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The Second Infantry Division has further completed more steps towards it’s transformation into a UEX. The transformation is difficult to explain unless you are in the army, but the bottom line is that the 2nd Infantry Division is more deployable than before the transformation.

The ROK Army’s Zaytun Unit has finally found something to do in Iraq. It took a year to find something for them to do but at least 40 of the 3,200 soldiers will be guarding a UN office building in Irbil the Kurdish capital city.

U.S. and South Korean defense officials from Washington and Seoul said yesterday they expect Korean troops in Iraq to assume guard duties for a UN relief agency office in the northern Kurdish city of Irbil, starting in September.
The United Nations asked Korea’s Zaytun unit, which has been stationed in Irbil since last year, for a protection force.

The UN’s office is situated near the Zaytun base. Officials from Korea and the United States confirmed the UN request and expect Seoul to approve the step. “We believe the mission fits the troops’ peace and reconstruction activities,” said Yoon Kwang-ung, Korea’s defense minister. “We believe the operation is possible without any additional [troop] deployment.”

Mr. Yoon estimated up to 40 soldiers would be assigned to guard the relief agency’s office.
Lee Jong-seok, deputy head of the National Security Council, also informed the National Assembly on Tuesday that the Blue House was considering a plan to assign Korean soldiers to guard the UN mission in the Kurdish region. The UN has made numerous requests for protection for its new building and staff in Irbil where the international body opened a new office in April. However, the Korean government was hesitant to accept the request citing the potential for an increase in threats against Korean troops.

I have been critical of this deployment from the start due to my concerns that Korea isn’t doing enough for reconstruction and also that if Korea loses a few soldiers in Iraq the anti-American Hatefest will begin again here blaming the US for the attack just like the US was blamed by many for the Kim Sun Il beheading last June, when they should of having been going after the terrorists that did it.

However, this is at least a start and I’m confident the ROK Army will carry out the mission well. Now somebody just got to find something for the remaining 3,160 other soldiers to do.

Korea Sojourner has a great post about inaccuracies in the Korean media regarding USFK accidents. The Korea Sojourner is right on the money with everything he says. Definitely check it out.

Charles Jenkins is back in the US, to see his 91 year old mother in North Carolina. I have talked about it before that I have no respect for Jenkins for what he did, but he has been tried by military court and paid his debt to society so he should be allowed to visit his mother. I’m sure looking back he probably wishes he would of done that tour in Vietnam instead of defecting to North Korea.

The Korean government is reportedly going to extend the ROK Army’s Zaytun Unit’s deployment in Iraq. Those who follow my blog know how I feel about this.

However, the extension is reportedly due to Iraqi forces not being able to fully take control of internal security for possibly another year. The first question that pops into my mind is, what internal security is the Zaytun unit providing in Iraq? The unit doesn’t even secure their own air field. The Kurdish Peshmerga soldiers do that. So obviously the reason for the extension is bogus. I just continue to feel that if countries send soldiers to Iraq they should be involved in at least meaningful reconstruction or internal security which right now the Zaytun unit does neither.

It is not because the ROK Army doesn’t have to skill to perform either mission but it is because of the weak political leadership. If a country is not willing to take casualties than don’t send your soldiers to Iraq. It is that simple. I imagine those Peshmerga soldiers providing security for the ROK Army could be better served elsewhere where real security assistance is needed. Like wise the Zaytun unit soldiers could be better served providing security in their own country. Especially with the downsizing of the USFK forces.

Well, gold old Daniel Hong took up Jodi’s challenge at the Asia Pages and has posted a response to his critics. Basically he continues to assert that he is not a racist:

As you have noted from the correspondence with Prasso, however, I may have misunderstood Prasso’s answer. But the point should not be whether I misunderstood and thus misquoted her. The real issue here is my “mental status” at the time of the question. Was I angry? NO. Have I been a racist before I attended the presentation? NO. Did I have a racial bias in my mind when I raised the question? NO. If I remember myself correctly, I have had no intention at all to be detrimental. It came out of my mind not with a racial prejudice (which I don’t have).

