Posted on 10/17/2002 6:04:08 AM PDT by Tumbleweed_Connection
In what now looks like one of the worst foreign policy blunders of the postwar era in light of North Korea's acknowledgement yesterday that it's working to develop nuclear weapons, the Clinton administration poured billions of dollars in foreign aid into the rogue state throughout the 1990's - and earmarked a substantial portion of that aid for North Korea's nuclear energy program.
As NewsMax.com reported in February:
A country designated by President Bush as part of the "axis of evil" received more foreign aid during President Clinton's two terms than any other country in the Asia-Pacific region, a congressional study concluded two years ago.
House Republican Policy Committee Chairman Christopher Cox, R-Calif., said the study conducted by his panel found that under the Clinton administration, North Korea became the "largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid in the Asia-Pacific region," according to the committee's report as quoted by CNSNews.com.
"In an astonishing reversal of nine previous U.S. administrations, the Clinton-Gore administration, in 1994, committed not only to provide foreign aid for North Korea, but to earmark that aid primarily for the construction of nuclear reactors worth up to $6 billion," the Cox Committee contended.
The committee's report added:
"The U.S.-funded light water reactors in North Korea will accumulate plutonium in spent fuel at the rate of about 17,300 ounces per year, enough to produce 65 nuclear bombs a year.
"The Clinton-Gore policy, it is now clear, has severely worsened the threat that North Korea poses to the world by systematically rewarding Kim Jong-il for his most dangerous misconduct. It has provided North Korea with an increased capacity for the development of nuclear weapons and the long-range missiles to deliver them."
Cox, along with fellow congressmen Ed Markey, D-Mass., and Benjamin Gilman, R-N.Y., sent a letter to President Bush in February calling for the U.S. to cancel the nuke deal and urged him to spotlight the North Korean threat during his then-upcoming visit to Japan, South Korea and China.
Beyond aiding North Korea's nuke program, the Clinton administration provided 500,000 metric tons of fuel oil per year to the communist dictatorship's state-run military-industrial base, a figure that was "almost double what North Korea's civilian economy can use," the Cox Committee said.
In 1999, Rep. Cox conducted a separate investigation into China's acquisition of U.S. nuclear secrets during the Clinton years, concluding that the People's Liberation Army had, for the first time in its history, acquired the capacity to strike the continental United States with nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles.
My feelings exactly....and while they're at it....take Al Gore, Terry McAuliffe, Sandy Berger and the rest of the Clinton Crew with them!
Because they see the writing on the wall. Since they now realize that the "Axis of Evil" designation has teeth and was not merely rhetoric, they have been making concessions for months to show they do not want to be next on the 'list'.
You got it! But they are merely symptoms of the real problem.
They didn't get into office by themselves -- they were elected -- not once, but twice. Their supporters could *maybe* claim ignorance of who and what he and his wife are the first time around and get away with it, but after they put them in there the second time they sealed their fate. His legacy is also theirs. They can run but they can't hide. They ferociously defend him, because they know that ultimately it is themselves they are defending.
He and his even more dangerous wife are the quintessential face of the fifth column in America --- today's DemocRAT party.
IT'S OBVIOUS NOW THAT HE APPEASED THE NORTH KOREANS.
REMEMBER WHEN JIMMY CARTER WAS SNOOKERED BY CASTRO AND THAT REFUGEE ARMADA?
CLINTON WAS WORSE BY TENFOLD!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The North Korean nuclear program has been going on for a number of years. They cannot afford conventional fuel to keep the lights on, so they decided to build a nuclear reactor. The reactor that a country such as NK would build would be a Graphite based, Fast breeder reactor (RBMK). Simple, when compared to a light water pressure reactor (PWR), and can produce its own fuel. It also produces lots and lots of Plutonium, some or all of which can be redirected into bombs. PWR reactors produce very little plutonium by comparison.
The thought process is that if they are given a PWR reactor or 2 (Much too complex for them to build!), they could operate it, under IAEC oversight, which all commercial reactors subscribe to, receiving fuel and delivering waste abroad (Japan or Germany), preventing them from redirecting the fuel rods to weapons production.
While I cannot speak to the politics of the situation (I personally didn't like it!) it was a workable win-win solution to the power shortage that faces NK, and the same time provides security to the region (Japan, South Korea, Phillipines, China), and puts some of our guys to work, building the thing.
If NK were really interested in power production only, this is the equivalent of winning the Lottery. Free money! The fact that NK will proceed with their own, home grown reactor means that they are interested in alternative uses for the spent fuel. They are admitting to it now because they were confronted in June with strong evidence of their continuing secret nuclear program, and that evidence was going public anyway. They are trying to mitigate the situation.
What will happen now is the $64 thousand dollar question....
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