Is US President Bill Clinton preparing for an air-strike on North Korea? K Govindan reports.
In a recent interview the US President declared, 'North Korea cannot be allowed to develop a nuclear bomb. We have to be very firm about it'.
Pentagon officials have talked up fears of a North Korean invasion of the South claiming that up to 70 per cent of their military forces were concentrated around the border.
However the South Koreans have pointed out that this has been the case since the end of the 1950-53 Korean War and is not unusual.Radio Pyongyang has denounced Clinton's remarks being 'bellicose...when the recognises that we have no intention to invade the South'.
In a further provocation the US and South Korea have been conducting their annual "Team Spirit' military operations on their side of the border - an exercise designed to intimidate the North.
The furore erupted over the Pyongyang regime's refusal to allow International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) officials to inspect the Yongbyung nuclear facility.
The North Koreans claimed they wish to resolve the nuclear issue through bilateral negotiations with the United States. In 1992 the IAEA twice visited this nuclear facility finding that it was intended purely for power generation. However the US rejected its report.
North Korea has had a nuclear plant since 1965 and has increased its reliance on this sector enabling it in a six year period (1978-1984) to register a 178 per cent increase in the supply of electricity.
The South Koreans believe that the North is developing a nuciear weapon in order to launch an attack on the South, driving out the 37,000 US troops and re-unifying the peninsula by force. The North Koreans believe that the threat of using a nuclear bomb protects them from a US/South Korean combined forces invasion which would be better armed and have better motivated LOODS Clearly the North Koreans perceive their nuclear development programme as a bargaining lever to extract political and economic concessions in an increasingly unfavourable politi"The North Koreans believe that the threat of using a nuclear bomb combined forces invasion which would be better armed and have better motivated troops" cal climate.
The ideology of juche or selfreliance pioneered by the despot Kim Il Sung or 'Great and Beloved Leader' as he likes to be known has reduced the North to a desperate economic state.
The North's traditional trading partners the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe have melted away insisting on scarce foreign exchange for their exports.
Two way trade between Russia and North Korea slumped to US$600 million in 1992. Meanwhile the North still owes Russia US$15.6 million in Their last remaining ally of importance is China. It too is embarrassed by its links with the Pyongyang regime and would possibly abstain on a Security Council resolution authorising United Nations sanctions against North Korea in return for favours from the United States.
The large Korean community in Japan protects them from a US/South Korean remits around US$600 -$700 million each year to their relatives in the North, and this is a major source of foreign exchange.
Reports of famine and food riots in the North have been dismissed by recent visitors as being unfounded. However there is food scarcity and giant posters exhort the people to 'eat two meals a day.
So far it seems unlikely that there will be any change in North Korea's stance until the death of its absolute leader. His son, Kim Jong Il or 'Dear Leader' as he is universally known is the heir apparent and Commander of the military forces.
He lacks the authority of his father and could face a military revolt in alliance with sections of the bureaucracy.
In South Korea these events are watched with great alarm when passions for re-unification with the North have greatly cooled with the experience of West Germany in its absorption of the East.
The US fears that the Rodang 1 missile developed by North Korea will be used to target its bases in the South and as far away as Okinawa in Japan. North Korea is thought to be selling one of these 1,000 kilometre range missiles to Iran which is a major supplier of its oil needs.
The hypocrisy and motives of the US administration are clear. While allies of the US like Israel and Pakistan develop nuclear weapons a blind eye is turned to this. The US itself is free to maintain its nuclear arsenal and deploy it in the East Asian region.
US capitalism is sustained by militarism - and its next target is North Korea. democratic Communist Party of India