Monday morning brief, oct 2

Good morning.

It's midnight in Pyongyang.

More ripples in Twitterverse of Trump undercutting Tillerson. Hawks eating up Trump's gesture towards military force. When the POTUS says these things, it will factor into NK's risk profile if it sees a US force coming towards it, whether peaceful or not.

The Warmbier torture story is still going around and around.. It is being used and will be used as a bolster for war. "Look at the grieving parents".  Remember that the medical examiners found no evidence of torture - and noted that he'd been well cared for. Something had previously aphyxicated him. The coroner also noted that many things can cause pain and don't cause lasting damage. So on balance, don't believe the propaganda, but do remember something happened, whether self inflicted or not.

The Wall Street Journal has a column today focusing on deterrence and containment rather than simple acceptance or simple war. The writer reminds us that this is the strategy used for the Soviet Union. My estimate is that this is probably where the bulk of the realpolitik types in the USA fall. But I am afraid I've never heard of North Korea trying to spread Communism, unlike the USSR. So perhaps "Deterrence" alone is all that is needed. I would rather avoid war, myself.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/between-war-and-acceptance-a-third-way-on-north-korea-1506956016

Summary: the full effects of Trump's lack of leadership skill are still sinking in. I anticipate later today or tomorrow we'll start seeing the diplomatic shadows visibly shift as various statements are made and emissaries go from place to place. Tillerson's resigning is still definitely a potential outcome. Non-Trump conservatives are looking for options besides war. 

Sunday Brief

Apologies for the lack of morning briefing. Familial duties summoned my attention.  Let's see if any change in the situation has presented itself in the last 18-20 hours....

It is 10:38 AM on Monday in Pyongyang.

38 North reports that Russia is providing a new peering Internet link out of North Korea. This is a serious move that will increase the NK resilience. Note that there was a emissary to Russia from North Korea sent last week.
http://www.38north.org/2017/10/mwilliams100117/

Trump rhetorically shoots Rex Tillerson, his Secretary of State, in the back. Why would anyone trust Mr. Tillerson to be backed up by Trump now?  Will the Kushners be the actual ambassadors, or other Trump princelings? Truly amazing.  Mr. Tillerson is an adult and probably figures that he can help manage the children in the room; but it's very much resignation material.
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/10/01/trump-tillerson-korea-twitter-243339
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/914497877543735296

In which a commentator argues that Mr. Kim is not crazy, and Americans are almost incapable of recognizing that they have a peer in Asia. I would concur.  I would note that Mr. Kim is famously good at lethal displays of power. There is a persistent thread of thought on the hawk Twitter accounts that North Korea is backwards and we'd roll right over them. I would suggest looking at some videos from North Korea of their mountains and contemplating mountain fighting with a dedicated and angry populace. (exhibit A for mountain fighting is always Afghanistan) Or, e.g., fighting in Seoul or Pyongyang. It'd be a brutal military campaign, and a long one, unless something really effective happened in the first few hours. Between you and me: ain't gonna happen. "A short victorious war" is an idea that got shot dead in Verdun and the Somme, and its zombie needs its head chopped off. This is particularly relevant in the face of the fact that effective information flows from the outside world don't happen in North Korea. So the populace is unprepared to surrender. Anyway. Consider contacting your House representative and pressing for impeachment.

https://deusexatomica.wordpress.com/2017/08/06/hes-fucking-crazy-and-we-need-to-nuke-him-first-kim-jong-un-north-korea-and-nuclear-deterrence/

The Washington Post remarks that the North Koreans are engaged in a brisk trade selling communist bloc spec weapons to countries and private armies around the globe. 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/a-north-korean-ship-was-seized-off-egypt-with-a-huge-cache-of-weapons-destined-for-a-surprising-buyer/2017/10/01/d9a4e06e-a46d-11e7-b14f-f41773cd5a14_story.html

A US deputy secretary of state, Mr. Sullivan, will travel to South Korea later this month. Will Trump stand by any diplomatic achievments he makes? That is the question that will be on the side of everyone's minds as they talk with him.

http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/news/2017/10/02/0200000000AEN20171002000200315.html?sns=tw

The Wall Street Journal continues the anti-NK narrative. Interesting story, though!

 https://www.wsj.com/articles/kim-jong-uns-nephew-was-in-danger-after-fathers-killing-north-korean-group-says-1506861913

Twitter accounts are calling purveyors of nuance and care leftist sympathizers.

The Department of State spokeslady, Ms. Nuart is taking a lot of flak for stating that North Korea can not have the bomb. It is a statement of fact that they do. 

As a side note,  I would also encourage contacting your US House member (If you are American) and pressuring them to move forward on HR 669 ( https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/669 ). HR 669 finds that being the first person in a conflict to use nuclear weapons and requires Congressional authorization for starting a war using nuclear weapons. The United States system is designed around checks and balances; there is no check or balance on the use of nuclear weapons by the US President. 

