Check for web archive captures
Deja Vu.... All Over Again
By lindamuralidharan on 2017-09-29 06:16:06
Yes, Yogi Berra, deja vu all over again. Daily I am reminded of those years with my brother in the back seat of those older
model Fords. You know, the ones with bench seats front and back and maybe even running boards. Do you all know what
the latter are? My family traveled yearly for a month's vacation on the cotton and tobacco farms of North Carolina (big
family for visiting) from our upstate New York home. There were no limited access roads or a Bay Bridge. It took two
days...sometimes with side trips to Monticello or Mt. Vernon....and it was straight through the traffic and heart of both
Philadelphia and Baltimore. My brother and I were territorial in our boredom. Each was supposed to have exactly one half
of the back seat and not one quarter of an inch more. So...somebody suddenly says "Hey, you're on my side" and then
pushes the offender back over the international border. "I was not," says the other and pushes harder back. "Were,
too"..."was not". So it went until we more or less came to blows and howled and a parent turned around and put a stop to it
in no uncertain terms. In other words, there was no end to the escalation until a moral authority entered the action. Sound
familiar? Does it sound like the quarreling of our current president and the leader of another nasty regime? However
greedy and self-serving our leaders have been over time, we have come to expect that they would at least show a modest
degree of decorum and common sense when discussing major international disagreements, and there was usually an effort
not to escalate in public (whatever machinations might be going on behind the scenes) so as not to make matters worse until
such time as the leaders might be actually ready to engage in war. (Then of course, the pro war propaganda could get
scandalously false and sometimes hyperbolic. I'm not alluding to angels here). [caption id="attachment_10394"
La
align="alignleft" width="300"] North Korean founder of Kim family dynasty:
Kim II] Sung 1976. (Photo credit should read STR/AFP/Getty Images)[/caption] I hazard the assumption that nearly all of us
get petulant at times. We may be too impatient with a wait staff or when a traffic light is not fixed immediately. Much of
the time we just grouse to ourselves or a confidant or to a desk clerk.....and of course,we are not generally leading heavily
armed nations and heavily nuclear armed nations at that. Whatever a good strategy might be to prevent any kind or war and
most especially a nuclear war, rants and rants and rants or endless tit for tats are not any kind of a sophisticated or
potentially very effective strategy. I do not place all blame for our circumstances on Donald J. Trump. Today and for
decades past, the United States has been a literal or figurative aggressor in Korea. We could not tolerate (that is the political
and economic elite could not) socialism on the Korean peninsula. Communism is, of course, a nasty form of socialism in
most instances....I'll remind everybody of exceptions in a minute....since it is authoritarian by definition (usually). In my
mind, we ourselves were illogical or perfidious in setting up an authoritarian capitalist regime under Syngman Rhee in South
Korea...killing thousands of people in the process. Remember the old saying? "He may be a thug but he's our thug." Both
systems sometimes evolve over time to be more minimalist rather than maximalist in their overall authoritarian practices,
but I certainly don't endorse either. In mind mind, the least authoritarian the better never mind what economic institutions a
given nation prefers. Another thing some people forget and many Americans were not even apprised of (and didn't bother to
read about in depth), is that a number of countries, Italy, France, and India come to mind, have entertained peaceful, elected
Communists in their various levels of government. I think the ones in India have been a little more successful than the
others. For a while an entire state in India was governed by the elected Communists. After a few years they were voted
out of office just like any other party might be. Last I checked a few local offices in another Indian state are held by
Communists but there is not a great impact or groundswell in their favor. In more recent years it has been the built in bias
that it wasn't okay for a country to have a Communist regime combined with our arrogance that the world needs to do what
we say that has prevented any good solution up to and including this point for the Korean Peninsula. I want to really scream
at the TV every time another pundit or political operative says, "But diplomacy has not worked so what else is there, short of
war?" We have not tried honest diplomacy so therefore it is not honest to say diplomacy has not worked. We usually want to
start out with our usual one upmanship. Some diplomats have tried to ameliorate that, and I think there were moments
when a president or two did. Definitely not George Bush, though. I myself remember when the Korean leader in charge
when George W. Bush was in office said that some relatively solid negotiations would continue only if our President agreed
to meet with him in person. Bush in his own form of typical arrogance, refused. Our Presidents have met with leaders of
dictatorial Russia, Soviet Union, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria...on and on it goes over time. Never mind the cozy
relationships we have had with countless cruel Latin American dictators over time. But no, we can't seem to understand the
value and logic of meeting North Korean like any other nation. [caption id="attachment_ 10396" align="alignright"
LaF
width="300"] George W. Bush with former Secretary of State Colin
Powell[/caption] Even though we are the ones who bombed and killed thousands in North Korea during the Korean War,
Bush decided to include North Korea in his Axis of Evil. Are we surprised that North Korean leaders believe they need a
nuclear deterrent to protect themselves? Bush's refusal point blank killed those negotiations at a point when North Korea's
nuclear program was relatively immature. Then, in my delight in obituaries that I mentioned last week, I read of the efforts
of one John W. Lewis, academic and diplomat extraordinaire. I was reminded by a note in the obituary of other times that
the US dropped the ball. Not North Korea. I had not remembered that B. Clinton had established an arrangement in 1994 to
recognize North Korea. I am not clear at this point that this happened while the Kim dynasty founder Kim I]-Sung was still
alive or his son Kim Jong-il was then in power. However, our former president, George W. Bush, negated this agreement.
