So, now what?

So, now that the insane dwarf in North Korea has moved the goalposts again, what do we do now? We've managed to impose sanctions on them since my dad was there (1950 - '52) and Dictator Kim's father was looking to buy nukes from the South Africans when I was there (1980 - '84).

Sanctions, as we've seen, don't work. The big shots over there still live well, the military still eats (1 million men under arms within 60 miles of the southern border), and the only people who suffer are the average North Koreans, who are just trying to get by without doing something that'll get them executed. Of all the nations in Bush's "Axis of Evil", this is the place that needs "regime change" more than any other. Unfortunately, after two mismanaged, misbegotten wars, after rampant accusations of war crimes at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, our moral authority is worth shit.

To see any change from the 'Kim Dynasty', Jong-il would have to be removed along with his henchmen and the onus is on the Chinese to accomplish it. Since they became the North's patron during the Korean War, the People's Republic of China has positioned itself as North's 'big brother', supplying basic needs in order to maintain a buffer between them and the "decadent West" in the person of South Korea and, to a lesser extent, Japan. It's time for China to rethink this position. Ol' Skool Communism is irrelevant in the 21st Century as the Chinese have found, developing their Capitalist bent since Nixon stopped by for a visit. Their troublesome relative on the southern border is becoming more a burden than a tool with which to badger the West.

Now, I'm not saying the Chinese should send a few hundred thousand PLA troops into North Korea in a ham-handed attempt at overthrow of Bushian proportions but, as a reporter on the BBC said yesterday, cutting off the flow of oil for a day or two would probably convince Kim to back down. Without the Chinese largess, North Korea stops and Kim knows it all too well. It is China that keeps him in power and it is China who holds the key to the North Korean nuclear conundrum.

With that in mind, the diplomatic pressure should be on the People's Republic of China, not North Korea. Weak resolutions and more sanctions handed down from the U.N. (which will probably be vetoed) will not work as we've seen since President Clinton's attempts to mollify the little shit. North Korea is China's responsibility, or this problem would have been solved in 1950. Had Mao not intervened on their behalf, there would be a unified Korean Peninsula today.

Mrs. Clinton, and the other members of the "Six Parties" must direct their efforts at China for anything substantial to appear from the blitz und donder in the aftermath of the latest tests. More sanctions heaped upon the DPRK will do nothing but make life in that horrible place a little more difficult for the man on the street. Kim will not be affected and should he become desperate for money, I would not put it past him to sell nuclear weapon technology to anyone with ready cash (Iran, al-Qaida, or some other idiots).

We've had 15 years of appeasement and in that time, Kim has improved his plutonium refinement and delivery system technology. Another 15 years (and maybe a military coup in the interim - Kim won't live that long - and all the problems that brings) and we might wake up to the news that Tokyo is a glowing hole in the ground. The time to resolve this is now and the road to resolution runs through Beijing.