Obama fails another test.
North Korea’s second underground nuclear test has shown the world that it’s only a matter of time before the secretive regime develops the ability to mount an atomic weapon on a missile.
Monday’s blast — by all accounts larger than its first one in 2006 — indicates the impoverished country will keep using its nuclear development in efforts to bolster its regime and raise its stature against its main perceived adversary, the United States. It has also raised fears of increased proliferation.
North Korea’s defiance in carrying out the latest explosion, which followed its first test in October 2006 that resulted in censure and sanctions by the United Nations, has met widespread condemnation and cast more doubt over the prospects for stalled talks aimed at the country’s denuclearization.
……Barack Obama said the blast and North Korea’s test firings of short-range missiles off its coast “pose a grave threat to the peace and security of the world,” while Pyongyang answered Tuesday by launching more missiles. And on Wednesday, the North warned South Korea and the United States that Seoul’s decision this week to participate in a U.S.-led program to intercept ships suspected of carrying weapons of mass destruction is equal to a declaration of war.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090527/ap_on_re_as/as_koreas_nuclear_threat
Oh, and by the way, they’ve reneged on the 1953 Armistice:
North Korea threatened a military response to South Korean participation in a U.S.-led program to seize weapons of mass destruction, and said it will no longer abide by the 1953 armistice that ended the Korean War.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=awBTCPe7S2gw&refer=worldwide
China can probably stop Kim Jong Il’s belligerence if it wants to, but I bet it’s using North Korea to test Obama’s response, especially since Bejiing is engaging in a military buildup of its own.
What now, Barack “negotiate without preconditions” Obama? More posturing? More deferring to the U.N.?
I didn’t think it was possible, but we now have a White House occupant who outdoes Clinton and Carter in the abject failure department.