William Perry calls for violence from the pages of Thursday’s Washington Post:
"Should the United States allow a country openly hostile to it and armed with nuclear weapons to perfect an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of delivering nuclear weapons to U.S. soil? We believe not. The Bush administration has unwisely ballyhooed the doctrine of "preemption," which all previous presidents have sustained as an option rather than a dogma. It has applied the doctrine to Iraq, where the intelligence pointed to a threat from weapons of mass destruction that was much smaller than the risk North Korea poses. (The actual threat from Saddam Hussein was, we now know, even smaller than believed at the time of the invasion.) But intervening before mortal threats to U.S. security can develop is surely a prudent policy.
"Therefore, if North Korea persists in its launch preparations, the United States should immediately make clear its intention to strike and destroy the North Korean Taepodong missile before it can be launched. This could be accomplished, for example, by a cruise missile launched from a submarine carrying a high-explosive warhead. The blast would be similar to the one that killed terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in Iraq. But the effect on the Taepodong would be devastating. The multi-story, thin-skinned missile filled with high-energy fuel is itself explosive — the U.S. airstrike would puncture the missile and probably cause it to explode. The carefully engineered test bed for North Korea’s nascent nuclear missile force would be destroyed, and its attempt to retrogress to Cold War threats thwarted. …
"There is nothing they could do with such warning to defend the bulky, vulnerable missile on its launch pad, but they could evacuate personnel who might otherwise be harmed. The United States should emphasize that the strike, if mounted, would not be an attack on the entire country, or even its military, but only on the missile that North Korea pledged not to launch — one designed to carry nuclear weapons. We should sharply warn North Korea against further escalation."
If you interpret this attack on your country as an attack on your country, well, that’s your own fault.
Meanwhile, the Post‘s staff writers had this to add:
"Also yesterday, the U.S. ambassador to Japan reiterated that "all options are on the table" with regard to North Korea."
Asked whether the United States would attempt to shoot down the North Korean missile if launched, J. Thomas Schieffer warned in an interview that "we have greater technical means of tracking it than we had in the past, and we have options that we have not had in the past."
Hat tip: Laura Rozen, whose sources seem to think it’s all just talk. She quotes Chris Nelson as telling her, "The only plausible explanation I have seen so far is that Perry thinks this will get the Norks’ attention that everyone is seriously pissed of, so they better back down."
William Arkin thinks all the rage over the rocket test is "much ado about nothing" in the first place:
"North Korea, starved for attention and with its own fish to fry domestically and in its own region, may or may not be preparing some rocket for launch, and it may or may not be attempting to use its missile as a bargaining chip or a PR stunt, and it may just be attempting to put its own satellite into space. What should crystal clear though in a world of risks and balances is that North Korea’s missile, even if it exists, is hardly a threat to us. …
"Lurking behind the story of course is the image of a long-range North Korean missile capable of hitting Alaska and even Los Angeles.
"It is a false image, and one that even if true, would be the least of America’s worries. …
"Part of the North Korea nuclear narrative is also that U.S. intelligence believes North Korea has manufactured enough nuclear materials for 10 weapons and might even have two already fabricated. The suggestion is that a nuclear weapon could be place on the Taepo Dong 2. It would indeed be a grave and provocative act, one that would be technically feasible by, say, 2016 at the earliest. And that’s if we did nothing between now and then to help North Korea along in changing the situation."
It’s too bad Bush chose to screw up relations with the North upon taking office, if not, we could use this time to better focus on the disaster of an unprovoked war of aggression he’s already gotten us into without all these distractions.
Typical of a Secretary of Defense. Always wanting to bomb somebody. I didn’t see anyone bombing the U.S. when we tested missiles. We do it all the time by the way.
Attack North Korea? Your kiddin’? What’s he been smoking? PCP? Wasn’t Perry supposed to be the kinder, gentler, diplomatic Secretary of Defense? As for that fuckin’ pygmy in Pyong-Yang he’s just running another bluff. He does it all the time. Another Korean War’s not going to gain him anything. Maybe an AK round in the base of his skull in China if he did finally go off his nut, invaded the South, then to tried to hide there after his chickenshit Stalinist State was destroyed…But seriously, I can’t fathom that kind of bombast out of Perry. He knows better. Somebody must’ve called him a punk. Either that or he’s getting freaky in his old age…Democrats like war too it seems…
Premeir Kim has a couple of options. Attack the South, and get nuked with USAF tacnukes. Sit tight with Stalinist control, and watch his nation starve to death such that even his own security forces end up as charity cases for the South; the end result is a Soviet style implosion. Or loosen control ala the rest of the ex-communist East Asia: economic powerhouses China and Vietnam.
Not too many choices for him. I feel kind of sorry for the bastard, in an abstract kind of way.
Don’t trust the Chinese. What better way for them to see how effective our missile defense is, then for NK to shoot off a missile. North Korea is their pawn to use as they see fit to their own advantage. Sort of like Cuba and the Soviets.
It’s one thing to starve illiterate, brutalized peasants and their infants to death in -0 weather. But to have them proclaim how much they enjoy all the Dear Leader has provided them with seems to me the ultimate horror of their enviable existence. Bush went the extra mile and learned a new word and said he “loathed” him. I still get the idea someone heavy in this Administration twisted William Perry’s nuts to come out with such a irregular statement given his History. Was a temporary distraction for the quagmire in Iraq. Which you notice there pulling out of the hat ex post haste. As for The PRC and their rapport with NK? The former are largely a diplomatic pain in the ass and a worsening immigration problem. As for trusting the Chinese, well, I’m sure you know the old adage “Nations have no permanent friends only permanent interests. Besides, we sold them most of the computer technology for their ICBM guidance control. Far cheaper to launch communication satellites on Chinese missiles. We sold did Saddam his chemical arsenal to boot. ‘Policy” at the time. That and they didn’t think he was crazy enough to invade Kuwait. Hell, Carter once technically supported the Khmer Rouge when they were invaded by The NVA in ’78 thus terminating the well known Killing Fields or Holliday in Cambodia…right down to the Cannabilism. It’s called Politics, and they’re as hierarchical as they are diabolic. Given these realities I have to admire the true Libertarians, even if in a pragmatic context they don’t make a hell of a lot of sense. But that’s just me. I suppose there’s a slight paradox at work. Besides, Web-logs keeps me out of the bars…But don’t sweat NK, there’s really nothing there to justify the cost of war, a little coal and a lot of manure and cabbage. Anyway you slice it, in The Realpolitik they don’t amount to much. Even with Nuclear weapons. Rather like a deadbeat Security Guard with a gun, if he uses it the first thing he loses is his minimum wage job. Still he likes packing it around. Makes him feel like he’s some-body.
What we need to do is bomb the fuck out of North Korea so they know we mean buisness.