blogging it real

So North Korea conducted a science experiment? Good job. Who knew that a mind-numbing Orwellian state could do long division? Even here, in the remote reache of Peru, echos of world leaders making a stink over North Korea can be heard.

The world deems North Korea’s science experiment a global threat. And the U.S. sees this as an aggressive move. Once again the thorn enters the lion’s paw. North Korea’s nuclear development program is a laughing joke. Even if they can split an atom, they are unable to get a ballistic missile to last in the sky for longer than 45 seconds. Japan and South Korea may want to worry about that, but there is enough military muscle in the region to make sure that nothing terribly wrong happens.

Indeed there is a bigger agenda behind the North Korea (third tier in the axis of evil) nuclear fear. A few months ago the world stared down the barrel of a gun at Iran, and their nuclear dreams. What happened to that? Grew old? Or did the bullshit overflow the pot? My guess is that by Friday the world will cool down on the North Korea fear, but it begs the question as to why the U.S. are beating the nuclear drums. Without getting too far into conspiracy theories, here’s three reasons why:

1) The U.S. is by far the largest holder of nuclear arms. 2,250 of which are on hair trigger alert (as in ready to go off in 20 minutes), and another 7,500 are on immediate stand-by, (let them rip in an hour). This has been a damn deadly scenerio since the cold war, and pointing fingers at developing nuclear nations certainly takes the heat off the fact that the U.S.A. could end the whole global show in under an hour.
2) The U.S. has spent millions upon millions into nuclear research. While the country has dismantled the MX Peacekeeper ICBM program, realizing that there are new foes and different realities to warfare in the 21st century, there has been a tremendous amount of research and development into smaller-scale instant sunshine containers. Operations plan 8044 identifies that modification to the nuclear stockpile is necessary to deal with rogue states and terror cells. This includes the need to eliminate ‘time urgent targets’ anywhere in the world. Combine this with the Bush administration’s policy of preemptive attack in the face of danger, and you have department of defense policy that replaces the role of nuclear weapons as a last-stand resort (in the cold war) to active preemptive tools that can be deployed from the air, sea, or ICBM machinery (excluding the MX Peacekeeper).

It has been nearly 60 long long years since the U.S. nuked a civilian population, turning people to shadows and killing the survivors with cancer in the blood. Any military driven economy needs to vent, in order to prove that it is worthwhile and needed. The Bush adminisration’s Preemptive War on Terror policy, combined with modifications to nuclear deployment strategy ensure that in the not-too-distant-future someone on the Axis of Evil, or the axis of not-quite-so-evil, will get evaporated.

Finally, there is nothing that scares the shit out of Americans more than a nuclear threat. Well, maybe Islamic guys with beards, but nuclear threat kept the United States scared for 40 years and justified global military intervention from Vietnam to El Salvador. 6 years into the war on terror, we’re getting tired of it. Bin Ladin is supposedly still getting dialysis treatment and threatening the world, and the god damn alert status has yet to hit green. In the Orwellian looking glass world, new threats are needed so the war can be continued. If it is not Iran’s dream of Nuclear War, then it is North Korea. If that fails, the myth can be constructed around Pakistan, India, or even France ( in a pinch). The social control thickens. People reamain scared and silent.

At this rate, and unless there is real global activism against the current U.S. administration and it’s policy, I’m giving us just a few more months before that nuclear clock goes two minutes closer to midnight....and it will be Washington, not Pyongyang that will be turning the dials.