North Korea: 2012-2016

[Dayuhan]

But you have to see things in their broader context here. For instance, if we're talking about the current financial crisis, one could certainly point to internal faults in America's financial regulatory system, and various sorts of internal economic imbalances. Any analysis that left out America's trade balance with China, and their threatening America's hegemonic status, though, would be lacking. My view, in both cases, is that while the external may not be a trigger for anything, it provides the context, or the backdrop, for everything else.

I'm not convinced that China "threatening America's hegemonic status" is a major issue here. It looks to me that China's emergence as a trading power of increasing prosperity is moving China's national interest closer to, rather than farther from, that of the US, especially where issues like North Korea are concerned. To put it simply, regional instability is bad for business, and China needs to do business. They've little interest in rocking the boat; the status quo is running rather nicely for them.

I'm not trying to say that external events have no impact on North Korea, I'm trying to say that the impact of any given event is likely to be extremely unpredictable, and that any external effort to influence North Korea is likely to be ineffectual and filled with possibilities for unintended consequences. I don't see any action that the US could take - especially unilaterally - that would be likely to have much positive impact.

For the US to do so would open it up to charges of using food to gain political favor. More practically, the US can never prevent other countries from stepping into the gap - particularly China.

I didn't say that the US could unilaterally exploit North Korea's perennial shortages of food and fuel. That would have to take place in the context of a regional sanctions package emerging from the 6-party format. It's clumsy, but it's necessary: it's a regional issue and requires a regional strategy.

As to the question of what degree of control the US still has over Japan - they are still a pacifist country, and the US is committed to defending them against foreign threats. The US obviously can't just give them orders, but it can work more subtly for or against their interests, in order to influence how much they trust us in general.

The US works for US interests, Japan works for Japanese interests. Where North Korea is concerned, those interests coincide to a large degree, as do those of other regional powers. That's why the 6-party format exists. The parties may have numerous areas of disagreement elsewhere, but none of them want to see conflict in the Korean peninsula.

And for Israel, my argument is just an extension of the notion the the US is always protecting Western Europe - very popular at certain points in the political cycle. Just include Israel in the grouping of 'Europe,' and substitute another term for 'protecting,' and you've got yourself a new perspective.

Against whom does the US protect Europe these days?

A new perspective, possibly... but I'm not sure how well supported that perspective is, or what practical solutions it produces.