Media and our legislators are too focused on local scandals and crime stories that little attention is drawn to what is transpiring within our part of the world, specifically, the fact that any miscalculation by the parties most concerned could push the entire world into the brink of a full-scale war.
Last Sunday, North Korea under its boy-king Kim Jong Un successfully conducted its sixth nuclear test. The head of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization which monitors and verifies seismic and nuclear activity around the globe says that North Korea’s test triggered one of the biggest tremors ever recorded by their monitoring system.
“It is a clear indication that the nuclear weapons program of North Korea is reaching a completely different level”, said the Vienna-based organization. NORSAR, a Norway-based group also monitoring nuclear tests, estimated an explosive yield of 120 kilotons, or 120,000 tons of TNT, even as South Korea estimated the explosion as having just 50 kilotons of TNT power.
Whichever, the threat from North Korea is a clear and present danger to world peace.
And it happened just as North Korea’s only global ally, and its economic lifeline, China, was hosting the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) summit of emerging economies (already a misnomer because for one, China is now the second largest economy in the world).
President Xi Jinping remained stoic, or at least maintained equanimity during the summit despite the clear provocation of its rogue neighbor and ally. A communiqué issued at the end of the summit expressed deep concern though, and called for peaceful settlement, even as Japan, over whose Hokkaido an earlier missile flew, and South Korea, were upset beyond words.
From Washington however, President Donald Trump chided South Korea and its newly-elected leader, President Moon Jae-in, who previously pressed for negotiations with Pyongyang which the American president considers “too soft a stance” toward the North.
Recall that the irascible Trump weeks back threatened Kim Jong-un and North Korea with “fire and fury like nothing the world has ever seen before.”
Monday’s tweet from the Donald alarmed not only South Korean leaders, but the whole world as well. What we are seeing are two unpredictable, even seemingly insane leaders, one of the most powerful military power, the other of a hermit kingdom with absolutely no scruples, holding the triggers to an unstable powder keg.
“South Korea is finding, as I have told them, that their talk of appeasement with North Korea will not work; they only understand one thing!” Trump tweeted.
Russia’s Putin warned against bellicose threats, saying that negotiations are needed to calm Kim Jong-Un, rather than threats, a direct reference to Trump.
Xi is most certainly displeased with the “hydrogen bomb” test unleashed by North Korea and at a most inauspicious date, his BRICS summit, but characteristically made a silent show of imperturbability. His government has been pressing its neighbor not to stage further nuclear testing, but the boy-king will not listen, as he eagerly taunts its South, Japan and the US of A with his “toys.”
The US Ambassador to the United Nations called for the “strongest sanctions” against the rogue state, but what would get Kim to stop, nobody really knows. Certainly not an increasingly toothless UN Security Council. Nobody, it seems can read the unreadable.
If war should erupt, whether through a pre-emptive strike from the US or if North Korea were to strike first, the result would be catastrophic. First in terms of thousands upon thousands of lives lost in South Korea and likely Japan as well. Second, the impact on the world economy could be disastrous. Hardly any nation on earth, which trades with Japan and South Korea, will escape an economic fallout beyond words to describe.
Last month, Kim threatened to send four missiles to the waters off Guam, which is American territory. The Americans responded with joint naval and military exercises in South Korea. Kim gave his Sunday explosion to show he would not be threatened.
To be sure, the US anti-missile defense system THAAD, could shoot down short, medium and intermediate ballistic missiles while still on the air, taking down a nuclear missile without detonating it. But still the anti-missile defense mechanism would emit radiation, and the effects would pose enormous risks.
But then again, North Korea would likely pull the trigger against South Korea and Japan, two of the world’s largest economies with huge populations. Japan already experienced a nuclear holocaust in Hiroshima and Japan, decided upon by a rational American president as the final solution to end a protracted war.
But now, we are looking at a not-too-rational American president, facing an insane boy-king.
What can the Philippines and Filipinos do?
I heard an analyst say that as Asean chair, our President could exercise his persuasive influence over the 10-country association to join the negotiations for peace and the appeal for calm and sobriety.
Frankly, I think all we can do is pray.