North Korea And Its Nuclear Ambitions

NORTH KOREA AND ITS NUCLEAR AMBITIONS North Korea recently declared its possession of the capabilities of the nuclear weapons and announced its readiness to resume broken talks that were meant to dissuade North Korea from the nuclear path. As the very purpose of the talks being rendered useless, the talks were naturally called off as now. The United States of America and other countries are naturally deeply upset with the crossing of the Rubicon by North Korea. In addition, North Korea is issuing serious warnings of retaliation including nuclear war against any aggressive actions against it by any country, the warnings primarily meant to South Korea, Japan and the United States of America, and issuing photos of its supremo, Kim Jong II leading his Generals in provocative manner. North Korea’s present stature as a de facto nuclear power with its missile capabilities pose real danger to the United States of America across the Pacific Ocean apart from posing mortal danger to the existence to South Korea and working as a constant irritant to Japan. North Korea is an enemy of the United States of America since the days of the Korean War of the 1950s during the height of the Cold War. It is now natural to expect some kind of pro-active action by the United States of America to neutralise North Korea to re-establish a kind of power balance and safeguard its interests in this part of Asia apart from making its own security foolproof from across the Pacific Ocean. Removal of the Kim Jong II regime may be a soft option. The North Korean supreme is already in extremely bad health. It is surmised that North Korea possesses at least eight nuclear bombs. Apart from it being a direct threat to the United States of

America, nuclear weapons or its technology being transferred to any of the numerous terrorist groups like the Al-Qaeda operating against the civilized world pose greater threat to the security of the world. North Korea openly claimed that it was a potential fear if North Korea is harmed in any way. Neither Russia nor China is comfortable with the nuclear North Korea though all three belong to the Communist bloc and both are parts of the international efforts and talks held with the North Korea to dissuade it from the nuclear path.

Indeed these countries are less

aggressive against North Korean nuclear ambitions and do not favour the fall of the Kim Jong II regime there. North Korea separated from South Korea after a quite violent history of war that threatened to become the harbinger of the Third World War in 1950s. South Korea with the help of the United States of America became a respected industrial power of Asia on par with Japan and Taiwan while North Korea under the Communist regime languished in this respect. It now wants to make up the loss of time and come back in the international arena by becoming a nuclear power. Blockade of North Korea is an option open for the world to force the country to fall in line with the world opinion, as shortage of food and other essential commodities is acute there. Communist countries naturally will resist any such measures against their brethren that hurt the interests of the common man there. World is watching how President Obama with all his well intended peace protestations would tackle this grave issue of nuclear threat while duty bound to protect the interests of the United States of America at any costs.

The average North Korean following the ethnic features of the Koreans and other people of the region is well below the average height and weight for his age. The height and weight of a North Korean child is also less than average for its age. North Korean entrepreneurs as well as common men as those in most other Communist countries prefer to migrate to neighbouring countries like China, Japan and South Korea or other western countries to work and earn money. South Korea facilitated mass employment to North Korean workers in industries at its border with North Korea by providing easy transit facilities across the border daily. South Korea is trying to make friends with North Korea and offered to provide two million megawatts of electricity to nearly double its output if it stops its efforts at nuclear weapons. The United States of America backed this plan. North Korea is in dire need of this electricity, as its present production hardly suffices to provide three to four hours of electricity every day. But, North Korea was not willing to barter its nuclear option for the electricity. Defence forces of the United States of America man the South Korean borders with the North Korea since the Korean War of the 1950s and it is a big irritant to North Korea. The Korean peninsula was formerly one nation in early 1950s. The threat of Korea going Communist inspired internal conflict in the country in early 1950s and led to the Korean War with the United States of America and its western allies militarily supporting the resistance while the Communist bloc with the then USSR and China in lead solidly backing the Communist take-over of the peninsula. This was while the Cold War was at its height at its nascent stage and the war ended with Korea being divided to two halves as North Korea in possession of the Communist Koreans and South Korea in possession

of those Koreans who championed the cause of democracy in Korea. However, hostile feelings between the countries continued unabated.