Informal Institute for National Security Thinkers and Practitioners

On this day in History:

On January 23, 1968, the USS Pueblo, a Navy intelligence vessel, was engaged in a routine surveillance of the North Korean coast when it was intercepted by North Korean patrol boats. According to U.S. reports, the Pueblo was in international waters almost 16 miles from shore, but the North Koreans turned their guns on the lightly armed vessel and demanded its surrender. The Americans attempted to escape, and the North Koreans opened fire, wounding the commander and two others. With capture inevitable, the Americans stalled for time, destroying the classified information aboard while taking further fire. Several more crew members were wounded.
...
On December 23, 1968, exactly 11 months after the Pueblo‘s capture, U.S. and North Korean negotiators reached a settlement to resolve the crisis. Under the settlement’s terms, the United States admitted the ship’s intrusion into North Korean territory, apologized for the action, and pledged to cease any future such action. That day, the surviving 82 crewmen walked one by one across the “Bridge of No Return” at Panmunjom to freedom in South Korea. They were hailed as heroes and returned home to the United States in time for Christmas. 
https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/uss-pueblo-captured

The USS Pueblo remains the second oldest commissioned ship in the US Navy and it unfortunately remains in Pyongyang, north Korea as a "museum."


Quotes of the Day:
“In the history of the human race, those periods which later appeared as great have been the periods when the men and the women belonging to them had transcended their differences that divided them and had recognized in their membership in the human race a common bond.”
- Haile Selassie, Ethiopian Statesman

“Wise people have an inward sense of what is beautiful and the highest wisdom is to trust this intuition and be guided by it. “
- Aristotle

“Every time we turn our heads the other way when we see the law flouted, when we tolerate what we know to be wrong, when we close our eyes and ears to the corrupt because we are too busy or too frightened, when fail to speak up and speak out, we strike a blow against freedom and decency and justice.”
- Robert F. Kennedy



1. U.S. criticizes North for missile tests as it prepares for military parade
2. Iran pays delinquent U.N. membership fee with funds frozen in S. Korea
3. N. Korea criticizes Japan's move to revise security documents
4. Freight Unloading Operations Begin at Uiju Airfield
5. North Korea's Missile Tests are Shaking Up the South Korean Election
6. Why is anti-Korean racism in Japan on the rise again?
7. Japanese embassy rejects Moon's present over Dokdo image
8. The Inside Story of Why Donald Trump's North Korea Strategy Failed
9. What Will Joe Biden Do If North Korea Tests Nuclear Weapons or ICBMs?
10. 5 Reasons Why South Korean Horror Movies Absolutely Rule




1. U.S. criticizes North for missile tests as it prepares for military parade

Huge parades will likely be held (for Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il) while Kim Jong-un prioritizes nuclear weapons and missiles over the welfare of the Korean people in the north. We should be having a field day with themes and messages in support of a comprehensive information and influence activities campaign. 

 
Sunday
January 23, 2022

U.S. criticizes North for missile tests as it prepares for military parade

In this image provided by the White House, U.S. President Joe Biden meets virtually from the Situation Room at the White House with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on Friday, Jan. 21, in Washington, D.C. [AP]
 
North Korea appeared to be preparing for a military parade over the weekend, shortly after U.S. President Joe Biden criticized North Korea's recent series of ballistic missile tests on Friday (local time) during an online summit with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida.
 
South Korean military authorities detected signs that the reclusive regime is preparing for a military parade in the capital city of Pyongyang, ahead of key political anniversaries, a military official told reporters on the condition of anonymity.
 
The North celebrates the birthdays of its leader Kim Jong-un's late father and grandfather, Kim Jong-il and Kim Il Sung, on Feb. 16 and April 15. Kim Il Sung was the founder of the regime.
 
The official said that high levels of activity could be seen among North Korean troops and trucks at Mirim Airfield near the capital, suggesting they were gearing up for a parade.
 
“As there are signs of preparations for a military parade, we are paying close attention to related developments,” the military official said. “Preparations appear to be in their early stage, and it is not yet clear when exactly the North will stage the parade.”
 
Signs of parade preparations came shortly after the North’s state media said Thursday that the country is considering “restarting all temporarily suspended activities,” suggesting that it may end its self-imposed moratorium on nuclear and intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) testing.
 
That announcement by state media, coupled with South Korean intelligence on parade preparations, has heightened speculation that Pyongyang could use the celebrations to showcase more advanced weaponry in its growing arsenal of missiles.
 
Much to the alarm of South Korea and neighboring Japan, North Korea has conducted four missile tests in quick succession since the new year, beginning with two separate tests of what it claimed were hypersonic glide missiles on Jan. 5 and 10, followed by a test of train-launched missiles Jan. 14 and a tactical guided missile test from Sunan Airfield near Pyongyang on Jan. 17.
 
The flurry of missile testing activity from the North was front and center of the regional concerns discussed during Friday’s virtual summit between Biden and Kishida.
 
In a press release shortly after the summit, the White House said that the two leaders condemned North Korea's recent launch of ballistic missiles as a violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions. 
 
The tests also triggered a second call by the United States for a meeting of the UN Security Council to address missile launches by North Korea.
 
The meeting was requested by the United States, France and Britain — three of the five permanent members on the Security Council — as well as non-permanent members Mexico, Ireland and Albania.
 
Five countries, including China and Russia, hold permanent seats on the Security Council, which is tasked with ensuring world peace, while 10 other countries take up non-permanent seats in the council on a rotational basis.
 
The meeting, which took place Thursday, was the second meeting of the Security Council on the North’s recent missile tests. The previous meeting took place on Jan. 11, shortly after the North’s second test this year.
 
However, China and Russia delayed the U.S. effort to impose sanctions on five North Koreans at Thursday’s meeting.
 
During the closed-door Security Council meeting, China and Russia placed a “hold” on the U.S. proposal.
 
China said it needed more time to study the sanctions proposed by the United States, while Russia said more evidence was needed to back the U.S. request.
 
Under current United Nations procedural rules, the holding action can last for six months. Should another council member extend the delay, the proposal will be blocked from consideration for another three months before it is permanently removed from the council’s agenda.

