Sunday, May 23, 2010

The sinking of the 'Cheonan' a violation of the 1953 Armistice?

As the late American comedian Jimmy Durante famously said: 'everyone wants to get into the act'.
Joining the angry chorus of blaming the DPRK [Democratic People's Republic of Korea aka North Korea] is the United Nations Command [UNC], which the US commands and has final authority.
Now the UNC has launched an investigation into the DPRK has violated the 1953 Korean armistice by sinking the ROK [Republic of Korea aka South Korea].
The entry of the UNC into the Wagnerian
orchestration of condemnation is yet another step in increasing North Korea to cry 'Uncle!' and confess.
The UNC is composed of 11 members--South Korea, the US, the UK,Canada, Australia,France,Turkey,Denmark,Switzerland,and Sweden. [A quick look at its mandate, passed in haste, leaves decisions and determinations not in the hands of the UN Secretary General but in the chief military officer who, surprise, surprise, surprise, is American.]
The Obama administration hopes to exert the maximum pressure on North Korea, in order to punish it for the sinking of the 'Cheonan', as well as the loss of 46 crew.
Which is not fully proven since the ROK and the US are unwilling to put all the exhibits of proof on the table. GuamDairy has raised the question of reasonable doubt of guilt.
The gambit of playing the UNC card makes GuamDiary to fret at the longer term consequences of such a move.
To GuamDiary the words of Euripedes comes readily to mind: 'Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad'.
The US' and Rok's rush to judgment by appealing to the UNC begins a slide on the slippery slope of heating up a cold war.
What action short of war will the UNC call for? It is beyond a shadow of a doubt, it will condemn North Korea for the sunken 'Cheonan'. It is a foregone conclusion!
GuamDiary is of the opinion that Seoul and Washington are acting rashly, and in haste, they have neglected a full review of the contingencies that will escape their control.
US secretary of state Hillary Clinton is forcing the issue. She may think that she is gradually turning the screws on the DPRK; she's wrong. She is opening up her own Pandora's box with dire consequences if her course of action is not reversed.
Pyongyang has responded strongly by condemning the UNC's investigation 'bogus'. Here's the pity of it all: the US and the ROK are stone deaf to the DPRK's arguments. They have learnt nothing from past history. Like the toppled French royal house of Bourbon, they forgot everything and learnt nothing. The closed mind George Bush learnt a hard lesson. He thumbed his nose at Pyongyang, but had to run fast back to discussions with North Korea, when they tested a nuclear device. It is so easy to thrust out one's chest, bellow threats, without nothing behind them but hot air.
Does Mrs. Clinton envision delivering a nuclear threat to the North? Has she thought of starting up a hot war which ended in a US stalemate and defeat to roll back communism? Such are legitimate concerns raised by convening a UNC enquiry.
In brief, GuamDiary see the UNC investigation as a smokescreen to advance US designs which for lack of clarity and in the US' diplomacy, so hopelessly wedded to the past, and weighed down by the weights and chains of muddled thinking and invested interests do raise a flag of warning and concern.
America's approach to the DPRK should be questioned. China and Russia will try to blunt Washington's thrust.
A slim ray of thought however does emerge: by raising the issue of the Korean armistice, is not the time right to reconvene in Geneva or elsewhere a conference which will work towards a peace treaty ending the tensions on the divided Korean peninsula; establishing diplomatic relations with Pyongyang and Seoul and Pyongyang and the US [on the heels of which other states will recongise the DPRK]; economic issues, and surely the nuclear issue. Such a conference will calm the fears existing in east Asia.
There is nothing Pollyanna-erish in this suggest, but as the way things stand now, US diplomacy is in the fast lane of war fever. Do not say, we didn't warn you!

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