North Korea's Missile

"But the devil of arms control also lies in the overall concept, with its implicit assumption that the weapons themselves are inherently more dangerous that the intentions of those who develop and deploy them. ... The irony is that Mr. Obama's opposition is making substantial reductions in the total US arsenal that much riskier. In the absense of actual testing,which hasn't happened in the US since 1992, the only real hedge against potentially defective weapons is a larger arsenal. ... In fact, a US nuclear aresenal that is diminshed in both quantity and quality would be an incentive for [Russia, North Korea, Pakistan and perhaps Iran] to increase their nuclear inventories, since the door would suddenly be opened to reach nuclear parity with the last superpower. Mr. Medvedev, for one, recently anounced Russia would pursue 'large-scale rearmament' of its army and navy, including nuclear arsenals", my emphasis, Editorial at the WSJ, 4 April 2009.

"Prior to North Korea's [NK] launch yesterday of a Taepodong-2 ballistic missile, President Barack Obama declared that such an action would be 'provocative.' This public statement was an attempt to reinforce the administration's private efforts to urge the Democratic Peoples' Republic of Korea (DPRK) not to fire the missile. ... Incredibly, US Special Envoy for [NK] Stephen Bosworth revealed--just a few days before the launch--that he was ready to visit Pyongyang and resume the six-party talks once the 'dust from the missile settles.' It is no wonder the North fired away. ... In 2006, when Pyongyang last lit off a volley of missiles and then exploded a nuclear device, the Security Council responded unanimously with Resolutions 1695 and 1718, which imposed extensive military and some economic sanctions. ... Yesterday's launch is attributable to prior failures, but the global consequences now unfolding are Mr. Obama's responsibility. In fact, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates is expected to announce today deep cuts in the US missile defense program, an extraordinarily ill-advsed step. ... Iran has carefully scrutinized the Obama adminstration's every action, and Tehran's only conclusion can be: It is past time to torque up the pressue on this new crowd in Washington. Not only is Iran's back covered by its friends Russia, China and others on the UN Security Council, but it sees an American president so ready to bend his knee for public favor in Europe that the mullahs' wish list for US concessions will grow by the minute. Israel must also be carefully watching how the US watched [NK] rip through 'the international community.' The most important lesson the new government headed by Prime Minister Bejamin Netanyahu should draw is: Look out for No. 1. If Israel isn't prepared to protect itself, including using military force, against Iran's nuclear weapons porgram, it certainly shouldn't be holding its breath for Mr. Obama to do anything", John Bolton at the WSJ, 6 April 2009.

"The President went even further in Prague, noting that 'as a nuclear power--as the only nuclear power to have used a nuclear weapon--the United States has a moral responsibility to act.' That barely concealed apology for Hiroshima is an insult to the memory of Harry Truman, who saved a million lives by ending World War II without a bloody invasion of Japan. As for the persuasive power of 'moral authority,' we should have learned long ago that the concept has no meaning in Pyongyang or Tehran, much less in the rocky hideouts of al Qaeda. The truth is that Mr. Obama's nuclear vision has reality exactly backward. To the extent that the US has manitained a large and credible nuclear arsenal, it has prevented war, defeated the Soviet Union, shored up our alliances and created an umbrella that persuaded other nations that they don't need a bomb to defend themselves. ... In Iran acquires a bomb or North Korea retains one despite this attempt to stop them, then the world will conclude that there is no such thing as an enforceable antinuclear order. It will be every nation for itself. ... Obama is a brilliant talker, and his words thrilled a Europe that wants to belive he can conjure peace and a nuclear-free world", my emphasis, Editorial at the WSJ, 7 April 2009.

"Reducing our nuclear arsenal only gives outlaw states (including China) the incentive to increase theirs, to try to rival ours. And eliminating nuclear-weapons testing reduces the reliability of our arms and hence their effectiveness as a deterrent. ... Beginning in 1906, Britain cut back an ambitious program of naval construction, begun under a previous adminstration, in the hope of thereby avoding an 'arms race' with Germany. ... The Washington Naval Conference of 1922 set limits on battleship consturction by the US, Japan, Britain, France and Italy. ... Britain's policy of restraint in military production in the 1930s--combined with with refusal of British and French governments to send forces to turn back Hitler's then weak army when it violated the Versailles Treaty by remilitarizing the Rhineland in 1936--did not placate Hitler", David Lewis Schaefer at the WSJ, 9 April 2009.

I agree with the WSJ. DO the math yourself. Or do you believe, along with that ignoramus Dianne Feinstein, we can blow the world hundreds of times over, my 15 January 2009 post, http://skepticaltexascpa.blogspot.com/2009/01/we-aint-got-no-enemies.html.

I agree with Bolton. Again. Provocative. So? What will you do about it? If nothing, shut up!

Obama is a brilliant talker. Really? I conclude he can't think. He could not have survived intellectually in my fifth-grade class. But he was on the Harvard Law Review. So? I disagree with the WSJ about the reason we dropped A-bombs on Japan, read Gar Alperovitz's The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb, 1995 for some possible explanations.

We apparently learn nothing from history. At least POTUS Obama hasn't.