BY MICHAEL LEE [lee.junhyuk@joongang.co.kr]



2.  Iran pays delinquent U.N. membership fee with funds frozen in S. Korea



Iran pays delinquent U.N. membership fee with funds frozen in S. Korea | Yonhap News Agency
en.yna.co.kr · by 최수향 · January 23, 2022
SEOUL, Jan. 23 (Yonhap) -- Iran has paid its dues to the United Nations with the country's funds frozen in South Korea in a move to immediately restore its voting power, Seoul's finance ministry said Sunday.
Iran made an emergency request to South Korea on Jan. 13 for the use of Tehran's funds in Seoul to pay its dues after being informed by the U.N. it would immediately lose its voting rights for the arrears.
Iran has more than US$7 billion in funds for oil shipments frozen at two South Korean banks -- the Industrial Bank of Korea and Woori Bank -- due to U.S. sanctions.
The U.S. reimposed the sanctions on Iran in 2018 when then U.S. President Donald Trump pulled out of a 2015 landmark nuclear agreement with Iran and five major world powers.
The Ministry of Economy and Finance said $18 million, part of the delinquent fees, was paid to the U.N. on Friday, using the Tehran assets frozen in South Korea after consultations with related organizations, including the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control and the U.N. Secretariat.
"Iran's right to vote at the General Assembly is expected to be restored immediately with the payment," the ministry said in a statement.
It marks the second time for Iran to use its funds held in South Korea to pay the U.N. fee following a similar case last year.

scaaet@yna.co.kr
(END)
en.yna.co.kr · by 최수향 · January 23, 2022


3. N. Korea criticizes Japan's move to revise security documents


N. Korea criticizes Japan's move to revise security documents | Yonhap News Agency
en.yna.co.kr · by 송상호 · January 23, 2022
SEOUL, Jan. 23 (Yonhap) -- North Korea's foreign ministry on Sunday criticized Japan's moves to revise a set of key security documents as "extremely dangerous" steps away from its long-held defense-oriented policy.
Japan has reportedly been moving to revise its national security strategy and other key defense documents this year as it confronts an increasingly assertive China and a nuclear-ambitious North Korea.
"What is extremely dangerous is that Japan is poised to include in these documents capabilities to attack enemy bases, a sharp increase in defense spending, and the development and purchase of armament equipment for preemptive strikes," the ministry said in a statement under the name of a researcher at its research institute on Japan.
The ministry also voiced concerns that the focus of Japan's defense strategy could shift to an attack and invasion.
sshluck@yna.co.kr
(END)
en.yna.co.kr · by 송상호 · January 23, 2022



4. Freight Unloading Operations Begin at Uiju Airfield


Does this indicate how trade will be conducted with China?
Freight Unloading Operations Begin at Uiju Airfield


Recent commercial satellite imagery indicates the likely first freight train to cross into North Korea from China in more than a year entered Uiju Airfield and unloaded its cargo. The airfield is widely believed to have been converted into a disinfection facility that would enable North Korea to resume import of much-needed food, medicine and other goods.
The country has been under a self-imposed lockdown since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020, and few goods or people have been allowed in or out of the country. That appears to have changed this week. After the first train crossed on Monday, additional trains were reportedly observed crossing in the following days. However, it is unclear at what level this will continue in the near term.
Cargo Unloading
Images of Uiju Airfield, situated a few kilometers from the Sino-North Korean border, show freight cars and unloading activity shortly after a train was observed crossing into North Korea on Monday morning.
Freight cars on the train appear to have been decoupled into smaller groups, with each group visible at one of five unloading platforms at the site. In total, there appear to be 16 freight cars at the site.
Figure 1. Overview of Uiju Airfield disinfection and quarantine site with five platforms for unloading goods.
Image Pleiades © CNES 2022, Distribution Airbus DS. For media options, please contact thirtyeightnorth@gmail.com.
A crane and trucks can be seen at the platforms. The workflow at the site is still unclear, but the trucks will likely transport cargo into nearby warehouses, where they will undergo a quarantine and disinfection procedure.
Figure 2. Close up of crane at one of the platforms at the quarantine site.
Image Pleiades © CNES 2022, Distribution Airbus DS. For media options, please contact thirtyeightnorth@gmail.com.
Figure 3. Close up of trucks at one of the platforms at the quarantine site.
Image Pleiades © CNES 2022, Distribution Airbus DS. For media options, please contact thirtyeightnorth@gmail.com.
The image was taken at 11:32 local time (UTC+09:00) on Monday morning, about two hours after another image showed a train on a rail spur at the entrance to the site. A train reportedly entered North Korea approximately two hours prior to that image.
Figure 4. Close up of train waiting to enter the quarantine site, image taken earlier in the morning on January 17.
Image © 2022 Planet Labs, PBC cc-by-nc-sa 4.0. For media licensing options, please contact thirtyeightnorth@gmail.com.
Truck Trade
Prior to the coronavirus pandemic, trucks were also commonly used for trade between the two countries, but that appears to remain suspended to date. No trucks have been observed at either the Chinese or North Korean customs yards for months.
Figure 5. Customs yards in Dandong and Sinuiju remain empty.
Image Pleiades © CNES 2022, Distribution Airbus DS. For media options, please contact thirtyeightnorth@gmail.com.
Update on January 23, 2022
Commercial satellite imagery from January 21 shows goods stacked and placed in several areas in the Uiju Airfield. The goods are likely those that came in on the trains observed earlier in the week.
Their placement in the facility appears to support earlier analysis that the site is divided into several different zones separated by fencing and bollards.
Figure 6. Overview of Uiju Airfield with goods visible, January 21.
Image © 2022 Planet Labs, PBC cc-by-nc-sa 4.0. For media licensing options, please contact thirtyeightnorth@gmail.com.
Figure 7. Close up of goods placed near warehouses by railway platforms at Uiju Airfield, January 21.
Image © 2022 Planet Labs, PBC cc-by-nc-sa 4.0. For media licensing options, please contact thirtyeightnorth@gmail.com.
Figure 8. Close up of the variety of goods at Uiju Airfield, January 21.
Image © 2022 Planet Labs, PBC cc-by-nc-sa 4.0. For media licensing options, please contact thirtyeightnorth@gmail.com.


5. North Korea's Missile Tests are Shaking Up the South Korean Election


Are we going to see "north wind" in this year's election?

