wailed in various parts of
Japan, giving the population a big scare and
undermining respect for its conservative
government.
Point
defense missiles – Japan’s current response –
won’t give it adequate protection. As France’s
Maginot Line so dramatically showed, fixed
defenses can be overcome by spirited, innovative
offensives. To defend itself, Japan – and
perhaps South Korea – need massive retaliatory
capability. But even then, if there is a north
Asian nuclear conflict, it’s likely North Korea
will save at least one or two nuclear missiles
for revenge against Japan.
China’s
Foreign Ministry has proposed the obvious,
sensible solution to this trumped-up crisis: the
US to cease its provocative annual air, land and
naval demonstration around North Korea’s borders
in return for the North outing a moratorium on
its provocative missile tests. So far,
Washington has refused this sensible solution.
Meanwhile, in a little-noticed, menacing
statement, China’s Ministry of Defense just
warned that China ‘would not allow’ US or South
Korea troops to enter North Korea. This is a
very serious warning that deserves utmost
attention in Washington.
It
reminds me of Imperial Russia’s warning
Austro-Hungary not to invade Serbia in the fall
of 1914 – or else. The ‘or else’ came: World War
I. And, of course, Mao’s China warning US Gen.
Douglas MacArthur not to cross the Yalu River in
1950 – or else. Soon after, 500,000 Chinese
troops invaded Korea.
Eric
S. Margolis is an award-winning, internationally
syndicated columnist. His articles have appeared
in the New York Times, the International Herald
Tribune the Los Angeles Times, Times of London,
the Gulf Times, the Khaleej Times, Nation –
Pakistan, Hurriyet, – Turkey, Sun Times Malaysia
and other news sites in Asia.
https://ericmargolis.com
Copyright Eric S. Margolis 2017
See also
North Korea’s Sixth
Nuclear Test: Strong Tremor Felt in China
North Korea says has
developed ‘advanced hydrogen bomb’ that can be
fitted on ICBM
Electromagnetic Pulse:
North Korea’s Latest Threat Against U.S.
Kim's final warning:
James Mattis raises threat of 'total
annihilation' of North Korea
'Unacceptable': China
slams Trump's threat to end commerce with N.
Korea's trade partners
WikiLeaks’s Assange:
Trump may be deposed if blocks trade with China
Peace in serious
jeopardy; no military solution to Korean
peninsula crisis – Russia’s UN envoy
