Starving and deluded – yet North Korea is ready for war (defectors impressed with Orwell)

The Times(UK) ^ | 05/30/10 | Sue Lloyd-Roberts

[TigerLikesRooster]

May 30, 2010

Starving and deluded – yet North Korea is ready for war

North Korea says it will strike if US reaction to the sinking of the Cheonan is 'excessive'

Sue Lloyd-Roberts in Pyongyang

SITTING in a leather chair in one of Pyongyang’s smartest hotels, the economic adviser to the North Korean government was enjoying giving me a lecture. “Our country has reached new heights of economic achievement,” said Ri Ki-song, “thanks to the strength and self-reliance of the North Korean people and to our plentiful natural resources.”

The room was suddenly plunged into darkness. It was another of the city’s daily power cuts.

The blackout might have cast a shadow on the country’s “new heights of economic achievement” but Ri continued without hesitation. “And, what is more, we are meeting all our people’s needs.”

Barely able to see my interviewee, I gave up. What was the point of reminding him that the World Food Programme reports that a third of his people are starving and there is so little power that half the factories in the country are not working?

During my visit — the first of this nature by a BBC TV crew to the world’s most secretive and isolated country in six years — I found a people in denial and suffering delusions. George Orwell would have felt at home here. Indeed, defectors from North Korea have been known to ask, referring to his dystopian classic Nineteen Eighty-Four: “How did he know our country so well?”

[TigerLikesRooster]

Indeed, defectors from North Korea have been known to ask, referring to his dystopian classic Nineteen Eighty-Four: “How did he know our country so well?”

LOL.

[TigerLikesRooster]

P!

[gaijin]

good post.

SPOOKY AS HECK...!!

[John Jorsett]

It’s nice that Baghdad Bob found a new job.

[piytar]

I’ve been saying for years that leftists don’t see Orwell’s 1984 as a cautionary tale. They see it as a blueprint.

Here’s just more confirmation...

[fabian]

It’s a damn shame that Gen. Macarthur was not allowed to defeat the north. They would be a untied and free Korea right now. Just a shame!

[RC one]

North Korea says it will strike if US reaction to the sinking of the Cheonan is 'excessive'

somehow I don't think they need to worry about it

[OldArmy52]

If Humanitarian organizations really wanted to help the NK people, they would be sending in assassins, not just food.

[Rembrandt]

OK, so let’s see a bunch of 5 foot 3 inch starved zealots fighting for the manhood of a little freak against a bunch of 5 foot 10 inch or taller well fed guys protecting a free country.

I think I know where I would place my won.

[struggle]

FUNNY STORY:

A Japanese reporter in Pyongyang was discussing the opening of the first Western-style restaurant in Pyongyang with a worker there. This happened around 2003 and I LAUGHED MY ASS OFF.

Japanese Reporter: So this Pyongyang’s first Western style restaurant?

Nork Restaurant Worker: Yes it is.

J: How much does a hamburger cost here?

N: About $3.

J: $3! You can’t find any hamburgers at that low of a price in Tokyo! I bet your fellow countrymen eat her all the time!!

N: Well, no, the average worker in North Korea makes around $2 a month.

[Dallas59]

The rest of the world can only hope that, like boasting in the dark of economic achievements, North Korea’s threat of “all-out war” is yet more posturing and delusion; that the sinking of the Cheonan was an attempt at a big splash and that business-as-usual will resume.

The reason why millions of North Koreans are starving and have starved to death.

[GeronL]

defectors must be pretty amazed at the real world.

[GeronL]

I doubt that place made a profit

[CitizenUSA]

piytar: “I’ve been saying for years that leftists don’t see Orwell’s 1984 as a cautionary tale. They see it as a blueprint.”

I think the truth is even more frightening. Only a handful see it as a blueprint. The vast majority don’t see any connection between 1984 and their own big government ideology. They are (apparently) completely blind that a government powerful enough to fix everything is also a government powerful enough to be Big Brother.

[struggle]

if you watch vbs.tv’s account, the guy who got in to North Korea was shown a tea house with a woman who literally had been there for months and no one visiting.

http://www.vbs.tv/watch/the-vice-guide-to-travel/vice-guide-to-north-korea-1-of-3

[GeronL]

wow

[hennie pennie]

*ping*

[tlb]

>>> so let’s see a bunch of 5 foot 3 inch starved zealots fighting for the manhood of a little freak against a bunch of 5 foot 10 inch or taller well fed guys protecting a free country.

God made all men, but Colonel Colt made all men equal. The last go-around those 5’3” guys killed 50,000 tall guys. Like you I’d put my money on the big guys in the end, but I wouldn’t be so cavalier about it. It won’t be cheap and easy.

[GeronL]

Just watched it. I might have bseen it before. Seriously deranged placed.

Very lonely tea girl

[seawolf101]

The room was suddenly plunged into darkness. It was another of the city’s daily power cuts. The blackout might have cast a shadow on the country’s “new heights of economic achievement” but Ri continued without hesitation. “And, what is more, we are meeting all our people’s needs.”