North Korea's Missile Tests are Shaking Up the South Korean Election
North Korea's flurry of missile tests has become a heated issue on the campaign trail in South Korea. 
The National Interest · by Mitchell Blatt · January 23, 2022
North Korea’s four missile tests in the first two weeks of 2022 have sparked fears of an arms race in Northeast Asia. Particularly concerning for security analysts and South Korean leaders was the firing of a hypersonic missile on January 12. The advanced missiles, which surpass speeds of Mach 5, may be able to evade radar and missile defense systems due to their high speed and ability to change direction in flight.
“While there’s some debate about the precise state of North Korea’s missile capabilities, including the new hypersonic missile it claims to have tested, what is clear is that North Korea’s continued advancement of its nuclear and missile programs are exacerbating the security dilemma in the region,” Patricia Kim, a fellow at the Brookings Institute, told the National Interest.
North Korean state media reported that the missile hit its target 621 miles from its launch site and executed “corkscrew maneuvering” during the final 150 miles of its flight path. The South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff confirmed that the missile launch hit speeds of Mach 10 and was more successful than previous tests of the DPRK’s hypersonic missile technology.
The “maneuvering” and gliding are crucial factors in the ability of hypersonic missiles to evade missile defense systems. While traditional ballistic missiles also reach speeds upwards of Mach 5, they follow predictable parabolic paths. A ballistic missile with a hypersonic glide vehicle attached, which is reportedly what North Korea fired, follows a ballistic path in the early and middle stages of flight before the vehicle comes off. However, Vann H. Vaan Diepen, an analyst writing for 38North, questioned whether the vehicle attached to the DPRK’s missile was really a glide vehicle and not a less advanced maneuvering reentry vehicle (MaRV).

“Because diplomacy has failed thus far to restrain Pyongyang, Northeast Asian states, especially South Korea and Japan, feel as if they have no other choice but to increase their own military capabilities and joint capabilities with the United States to deter, or in the worst case, preempt, a North Korean attack,” Kim said. “Beijing, however, claims these moves shift the military balance in the region in a way that threatens its own security, and that it must continue to advance its own strategic capabilities in response. In sum, North Korea’s ever-advancing missile and nuclear programs are creating major ripple effects on the region.”
South Korean presidential candidate Yoon Seok-youl advocated for the country to strengthen its defenses following North Korea’s tests. “Peace is not achieved by way of slogans. Peace is a result of overwhelming power. A strong deterrent against North Korea alone can guarantee the ROK's peace,” he wrote in a statement on Facebook.
Yoon said that South Korea must develop the capacity for preemptive strikes, acquire its own hypersonic missiles, strengthen its missile defenses, and enhance the country’s retaliatory strike capabilities. He tied those capabilities to the “three-axis system,” a set of strategies and components that are being developed to counter a North Korean strike.
The three-pronged system, which aims to take out North Korea’s nuclear infrastructure and leadership before an attack can take place, was originally known as the “Kill Chain” and was renamed as the "strategic target strike” in 2019. Yoon said he would “restore and reinforce at an early date the ‘three-axis system,’” which he accused the Moon administration of undermining.
Democratic Party of Korea presidential candidate Lee Jae-myung accused Yoon of being ignorant of the system. "Kill Chain refers to a military strategy of striking a target when a weapon of mass destruction or a nuclear attack is obvious and imminent. It is not something that can be mentioned in such a situation like a test of a weapon or a projectile,” Lee said at a press conference on January 12.
Some of Yoon’s proposals are already being worked on by the South Korean military. In 2020, then-Defense Minister Jeong Kyeong-doo announced plans to develop hypersonic cruise missiles. Earlier in January, the Hankyoreh revealed more details about the hypersonic missile currently being developed by South Korea. The Hycore, an ultra-high-speed cruise missile, is more advanced than North Korea’s glide missiles and could be put through initial tests as early as this year. While hypersonic glide missiles can be detected by radar when they are high in their ballistic flight path, cruise missiles flying closer to the ground are much more difficult for radars to detect. In effect, a hypersonic cruise missile, such as those being developed by South Korea and Russia, combines the high speed of a ballistic missile with the precision maneuverability of a cruise missile.
Yoon’s hawkish attitude represents a major contrast with Lee, who supports continuing many of Moon’s diplomatic efforts with North Korea. In another statement posted to Facebook following North Korea’s recent threat to resume nuclear testing, Yoon said that “the Moon Jae-in government's ‘Korean Peninsula Peace Process’ is an utter failure. The North Korean regime over the past five years has shackled the hands and feet of the ROK government while advancing its own nuclear and missile capabilities.”
The Lee campaign, meanwhile, warned that Yoon’s “preemptive strike theory” threatens the peace and stability of South Korea. “A preemptive strike against North Korea on the battlefield on the Korean peninsula, where North and South Korea are facing each other, is an extremely dangerous scenario that is highly likely to expand in scope into an all-out war that will not be locally confined,” Choi Jieun, the Lee campaign’s spokesperson for international affairs, said at a briefing on January 11.
Lee even called Yoon a chicken hawk: “People who never served in the military are calling for annihilating and reunifying the North.”
Although the debate over defense policy and diplomacy has become fiercer and more frequent lately, some observers don’t think North Korea will be a significant factor in voters’ choices on March 9.
Jong Eun-lee, a research fellow at the North Korea Development Institute, told the National Interest that “the election impact is minor because of other issues, but it could shift [the] public debate toward a more hawkish stance on China and North Korea.” Jong added that if that happens, Lee’s more dovish stances would become less popular among the public.
John Lee, a columnist for NK News, largely agreed that the electoral impact will be limited. “South Korean voters don't care about North Korea, and we care about them less with each passing year,” he told the National Interest. “Not only have the North Koreans reached diminished marginal returns with their missiles … they've reached the point of negative outcomes. Unless the ROK-U.S. mutual defense treaty suddenly gets scrapped, no one in South Korea is staying awake at night because of North Korean missiles.”
As for Yoon’s reference to a “preemptive strike,” John Lee suggested it might be a ploy to shift the conversation away from various news stories about Yoon's wife and mother-in-law. He added that while South Korea's Far Right may support an aggressive stance toward North Korea, they are “a tiny minority.”
Mitchell Blatt is a former editorial assistant at the National Interest. He is based in Korea where he covers foreign policy, Korean politics, elections, and culture. He has been published in USA Today, The South China Morning Post, The Daily Beast, The Korea Times, and Silkwinds magazine, among other outlets. Follow him on Facebook at @MitchBlattWriter.
Image: Reuters
The National Interest · by Mitchell Blatt · January 23, 2022

