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US is putting North Korea's finger on the nuclear trigger (Bush's double standard)
Sydney Morning Herald ^ | August 7 2002 | Paul McGeough

Posted on 08/06/2002 8:10:03 AM PDT by dead

A contract for atomic power plants is a breathtaking example of Bush's double standards, writes Paul McGeough.

Let's take a walk along the axis of evil. There's Iraq, an evil-doer that faces a military onslaught from the United States because of its chemical and biological weapons programs.

Next door is Iran, another pariah state in search of nuclear weapons and the cause of great consternation in Washington. That is because Russia is building it the first of six nuclear power plants, which the US worries will feed into a secret weapons program in Tehran.

Now, let's move around the globe. There's North Korea, the third member of George Bush's axis of evil.

Pyongyang is a reprehensible Stalinist regime that refuses to allow international inspection of its covert nuclear program, that visits the most appalling suffering on its own people and, if all goes well, today it will pour the concrete foundation for the first of two US-supplied nuclear reactors, from which it will be able to extract sufficient "near-weapons-grade" plutonium to make dozens of bombs.

The world should be used to double standards in the Bush Administration's foreign policy. But whichever way you look at it, this one is breathtaking. If Pyongyang is to be trusted, why not Baghdad, and Tehran? If the US is going to war in the name of well-founded principles, why stop at Baghdad? Shouldn't the same fight be taken to Tehran and Pyongyang, too?

If the justification for war against Iraq is that it may share its weapons technology with terrorists even though there is no evidence of its links to terrorism, why not bomb Tehran, given its support for Hezbollah in Lebanon, its stockpiles of chemical weapons and its implication in weapons smuggling to the Palestinians?

It's hardly surprising that the Russians are most upset that Washington is demanding that it abort the nuclear project in Iran at the same time as the US has decided to proceed with a similar project in North Korea.

US diplomats have listed the Iran reactors as "the single most important proliferation issue in the world". But Moscow snapped back that it will repatriate all the plutonium created in the Iranian plants and that Iran has agreed to international inspections.

A deal between the US and North Korea in 1994 calls for the North to abide by the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, especially its inspection provisions, and for a freeze on Pyongyang's nuclear program. In return, the US will build it two big nuclear-power plants; and until they are up and running, Washington is pitching in half-a-million tonnes of heating oil each year.

The International Atomic Energy Agency challenges North Korea's declaration on its nuclear inventory; the CIA estimates that it has sufficient material for a couple of bombs, and refugees from the north have reported the operation of an underground uranium processing plant at Mount Chun-Ma since 1989.

The point at which Pyongyang was to be subjected to inspections is in dispute - the 1994 agreement stipulates a non-specific time when "a significant proportion" of the reactors is complete. The IAEA argues that thorough inspections will take so long that they should have started months ago. But the fear in the north is that Washington only wants inspections now in the hope that they will throw up sufficient reason to abandon the project.

The language out of Pyongyang is not so different from that out of Baghdad or Tehran these days. When Bush refused to certify North Korean compliance with the 1994 agreement earlier this year, Pyongyang railed against the "nuclear lunatics" in the White House, it threatened to abandon the deal and it put out feelers for nuclear assistance in Moscow.

The US State Department argues that the plants to be built in North Korea are "proliferation resistant". But this assertion is rejected in the strongest terms by nuclear experts like Victor Gilinsky, who served on the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission under three presidents, and Henry Sokolski, the executive director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Centre.

They argue that the light-water reactors being built in North Korea and Iran could produce enough weapons-grade plutonium to make dozens of bombs. Studies had demonstrated that plutonium could be cheaply and quickly extracted from spent fuel rods.

They dismiss the claim that any bomb-making would be detected well before completion, saying: "This is hard to sustain in view of the North Koreans' nonproliferation treaty violations, their stiff-arming of IAEA inspectors and the slow reaction of the world powers."

But fear not. Washington is making sure that the despotic north, as Bush calls it, does not have an easy life. The US is opposing a South Korean proposal to build a mobile phone network in the north. Explaining the military basis of the objection, a diplomat asked: "Do we really want their soldiers equipped with high-tech cell phones?"

