Duped in North Korea: From Obama's Mentor to Jimmy Carter

American Thinker ^ | November 26, 2010 | Paul Kengor

[neverdem]

The North Korea situation is not going away. Personally, I'm sympathetic to the complexities of the situation. I've dealt with it since the early 1990s, beginning at the Center for Strategic & International Studies. I had few answers then, and still few today.

What I do know, however, is that much of the American left has been misled on North Korea since the very division of the peninsula in the early 1950s. The left has suffered two threats in particular -- call them "internal": First, there was the deception and manipulation by the communist left, which, by its nature, refused to openly acknowledge that it was communist and serving the Communist Party line. Second, there was dangerous self-delusion and gullibility among some leading Democrats. As to the first, there's the case of Frank Marshall Davis; on the second, there's Jimmy Carter.

As I've written here and elsewhere, Frank Marshall Davis was a mentor to Barack Obama and an actual CPUSA member. The Senate Judiciary Committee asked Davis about that association in 1956, under oath, where Davis pleaded the Fifth Amendment. No matter -- the next year, the Senate, in a report titled "Scope of Soviet Activity in the United States," definitively listed Davis as an "identified member of the Communist Party." (Click here to view the documents at my website.)

Only recently, with the declassification of Davis's 600-page FBI file, can we see the evidence. In my book, Dupes, on page 507, I reprint an FBI document that features Davis's Communist Party number: 47544.

As to the point of Korea, I found all the columns Davis wrote for the Honolulu Record, the CPUSA organ in Hawaii, in 1950. That was the period when Korea erupted into a hot war that killed tens of thousands of American boys, with the peninsula divided into a communist north and non-communist south.

Many American liberals/progressives were unsure where to stand on U.S. involvement, even as President Harry Truman, a Democrat, sent troops. For communists, however, this was a no-brainer: They wanted no U.S. involvement because they wanted all of Korea to be communist, following Red China's recent path. This was the Stalinist line, the Maoist line, and the worldwide communist line. Thus, American communists ridiculed the very idea of U.S. engagement as a McCarthyite manifestation of paranoid anti-communism, as an "inordinate fear" of communism, as U.S. imperialism, as Uncle Sam sticking his nose where it didn't belong, as...well, whatever worked.

For Frank Marshall Davis, this stance is evident in a February 9, 1950 piece he wrote for the Honolulu Record, where he accused President Truman of "manufacturing crises" for the sake of Big Business and U.S. imperialism. This was the standard party line for Davis. Most interesting about this piece, however, is how Davis applied the assertion to two countries that today remain our most persistent challenges: North Korea and Iran.

"Temporarily balked but not defeated, our dividend diplomats, with the willing hands of President Truman, went into the crisis-making business," wrote Davis. "If Molotov coughed, it threatened our 'security' in Iran. If Vishinsky laughed, we were 'endangered' in Korea."

This was, maintained Davis, a bunch of bluster, a phony "propaganda barrage" by Truman, as were the Truman Doctrine, the Marshall Plan, and the creation of NATO, all of which Davis (following Moscow's lead) adamantly opposed. "We manufacture crises so rapidly," claimed Davis, "that a new one is shoved in front of us before we can examine yesterday's or the one rushed in this morning."

And Korea, insisted Davis, was the latest such case.

How many liberals/progressives fell for this communist line? How many Americans communists pushed the line?

Well, without delineating which were liberals/progressives or communists, dupes or dupers, among those strongly against our Korea involvement were playwright Arthur Miller, the ACLU's Corliss Lamont, and Hollywood writers like Dalton Trumbo and the snarling Lillian Hellman.

The communist left didn't stop pushing this line until the north was firmly in communist hands. It has been a murderous dungeon ever since, run by two lunatics from the Kim family. These two men, of course, can't be trusted, which brings me to my second case, involving Jimmy Carter.

In June 1994, Carter visited North Korea. He was hosted by Kim Il-sung, a tyrant, who died mere days later. And yet, Carter reported that Kim was "vigorous, alert, [and] intelligent" and had engaged in "very free discussions with his ministers." Kim spearheaded a militantly atheistic regime, which jailed Christians; Carter, however, discovered a Kim "very friendly toward Christianity."

For the impressionable ex-president, Kim provided the full Potemkin village treatment. To say Carter was suckered is an understatement. He wrote this report:

People are busy. They work 48 hours a week. ... We found Pyongyang to be a bustling city. The only difference is that during working hours there are very few people on the street. They all have jobs or go to school. And after working hours, they pack the department stores, which Rosalynn visited. I went in one of them. It's like Wal-Mart in American stores on a Saturday afternoon. They all walk around in there, and they seem in fairly good spirits. Pyongyang at night looks like Times Square. They are really heavily into bright neon lights and pictures and things like that.

