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The Korea Times

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Donald Kirk

Dividends of summitry

The rapid succession of summits between President Yoon Suk Yeol and President Biden and then between Yoon and Japan's Prime Minister Fumio Kishida should in theory open a new chapter in South Korea's two most important relationships with foreign countries.

2023-05-11 16:43

Debating extended deterrence

Deterrence is the new word for defense. When our leaders talk about increasing “deterrence,” they mean doing a lot more to defend against enemies. Now the Americans and Koreans are talking about vastly increasing their deterrence against North Korea, which says it's building more and better missiles, and more nuclear warheads too, all for defense.

2023-04-25 16:56

On defense against China

The United States has strengthened its defenses in East Asia by gaining year-round, permanent access to nine bases in the Philippines. These aren't American bases, but U.S. troops can move in and out of them as needed for exercises or, for that matter, in a real war.

2023-04-13 16:42

Leaders on trial

Show trials of foreign leaders make the indictment of Donald Trump for paying off a porn actress to silence her look like an episode that should flicker, flare and fade.

2023-04-09 16:50

Waging Star Wars

The heavens far above the stratosphere may be the battleground in star wars against North Korea's vaunted hypersonic cruise missiles. The U.S. command showed off its high-flying answer to attacks from the North while U.S. and South Korean forces were winding up their first full-scale joint war games in six years.

2023-03-28 18:01

'Evil empire,' 40 years later

The U.S. and the Soviet Union were still waging the Cold War, immersed in concerns about arms control and nuclear proliferation, when President Ronald Reagan, on March 8, 1983, warned against “the aggressive impulses of an evil empire” in “the struggle between right and wrong and good and evil.” Forty years later, those words ring truer than ever.

2023-03-14 17:13

China as 'honest broker'

WASHINGTON - We don't have to be told how disappointing the Chinese as moderators or hosts in negotiations are. The failure of the six-party talks on North Korea, run by China from 2003 to 2007, should be enough to convince anyone that talks hosted by Beijing will go nowhere.

2023-03-02 16:50

Waging balloon warfare

NEW YORK - An entire new menace now threatens the world's warring factions. Who would have thought balloons would raise such a ruckus?

2023-02-21 16:50

Perils of royalty

LONDON - Prince Harry's book “Spare,” about his terrible tiffs with higher-ups in the British royal family, including the “heir” to the throne, elder brother Prince William, invites comparisons with another “royal family,” that of Kim Jong-un, up in North Korea. Had Prince Harry lived in another age, he would have suffered the same consequences as did the relatives of Kim Jong-un.

2023-02-02 17:00

Japan's military renaissance

WASHINGTON - Watch out for Japan. Also watch out for China. And watch out for nukes. These days, in Northeast Asia, everyone has to watch out for everything with increasing trepidation.

2023-01-17 16:50

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