How to Begin Dealing with Kim Jong-Il

J. Peter Pham, Ph.D., Director of the Nelson Institute for International and Public Affairs at James Madison University, has the answer for how to deal with Kim Jong-Il and the murderous North Korean regime.

"Don'’t Feed the Animals": How to Begin Dealing with North Korea'’s Kim Jong-Il

Given the inhumane nature of the regime in Pyongyang as well as its dangerously provocative and destabilizing pursuit of weapons of mass destruction (WMD), it is clear that the only sensible long-term policy strategy is one of regime change. Kim Jong-Il'’s ongoing tenure-—or, for that matter, his continued physical existence in this vale of tears where he has been the cause of a disproportionate number of tears-is in the interest of neither the international community nor the United States, to say nothing of the long-suffering North Korean people. This does not mean, however, that we should be preparing a military campaign, even if no options should be ruled out a priori. Rather, what should be done immediately is that the United States and its allies should stop any policies that help strengthen a rogue regime that we need to ease off the world stage sooner or later. In substitution, we need to adopt the same policies that the Central Park Zoo and every other zoological institution has in place to cope with the risks associated with having wild animals in close proximity to urban humans, most of whom have long ago shed the hunter instincts of their distant ancestors.

Dr. Pham tells us to keep the animals from roaming freely amongst the humans, not to feed the animals, and not to touch the animals. [Note to liberals, the reference to "animals" is only part of the metaphor being used. He is not calling Koreans animals. - ed.]

Dr. Pham pulls no punches. This piece is a good read.

Undoubtedly, the Dear Leader will bitterly resent a strategy that prevents him from trading abroad in the only product that his country produces that anyone wants (weapons of mass destruction) and thus receiving the means to purchase at home the loyalty of the party and military officers on whom his regime depends (food and other basic supplies) [while those not in the Party or the Military are denied food, the distribution of which is very closely controlled - ed.], while simultaneously denying him the international attention and stature that he believes himself entitled to and which he exploits for regime legitimization. So be it. The international community can ill-afford to continue indulging a tyrant in possession of nuclear weapons capable of striking South Korea and Japan and clearly pursuing the capacity to strike the west coast of the United States. Anyway, I recall no one at the zoo objecting that the poisonous snakes were kept behind glass-or caring what the snake thought of its surroundings.

Read it all.