By now I am sure many of you have seen the news that Sony has indefinitely postponed/canceled the theatrical release of The Interview under threat from hackers apparently connected to the regime in North Korea. It is not clear whether the threat was explicitly against...
The University of Southern California Korean Studies Institute and the Center for Strategic and International Studies are running a joint Korea Project: Planning for the Long Term (pic to the left)....
So North Korea has issued a "Gangnam Style" video to mock a South Korean presidential candidate, Park Guen Hye, from the ruling conservative party. According to Malaysia's The Sun Daily:"The parody,...
I know what you’re thinking – how many more d--- pictures of this guy and Kim Il Sung (left, KJI right) do I have to look at? Well…too bad! They go on and on and on…In the last two weeks I rolled...
For the past 5 months, I've been following the strange story of Israel's bombing of a mysterious site in Syria. In this month's New Yorker, Seymour Hersh has an excellent look into the subject. Hersh takes a round-up of the major media stories of the event, analyzing how they advance the narrative of the episode, and adds some first-rate reporting from Israel, Syria, and Washington. While his article sheds new and important light on the subject, at its core, it remains a mystery:Morton Abramowitz, a former Assistant Secretary of State for intelligence and research, told me that he was...
The controversy over the Israeli raid into Syria rages on. The Sunday Times has peeled back another layer of the onion, one that only deepens the mystery as to what Israel actually bombed in northern Syria. This latest tidbit seems to support the notion that it was in fact a North Korean supplied nuclear site in Syria. If true, it is perhaps only the tip of a much larger iceberg, and per Landis:"If this story is true," a Syrian friend of mine just told me, "Asad should fire his top generals, instantly."The Times reports:ISRAELI commandos from the elite Sayeret Matkal unit – almost certainly...
Something is brewing in the Middle East that merits close attention, because the more we learn about it, the more intriguing it becomes. It also brings home some chickens to roost, so to speak, for earlier Bush Administration foreign policy failures.Last week, Israel launched a highly secret air-strike deep into Syria. Despite the fact that Israel and Syria share a border (the direct route), the squadron of Israeli F-15's flew over the Med, through Turkey (a very close Israeli military ally), and dropped significant ordinance onto a Syrian target. The entire operation has been cloaked in...
Last Thursday, Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill made a sudden and surprise visit to North Korea to talk directly with the North Korean government about their nuclear program.All I can say is-- its about (_______) time. And, it shows the power of good, pragmatic diplomacy.From 2001 through 2004, the Bush Administration held a very tough line toward North Korea--axis of evil, no direct talks, CVID, etc. This tough line was very popular with the Administration's base conservative philosophy about getting tough with the evil dictators around the world and not negotiating with...
It wasn't quite one of my best-laid plans, but it did go awry this weekend. I had intended to blog about 3 or 4 interesting stories I've been following over the weekend, but between feeding the new kid, searching for child care (if this were one of those so-called 'mommyblogs,' oh the stories i could post. but its not, so i won't...) and of course the fantastic Taste of Wheaton today, time flew by and here it is, Sunday night watching the Mets - Yankees game (and I share Rodger's view on this) and this is all that there is time to do. So, here goes:Event I really really really really wanted...
National Security is all about prioritizing tough decisions. Often, an administration can get away with avoiding the really tough calls, but from time to time, issues arise that force policy makers into pragmatic trade-offs between vital values and interests. Those choices are very instructive and insightful as to how a President sees the world. The NY Times reports that the Bush Administration faced just such a choice between its key goals of counter-terrorism and counter-proliferation:Three months after the United States successfully pressed the United Nations to impose strict sanctions on...
I'm still reading reports of the North Korea nuclear deal, and I should have more to say as things develop. A few quick thoughts:1. The terms of the deal, at least as currently reported, seem reasonable. North Korea looks to get most of what it wants, but the benefits of a non-nuclear North Korea mitigate against that. The administration should ignore the howls of protest already emanating from hardliners. The US, Japan, and South Korea don't have any other good options. Military strikes are too costly, and the Chinese will only pressure North Korea so far in the current environment. As I...
Where to start? About 2 years ago, Patrick and I did an event with the campus Debate Club, where he and I each teamed up with a student and debated "US Foreign Policy: Going to Hell in a Hand Basket." It was great fun. I was on the side of hell in a hand basket (and won), though it helped to have reality on my side. Reality is back in force, and its not good for the Bush Administration and its not is it good for US foreign policy.The Washington Post has a solid overview in today's paper.On three key flash points -- North Korea, Iran and Sudan -- the Bush administration confronts the...