6. Why is anti-Korean racism in Japan on the rise again?

Why is anti-Korean racism in Japan on the rise again?
An upswing in hate crimes has seen homes burned and death threats made towards ethnic Korean communities – whether allied to North or South – in Japan
The countries share a history complicated by colonialism, war, missile tests and ‘comfort women’. With elections looming, things may be about to get worse

By Julian Ryall South China Morning Post4 min

A statue of a ‘comfort woman’ at the Korea Botanic Garden in Pyeongchang, South Korea. Japan’s use of the wartime sex slaves is one of many issues complicating the countries’ ties. Photo: Kyodo
Nearly 20 years ago, after Pyongyang admitted that its agents had abducted Japanese nationals, someone smeared on the walls of Chung Hyon-suk’s Tokyo home: “North Koreans live here. Be careful.”
The sense of danger she felt that day has returned.
Japan’s relationship with the two Koreas has always been complicated due to Tokyo’s colonial rule of the peninsula, but things changed for North Korean residents of Japan after they confirmed the abductions,” she said.
“Politicians and the Japanese media kept up a constant attack on everything about Korea and for the next decade it was difficult to live here,” said Chung, who was born in Japan and has lived in the country all her life. Her grandparents were originally from North Korea and she is a member of Chongryun, the association of North Korean residents of Japan.
“Our house was damaged and I was very worried about my two sons, who were at primary school at the time, so I went to the police,” she said.
The Korean community reported numerous incidents, such as girls attending Korean high schools having their distinctive Korean-style uniforms slashed by assailants and receiving countless online threats.
There was also an upsurge in political movements such as the ultranationalist Zaitokukai, or the Association of Citizens against the Special Privileges of Second-Generation Koreans, which openly described ethnic Koreans as criminals and “cockroaches”.
Chung said that in recent years the situation had become more stable as the abduction issue faded and the government took measures to outlaw the most blatant acts of racism. But in the past 18 months or so, there has been a clear sense that the Korean community – whether allied to North or South – is once more being targeted.
In January last year, the local government in Kawasaki city, on the southern border of Tokyo, had to boost security at a community centre in one of its primarily Korean neighbourhoods after it received a card threatening to “exterminate” Koreans living in Japan.
The card was delivered a month after the city became the first in Japan to enact a law against hate speech.
In August, a fire ripped through the Utoro district of Uji city, in Kyoto prefecture, which is similarly home to a large Korean community. Seven homes were destroyed in the district of around 50 Korean families, who are the descendants of people drafted into the area during World War II to construct a military airfield.
Police later took into custody Shogo Arimoto, 22, and charged him with arson. He was also charged with setting fire to the offices in Aichi prefecture of Mindan, the association of South Korean-affiliated residents of Japan.
A few days after Arimoto’s arrest and with the suspect still in custody, officials of Mindan reported to police that the windows at their office in Hiraoka city, in Osaka prefecture, had been deliberately smashed.
At a rally of Utoro residents, lawyer Gu Yang-ok told the Mainichi newspaper: “I felt as if my own body had been burned. But what I am afraid of most is that there is no reaction from society.”
Chung has the same fear, as relations between Japan and the two Koreas once again appear to be in a downward spiral.
“Back in 2018, when North Korea, South Korea and the United States were talking and there were no missile launches or nuclear tests, things were peaceful in Japan for us,” she said. “But now we have swung back to friction and threats, with the North testing some missiles already this year, and the sense among my friends is that things are going to get worse again.”
Kim Myong-chol, 70, an ethnic Korean who has spent his entire life in Japan, agrees that tensions are rising.
“Japanese have a special feeling of superiority over Koreans,” he said. “Many of them have a hatred for Koreans and Korean culture and that is the same attitude that they used to justify their colonial rule over the Korean peninsula in the past,” he said.
“Now, the Japanese need a scapegoat to divert public attention away from all the problems that they have at home, and Koreans are an easy target,” he said. “It has always been that way.”
Both Japan and South Korea have elections in the coming months and candidates and parties in both nations have in the past earned political capital by criticising their neighbour.
South Korea’s decision to unilaterally withdraw from an agreement with compensation signed by the two governments in 2015 and which was understood to draw a final line under the issue of Korean sex slaves – euphemistically known as “comfort women” – forced to work in military wartime brothels was met with incredulity and anger in Japan.
Tokyo responded – although it continues to deny that its actions were retaliation – by halting exports of chemicals critical to South Korea’s semiconductor industry. Relations have been further soured as a number of South Korean courts have found in favour of plaintiffs seeking compensation for years of forced labour at Japanese conglomerates during the colonial period, an issue that Tokyo insists was settled when the two nations forged diplomatic relations in 1965.
“These things seem to come in waves and the new surge is linked to the elections, particularly in South Korea as criticising Japan is a popular position,” Chung said. “And now we have the North testing missiles as well, so there is plenty for Japan to get angry about.
“We seem to be getting into another downward spiral when what is needed is a brave politician to step forward and say ‘enough is enough’,” she said. “But I look around, and I don’t see anyone stepping up.”
Julian Ryall never expected to still be in Japan 24 years after he first arrived, but he quickly realised its advantages over his native London. He lives in Yokohama with his wife and children and writes for publications around the world.


7. Japanese embassy rejects Moon's present over Dokdo image



Sunday
January 23, 2022

Japanese embassy rejects Moon's present over Dokdo image

The illustration on the face of a box containing a Lunar New Year gift from President Moon Jae-in and first lady Kim Jung-sook, sent to all embassies in Korea. [YONHAP]
 
The Japanese Embassy in Seoul rejected President Moon Jae-in’s Lunar New Year gift after finding an image of islands which it said are suggestive of the Dokdo islets in the East Sea, which Japan claims are territorially its own, on the gift box, reported local media outlets in Tokyo on Saturday.
 
The gift box, which contained honey, traditional liquor and other local food products, was sent to all embassies ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday, which falls on Feb. 1.
 
