Washington Post (September 27)
Tensions between the U.S. and North Korea have “escalated from a game of blind man’s bluff to a drag race of nuclear chicken,” with the fate of the Pacific resting on the whims of “Rocket Man” and President “Dotard.” This is how things go “in Toontown, where two of the planet’s most unstable state actors call each other names and spin the roulette wheel toward nukes and annihilation.” What else is there to do, but “pray that we and the planet survive the Dotard and the Rocket Man?”
Tags: Annihilation, Fate, North Korea, Nuclear chicken, Pacific, Pray, President Dotard, Rocket Man, Roulette, Survive, Tensions, U.S., Unstable, Whims
New York Times (September 20)
“The United Nations isn’t the venue one would expect for threatening war. Yet that’s what President Trump did in his first address to the General Assembly.” His “dark tone and focus seemed a significant deviation, not least his relentlessly bellicose approach to North Korea,” in front of a “world body whose main purpose is the peaceful resolution of disputes.”
Tags: Bellicose, Disputes, General Assembly, North Korea, Peaceful, Resolution, Threatening, Tone, Trump, UN, War
ABC News (September 18)
Progress could involve an “active containment” strategy “using existing military capabilities, by forming a missile defense perimeter in international waters surrounding North Korea that would knock down every missile launched.” Not only is the idea currently feasible, it could be achieved relatively simply. “Just two U.S., Japanese, or Korean destroyers in international waters off North Korea could form this missile defense perimeter…. Intercepts could be calculated to occur outside of North Korean airspace, and to have the debris fall harmlessly into the ocean.”
Tags: Active containment, Airspace, Destroyers, Intercepts, International waters, Japan, Military capabilities, Missile defense, North Korea, Progress, South Korea, Strategy, U.S.
The Bangkok Post (September 14)
“The North Korean ‘crisis’ of recent months is largely an invented one.” Little has changed. “The probability that North Korea would fire a nuclear-tipped missile at the United States was” and remains, “essentially zero.” Given “the undeniable reality of mutual deterrence, the North Korean ‘crisis’ of 2017 can most accurately be seen as a media puppet show put on by Chairman Kim and President Trump for their own public relations purposes. Nonetheless, it’s a dangerous play.”
Tags: Crisis, Dangerous, Invented, Kim, Media puppet, Missile, Mutual deterrence, North Korea, Nuclear, Trump, U.S., Undeniable
The Atlantic (September 11)
Amid “growing concern about the real possibility of war with North Korea,” many have still not realized the danger of “an even darker specter. Could events now cascading on the Korean Peninsula drag the U.S. and China into a great-power war?”
Tags: Cascading, China, Concern, Danger, Korean Peninsula, North Korea, U.S. War
The Economist (September 2)
“After pausing his missile tests just long enough for America’s secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, to say that Mr Kim was showing ‘restraint’, and for Mr Trump himself to claim to have Mr Kim’s ‘respect’, North Korea’s dictator unleashed three short-range missiles into the Sea of Japan.” Then Mr Kim shot an intermediate-range missile over Hokkaido, leaving many on edge. Despite this menace, it remains “striking that in Japan and South Korea, many fear Mr Trump’s unpredictability even more than Mr Kim’s.”
Tags: Hokkaido, Kim, Missile tests, North Korea, Respect, Restraint, Sea of Japan, South Korea, Tillerson, Trump, U.S., Unpredictability
The Korea Times (August 13)
“In South Korea, frustration is increasing more over Trump’s loose lips than the North’s provocations. The reason is not that South Koreans have any brotherly love left for their northern neighbors. But from their experience living with the time bomb to the north, they think the real risk comes from Trump’s mouth. Their fear is backed by the market—foreign investors are in a sign of nervousness taking their money out of the country, albeit not at an alarming level so far.”
Tags: Fear, Frustration, Investors, Loose lips, Market, Nervousness, North Korea, Risk, South Korea, Trump
Fortune (August 12)
“As many in the United States and abroad are watching as tensions grow with North Korea, Tesla founder and CEO Elon Musk issued a warning about artificial intelligence,” urging followers to keep their priorities straight. Musk pointed out that AI was riskier than North Korea and “also warned that artificial intelligence should be regulated the same way anything that could pose a danger to the public is.”
Time (August 9)
“If Trump’s goal with two days of tough talk was to scare North Korea, Kim, the commander, put that idea quickly to rest. He called Trump’s rhetoric a “load of nonsense” that was aggravating a grave situation, adding “sound dialogue is not possible with such a guy bereft of reason and only absolute force can work on him.”
Tags: Aggravating, Bereft of reason, Dialogue, Grave situation, Kim, Nonsense, North Korea, Rhetoric, Tough talk, Trump
The Atlantic (July/August Issue)
Although Donald Trump called Kim “a madman with nuclear weapons,” North Korea’s leader “appears to be neither suicidal nor crazy.” In fact, “he has acted with brutal efficiency to consolidate that power; the assassination of his half brother is only the most recent example. As tyrants go, he’s shown appalling natural ability…. his moves have been nothing if not deliberate and even cruelly rational.” With only bad options for dealing with the North, this is “perhaps the most reassuring thing.”
Tags: Appalling, Assassination, Brutal, Crazy, Deliberate, Efficiency, Kim, Madman, North Korea, Nuclear weapons, Rational, Reassuring, Suicidal, Trump, Tyrants