As I stated in my last posting on this subject, I only have Daniel Hong’s words to judge him by. He wants us to judge him by his alledged good background:

Had the readers known my background, the inflammatory phrase could have been simply dismissed as a conjecture, a crude expression, or my peculiar writing style. Many of my family members and relatives are either engaged or married inter-racially. Their partners and spouses are consist of American (Caucasian), Indian, Japanese, Italian and British, to name a few. As to my friends, the circle even goes further, including homosexual, atheist, religious fanatic, democratic and republican, etc. You name the color or the life style. I have them either in my own family circle or within the third degree friendship perimeter.

Being in the military I have met many African-Americans which I would never have met growing up in the middle of no where in Colorado. Something I will never forget one of my good African-American friends telling me is that something African-Americans find very offensive is when white people try to tell them they are not racist because they have X amount of black friends. It makes them feel like they are just some statistic so that person can vouch for his good character. It was a conversation I would never forget. Mr. Hong is trying to use his so called multi-racial acquaintances as a statistic as well.

Mr. Hong wants us to judge him by his alledged good character which as a reader I have no way of verifying, but I do know what he wrote:

Later in the discussion session after her lecture, I raised several questions: “Who are those Western men or Americans chasing after Asian females? Aren’t they what the Southern Californians would call, UCLA (Ugly Caucasians Living with Asians)? Aren’t they at the bottom of the Darwin’s food chain that they couldn’t get what they want in their own land because of their low social status and therefore only option left for them is to chase after those Asians? I know, without any empirical data, it’ll be difficult to press the argument”

If I would of wrote something similar to this but substituted caucasians for Koreans chasing after bar girls in the Phillipines or Thailand, Mr. Hong would probably be the first person in line calling me a racist. Yes that is right there are ajushis chasing the bar girls in those countries just like Mr. Hong’s so called UCLAs are.

Having personally traveled to many countries in my time in the military, Mr. Hong needs to realize it isn’t just white people that exploit poor women for sex. It is a global problem involving all nationalities not just western caucasians. This whole issue is similar to the people who blame USFK for all the prostitution in Korea or those who blame USFK for all the traffic in Korea, or pollution in Korea when USFK is only a drop in the bucket to a much larger problem.

All Mr. Hong has to do to end this controversy is to just apologize for his comments. He keeps making excuses instead of taking responsibility and just saying he apologizes for his comments. I apologized to Ms. Prasso on my site for saying she is a racist. She was misquoted by Mr. Hong which made my opinion inaccurate and after doing a little bit more research on her she is definitely not a racist, but is someone well informed on issues regarding Asia. May not agree with all her opinions but she is never the less well informed.

I think Daniel Hong needs to start his own blog. That way we can all see what he really believes on things. I would even give him free advertising on my site. Well, I guess we will see if this is the end of it. If it isn’t I may have to create my own Daniel Hong sidebar topic link.

The current edition of the Asia Times provides this article that might have well been written by Kim Jong Il himself. Basically this author thinks all the problems in Northeast Asia is America’s fault. You will even see that even Dokto is America’s fault too. Being an American, I can’t tell you how tired I am of hearing how everything in the world is America’s fault. North Korean nukes are America’s fault, terrorism is America’s fault, the bad economy must be America’s fault, even Dokto is America’s fault now. Heck, Ben and J-Lo’s break up that must obviously be some sinister CIA plot too.

The Asia Times is a quality publication so I’ll let this piece of poor journalism slide. Actually I won’t even call it journalism, it is more like propaganda from the Dear Leader himself. Anyway read it and make your own opinions because I have made mine.

First of all he blames the nuclear crisis on America:

Several times, the DPRK put a just demand to the US to change its hostile policy aimed at seeking “regime change” and shift its policy in favor of peaceful co-existence between the DPRK and the US. If the US does this, the nuclear issue can be resolved.

But the second Bush administration, like that of the first term, stipulated as its policy not to co-exist with the DPRK, but to “overturn” the system chosen by the Korean people themselves.