The front of the box has an illustration of a sun rising behind islands.
 
The Japanese Embassy, upon receiving the gift, deemed the illustration “suggestive of the disputed island of Takeshima,” and returned it to the Blue House on Friday, according to the Tokyo-based Mainichi. Japan calls the islets Takeshima and Korea calls them Dokdo.
 
The embassy also reportedly lodged a protest to the Korean government, stating that the islets are Japanese territory.
 
Seoul maintains that there is no territorial dispute as the Dokdo islets in the East Sea are historically, geographically and under international law an integral part of Korean territory.
  
It’s customary of the Moon government to send holiday gifts in a box designed after Korea's cultural heritage items. Last Lunar New Year, it was the 19th century painting “Ten Symbols of Longevity,” and during the last Chuseok harvest holidays it was the Joseon Dynasty’s court decoration “Ilwolobongdo.”
 
The Dokdo islets are known in Korea to be the first Korean territory to be hit with sunlight when the sun rises each day.
 
The Blue House as of Sunday has not officially commented on the matter, including whether the illustration was meant to signify Dokdo.
 
The latest protest from Japan follows a statement from Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi last week that also claimed the islets as Japanese.
 
The minister, in addressing the parliament on Jan. 17, claimed the islets are an “integral part of Japanese territory both historically and under international law.”
 
Korea’s Foreign Ministry protested immediately.
 
“We strongly protest the Japanese government's reiteration of its unfair claim to Dokdo through the foreign minister’s diplomatic address to the parliament, and we strongly urge that it be immediately withdrawn,” reads the statement released by the ministry within a few hours of the minister’s statement. “The Japanese government should immediately stop futile claims and attempts to claim Dokdo, which is clearly our own territory historically, geographically and internationally, and should be clearly aware that correct historical awareness is the basis for future-oriented development of Korea-Japan relations.”
 
The two countries’ relations have been at a historic low in recent years over a number of disputes, many relevant to the years when Japan had annexed Korea (1910-1945). They include disputes over compensation of victims of Japanese wartime sexual slavery and forced labor.
 

A music video produced by Seoul-based think tank Northeast Asian History Foundation shows the Dokdo islets in the East Sea. The music video was released on Oct. 20, 2021. [NORTHEAST ASIAN HISTORY FOUNDATION]

BY ESTHER CHUNG [chung.juhee@joongang.co.kr]

8. The Inside Story of Why Donald Trump's North Korea Strategy Failed

I never knew there was a special advisor for north Korea in OSD.

Some very interesting insights here.


The Inside Story of Why Donald Trump's North Korea Strategy Failed
19fortyfive.com · by ByAnthony Holmes · January 20, 2022
2017 was the year of “fire and fury” in American policy toward North Korea. Pyongyang tested its first ICBM on July 4th, and its second a few weeks later. The first quarter of 2018 was looking similar before the election of Moon Jae-in as South Korea’s President. A summit in Singapore, where I co-represented the US Defense Department, and Hanoi led many to believe change was coming. 2019 and 2020 became about not upsetting the apple cart and North Korean vacillation between peace rhetoric and spectacular displays of intemperance. We ended Trump’s term with talk of “love letters” exchanged with Kim Jong Un.
So In 2022, why are we in a similar place to 2018? North Korea continues its nuclear weapons modernization, evidenced by tests of innovative and dangerous missile systems and the continued operation of weapons research centers at Yongbyon and elsewhere. Seoul continues its fruitless and often degrading peace overtures, to which the Regime either does not respond or replies via messages from officials low enough in the Regime’s hierarchy to drive the insult home.
North Korea is still under sanctions, but Russia and China violate them, and South Korea keeps insisting we need to carve out exemptions or abolish them. There is regular talk of offering the North a unilateral peace declaration Pyongyang has not asked for.
Why are we in this position? Because something went wrong with our policy in 2018.
President Obama famously warned incoming President Trump that North Korea was his number one concern. President Trump took him at his word and oriented his incoming administration to mitigate that threat. In late 2016 while working for the Defense Intelligence Agency, I was invited to join the Office of the Secretary of Defense and lead a large DOD team to provide options to the incoming Trump Administration. I remained a special advisor for North Korea until the end of the Trump Administration and worked closely with the most senior administration officials.
The President’s instructions were to think big and not be beholden to the past. No one wanted war, but we all understood Pyongyang never believed any real punishment from the United States, China, or others was in the waiting. To put it simply, North Korea had learned to live with the current state of affairs, sanctions, and international pariah status, and was willing to incur even more pain to achieve its strategic goals.
My team produced dozens of draft proposals for the National Security Council. After a flurry of meetings, the President’s aides whittled them down to 3. The President selected what came to be known as the Maximum Pressure Campaign. Simply put, it was the policy of the United States that we would use every element of national power on North Korea and its enablers to make it understand that nuclear weapons made it less secure, weakened its standing, denied it its goals, and increased the likelihood of conflict.
It was sanctions, rhetoric, targeted asphyxiation, and implied risk. And it worked. For a while.
More than a dozen countries that had diplomatic relations or economic relations with Pyongyang closed or reduced North Korea’s presence. These countries told us they understood we were “taking North Korea seriously now.” When meeting with foreign representatives, we would often ask “do you want to be friends with North Korea, or do you want the U.S. wondering why you are cozy with them?” Sanctions enforcement was among the most strict it had ever been. North Korea felt the pressure.
But our successes bred concern and political theater. Some in Congress were convinced we wanted war. One time when I was in Seoul, a U.S. servicemember asked me bluntly if he should send his family home before the shooting started. The American media, hostile to anything President Trump did, ran articles parroting North Korea propaganda.
In May 2017, South Korea’s new President Moon Jae-in replaced the disgraced and impeached Park Geun-hye. While the election was never explicitly about North Korea, there was no doubt that it was a factor in the public’s choice. During a meeting with a senior Moon advisor, he told me “there will not be another Korean War.” When I pointed out that North Korea did not need Seoul’s permission to start a new one, he slowly repeated the line for emphasis.
Then in 2018, it all came undone. The same North Korean despot who had spent a year promising nuclear strikes on the American homeland and at one point even praised assassinating U.S. political leaders in state media, suddenly became interested in a summit. One of Moon’s envoys traveled to the White House to convey Kim Jong Un’s willingness to meet.
Many people, myself included, strenuously warned the White House that if we agreed to meet Pyongyang would fall back into familiar patterns and beat us with experience. It would say all the right things. It would make the U.S. negotiate with itself – a skill it mastered over decades of practice. By continually operating at the upper limit of bellicose rhetoric, North Korea could invite and receive concessions if it lowered the volume even a little, and demanded and receive rewards just for agreeing to talk. North Korea would threaten to walk away, and we would reward it for not doing so. For the longer negotiations drag on, the more reaching an agreement – any agreement at all – becomes the goal, rather than getting to a good outcome.
We warned that our friends and competitors were watching for any sign that our determination with North Korea was waning. If we softened now, they would see a green light to resume relations. North Korea’s “no questions asked” trade policies are unfortunately attractive to many.
I said explicitly that we should not have a summit with North Korea until it needed relief more than we wanted to talk.
But the President did agree to talk, North Korea fell back into old patterns, and two years of effort was undone.
Anthony W. Holmes was the special advisor for North Korea in the Office of the Secretary of Defense from 2017-2021. He co-represented the Department of Defense at the first summit between the United States and North Korea in Singapore. He is a senior non-resident fellow at the Project 2049 Institute. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not necessarily represent the views of any agency. He currently lives in Florida.
19fortyfive.com · by ByAnthony Holmes · January 20, 2022