Of course, in truth, North Korea is draped in darkness, as well-known satellite photos attest (click here). Worse, within just one year of this incredibly gullible appraisal by Carter, 10%-15% of the North Korean population (two to three million people) starved to death -- the worst famine in modern times.

Adding insult to injury, a few years after that, North Korea announced that it was a nuclear state, a direct violation of the "Agreed Framework" brokered by Carter in 1994. Then, Carter triumphantly assured us that "the crisis is over" -- words headlined by both the New York Times and Washington Post.

Needless to say, the crisis was far from over. And when George W. Bush, saddled with this agreement, which North Korea was clearly violating, declared the Kim regime part of an "axis of evil," Carter protested. "I think it will take years before we can repair the damage done by that statement," sniffed Carter.

No, it will take years before we can repair the damage done by Carter's mistakes, from North Korea to Iran.

I don't have the answer for resolving the North Korea situation, but I do know what hasn't helped. Jimmy Carter hasn't, and neither did the communist left, embodied by the likes of Frank Marshall Davis.

In both cases, America has been poorly served. It doesn't help that we've been duped, first by communists who concealed their loyalties and intentions from their liberal/progressive "friends" -- as Korea was split in two -- and then by the ever-present naïveté that has plagued Jimmy Carter's judgment for decades. Deception and delusion on the left have exacerbated an already complex situation.

Paul Kengor is professor of political science at Grove City College. His books include The Crusader: Ronald Reagan and the Fall of Communism and the newly released Dupes: How America's Adversaries Have Manipulated Progressives for a Century.

[hflynn]

I've dealt with it since the early 1990s, . . . .

This guy is all BS. North Korea did not have nuclear weapons in the early 1990's which means nothing was dealt with.

[M Kehoe]

Whether its the new islamic republic or north korea, jimmy carteh is the gift that keeps on giving.

My Lord, why do we have such stupid people in...

5.56mm

[hosepipe]

Jimmah Carter is as duped as he wants to be..

[LucyT]

Duped in North Korea: From Obama's Mentor to Jimmy Carter

(excerpted)

"...much of the American left has been misled on North Korea since the very division of the peninsula in the early 1950s. The left has suffered two threats in particular -- call them "internal": First, there was the deception and manipulation by the communist left, which, by its nature, refused to openly acknowledge that it was communist and serving the Communist Party line. Second, there was dangerous self-delusion and gullibility among some leading Democrats. As to the first, there's the case of Frank Marshall Davis; on the second, there's Jimmy Carter.

As I've written here and elsewhere, Frank Marshall Davis was a mentor to Barack Obama and an actual CPUSA member. The Senate Judiciary Committee asked Davis about that association in 1956, under oath, where Davis pleaded the Fifth Amendment. No matter -- the next year, the Senate, in a report titled "Scope of Soviet Activity in the United States," definitively listed Davis as an "identified member of the Communist Party."

Only recently, with the declassification of Davis's 600-page FBI file, can we see the evidence. "... FBI document that features Davis's Communist Party number: 47544.

As to the point of Korea, I found all the columns Davis wrote for the Honolulu Record, the CPUSA organ in Hawaii, in 1950.

[snip]

The communist left didn't stop pushing this line until the north was firmly in communist hands. It has been a murderous dungeon ever since, run by two lunatics from the Kim family. These two men, of course, can't be trusted, which brings me to my second case, involving Jimmy Carter.

"...it will take years before we can repair the damage done by Carter's mistakes, from North Korea to Iran.

. . . . Check out article.

[Plumberman27]

Correct me if i am wrong but that is still technically an active war. No peace treaty was ever signed only a stalemate resulted and both sides sign an agreement to end the fighting but no actually peace treaty was signed. Only a cease fire was signed by both sides.

I do not feel they are worth defending except for control of the area since Japan would be next. I certainly do not see any students from South Korea demanding we leave now as i did a few years back. Where are all these kids with these ideas they had? How about we leave now kids and see how well you like the North Koreans. Them little bast*rds are all hiding in their basements hoping we defend them again. We had thousands of our soldiers die for their freedom and they had the audacity to protest us still being there. Well now they can see why we are still there.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

Please re-read the article more carefully. He certainly did not assert NK had nuclear weapons in the early 90s. I’m not sure where you got that idea. Maybe from his opening sentence: “The North Korea situation is not going away. Personally, I’m sympathetic to the complexities of the situation. I’ve dealt with it since the early 1990s, beginning at the Center for Strategic & International Studies.”

