The Bush administration has never had a consistent approach to North Korea, alternating between Bolton’s bluster and Rice’s behind the scenes attempts at multilateral diplomacy with China in the lead role. So perhaps it should come as no surprise that as Bush prepares to leave office on Tuesday, new reports suggest the North Koreans are once again in the nuclear bomb building business:
North Korea today threatened to ”shatter” the conservative South Korean government in Seoul, as reports emerged that Pyongyang claims to have weaponised enough plutonium stocks to produce four or five nuclear bombs.
Relations across the heavily fortified border have turned frosty since South Korea’s president, Lee Myung-bak, came to office last year promising to get tough on his communist neighbour after a decade of attempts by liberal governments to engage with Pyongyang. In December, North Korea closed border crossings and accused Seoul of plotting to assassinate the North’s leader, Kim Jong-il. […]
“Strong military measures will follow from our revolutionary armed forces,” the [North Korean Military] spokesman added, warning of a clash along a disputed maritime border. Disagreements over the boundary triggered naval skirmishes in 1999 and 2000.
The statement came as an American scholar said North Korean officials had told him Pyongyang has weaponised 30.8 kg (68lb) of plutonium, enough for four or five bombs.
Selig Harrison, a North Korean expert at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, said the North Koreans had told him the weapons cannot be inspected.
Of all the many mistakes Bush made, his complete inability to address the danger of nuclear proliferation during the last eight years may be the one that in the near future comes back to haunt the world more than any other. Then again, Bush and Cheney adopted the strategy of first use of nuclear weapons by the United States, and at one time it was reported that Cheney was pushing for the use of nuclear weapons in military plans which the Pentagon prepared regarding an attack against Iran. When political leaders are insane enough to promote the use of nuclear weapons in their own arsenal, their blindness to the danger that other countries may adopt a similar approach should not have been much of a surprise.
