icon caret-left icon caret-right instagram pinterest linkedin facebook twitter goodreads question-circle facebook circle twitter circle linkedin circle instagram circle goodreads circle pinterest circle

Hither and Yon

Running with the nuclear football: Is acting crazy the best way to deal with Kim Jong-Un?

October 12, 2017
Special to WorldTribune.com

By Donald Kirk

Donald Trump at times engages in such flights of rhetorical fancy that a lot of people think he’s crazy or anyway unpredictable.

How can you be sure of a president who talks about destroying North Korea, who holds out “the military option” ― but professes to  Read More 
Be the first to comment

South Korea’s pro-North Left can’t believe the leader they backed appears to collude with Trump

October 8, 2017
Special to WorldTribune.com

By Donald Kirk

SEOUL —South Korea’s outspoken radicals and leftists can hardly hide their dismay.

To the consternation of organizers of the candlelight crusade that brought down the government of the conservative Park Geun-Hye, ousted and jailed on a wide range of offenses, their one-time hero, Moon Jae-In,  Read More 
Be the first to comment

north-korea's-200th-declaration-of-war-has-a-new-wrinkle

September 29, 2017
Special to WorldTribune.com

By Donald Kirk

North Korea has been crying wolf so often it’s hard to get too excited by the “declaration of war” North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong-Ho made in New York this week.

Did not the North Koreans declare war after the release of the film “The  Read More 
Be the first to comment

Playing defense: Who are Kim Jong-Un and Donald Trump kidding with their war of words?

September 24, 2017
Special to WorldTribune.com

By Donald Kirk

It wasn’t exactly a declaration of war, but it did come close. What else to make of President Trump’s remark that the U.S. might “totally destroy North Korea”? It was one thing to belittle Kim Jong-Un as “rocket man” but quite another to  Read More 
Be the first to comment

Oil for N. Korea: China much angrier at THAAD than Pyongyang’s nukes

September 15, 2017
Special to WorldTribune.com

By Donald Kirk

President Moon Jae-In has to be a master of the art of compromise. He was all for the latest watered-down UN sanctions that cut down but don’t cut off the flow of oil from China and Russia to North Korea.

The U.S. would far  Read More 
Post a comment

Pax Koreana? In their dreams

September 7, 2017

By Donald Kirk

Donald Trump doesn’t get it. He warns South Korea about “appeasement,” but who’s appeasing whom?

Yes, President Moon Jae-In, hero of the candlelight protests that lofted him as the liberal darling into the presidency after the ouster of the conservative Park Geun-Hye, would love to go down in  Read More 
Post a comment

Korean sovereignty: When ‘peace’ advocates say the ‘people’ they don’t mean South Koreans

August 31, 2017
Special to WorldTribune.com

By Donald Kirk

One demand you don’t hear South Korean leaders making whenever North Korea pops off another missile is, “Oh, let’s sign a peace treaty, and everything will be okay.”

That’s partly because, if there’s one party with whom North  Read More 
Be the first to comment

Information War: Here’s how to bring the brutal North Korean regime to its knees

By World Tribune on August 24, 2017
Special to WorldTribune.com

By Donald Kirk

Donald Trump’s notion of “fire and fury” for North Korea inspires cheers, fears and jeers. Is he threatening the biblical “fire and brimstone,” or does his rhetoric more closely resemble Shakespeare’s “tale told by an idiot, full of sound and  Read More 
Be the first to comment

Dreaming: What if Kim Jong-Un wanted to prove he is human? Here’s how

By World Tribune on August 18, 2017
Special to WorldTribune.com

By Donald Kirk

Small gestures would be so helpful in bringing about reconciliation with North Korea.

Take, for instance, the cases of the three U.S. citizens still held in the North. They are all Korean-Americans, two of them former teachers at the Pyongyang University  Read More 
Be the first to comment

On their minds in South Korea’s island paradise: Visions of peace … and returning Chinese tourists

By World Tribune on August 10, 2017
Special to WorldTribune.com

By Donald Kirk

GANGJEONG, Jeju: Upstaged by THAAD ― that’s the sad fate of the gaggle of dutiful protesters who pray and hold signs aloft and march in front of the main entrance to the gleaming new Republic of Korea naval base on the southern  Read More 
Post a comment