Robert Kaplan paints a startling picture of what's ahead for North Korea when, not if, the Kim regime falls. Even if war with North Korea can be avoided, there are still various nuclear and chemical weapons to be secured, not to mention the humanitarian challenges of feeding 23 million people. We've got 30,000 men in harm's way there, and we've already given 50,000 lives to keep the South free this long. Kaplan says China has strategic designs on the North of the peninsula, and yet it will be the Chinese that the U.S. government will have as a necessary international partner in shaping the regime's aftermath. Talk about your test of U.S.-China relations. Read it all.
If Kim's nuke test has an upside, maybe it's to jumpstart the public debate on our policy and our planning for this eventuality.
Posted by dan at October 9, 2006 8:34 PM