North Korean officials are fuming again tonight following the announcement that the South Korean military is planning to conduct yet another military drill along the tense border between the two nations, the third major set of war games since a late November clash.
Unlike the previous live-fire drills, the latest drill will involve computer simulated war games. North Korea, however, insists that the latest drill proves the South’s “persistent design for invasion.”
Normally such allegations, particularly from North Korea, are shrugged off as paranoia, but given the South’s determination to launch drill after drill along the border, and their repeated public talk of annexing the North as part of a long-standing goal of reunification, the comments have at least some grounding in reality.
Tensions have been on the rise on both sides of the border over the past two months, but North Korea has recently made offers to restart negotiations. Unfortunately so far it does not appear that such talks are in the offing.
Does anyone think that South Korea (ROK) acts alone in this matter? The US's fingerprints are all over this. One must ask why. The answer is that the US sees China as a rising economic power and the only one which might challenge its hegemony. And the US reacts as it always does with such threats – both militarily and economically. With the Great Recession the US is not in such a sterling position to act economically and so the the military crowbar comes out wielded by the ROK in this case.
China and the North (DPRK) have called for six party talks repeatedly (Japan, US, Russia, DPRK, ROK, China) to settle the dispute but the US and its allies are having none of it.
John V. Walsh
There is no question that the USA is responsible for much of the political tension on the Korean peninsula. BOTH Koreas would be better off in every possible way if Yankee would go home, but Washington wants a base for domination of Asia and to poke China in the eye. So foolish…
just the maritime provinces , the better to extract terrestial resources my deary
Military actions, to certainly include provocative exercises and live firing into disputed waters, are prohibited by the 1953 Armistice Agreement Preamble: ". . . with the objective of establishing an armistice which will insure a complete cessation of hostilities and of all acts of armed force in Korea until a final peaceful settlement is achieved, . . ." http://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=true&am…