There are two problems with this right at the gate. First, it is foolish and arrogant to refuse to recognize a full fledged
country with a stable governing person or group. Look how long it took us to recognize the Communist regime of China.
Wasted ink and efforts in avoiding that while we have recognized and promoted endless nasty regimes. We just pick and
choose with little rational real world basis. Second, the egos of leaders like Donald Trump and the parade of Kim family
dictators are significantly involved in their foreign policy. Treating a person with respect for his or her position does not
mean we like the person or their policies. Pushing their buttons, on the other hand, can provoke actions that are divisive,
negative, and often threats to peace or at best, to stable economic and international functions. If we had diplomatic relations
with the succeeding Kim dictator, Kim Jong-Un, it is extremely likely that some kind of stasis could already be in place
regarding his nuclear plans and claims. Rational and well informed diplomats and people with great knowledge of China, the
Korean Peninsula, and that region as a whole do not expect anything to convince China, Pakistan, India, North Korea to
unilaterally give up nuclear capacity. However, agreements mutually befitting all sides are most likely when parties are
approached without preconditions and with due respect for the process and for the legitimacy of a given government to enter
into agreements. [caption id="attachment_ 10397" align="alignright" width="300"]
La
US military personnel in South Korea[/caption] G.W. Bush made matters
even worse when he repudiated another statement cosigned by President Clinton and North Korean official Vice
Pyongyang. Lewis was against these Bush actions at the time and later in a 2015 interview it is reported that he said the
result was that North Korea went nuclear. I think it is obvious to those who take the time to look behind the scenes that the
external nastiness of N. Korea grows from a legitimate paranoia that the US may want to institute regime change there or
worse. I know that there are other complexities regarding Neocons wanting war with Iran and the way Iran handles its
internal and external affairs. The parallels with North Korea are significant. Recently I saw on the internet a reproduction
of a cartoon published inside Iran. It showed more than a dozen US military bases in countries surrounding Iran.
(Remember, Iran has never wished to attack the United States and even Israeli intelligence officials have made clear that
despite occasional inflammatory rhetoric, Iran poses no existential threat to Israel.) The caption was, "We apologize for
building our country in the middle of territory covered by your military bases". [caption id="attachment_ 10398"
align="alignright" width="300"] US military might in South Korea seen as
threat to Norrh Korea[/caption] [caption id="attachment_ 10399" align="alignright" width="600"]
La
South Korean family
vulnerable to war[/caption] Back to the issue of North Korea. I know that diplomacy is not quite the same as if you had a
conflict with a neighbor over a parking spot and you called her up and said, "let's meet for coffee and figure out a
compromise." No, there are many complicated steps that precede any ultimate scheduled official negotiations regarding
critical matters. And much of this may take place for weeks or months behind the scenes. I certainly hope (we have had
hints of this) that such processes are now going on with our foreign policy people. It will be very significant if President
Trump is mostly blowing smoke at the moment and is also going to see the value of his having a "personal" relationship with
Kim Jong-Un and will meet him for talks. Trump frequently brags that personal relationships with foreign leaders is his
strong point. We also have to hope and perhaps lobby for the filling of empty State Department positions in this
administration with solid, knowledgeable, persons. On the surface of things, though, we are currently hearing more and
more of Trump trying to make patriotism some kind of litmus test for any kind of legitimate public policy or personal
opinion. If military action is undertaken first towards North Korea, the physical and human devastation could be beyond
imagination. However, it would be real people not imaginary ones killed in the thousands....children in North Korea or
South Korea, Americans working or living as part of the military in South Korea and Japan...maybe your cousin is one of
them, maybe your niece's husband is deployed there... [caption id="attachment_ 10400" align="alignleft" width="600"]
North Korean children trained
to be prepared for an attack by the USA[/caption] Thus we all need to be wary. Who was it who said that "Patriotism is the
last refuge of a scoundrel" ? Oh, yes, right. It was Samuel Johnson according to his famed biographer James Boswell. Ah,
deja vu all over again. During the lead up to and during the first couple of years of the Afghan and Iraq wars those of us
opposed were accused of being treasonous or unAmerican. Not patriotic. Now our president wants to paste over any of his
faults or failures with a claim that he is first and foremost a patriot promoting patriotism.
