Much Ado, aka the North Korean Rocket
As a lifelong member of the group proverbially referred to as being "the Little Guy," I enjoy seeing people in little countries twitting big ones and getting away with it. and in the past two weeks we saw a good example of that. It was accomplished by a Roman candle of sorts fired high into the atmosphere by North Korea.
True, the People's Republic of North Korea is no sort of country in which anyone in his right mind would want to live. Though it must, like any country, have a large population of pleasant women, the impression is that it exists for only one purpose, to scare its neighbors, and the mass of its population is forced to undergo all kinds of privation to support that habit. Plus the climate there is painfully and gloomily cold and therefore terrible, and the terrain isn't much better, and that kind of thing could very well be why the attitudes there aren't the best.
Therefore not so long ago, in the early 1950's, at the beginning of the Police Action of which I am listed as being a military veteran, we saw the North Koreans come spilling over the 38th Parallel from their half of the peninsula with knives clenched between their teeth, just like invaders from the north in many places in the world since time immemorial, though that can't be all that the leaders in countries like South Korea, the U.S., and Japan have in mind in their constant present-day tussles with the North Koreans.
Actually you see much these same intransigences and stalemates in many other longitudes and latitudes, especially in the cases of the U.S. vs Cuba, and with Israel vs. the Palestinians, and with the U.S. and Israel vs. Iran, wherein the stronger force, for appearance's sake as much as for any other reasons, is unable to bend the weaker fully to its will but is so hellbent on continuing to try to do so that it starts looking ridiculous in its methods.
Therefore recently we heard the North Koreans announce that they were going to put a communications satellite into high orbit, and for that obviously you need a powerful rocket, of the kind that conceivably could also be used to deliver nuclear devastation to places ranging from just a few miles away to thousands of miles, such as Seoul, Tokyo, or Seattle. So North Korea's adversaries went into high dudgeon, high alert, and carefully modulated hysterics, though mainly into what I would call "intense rocket gazing," which is all that what they did amounted to and was all that the effort merited being.
Japan took the lead in seizing this chance to do some woofing that the world could hear. Up to 1945 it used to do the lion's share of the woofing and the biting in that part of the world, but as a result was so thoroughly neutered that it has remained curiously comatose ever since, even with its numerous glorious sights and, secondarily, its ec0nomic might.
Japan used as its weak excuse for its suddenly loud barking this time the possibility of debris from the rocket falling on its territory, and North Korea has been criticized for directing its rockets over Japan's islands. But a glance at a map shows that it would be hard for North Korea to arrange for a long-range rocket to fall harmlessly (except to a few fish with bad timing) in a large body of open water without crossing some part of Japan's long string of islands. And what made Japan's protests extra-comical was that the territory in question was in its lightly inhabited far north, on Hokkaido and thereabouts, where not one Japanese in a hundred would ever think of going to spend a vacation, much less of building a happy hacienda.
Also you would think that the Japanese would welcome a rain of debris, so that its intelligence people and also its artisans could make something of it, not to mention the wonderful souvenirs that such an event would supply. And anyway, what's a little debris? When the space shuttle Columbia burst apart six years ago while coming in for a landing with several unlucky astronauts aboard, it strewed all kinds of debris across several states (especially Texas, with its peculiar and continually demonstrated ability to intrude itself into all kinds of situations and tragedies), without injury to anyone beneath, and people were glad to get that, in memoriam as much as for any other reason.
Meanwhile warriors in the U.S. joined the Japanese, with speculations on the ability such a rocket would have to reach Seattle and elsewhere, despite the fact that the U.S. has been bursting to overflowing with all types of rocketry and missiles, enough to reduce North Korea to a single dust speck, and has had that ability -- and sometimes a barely suppressed desire to do just that -- for quite a long time. During the Korean Police Action, H. Truman had to fire General D. MacArthur over just such a suggestion, when North Korea, in comparison, had relatively little more than a few hammers and sickles.
Unperturbed and unsympathetic with its adversaries' concerns, especially because in the past two of its critics had at some point invaded them, and the third had also done that when in retaliation it got enough help, and with Japan in particular having squeezed both parts of Korea in a murderous grip for many years that are still fresh in memories, the North Koreans marched straight ahead and leisurely set up their rocket in plain sight, and at the appointed hour they lit the fuse, while ignoring threats from some Japanese to shoot it down.
North Korea's trio of adversaries declared that the mission was a failure and that the rocket landed without damage to anything but itself in the Sea of Japan. But the North Koreans insist that the launch was a success and that it placed a satellite in orbit, from where it is now bouncing back, apparently only to them (and good thing!), patriotic songs.
It all reminds me of a line from E. Ionesco's Theater of the Absurd play, "The Bald Soprano," which went, "The truth must lie somewhere between." And meanwhile the U.S. and Japan are pushing hard to get North Korea censured in the U.N. for this effort that amounted mainly to knocking askew its adversaries' toupees.
One of these days maybe some powerful and power-obsessed entity somewhere will test the idea that much more can be gained by helping seemingly intractable and usually much smaller entities out of their troubles by walking the extra mile with consideration and generosity, or at least just letting them go on their merry way, instead of relying on kneejerk pugnacity and unending threats. I see no reason why that wouldn't work as well on the international level as it does with neighbors right across the alley.
