[USFK Forums] North Korea bluffing? [Minot Daily]

[C. Y. Lee]

Uploaded by C. Y. Lee on Thursday, March 30, 2006

North Korea bluffing?

The Minot Daily, Wednesday, March 29, 2006 — Time: 5:02:50 PM EST

A North Korean official this week made an extraordinarily chilling threat. Speaking of pressure exerted against his country by the United States, concerning North Korea's work to provide itself with a nuclear arsenal, the foreign ministry spokesman said this: "Preemptive strike is not the monopoly of the United States."

North Korean officials' long history of using bombast for domestic as well as foreign relations purposes makes any statement from that regime difficult to decipher. The preemptive strike comment, however, certainly sounded like a serious threat.

Nuclear proliferation has made it possible for many countries to engage in atomic bluffing. It also means that some may be capable of carrying out their threats.

But no country on earth has the massive nuclear strike capability of the United States.

Perhaps it is time for U.S. leaders to voice a variant of the old "mutually assured destruction" - or MAD - philosophy that was used against the old Soviet Union during the Cold War. MAD simply meant that a nuclear exchange between the two powers would have meant widespread destruction and loss of life in both countries.

MAD isn't valid in regard to North Korea - thank heaven. Our leaders, then, should respond through diplomatic channels with a reminder to Pyongyang that, should North Korean leaders be foolish enough to make good on their pre-emptive strike threat, their country would be destroyed - utterly and completely.

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