Summary: Trump is significantly damaging diplomatic efforts.  North Korea has gained a substantial improvement in their communication ability. The United States Government public party line appears to be "Denial".

Friday morning summary

Good Morning this Friday!

It is 12:27 a. m. in Pyongyang

From the "more reputable sources" section of Twitter....

• A report claims Russia and North Korean diplomats begin talks (as per expectation)
• South Korea's ambassador is working on minimizing China's upsetness over the SK THAAD antimissile system. 
• Some level of sesmic activity from the NK region, estimated to be natural.

Trump will make an Asia circuit in November. This is a good idea.

And from the less reputable...

• NK Korea H bombs are a globalist conspiracy.
• Fake News charges are being levelled at the media for disagreeing with Trump
• Definitely seeing a ton of bots arguing pro-war. Wonder who is running those? US right-wingers?

Summary: no substantial change

noëlle on nazis

pnathan: This is from @noelle@mastodon.social. This is a good write up.

---

I wrote this a while ago, but it's still appropriate.

I hear a lot of people (mostly apologists) complaining about Nazi-punching on the grounds that non-Nazis might get punched too, that "the real Nazis died out in 1945", etc. This is concern trolling on its face, but let's talk about Naziism just for the record.


The group we think of as the post-Weimar German Nazi Party was called the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, or NSDAP. I'll refer to it as NSDAP to identify it specifically, because otherwise it would be easy to get tangled up.

This next bit is a little simplistic, but it gets the gist across, and still goes long. Sorry!


NSDAP was predicated on racism, and specifically nationalistic racism. They wanted "Germany for Germans"; the blonde blue-eyed Aryan was their ideal, but not their litmus test.

As such, they had three goals: putting business back into the hands of the German people, expelling foreigners and expanding German control, and maintaining the purity of the German people through eugenics.

The first was Volksgemeinschaft, or "people's community"; it advocated profit-sharing and common ownership of businesses. (It's important to note that this WASN'T Marxist socialism; NSDAP supported the middle class and was vehemently anti-Communist.) The idea was to keep international interests out of Germany, and specifically Jewish interests; NSDAP founder Anton Drexler believed that Jews controlled int'l capitalism and finance. (This formed a basis for their persecution.)


The second was the relatively longstanding German policy of Lebensraum, or "living space". This held that not only was Germany for Germans only, but that Germany had a right to spread out into areas controlled by "lesser races", both for comfort and as a defensive barrier. Lebensraum had provided a pretext for Germany to engage in WWI and it would again in WWII.


Finally, we get to eugenics, which NSDAP argued would "improve the stock of the German people" -- and in the process eliminate those pesky foreigners, of course.

These three ideals - Volksgemeinschaft, Lebensraum, and eugenics - formed the core of the NSDAP's policies and drove its actions. Some of you are looking at this and thinking, "Hm, those look familiar." They do, or they should. Trump was elected on those ideals.


Volksgemeinschaft has its equivalent in "America First". Many of the alt-right hate international business, especially when they think international business is controlled by Jewish people. (When they talk about the Rothschilds, that's what they mean.) When Trump and the alt-right talk about bringing jobs back to the US, they're blaming foreigners for the actions of US corporations.

Volksgemeinschaft is also anti-big-business, which is why businesses catering to people with these beliefs position themselves as being composed of and benefitting the "common people". It's a trick to fool people into thinking they're smaller than they are.

We see Lebensraum in "white nationalism" and immigration bans, but it also manifests in subtler ways. Trump's Wall is Lebensraum, for example.

The appearance of Lebensraum in the US should be no surprise. The US was built on settler colonialism, and it continues today in actions like the DAPL.

Finally, eugenics. It's rare to hear the word these days, since it's so thoroughly entwined with Naziism. But e.g. the anti-vaccination movement is, at its heart, eugenicist, as are anti-miscegenation, "conversion camps", etc. Anything that seeks to remove "undesirable" traits from the population is in the eugenics tradition.

(Note that the eugenics thing is about traits, not beliefs. There's a substantial difference.)

So when we see our President espouse the ideals of "America First", #MuslimBan, and anti-vaxxing... it's hard not to be concerned.

And it's all too easy to look at his supporters, both in the alt-right and closer to the center, and see Germany in 1933 - and we really don't want a repeat of 1938.


Response from @ghost@mastodon.social


anti-vax-ism from an anti-autism or "the body can heal itself" mentality is pure eugenics, but I'd hate to erase the anti-vax subset of the population (especially POC) who legitimately don't trust pharma/science & govt not to inflict harm on their families when they've historically faced tremendous harm in the name of science and/or government. I do agree completely that eugenics is incredibly important to the right. the anti-vaxxers who are legally permitted to be anti vax are rich and usually white. They can afford to bypass laws. POC tend to be poorer and legally forced to vax without consent because they have children they can't homeschool or private school, and obviously don't want to risk having kids taken away. So I guess I like to specify that some eugenicists are anti-vaxxers but not all anti-vaxxers are pro-eugenics?