Kim Jong Un is acting a little bit crazier than his dad ...

What if North Korea is Serious?

by Michael J. Totten

North Korea appears to be acting crazy again. This week we’re waiting to see if Pyongyang will carry out its promise to fire a Musadan missile which is theoretically capable of flying 2,180 miles before detonation.
I say North Korea appears to be acting crazy because making scary-sounding noises and threats like an out of control adolescent in desperate need of attention has been its modus operandi for as long as I can remember.

It’s a well-established method of international blackmail. 

• Step one: yell like a belligerent lunatic and make the world tremble. 
• Step two: sit at the table for some cool-down talks with the United States government. 
• Step three: get fistfuls of concessions and aid.

Surely North Korea’s young new god-king Kim Jong Un learned this from his late father Kim Jong Il. He learned everything about internal and external politics from his dad.

Only he’s acting a little bit crazier than his dad. His government is warning foreigners to leave South Korea. He recently threatened to scrap the 1953 armistice that turned the hot Korean War into a cold one. Then he said he’s going to abandon the joint declaration on the de-nuclearization of the region.

The Norks even released a new video depicting missile strikes on the White House and the capital building in Washington DC. You can watch that video here. I don’t speak Korean, but to say the narrator has a hysterical warmongering voice is putting things lightly. Never mind the ludicrous and cartoonish music. Watch and listen to that and imagine how freaked out the planet would have been had the Bush administration produced anything like it.

.....................

Read more: www.worldaffairsjournal.org