Kathreb

Discussing North Korea

Carthatidae posted a link to an article advocating the end of the Kim dynasty in North Korea. A interesting article. Stanford, as part of Homecoming, held a panel discussion on Friday entitled: Its a MAD mad World: Prospects for Security, Diplomacy, and Peace on the Korean Peninsular. Speakers were , Bernard Black, Mi-Hyung Kim, Scott Sagan, and Shin Gi-wook. It was chaired by Allen Weiner.

Each speaker addressed a different perspective of the issue such as North Korea, South Korea, & US and highlighted the big differences in priorities between US and South Korea and the possible motivations behind North Korea's actions as a means of trying to assess which policy approaches might work and which might not. The general consensus in the end was that this is a difficult situation and none of the options are attractive and different options are even less attrative than others for different countries. Professor Sagan brought up the interesting topic of 'precedent setting' and looked at what lessons other countries who possess the capabilty to develop nukes might learn from US handling of the North Korea issue.

Antoher issues mentioned was the unlikelihood of making much further progess on this issue until after the US elections in 2004. As one speaker put it, the North is probably hoping that regime change will come to US before it comes to them.

During the question and answer session, Jim Woosley, former director of the CIA and apparent alumni asked a question or rather a comment about the possibility and forces required to change a system from within.

Korea Peace Day
I have added numerous new links to my site which was a much overdue update. Among the newbies is the link to the Alliance of Scholars Concerned about Korea. Co-founder, Professor Shin, is a member of the Stanford faculty and has been telling us about this upcoming event which seems quite worthwhile.

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