All But A Declaration Of War
Kim Jong Il's "unofficial" spokesman has what amounts to a declaration of war against the United States published in Asia Times. It's important to note that even the Asia Times puts the word "unofficial" in quotes. Kim Myong Chol is the pipeline Kim uses to send his declarations out to the world.
The nuclear test, once conducted, will have far-reaching implications for the Koreas and the rest of the world. It carries five messages.
The first message is that Kim Jong-il is the greatest of the peerless national heroes Korea has ever produced. Kim is unique in that he is the first to equip Korea with sufficient military capability to take the war all the way to the continental US. Under his leadership the DPRK has become a nuclear-weapons state with intercontinental means of delivery. Kim is certainly in the process of achieving the long-elusive goal of neutralizing the American intervention in Korean affairs and bringing together North and South Korea under the umbrella of a confederated state.
Unlike all the previous wars Korea fought, a next war will be better called the American War or the DPRK-US War because the main theater will be the continental US, with major cities transformed into towering infernos. The DPRK is now the fourth-most powerful nuclear weapons state just after the US, Russia, and China.
The DPRK has all types of nuclear bombs and warheads, atomic, hydrogen and neutron, and the means of delivery, short-range, medium-range and long-range, putting the whole of the continental US within effective range. The Korean People's Army also is capable of knocking hostile satellites out of action.
All the past Korean heroes let the Land of Morning Calm be reduced to smoking ruins as the wars were fought on its soil, even though they repelled the invaders. One of the two major aspirations of the Korean people has been the buildup of military capability enough to turn enemy land into the war theater. Kim has splendidly achieved this aspiration.
The other has been the neutralization and phasing out of the American presence in Korea before the two Koreas come together as a reunified state. When President George W Bush agreed on the 2009 transfer of wartime operational control over South Korean forces to the South Korean president, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld signaled the withdrawal of US troops with combat troops relocated from the front line to bases behind Seoul.
The title "the greatest iron-willed, brilliant commander" is reserved for Kim Jong-il, who has led tiny North Korea to acquire the most coveted membership of the elite nuclear club, braving all the nuclear war threats, sanctions and isolation efforts on the part of the US. It is little short of a miracle that the leader has outmaneuvered and outpowered the Bush administration against heavy odds.
There are five "messages" in this highly unusual document. But in essence it shows a thoroughly insane world view. One can assume this is direct from Kim himself. The claims are that North Korea has a massive arsenal of all types of nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them. It also appears to indicate that they have every intention of using them. The article also quotes extensively from American media.
There is a line being crossed here. Kim is apparently too insane to care.
North Korea | Gaius October 6, 2006
