Dangerous Times to be Laughing About

I’m seeing a lot of jokes being passed around on the internet about the sudden death of Kim Jong II, the leader of North Korea.  Most of these jokes center on his reported idiosyncrasies and the personality cult that both he and his father employed to run North Korea.  What people don’t seem to realize is that this portends a very dangerous time for the entire world – specifically because of that personality cult.  Even a casual student of geo-politics should be aware of what a special case this nuclear armed country is.  North Korea has been on a war footing for more than a half century – it is in effect an armed camp.  Even if North Korean military equipment is dated; numbers have a quality all of their own. Every resident is fanatically devoted to the leader; they are vigorously isolated from the rest of the world by their government.  They accept what their government puts out as the absolute truth.  The stories that we laugh at in the west, such as playing a round of golf with 5 holes in one, are accepted as gospel in North Korea.  Now their infallible leader is suddenly gone with only preliminary succession plans in place.  Kim Jong II’s third son, Kim Jong Eun, is in his late twenties and was only recently anointed as successor.  He will have to quickly establish control of the military which is central to control of the country.  The North Korean military is dedicated to one purpose, conquering South Korea, even to the point of using their nuclear arsenal.  Many senior officers in that military will now see an opportunity to pursue that heart felt goal.  Any attack on South Korea will quickly draw in both the U.S. and Japan, the latter serving as our strategic base.  China views this area as their backyard but more importantly well within their area of influence.  They have always resented the strong American presence in the area and would most certainly react to American military intervention.  You should refer to your history book to see what was happening at this time of the year in 1950 when a Chinese Army a million strong descended from the Yalu in the face of MacArthur’s arrogance.  One can only hope that the American and Chinese economies have become so interdependent that this will have a soothing effect on the most militant elements within each respective super-power.  While some of the stories I see are funny – everyone should be laughing nervously.  Do not make the mistake that the North Koreans will think or react as we would.  This is a very dangerous time and one hopes that the leadership of the countries involved is up to the tasks over the next year (great time for a U.S. presidential election!!)