9. What Will Joe Biden Do If North Korea Tests Nuclear Weapons or ICBMs?

Excerpts:
So we have to live with North Korean testing, just as we have in the past. Should Pyongyang resume nuclear testing – even more frightening than missile testing – the international community will (and should) consider another round of multilateral sanctions. But North Korea has been pretty well blockaded from the world economy since the onset of ‘sectoral sanctions’ in 2016. And the sanctions generate a lot of humanitarian backlash because of North Korea’s already severe poverty.
Negotiation and more investment in missile defense are probably our best medium-term options moving forward. North Korea is so dangerous, that we should always make an effort to talk with it. If US and DPRK negotiators could nail down a genuine arms control agreement – rather than Trump’s made-for-TV diplomacy – Biden might consider meeting Kim. But in lieu of that, the US and South Korea should keep plugging away at missile defense. North Korea’s refusal to halt or freeze its WMD development, and its relentless gimmickry in negotiation, even with Trump, leave us no choice.
What Will Joe Biden Do If North Korea Tests Nuclear Weapons or ICBMs?
19fortyfive.com · by ByRobert Kelly · January 20, 2022
America’s Poor Choices if North Korean Resumes Nuke and ICBM Testing: Perhaps it was inevitable. Negotiating with North Korea has proven so futile for so long, that the North’s recent announcement that it may resume ICBM (intercontinental ballistic missile) and nuclear testing probably does not surprise many analysts anymore.
The North’s rationale for this is old hat by now. It has justified its weapons of mass destruction programs for decades by declaiming (falsely) a US ‘hostile policy.’ The US recently sanctioned several North Korea officials connected to its WMD programming. Given that North Korean elites are scarcely exposed to American punishments anyway – because of how little North Korea interacts directly with the US – this seems like quite an overreaction. The real reason is almost certainly the collapse of the negotiations under former US President Donald Trump and the lack of any follow-up by current President Joseph Biden.
Trump’s Diplomacy
In 2018 and 2019, Trump met the North Korean supreme leader, Kim Jong-Un, three times. This was unprecedented. North Korea had sought such a summit for decades. It would be a huge coup for the tiny, backward, Orwellian tyranny much of the world simply wanted to forget about. A summit would suggest a North Korean peer equality with South Korea, something Pyongyang desperately wants to assert as it has fallen further and further behind Seoul. Nothing would legitimate North Korea’s existence as a real country – rather than a failed, bizarre cul-de-sac of Korean history – like a face-to-face meeting with the most powerful leader on the planet.
For this very reason, US presidents always rejected such summits. They would grant legitimacy to North Korea which the US wants South Korea to have. They would also place the US president next to the worst human-rights abuser on the planet, a moral stain on the office. Trump, the gleeful disrupter, simply ignored all that and met Kim in hopes of a Nobel Peace Prize. Analysts worried that Trump would make large concessions to Pyongyang in search of any deal which would win him the Nobel.
Yet Kim, surprisingly, gimmicked the ensuing negotiations. His offer to Trump, at Hanoi in 2019, was laughably one-sided. Kim wanted full sanctions relief for the decommissioning of one obsolete reactor. Trump, despite his lust for ratings and attention, wisely rejected this, and negotiations under his presidency faded away.
Now North Korea Expects Presidential Attention
In the fall of 2019, Trump sent his secretary of state to Pyongyang. The North Koreans ignored him, insisting on negotiating seriously only with the US president himself. The North Koreans similarly ignored the South Korean president, treating him as subordinate to the American alliance leader. The message was clear: having once met a US president, the North would only negotiate seriously with him next time.
Yet Biden did not have time for this in his first term. Biden learned, like so many others who have leaped into the North Korean quagmire, that the issues are deeply set and not amenable to quick, Trumpian solutions, and that the North is determined to draw out negotiations to capture the status gains of being treated as a consequential player in world politics. Just as unsorting the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a thankless task that can easily swallow a president’s foreign policy for naught, so is the gordian knot in Korea. Biden, seeing how badly Trump got burned – three high-profile, but fruitless meetings with the world’s most brutal tyrant – choose to demote Korea. This may have been wise for the fate of his presidency, but we know North Korea will not be ignored. Hence the likely inevitability of the recent North Korea announcement: if we do not talk with them, they test. And now they expect no less than the US president to negotiate with them.
What Can We Do?
The short answer is, not very much. If there was something the international community could do to derail North Korea’s aggressive WMD testing, we almost certainly would have done it before. In the greater Middle East, the US often uses asymmetric tactics against weak states, such as special operations forces or drones. That option is foreclosed in northeast Asia.
Image: KCNA.
Image of Hwasong-12 IRBM. Image Credit: KCNA.
The US has never asymmetrically struck North Korea for several reasons. First, North Korea is geographically difficult to penetrate. Second, it has a large professional military that would aggressively fight any perceived penetration. Third, we do not know what North Korea’s redlines are. We do not know, for example, how it would respond to a drone strike against a facility. Given South Korea’s vulnerability to North Korean retaliation, the US and South Korea have never taken that risk.
Other direct action is risky. Suggestions include aggressively hacking North Korea or shooting down a test missile. But the former is difficult because we have so little access to North Korea and it is so de-linked from the rest of the world. The latter is initially attractive, but the US military fears its missile defenses in South Korea and Japan might miss the North Korean test missile, embarrassing the US and casting doubt on American regional defense capabilities.
So we have to live with North Korean testing, just as we have in the past. Should Pyongyang resume nuclear testing – even more frightening than missile testing – the international community will (and should) consider another round of multilateral sanctions. But North Korea has been pretty well blockaded from the world economy since the onset of ‘sectoral sanctions’ in 2016. And the sanctions generate a lot of humanitarian backlash because of North Korea’s already severe poverty.
KCNA screenshot of Hwasong-16 ICBM.
Negotiation and more investment in missile defense are probably our best medium-term options moving forward. North Korea is so dangerous, that we should always make an effort to talk with it. If US and DPRK negotiators could nail down a genuine arms control agreement – rather than Trump’s made-for-TV diplomacy – Biden might consider meeting Kim. But in lieu of that, the US and South Korea should keep plugging away at missile defense. North Korea’s refusal to halt or freeze its WMD development, and its relentless gimmickry in negotiation, even with Trump, leave us no choice.
Dr. Robert E. Kelly (@Robert_E_Kellywebsite) is a professor of international relations in the Department of Political Science at Pusan National University. Dr. Kelly is now a 1945 Contributing Editor as well.
19fortyfive.com · by ByRobert Kelly · January 20, 2022