Indeed. It would be a pity if one of them were to make a call that gave away Pyongyang's plans for the imminent expansion of its nuclear weapons program.


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS:
Of course, Mr. McGeough never once mentions the name of the appeasing idiot who thought up this plan - Bill Clinton. Like the American media, he has that subtle habit of attributing mistakes by Republican administrations to the President by name, but Democratic screwups are attributed only to "Washington".

But that little rant aside, Clinton's gone and Bush is president now. Is he serious about keeping weapons of mass destruction out of the hands of rogue nations and terrorists?

This is certainly not a move in that direction.

1 posted on 08/06/2002 8:10:03 AM PDT by dead
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To: dead
Bill Clinton came up with the idea. Bush didn't need to follow through.
2 posted on 08/06/2002 8:20:12 AM PDT by Eric in the Ozarks
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To: dead
Bush is well on the way to losing his base. Like father like son?
3 posted on 08/06/2002 8:31:26 AM PDT by hang 'em
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To: Eric in the Ozarks; hang 'em
I have no idea what the hell he is thinking here.
4 posted on 08/06/2002 8:41:26 AM PDT by dead
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To: dead
I think its a terrible idea.
5 posted on 08/06/2002 8:48:51 AM PDT by Eric in the Ozarks
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To: hang 'em
"Bush is well on the way to losing his base. Like father like son? "

'His base' can take a hike, they have nowhere to go. The NEWGOP is reaching out to pry gay, Hispanic, Black and Jewish voters from the Democats. The NEWGOP is a pander party. Aside from Monica and tax cuts for the dead, what's the difference?

6 posted on 08/06/2002 8:54:25 AM PDT by ex-snook
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To: Eric in the Ozarks
I think its a terrible idea.

The fact that nobody is showing up to defend it is evidence as well.

7 posted on 08/06/2002 9:04:35 AM PDT by dead
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To: dead
The government doesn't serve the people the people serve the government. Alex Jones has been screaming about a reactor sent to north korea by the US. Why would the US do such a thing to threaten their own citizens?
8 posted on 08/06/2002 11:42:33 AM PDT by bok
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To: dead
Alex Jones (infowars.com) - Bush is out clintoning clinton.
9 posted on 08/06/2002 11:44:22 AM PDT by bok
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To: dead
Of course, Mr. McGeough never once mentions the name of the appeasing idiot who thought up this plan - Bill Clinton.

Ummm. I think Carter had his fingers in this too. ...But do recall the basis for this plan: To halt an ACTUAL nuclear weapons research and construction project.

10 posted on 08/06/2002 1:11:36 PM PDT by lepton
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To: lepton
A few bombs would have been both far far cheaper and far far more effective.

You'd have to be JimmyCarter-naive to believe that this plan is going to hinder nuclear weapon production in NK.

11 posted on 08/06/2002 6:17:06 PM PDT by dead
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To: All

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12 posted on 08/06/2002 6:17:24 PM PDT by Bob J
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To: dead
A few bombs would have been both far far cheaper and far far more effective.

You'd have to be JimmyCarter-naive to believe that this plan is going to hinder nuclear weapon production in NK.

At the time - however now we're tangled up in the mess, having made promises and letting them stand for several years. The plan is not entirely useless, as the power plants will be of types with more limited enrichment capabilities. I will absolutely concur that the plan was laid out with poor judgement, and a Clintonian effort to evade conflict, but until something else happens, we're rather stuck with it.

13 posted on 08/07/2002 7:50:46 AM PDT by lepton
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To: lepton
we're rather stuck with it.

No we’re not.

North Korea is not in compliance with the inspection provisions of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.

Rather than argue that they need to comply, we should just walk away from the agreement and restart negotiations from square one.

That way we could secure an agreement without input from saps like Jimmy Carter or traitors like Bill Clinton. And our military options should be openly discussed during the negotiations.

14 posted on 08/07/2002 8:20:09 AM PDT by dead
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To: dead
Hey, you're a pretty smart guy!
15 posted on 10/18/2002 12:22:59 PM PDT by dead
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To: dead
One military option: quit supplying N Korea with 500,000 tons of fuel oil annually.
16 posted on 10/22/2002 9:49:35 AM PDT by secretagent
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