Donald Trump just said that "Talking is not the answer!" when dealing with North Korea, as we read in one report:
Washington has been paying Pyongyang “extortion money” for over two decades, US President Donald Trump said in a tweet on Wednesday.
According to Trump, the US has been in talks with North Korea all that time.
Trump's tweet comes following an official statement released by the White House, in which the president said that “all options are on the table” in regard to the current tensions in East Asia.
Meanwhile, US Defense Secretary James Mattis didn’t immediately exclude diplomacy when confronted by reporters Wednesday. "We are never out of diplomatic solutions," Mattis said, as he headed to a meeting with his South Korean counterpart, Song Young-moo. "We continue to work together, and the minister and I share a responsibility to provide for the protection of our nations, our populations and our interests," the US defense chief added.
On Tuesday, Pyongyang launched a ballistic missile which passed over Japan. Calling that move “threatening and destabilizing,” the US leader said North Korea “has signaled its contempt for its neighbors, for all members of the United Nations, and for minimum standards of acceptable international behavior.”
Washington has sided with Tokyo and Seoul, with the three nations claiming they are facing a "grave and growing direct threat" from Pyongyang.
Meanwhile, other UN members – including Russia, China and Germany – have been pushing for a diplomatic solution. Moscow and Beijing insist that all sides should be listened to in order to resolve the Korean crisis, in which regard they are now supported by Berlin.
This is what, I hope, this won't lead to: the United States giving the green light to Japan to commence its remilitarization under the justification of the threat of North Korea. I warned about this last year. In August of 2016, I wrote:
On account of fears about Russia, China and North Korea, the Americans will break the chains imposed on Japan and thus enable them to revive their military strength. This is reflected in recent statements by Donald Trump in regards to fears about North Korea. Donald Trump, who is very likely to be the next president of the United States, has suggested that Japan be allowed to have nuclear weapons in order to keep the North Koreans in check. The United States, according to an agreement made with Japan, is suppose to be the aid of Japan in the case of any military conflict that would put the Japanese in danger. Donald Trump does not want to follow the initial plan, but rather it appears that he will allow Japan to fight out any conflicts on its own. Donald Trump stated:
“Unfortunately, we have a nuclear world now… Would I rather have North Korea have [nuclear weapons] with Japan sitting there having them also? You may very well be better off if that’s the case. … If they’re attacked… we have to come totally to their defense. And that is a — that’s a real problem.”
He also stated: “Here’s the thing with Japan… They have to pay us or we have to let them protect themselves.”
Both of these statements are quite significant. For one, this plan of isolationism is exactly what the Japanese want, and have wanted for decades. If Trump wins (and it looks like that he will), and his plan for Asia is put forth, it will reset Asia to an environment very much paralleled to how it was before erupting into the Second World War.
Trump’s plan of having Japan no longer dependent on the US for military support, will give Japan the excuse it needs to rearm and to restrengthen its former martial strength, and to further revive the imperial religion that it once maintained and that enflamed its aggressions towards the rest of East Asia. Secondly, Trump’s plan to push Japan to purchase American vehicles and to pay the US would further be used by the Japanese to prove American hostilities and to justify aggression against the United States.
Trump’s policy for East Asia would break the barriers that are keeping, by a hair, the former conflicts of the recent past from resuming, the conflicts that lie between Japan, its Asian neighbors, Russia and the United States. For over seventy years, US policy on Japan has worked as a mask, covering up the immense hatred that exists between Japan and its Asian neighbors, specifically China and the Koreas. But with the policies that the US is undertaking, and will be enacting, in regards to Japan, that mask is soon to be removed.
A senior official in the government of Shinzo Abe, the Japanese prime minister, said in regards to Trump’s words: “If what he says actually comes to pass, it’s going to be transforming for Japan. It would be a critical blow.” It truly would be transforming, not because it has to be transforming, but because Japan will use such a policy as a justification for violent and fanatical nationalism.
Germany is also a major player in this conflict. In their own pursuit to power, the Germans are currently making hundreds of millions from selling their military technology to South Korea, and all of this profiteering is being done under the pretext of "North Korea is a threat." According to one report by DW on German arms sales to South Korea:
The German cruise missile Taurus KEPD-350 has a lot of demand in South Korea. The nearly 1,000-kilogram high-tech weapon made by an eponymous German firm, Taurus Systems, has a range of almost 500 kilometers. It has been specifically designed to penetrate highly capable air defense systems in low-altitude flight.
The weapon is capable of both hitting deep underground bunkers as well as destroying large surface areas. South Korea's significance for Taurus, based in Germany's Bavaria state, is seen by the fact that the company set up a representative office in Seoul in 2014. In October 2016, 177 cruise missiles were handed over by the firm to the South Koreans. The delivery of 90 more has already been decided.
But cruise missiles were only a part of the armaments bought by South Korea last year. In the first half of 2016, South Korean purchases of German military gear amounted to over 200 million euros, according to German government data.
Now, ask yourself, why is Germany interested in selling weapons to South Korea? Beyond profiteering, I sense an ideological nostalgia: Germany was an ally to Japan in the Second World, and South Korea is enemies with North Korea. By helping the South, it shows a solidarity in the war against Communism, and thus a solidarity with Japan, which is currently under a Right-wing and ultra-nationalist government.
Also, selling weapons is a way for Germany to partake in a gradual road towards full on militarism, and to make itself into a major force for militarization. Germany wants to make itself into a great military power, and so in the sale of arms it demonstrates this desire. This fixation on North Korea is only helping Japan escalate in its envisioning of a revived Japanese empire. Its the same as Germany using the terrorism of Islamic immigrants (people they brought in for the purpose of creating reasons to advance their military capabilities) and fears about Russia to justify its own militarism. Its also the same thing as Turkey using ISIS and the Syrian civil war to justify reviving the Ottoman Empire. The recent craze into nationalism will only lead to one thing: nations trying to create world empire, and in this rush to utopia, there will be blood.
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