After the seeming rapprochement between North and South Korea the other day, a few thoughts occurred, mostly in the realm of cautious optimism. I'd say LGM's Robert Farley pretty much captures my observations on what's happened so far, and what's likely to happen.
When Kim Jong Un says "denuclearization" and Mike Pompeo or Emperor Snowflake says the same word, there's a very good chance that two different meanings are being conveyed. It seems incredibly unlikely that Kim would surrender weapons that he and his father spent decades developing and building. At best he might agree to a cessation of testing and production, but in exchange for what? Farley is absolutely correct that on the off chance that NK completely disarms, with or without major concessions in return, Snowflake actually would deserve the Nobel Peace Prize.
Bu Snowflake is who he is, and at heart he is a loudmouth, a fuckup, a loser who manages to escape accountability. He'll find a way to fuck this up, and it's because he thinks that the outcome of Korea will serve as a warning to the Iranian mullahs. It doesn't occur to him that maybe North Korea -- and South Korea, for that matter -- observe his bad-faith dealing with Iran, the constant overt attempts to derail and abrogate the JCPOA, and assume that we'll deal with them the same way.
Analysts continually try to assess Kim Jong Un and determine whether he's a "rational" or "irrational" actor. A truly rational actor would do exactly what Kim's been doing, and be sure to cover his ass going into this "summit" that's supposed to resolve things. Even before the current escalation in hostilities with NK, as much as it pains me to say, Kim seems to have been a rational actor for most or all of his time at the helm, certainly more so than Snowflake in his tenure so far.
Although NK is as much a cult as a country, the fact is that the Kim regime has to balance dynamic internal tensions as well as fend off potential attacks from the US, as well as the cynical game China and Japan and Russia (who have various practical historic and strategic reasons to want Korea to remain divided) are playing. His reaching out to his counterpart across the DMZ may actually have a small core of sincerity (Kim was educated in Switzerland, and is obviously much more westernized than his father), but the clear strategic goal for him right now is peeling South Korea away from our orbit, maybe driving a wedge with them on continuing sanctions.
The US' strategic goal with Iran seems to be whatever the Saudis and Israelis want. It's pretty clear that the Snowflake administration's short-term goal is to either provoke or contrive Iran into a war, further entrenching US troops in a region where they've been stuck for more than a quarter-century now, with no end in sight.
For someone who claimed to have wondrous prescience and profound insight into the folly of conflicts in that region -- without, of course, being able to articulate any of those observations even on a retroactive basis -- Snowflake sure seems eager to stoke that region's eternal grievances.
At least there's this -- once we've invaded Iran, there should be logistical continuity from Afghanistan to Syria, thus hopefully simplifying supply chains and movement of troops and materiel.
When Kim Jong Un says "denuclearization" and Mike Pompeo or Emperor Snowflake says the same word, there's a very good chance that two different meanings are being conveyed. It seems incredibly unlikely that Kim would surrender weapons that he and his father spent decades developing and building. At best he might agree to a cessation of testing and production, but in exchange for what? Farley is absolutely correct that on the off chance that NK completely disarms, with or without major concessions in return, Snowflake actually would deserve the Nobel Peace Prize.
Bu Snowflake is who he is, and at heart he is a loudmouth, a fuckup, a loser who manages to escape accountability. He'll find a way to fuck this up, and it's because he thinks that the outcome of Korea will serve as a warning to the Iranian mullahs. It doesn't occur to him that maybe North Korea -- and South Korea, for that matter -- observe his bad-faith dealing with Iran, the constant overt attempts to derail and abrogate the JCPOA, and assume that we'll deal with them the same way.
Analysts continually try to assess Kim Jong Un and determine whether he's a "rational" or "irrational" actor. A truly rational actor would do exactly what Kim's been doing, and be sure to cover his ass going into this "summit" that's supposed to resolve things. Even before the current escalation in hostilities with NK, as much as it pains me to say, Kim seems to have been a rational actor for most or all of his time at the helm, certainly more so than Snowflake in his tenure so far.
Although NK is as much a cult as a country, the fact is that the Kim regime has to balance dynamic internal tensions as well as fend off potential attacks from the US, as well as the cynical game China and Japan and Russia (who have various practical historic and strategic reasons to want Korea to remain divided) are playing. His reaching out to his counterpart across the DMZ may actually have a small core of sincerity (Kim was educated in Switzerland, and is obviously much more westernized than his father), but the clear strategic goal for him right now is peeling South Korea away from our orbit, maybe driving a wedge with them on continuing sanctions.
The US' strategic goal with Iran seems to be whatever the Saudis and Israelis want. It's pretty clear that the Snowflake administration's short-term goal is to either provoke or contrive Iran into a war, further entrenching US troops in a region where they've been stuck for more than a quarter-century now, with no end in sight.
For someone who claimed to have wondrous prescience and profound insight into the folly of conflicts in that region -- without, of course, being able to articulate any of those observations even on a retroactive basis -- Snowflake sure seems eager to stoke that region's eternal grievances.
At least there's this -- once we've invaded Iran, there should be logistical continuity from Afghanistan to Syria, thus hopefully simplifying supply chains and movement of troops and materiel.
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