He provides a factual timeline and talks about the dupes in the communist party in the US and the fecklessness of Carter:
1994: Carter visited NK and met with Kim Il-sung
1995: NK starves 10%-15% of its population to death
2006: NK announces it is a nuclear state

Please explain how he is full of BS. Extra credit if you posit a rationale thesis.

[Mister Da]

“... the ever-present naïveté that has plagued Jimmy Carter's judgment for decades.”

I do not believe Carter is naive. He is a graduate of the Naval Academy & a former sub commander. Naivete could not survive those 2 challenges.

Carter hates America for running him out of office in 1980. Ted Kennedy tried & failed to take him out in the Rat primary, but Reagan beat him badly in the general election. IIRC, even his home state Georgia voted against him.

Only spite could drive a man to say & do the despicable things he has said & done. No good that he has ever done can compensate for the evil he has perpetuated.

[Bean Counter]

Excellent analysis and thanks for posting it. I’m absolutely certain that most Americans have forgotten about Jimmy Carter’s travels into North Korea, which is why he’s so vocal about it to this day.

Carter is and always has been an idealist, and (quoting HL Mencken here...) “An idealist is one who, on noticing that a rose smells better than a cabbage, concludes that it will also make better soup.” Carter was every bit as prepared to conduct foreign policy as the current (P)resident and his term should stand as a stark warning to the long term consequences of putting a dip-thong populist in charge of things.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Thanks for the ping.

[Strk321]

“Carter hates America for running him out of office in 1980. Ted Kennedy tried & failed to take him out in the Rat primary, but Reagan beat him badly in the general election. IIRC, even his home state Georgia voted against him.”

No, he did win Georgia. But as everyone knows, a president who faces strong primary challenges does not get reelected.

I mentioned Carter’s visit to NK in a thread the other day, and the only conclusion to be made was that a guy who would think Pyongyang was like Times Square in New York is functionally insane.

Admittedly, he wasn’t the only person to be duped by North Korea. Billy Graham got snookered pretty badly as well.

[B212]

NK, never confused me, it has always been clear that they were an inbred, hermit nation, stuck in 1945...

[Diogenesis]

Secretary of Defense Cohen, Impeached Bill Clinton, Albright, and too-long-accepted CODE-level thief
and accepted-document-destroyer National Security Adviser Sandy Berger,
holding "court" in the Ronald Reagan Building on April 25, 1999.
The Impeached Bill Clinton: "We were all making comments
we shouldn't have about how the meeting was getting very boring.
So finally we decided we had to make like the monkey. Cohen
started this 'hear no evil,' and then I was next so I spoke no evil,
then Madeleine saw no evil, so Sandy Berger said, 'I'm evil.'"

[The Comedian]

3.

Million.

People.

Died.

Because our Federal employees didn't liberate a Stalinist slave pen.

It wasn't due to lack of ability. It was due to lack of morality.

Jimmy Carter and the Democrat party were complicit in the deaths of 3 million North Korean slaves, because they didn't subscribe to the American moral imperative of freeing slaves. Thank God George Bush revived the imperative for Iraq. It may have morphed into something stupid, but the original mandate to free slaves, by force if necessary, was the peak of American moral superiority. "With no consideration of the cost or benefit to ourselves, we will liberate you" is a pretty damned powerful mission statement.

Die, Jimmy Carter. Die alone, and afraid.

Frowning takes 68 muscles.
Smiling takes 6.
Pulling this trigger takes 2.
I'm lazy.

[Deklane]

“And after working hours, they pack the department stores, which Rosalynn visited. I went in one of them. It's like Wal-Mart in American stores on a Saturday afternoon. They all walk around in there, and they seem in fairly good spirits.”

Carter clearly didn't read the book UTOPIAS ELSEWHERE by Anthony Daniels (Crown, 1991). (Daniels also writes under the name Theodore Dalrymple.) The book is an account of Daniels’ trips to the various remaining hard-core Communist regimes of the time, including a chapter on his impressions of North Korea. He went to a department store in Pyongyang much as Carter did... and discovered it was a bizarre sham. The store was crowded, but no one was buying anything. “Shoppers” milled aimlessly, ignoring the displays, like illiterates in a library filled with books they couldn't read (as Daniels put it). There was no interaction between “shoppers” and clerks. Everyone in the store was a participant in some kind of mock simulation of a department store, staged for some inscrutable propaganda purpose by the regime. Then again, maybe it did have a purpose. It certainly fooled Jimmy.

[lentulusgracchus]

Die, Jimmy Carter. Die alone, and afraid.

In the rain. Beneath a black sky, with the words of the holy martyrs ringing in his ears, to rebuke his pride: "Usquequo, Domine?"

[neverdem]

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[Chode]

Ohh WOe is me... Whys everybody always pickin on me???

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the ping!

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks neverdem.