KOREA/NORTH KOREA

GARY LEUPP—Whether this is a temporary setback or the collapse of diplomatic efforts, Trump looks bad in this situation. He seems petulant and hypocritical. Yes the North Korean statement by a high-ranking woman in the Foreign Ministry is defiant, but many Koreans are like Trump in that when attacked rhetorically, they counterattack rhetorically. In this case the insulting language was intended to echo Trump’s language vis-a-vis the DPRK.

JEFF BROWN—The DPRK had the honesty to state to the world that it will not allow the country and its people to end up like another Libya or Iraq, which both denuclearized, de-chemical weaponized and once defenseless, got the American freedom and democracy treatment, with millions getting slaughtered and starved to death in the process (http://chinarising.puntopress.com/2017/08/28/why-dprk-will-n-e-v-e-r-stop-its-nuclear-arms-program-china-rising-radio-sinoland-170828/).

STEPHEN LENDMAN—America is thermonuclear armed and dangerous worldwide. Yet it demands North Korea abandon its key deterrent – developed and maintained only because of feared US aggression. Trump administration officials demand more from Pyongyang than it’s likely to accept – dismantlement of its nuclear program entirely, its nukes removed to Oakridge, TN for US-overseen destruction, leaving the DPRK vulnerable to a nation militantly opposed to all sovereign independent governments.

BRUCE DIXON—Cable news coverage never mentions that there are 15 US military bases on Korean soil, housing anywhere from 30 to 40,000 US troops, probably nuclear armed. The largest, Camp Humphreys is in the middle of scandal-ridden expansion plans to hold 40,000 US personnel in that one spot alone, all paid for by South Korean taxpayers, not American ones. South Korean civil society has long resented its American overlords and their military presence.

PETER KOENIG—France and the UK, of course along with Washington, are also following Israel’s cue – destroy and partition Syria and Iran – to create a Greater Israel, from the Euphrates to the Red Sea. And of course, the EU, miserable vassals of Washington, will keep their stranglehold with sanctions on Venezuela – Venezuela that has arguably together with Cuba, the best democratic system in the world, has never done any harm to anyone, let alone to those sanctioning countries. Even Switzerland had the audacity to join the EU’s sanction regime against Venezuela, a country that has been among the most pleasant partners of Switzerland in the past. One can only wonder, how low do these countries pull down their pants to please their ruthless Atlantists neofascist masters.