10. 5 Reasons Why South Korean Horror Movies Absolutely Rule

5 Reasons Why South Korean Horror Movies Absolutely Rule
Cracked · by Jay L'Ecuyer · January 23, 2022
Korean Horror — or K-Horror as the cool kids call it — has been having quite a moment since the turn of the century for good and also multiple reasons. A decent chunk of South Korea's horror films are rated among the top Horrors of the 21st century, and horror fans might just choke on a Ceiling Ghost's dandruff if you claim to be a fan of the genre, but you still haven't seen classics like The Host, I Saw The Devil, or A Tale of Two Sisters.
A Tale of Two Sisters, B.O.M. Film Productions Co.
“You can’t sit with us.”
K-Horror is pretty unique in the horror genre. It's also distinct from other Asian horrors, because while Japan is more into those Ceiling Ghosts, Korean Ghosts are sad and ruthless and almost always stem from some South Korean folklore. K-Horror knows how to pack a punch no matter what story is being told because it's rooted in a psychological and more emotional reality.
And that's just the start of it, because …
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5They’re Not Afraid To Explore And Push Genre Conventions
Let's kick it off with Train to Busan, a well-known and extremely popular South Korean horror — so of course, it's getting an American remake — and one of the best zombie horror movies to date. It's zombies on a train. Best four-word pitch ever.

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But it's not just a zombie horror movie. It's a full-on action zombie horror peppered with social commentary that even has the audacity to make us emotional.
Train to Busan, Next Entertainment World.
We haven’t cried like this in an action horror since Will Smith killed that dog.
K-Horror movies love bringing the action, and why not? James Wan's 2021 horror Malignant showed how effective action-horror can be — a thing K-Horror already knew back in 2003 when Oldboy was released.
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Of course, Oldboy is mainly billed as a revenge thriller, but thanks to that very real octopus scene and that very gross finale, cinephiles have claimed it as belonging to both — making it an action horror revenge thriller film. This might sound strange to many people who struggle to accept that The Silence of the Lambs can both be a thriller and a horror, but Korean filmmakers totally get it. They have no problem blurring the lines of where one genre ends and another begins. Korean cinema thrives on thrillers in general, and they don't give a cannibal whether a movie fits neatly into one specific genre and its formulaic storytelling rules or tropes or ghosts that always look like they've been crying in the shower.

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Thirst, the 2009 horror about a priest becoming a vampire from acclaimed director Park Chan-wook (Oldboy, Stoker, Snowpiercer) is a drama thriller romance horror.
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Bedevilled, a tale about gender-based violence, goes from thriller to domestic drama to full-on horror by the end of its second act.

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The Host (2006) is a brilliant sci-fi creature feature family drama satire comedy action horror movie from the wonderful Bong Joon-ho who went on to make Parasite and win all the awards.
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And so on and so forth. Sure, South Korea isn't the only country mixing genres and styles and whatnot, but the seamless way in which they pull it off is what's so admirable. It never feels too much or even a bit messy, and that is quite the feat because …
4They’re Not Afraid To Layer Their Movies
Train to Busan is a movie about a capitalist businessman whose work seems more important than his daughter until a zombie invasion hits, and he needs to protect her, learn to survive with the help of others, and get to the only safe haven in South Korea — the city of Busan. But if you know your Korean War history and you know that Busan was the only city along with Daegu that wasn't invaded by North Korea during the first three months of that war, then the film starts to look a tad bit different.
Train to Busan, Next Entertainment World.
Less subtle, more horrific.

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Of course, it's also about the clash of individualism and collectivism. Oh, and also class wars, because when we say K-Horrors are layered, we're not talking about ghosts that are also walking STDs or grief monsters sporting top hats. We're talking 'Three Traumas In A Trench Coat' layering. Many of their films use their conflict-ridden past with either Japan or North Korea as a background tool to unspool many a fear (see The Wailing, The Piper, and their take on the found footage genre, Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum). Almost all of their top films deal with some kind of abuse, and the majority of K-Horrors like to explore their own superstitious and/or spiritual customs — there's a lot of shamanism in their culture — and the hysteria or the concept of evil that often go with it.
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And that's a big reason why the world is so fascinated with K-Horror, because through these films we get to experience many interesting facets of not only their history but also their culture and, ultimately, their fears. Korea is a big fan of adapting its own folktales to highlight these horrors and fears. A Tale of Two Sisters, The Mimic, and The Closet are just three examples of Korean folktale adaptations.

