North Korea is moving away from possible unification with South Korea in major policy change.

 

Kim Jong Un. BBC/Reuters

Kim Jong Un has said that North Korea will no longer have unification with South Korea as a goal and that the constitution should be changed to declare South Korea as a "principal enemy". BBC. Three organizations founded for the purpose of unification will also be shut down. Kim also said that if a war with South Korea were to break out North Korea's goal will to be to conquer South Korea. Tensions between South Korea and North Korea are growing. Last year both South and North Korea dropped their five year deal to reduce tensions after North Korea launched a satellite. Experts say that war between the two Koreas is more likely than any time since the war ended. 

My Comment:

This story is a few days old but I thought I should post about it anyways. North Korea isn't in the news despite how dangerous the situation is. This is due to a busy news cycle and the actual wars that are happening. The Red Sea Crisis, the Gaza War, everything Iran is doing and, of course, the Ukraine war are sucking up a lot of the media attention. Not to mention the 2024 Presidential race here in the United States. 

But this is a serious threat and could be the next major war to break out. This is Kim Jong Un giving up on any diplomatic solution to the Korea conflict and the fact that his rhetoric has reached levels that we haven't seen before is very concerning. 

Of course the same is true for South Korea. They withdrew from the deal they had first after North Korea launched a satellite. In retrospect that seems like a terrible idea. Abandoning a deal like that just because the other side launched a satellite seems like an extreme over reaction. But they did it anyways and now Korea is close to war. 

The Biden White House appears to be out to lunch on this issue, which is not surprising. To be fair, they have screwed up so badly on so many other foreign policy issues, they may simply not have the diplomatic resources to deal with this crisis along with all the other ones. They have nobody to blame but themselves of course, I doubt any of this would have been happening under Donald Trump, or even any halfway competent president of either party. It's just another example of how the Biden administration is uniquely bad. 

Speaking of Trump, I'd also like to point out that under Trump North Korea was a solved issue for all intents and purposes. Trump had a good relationship with Kim and was able to improve relations. He wasn't able to get a deal to end the war, but if he had been able to get a 2nd term he probably would have been able to. Alas, that didn't happen. 

So is war coming? It's possible. Usually North Korea only saber rattles like this when it wants something. But unlike other times I haven't heard any issues that North Korea is dealing with, such as famine. This could indeed be something more serious. And it's also possible that Kim just wants attention from the United States but given the situation right now, he's not likely to get it. 

The other factor is that the United States is both weaker than any other time in recent history. The United States is under siege and is very foolishly wasting huge amounts of resources in Ukraine. We are also getting dragged into a war with Yemen and possibly Iran as well. Though I doubt that North Korea could legitimately win a war with South Korea, if there was ever a time to try...