Donald Kirk

Reporters vs editors: Paul Morton’s story is finally told
Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
Fights between reporters and editors are classic. Reporters don’t trust editors, and editors don’t trust reporters.
That little observation is by way of commenting on what has to be about the worst reporter-editor  Read More 

JIJI
JUN 30, 2015

SEOUL – A freelance U.S. journalist testified in a Seoul court that South Korea’s indictment of Japanese reporter Tatsuya Kato for allegedly defaming President Park Geun-hye was excessive.

Donald Kirk, 77, was testifying Monday at the Seoul Central District Court as a witness for Kato, 49, a former Seoul bureau chief for the  Read More 

Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
It’s a time for anniversaries and memories of the tragedies that have afflicted Northeast Asia over the past century.
On Tuesday, the Japanese remembered the horror of the single worst battle in Asian history, the three-month struggle for Okinawa. The battle ended with the  Read More 

Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
You have to wonder what Kim Jong-Un is eating these days.
Every time his picture appears visiting a military unit or a factory or an agricultural cooperative, he seems to have gained a kilogram or two. What’s he feasting on? What’s his favorite  Read More 

Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
AIDS, SARS, MERS ― the four-letter acronyms leap from the headlines like killers in a horror movie each time the latest deadly disease spreads shock and awe among people to whom the inability to find cures seems unimaginable.
It was just a century or so ago  Read More 

Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
SUBIC BAY, Philippines ― The presence here of the USS Shiloh, a cruiser laden with missiles and cannon, reminds visitors of a bygone era. It was almost 25 years ago that the U.S. Navy had to abandon Subic Bay and the U.S. Air Force evacuated  Read More 

Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
The crusade of WomenCrossDMZ for peace on the Korean Peninsula had certain defined boundaries.
Don’t talk about human rights and nukes. Say all you want about American sanctions on North Korea and the need for a peace treaty to end the Korean War.
The  Read More 

Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
The stakes are escalating in the contest for Northeast Asia.
North Korea’s got nukes and lots of missiles, most recently maybe the SLBM for submarine-launched ballistic missile. The U.S. has glistening new hardware too. THAAD, Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense, the missile system for  Read More 

Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
SAIGON — It’s become fashionable among intellectuals from left and right to talk about the Vietnam War in terms of “lessons learned.”
Better yet, critics of U.S. policy write and talk about “lessons not learned.” One of the latter emailed asking me to tell  Read More 

Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
SEOUL — Anniversaries have their special appeal. The first anniversary on April 16 of the sinking of the Sewol off South Korea’s southwestern coast evoked emotions of outrage and sadness over the loss of 304 lives, 250 of them teenagers from the same school near Seoul.
Anniversaries of  Read More