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And they don't just stick to their own folktales. See what they did with the story of the Pied Piper.
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3They Tend To Stay Away From Hollywood Tropes
Slow zombies? Not in K-Horror. Besides Train to Busan's fast and voracious cannibal corpses, #Alive also features quick as lightning undead, and the upcoming Netflix series All of Us Are Dead will clearly be following the entertaining Korean trend:

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Happy and victorious endings? Not in K-Horror. In keeping with the more realistic and emotional approach to horror, you won't often see a South Korean horror film where the "Final Girl" triumphantly makes it, or the monster/bad guy is defeated. And even if they are — think the absolutely brutal action-horror revenge thriller I Saw The Devil — it doesn't leave you feeling good because the supposed victory came at too high a price. Or, as is the case of The Mimic, The Closet, or K-Horror's take on the mystery slasher genre, Bloody Reunion — someone gets left behind.
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Brutal, not-so-happy endings are also in keeping with the storytelling structures of folktales. It can't be a cautionary tale if everything's just fine and dandy by the time the end credits roll. K-Horrors aren't fairytales or fantasies. They're considered some of the scariest horror movies in the world because they're not afraid to show just how dark human nature can go. They are more concerned with the real-world problems of abuse and neglect of women and children than having some ending that says, "But look how these women and children overcame it, yay!" In the best Korean horrors, the woman doesn't escape her abuse, the mother doesn't recover from her grief, and the absent father doesn't get another sunrise with his daughter.

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Because therein lies the horror that needs our attention.
2 They're Not Afraid To Take Their Time Building The Scares
Also considered a Hollywood trope, K-Horrors largely steer clear from jump scares. And while they can deliver a good twist like any Shyamalan/James Wan movie, they never sacrifice character or story to do so. Well, almost never.
One of the most American K-Horror movies this writer has seen to date is the 2013 Killer Toon, a slasher about a webcomic artist whose stories seem to predict the death of others but is so filled with dream sequences and jump scares that it completely loses its tension and fails to actually deliver a scare. Especially since, by the end of the film, the characters just don't make much sense anymore.
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And while the scattered graphics and animation looks pretty rad, the overuse of dramatic music to try and build tension sounds a bit too much like the operatic scoring of Scream. Which, you know, worked for Scream because it was a comedy horror.
CJ Entertainment
Killer Toon, not so much.
But Killer Toon is an outlier here (and let the record reflect: still not the worst movie in the world) because most Korean horrors are just incredibly good at building tension and leaving us horrified. It truly feels like they have mastered the slow burn. K-Horrors will twist your guts until you run out of air and double over, before twisting some more.
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Bedevilled, a movie about what happens when sexism and abuse are just left to run riot, doesn't just jump into the main conflict and treat the story like it's a sprint. It gives you a quick glimpse of the troubles, and then it slowly unravels the horrors of the two women at the center of it, letting you endure along with them.

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I Saw The Devil is one of the most torturous films you'll ever see as it actually hits you with the horror from the very beginning … and then stays there, taking its sweet time to let the story play out while stringing you along like you're a hostage with Stockholm syndrome.
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Of course, the best example of just how good Korea is at building a horror crescendo comes in the form of director Na Hong-jin's masterpiece, The Wailing. At two hours and thirty-six minutes, it's one of the longest but also one of the best horror movies you'll ever experience. Because people, it's a f**king experience.

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There's a set-piece around the middle part of the film that escalates the tension, and from there, it wrings you out like a wet sack before tossing you — mercifully — into the sun.
And it doesn't need a myriad of jump scares to do it.
1They’re Not Afraid To Be Sincere
When Western cinema addresses real-world issues in their horror movies, oftentimes it's either so subtle that a lot of people might (and will) miss the point altogether, or it's so wild and over-the-top that it loses earnestness because it seems more preoccupied with you just getting how clever they're trying to be. Korean horrors don't do that. They don't throw one giant slow-mo wink your way, and they do not treat their superstitions, fears, and conspiracy theories like it's the most bonkers, out-there phenomena in the history of phenomena.
The Purge, Universal Pictures.
But you do you, America.
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In fact, Korean horrors treat their fears and flaws in a very normal, very sincere manner. And they're not afraid to make fun of themselves. Both The Host and The Wailing are excellent examples of this because they are wildly different movies, yet they both feature main characters who are bumbling buffoons and just way in over their heads, in a comical way. Even Oldboy starts off with the "bumbling buffoon" trope, with the main character drunk out of his mind making an absolute fool of himself at the police station.
Oldboy, CJ Entertainment.
Relatable in any culture.
It's a clever way of making us laugh and, in doing so, getting us to let our guards down. That way it hits so much harder when they start throwing all the bad things at us. Yes, we will laugh at the dumb Dad who doesn't know how to be a Dad, but we will also feel it by the time Dad can't save his kid because 1) it will always be a trope that resonates, and 2) K-Horror will be brutal in its depiction of it.
Korean Horror understands that it is as normal to laugh at our own dumb butts as it is to fear cruelty, abandonment, and loss.
And it's not afraid to say so, sincerely.
For more horror opinions, follow Zanandi on Twitter.
Top Image: Next Entertainment World.
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Cracked · by Jay L'Ecuyer · January 23, 2022


V/R
David Maxwell
Senior Fellow
Foundation for Defense of Democracies
Phone: 202-573-8647
Personal Email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com
Web Site: www.fdd.org
Twitter: @davidmaxwell161
Subscribe to FDD’s new podcastForeign Podicy
FDD is a Washington-based nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.

V/R
David Maxwell
Senior Fellow
Foundation for Defense of Democracies
Phone: 202-573-8647
Personal Email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com
Web Site: www.fdd.org
Twitter: @davidmaxwell161
Subscribe to FDD’s new podcastForeign Podicy
FDD is a Washington-based nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.

If you do not read anything else in the 2017 National Security Strategy read this on page 14:

"A democracy is only as resilient as its people. An informed and engaged citizenry is the fundamental requirement for a free and resilient nation. For generations, our society has protected free press, free speech, and free thought. Today, actors such as Russia are using information tools in an attempt to undermine the legitimacy of democracies. Adversaries target media, political processes, financial networks, and personal data. The American public and private sectors must recognize this and work together to defend our way of life. No external threat can be allowed to shake our shared commitment to our values, undermine our system of government, or divide our Nation."
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