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The games warmongers play. On December 29, Reuters reports that:

South Korea on Friday termed North Korea a grave threat, a further sign of the deepening chill in relations between the two since Pyongyang's nuclear test nearly three months ago.

A defense white paper used some of the harshest language to describe its communist neighbor since the South tried to set aside decades of outright hostility toward the North with the diplomacy of what Seoul dubbed its "sunshine policy".

"North Korea's conventional forces, its nuclear test, weapons of mass destruction and the forward deployment of its troops are a grave threat to our security," the white paper said….

The ministry said the October 9 test along with the development of other weapons of mass destruction, a standing army of almost two million and the forward deployment of conventional weapons made the threat from the communist state more serious.”

This threat is laughable. North Korea can’t even feed itself. From what I’ve heard, the reason it has a two-million man army is because joining the military is about the only way to get anything to eat. A few years ago on Japanese television I saw a picture of the two Koreas from the air at night. South Korea was a mass of light. North Korea was almost dark, considerably darker than it was twenty years ago. (They showed that picture, too.) Would a country that can’t even keep the lights on attack an industrial powerhouse like South Korea? Does anyone believe China would support North Korea if it rushed across the border to attack the South? Does anyone believe the US and most of the world would NOT support South Korea if it were suddenly attacked? An attack on anyone by North Korea would be suicidal. And yet, South Korea’s Defense Department, with a straight face, issues a dire warning about the threat from the North. This is what warmongers do. They get their citizens to pay handsomely to defend against the worst-case fantasy. This is precisely how Russia was used by the US to justify 5.5 trillion dollars worth of nuclear weapons and delivery systems during the Cold War.

Now, the same principle is at work in Japan. As we have mentioned previously in this column, in 1999, Shingo Nishimura, vice minister of Defense, was forced to resign two weeks after suggesting that Japan should acquire nuclear weapons. However, on August 11, 2003, Yuri Kageyama, writing for the Associated Press, reported that:

The Japanese taboo on discussing the development of nuclear weapons is disappearing, the Associated Press reported Saturday (see GSN, Feb. 20).

“People are clearly waking up to the idea,” said opposition lawmaker Shingo Nishimura, who was forced to step down in 1999 as vice minister for defense after he suggested that Japan should consider acquiring nuclear weapons.
Senior ruling party officials Yasuo Fukuda and Shintaro Abe [now Prime Minister Abe] have suggested this year that Tokyo consider the nuclear option, AP reported.

“Japan must start saying right now that it might go nuclear,” said Tadae Takubo, a professor of policy at Kyorin University. “For a nation to entirely forsake nuclear weapons is like taking part in a boxing match and promising not to throw hooks,” Takubo added.

While the discussion of nuclear weapons is becoming more acceptable, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said Japan will not seek a nuclear capability.

“Our country’s stance on this will not change,” he said. “We will do our utmost to advance the call for smaller nuclear arsenals and nuclear nonproliferation while working toward ridding the world of nuclear weapons.”

Now that Shintaro Abe is prime minister, he is stating categorically, like Koizumi before him, that Japan will not go nuclear. However, Komfie Manalo, All Headline News correspondent, reported on December 26, 2006:

A Japanese government internal document said Japan would need at least three to five years to test produce small nuclear warheads despite having a uranium enrichment plant and the technology and equipment for the reprocessing spent nuclear fuel.

A report by the Sankei Shimbun said that technical restrictions are the primary reason for Japan's incapacity to mass produce nuclear weapons.
The September 20 document entitled "On the possibility of domestic production of nuclear weapons” said that the country is not capable of converting its nuclear resources in the immediate future even if Japan is not confined by domestic and international treaties.

Current nuclear facilities in the country are not suitable for the mass production of materials to be used for nuclear weapons, the document said.

This story is presented as a shocking revelation. Imagine, most Japanese have assumed that Japan could build a bomb in 15 minutes if necessary. Now the Sankei Shimbun is horrified to learn that it could take 3 to 5 years. Manalo continues: “It adds that producing a small nuclear weapon would require a budget between $1.69 billion to $2.554 billion and several hundred technical experts.”

I interrupt here briefly to remind you that these billions of dollars, not North Korea, are what this whole program is about. Manalo continues:

The document was prepared by a panel of experts from government organs who conducted the research secretly. But Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuhisa Shiozaki on Monday denies the government is aware of the document.

Shoichi Nakagawa, chairman of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party Policy Research Council, has been calling for a debate over the necessity of Japan becoming a nuclear power after North Korea test fired a nuclear bomb in October.

Foreign Minister Taro Aso has supported Nakagawa's call. Their controversial remarks put them under criticism from all over the political field.

The good news is that Nakagawa and Aso are being criticized for suggesting that Japan go nuclear. The bad news is that they are not, like Nishimura in 1999, being forced to resign. Not by a long shot. Japan’s need for nuclear weapons is now a serious political debate. Although the government denies doing so, the government is obviously studying the possibilities. North Korea is being used as a threat to persuade the Japanese people to pay billions of dollars for nuclear weapons they will be much better off without. The persuasion will take more time, but the Liberal Democratic Party is working on it.

Meanwhile, as the anti-nuclear, pacifist nation Japan debates the need to go nuclear, the People’s Daily Online reports on December 29 that:

The Chinese government has published details of its nuclear strategy for the first time in a key policy document issued Friday, saying the ultimate aim of nuclear development was self-defense.

In a white paper on China's national defense in 2006, the government reiterates its stand of never being the first to use nuclear weapons, promising not to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear-weapon countries and regions, and advocating the comprehensive prohibition and complete elimination of nuclear weapons.

Unfortunately, the US policy on nuclear weapons is far less civilized. Its 2002 Nuclear Posture Review clearly states that the US military has drawn up plans to use nuclear weapons against seven nations (Russia, China, Iran, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, and Syria), four of which are non-nuclear. And, it declares openly that the US intends to use them preemptively if it encounters, for example, “surprising military developments.” However, the year 2007 has started off with what could prove to be a civilization-saving miracle. On January 4, former Secretaries of State George Schultz and Henry Kissinger, former Defense Secretary William Perry, and former chair of the Armed Services Committee Senator Sam Nunn issued an amazing joint opinion piece that starts:

Nuclear weapons today present tremendous dangers, but also an historic opportunity. U.S. leadership will be required to take the world to the next stage -- to a solid consensus for reversing reliance on nuclear weapons globally as a vital contribution to preventing their proliferation into potentially dangerous hands, and ultimately ending them as a threat to the world.

It ends:

Reassertion of the vision of a world free of nuclear weapons and practical measures toward achieving that goal would be, and would be perceived as, a bold initiative consistent with America's moral heritage. The effort could have a profoundly positive impact on the security of future generations. Without the bold vision, the actions will not be perceived as fair or urgent. Without the actions, the vision will not be perceived as realistic or possible.

We endorse setting the goal of a world free of nuclear weapons and working energetically on the actions required to achieve that goal, beginning with the measures outlined above.

Something’s happening here. Japan is going nuclear, but Kissinger is an abolitionist. Will Japan build its own nuclear weapons or will the US get rid of theirs? Will 2007 be the year the world starts seriously trying to liberate itself from the nuclear threat? Or will it be the year we say, “Oh my goodness, if North Korea has them, surely we all need some.” Stay tuned.