True, the People's Republic of North Korea is no sort of country in which anyone in his right mind would want to live. Though it must, like any country, have a large population of pleasant women, the impression is that it exists for only one purpose, to scare its neighbors, and the mass of its population is forced to undergo all kinds of privation to support that habit. Plus the climate there is painfully and gloomily cold and therefore terrible, and the terrain isn't much better, and that kind of thing could very well be why the attitudes there aren't the best.
Therefore not so long ago, in the early 1950's, at the beginning of the Police Action of which I am listed as being a military veteran, we saw the North Koreans come spilling over the 38th Parallel from their half of the peninsula with knives clenched between their teeth, just like invaders from the north in many places in the world since time immemorial, though that can't be all that the leaders in countries like South Korea, the U.S., and Japan have in mind in their constant present-day tussles with the North Koreans.
Actually you see much these same intransigences and stalemates in many other longitudes and latitudes, especially in the cases of the U.S. vs Cuba, and with Israel vs. the Palestinians, and with the U.S. and Israel vs. Iran, wherein the stronger force, for appearance's sake as much as for any other reasons, is unable to bend the weaker fully to its will but is so hellbent on continuing to try to do so that it starts looking ridiculous in its methods.
Therefore recently we heard the North Koreans announce that they were going to put a communications satellite into high orbit, and for that obviously you need a powerful rocket, of the kind that conceivably could also be used to deliver nuclear devastation to places ranging from just a few miles away to thousands of miles, such as Seoul, Tokyo, or Seattle. So North Korea's adversaries went into high dudgeon, high alert, and carefully modulated hysterics, though mainly into what I would call "intense rocket gazing," which is all that what they did amounted to and was all that the effort merited being.
Japan took the lead in seizing this chance to do some woofing that the world could hear. Up to 1945 it used to do the lion's share of the woofing and the biting in that part of the world, but as a result was so thoroughly neutered that it has remained curiously comatose ever since, even with its numerous glorious sights and, secondarily, its ec0nomic might.
Japan used as its weak excuse for its suddenly loud barking this time the possibility of debris from the rocket falling on its territory, and North Korea has been criticized for directing its rockets over Japan's islands. But a glance at a map shows that it would be hard for North Korea to arrange for a long-range rocket to fall harmlessly (except to a few fish with bad timing) in a large body of open water without crossing some part of Japan's long string of islands. And what made Japan's protests extra-comical was that the territory in question was in its lightly inhabited far north, on Hokkaido and thereabouts, where not one Japanese in a hundred would ever think of going to spend a vacation, much less of building a happy hacienda.
Also you would think that the Japanese would welcome a rain of debris, so that its intelligence people and also its artisans could make something of it, not to mention the wonderful souvenirs that such an event would supply. And anyway, what's a little debris? When the space shuttle Columbia burst apart six years ago while coming in for a landing with several unlucky astronauts aboard, it strewed all kinds of debris across several states (especially Texas, with its peculiar and continually demonstrated ability to intrude itself into all kinds of situations and tragedies), without injury to anyone beneath, and people were glad to get that, in memoriam as much as for any other reason.
Meanwhile warriors in the U.S. joined the Japanese, with speculations on the ability such a rocket would have to reach Seattle and elsewhere, despite the fact that the U.S. has been bursting to overflowing with all types of rocketry and missiles, enough to reduce North Korea to a single dust speck, and has had that ability -- and sometimes a barely suppressed desire to do just that -- for quite a long time. During the Korean Police Action, H. Truman had to fire General D. MacArthur over just such a suggestion, when North Korea, in comparison, had relatively little more than a few hammers and sickles.
Unperturbed and unsympathetic with its adversaries' concerns, especially because in the past two of its critics had at some point invaded them, and the third had also done that when in retaliation it got enough help, and with Japan in particular having squeezed both parts of Korea in a murderous grip for many years that are still fresh in memories, the North Koreans marched straight ahead and leisurely set up their rocket in plain sight, and at the appointed hour they lit the fuse, while ignoring threats from some Japanese to shoot it down.
North Korea's trio of adversaries declared that the mission was a failure and that the rocket landed without damage to anything but itself in the Sea of Japan. But the North Koreans insist that the launch was a success and that it placed a satellite in orbit, from where it is now bouncing back, apparently only to them (and good thing!), patriotic songs.
It all reminds me of a line from E. Ionesco's Theater of the Absurd play, "The Bald Soprano," which went, "The truth must lie somewhere between." And meanwhile the U.S. and Japan are pushing hard to get North Korea censured in the U.N. for this effort that amounted mainly to knocking askew its adversaries' toupees.
One of these days maybe some powerful and power-obsessed entity somewhere will test the idea that much more can be gained by helping seemingly intractable and usually much smaller entities out of their troubles by walking the extra mile with consideration and generosity, or at least just letting them go on their merry way, instead of relying on kneejerk pugnacity and unending threats. I see no reason why that wouldn't work as well on the international level as it does with neighbors right across the alley.
posted by Carl (aka Sofarsogoo) | 8:20 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home