The policy is actually “regime transformation” and if the DPRK wanted peaceful coexistence why did they start secretly building nuclear weapons when they signed an agreement not too? The only peaceful coexistence Pyongyang wants is one that provides them with lots of free foreign aid. That is what the whole nuclear crisis is about, getting free money. Then to say that the DPRK system is chosen by the people is truly ridiculous. I haven’t seen to much DPRK election coverage lately.

Korea is the only place I know of where a steep reduction in troops is considered an arms build up:

The US announced in May 2003 an “arms buildup plan” with an envisaged investment of US$11 billion for south Korea. In mid-2004, it began deploying en masse its latest war hardware with an increased fund of $13 billion under the signboard of “relocation of combat forces”.

The “arms buildup plan” is justified to fill the “security vacuum” to be caused by the “reduced US troops” in south Korea. This plan [has already been more than half realized].

The majority of increased spending went into upgrading defensive weapon systems. The US Army recently upgraded the PATRIOT missile batteries located on the peninsula to a PAC-3 configuration which is a more reliable missile to defend South Korean cities with. You can’t attack Pyongyang with a PATRIOT. Other spending went into upgrading the remaining tanks and helicopters left here on the peninsula. The overall numbers of this equipment dropped thus causing a need to upgrade the old hardware left over. A division minus worth of upgraded equipment is not a threat to North Korea.

Then he makes this comment about the Foal Eagle training exercise:

The US, as it reinforces its armed forces in South Korea, commits itself to continued joint military exercises on a large-scale basis against the DPRK. Last March, the US and belligerent forces in south Korea staged in the whole area of south Korea joint military exercises codenamed “Foal Eagle”. Such military exercises are, to all intents and purposes, a nuclear war rehearsal with its eye on the north, and include massive participation of elite forces in south Korea , the US mainland, and overseas and other nuclear strike forces such as aircraft carriers.

If he only knew how unrealistic these exercises are. These exercises are mostly computer generated simulation exercises that are intended to create a joint training environment with the ROK Army and to get used to over coming the language and cultural barriers that exist between the two armies. To see how real these exercises are check out Gardener in Korea’s take on it.

Here is a passage that is really laughable:

The DPRK also took a measure to bolster its nuclear weapons arsenal in order to protect the ideology, system and democracy chosen by its people as the US disclosed its attempt to topple the political system in the DPRK at any cost.

Once again, I will say it again; they are building nukes to get more international aid since their ideology and system is a failure. To keep their own people fooled indefinitely they need international aid or in other words, free cash. Then to say that America is intent to topple Kim Jong Il at any cost is also laughable. No one would care about Kim Jong Il if it wasn’t for nukes. If it wasn’t for the nuclear threat everyone would be content to let him rot away in his crappy country. Then the writer just had to throw in once again, that the DPRK is a democracy chosen by the people. Did Kim Jong Il promise him his own Russian drinky girl if he wrote this crap?

Here is the best part where the US is responsible for the Dokto crisis:

Recently, the US fans Japan over Tokdo islet, sacred territory of Korea, and Tokyo’s bid for permanent membership on the UN Security Council. This puts a great spur to Japan in its undisguised bid to seize territories of other countries and distort history.

Yes, the writer Mr. An has found out the US’s deep dark secret. The US wants Japan on the UN security counsel so they can take Dokto! Has it ever occurred to Mr. An that the US wants Japan on the security not because of Dokto but because they are strong supporters of US policy. Does everything involving Japan always have to have a Dokto conspiracy?

This guy just doesn’t know when to stop:

The US does not like to see the Korean nation moving toward reunification hand-in-hand and tries by all possible means to put a fifth wheel in the smooth development of inter-Korean relations.

Yeah this whole reunification thing has gone real smooth, let’s see where do I start. How about North Korean spies infiltrating into South Korea and killing civilians and soldiers. Or better yet the constant naval skirmishes including the one 2002 that killed 6 South Korean sailors and injured 18 that was deliberately carried out to draw attention from South Korea co-hosting the World Cup. There must be some sinister American plot behind this too.

Now this guy begins getting into his solution to end the nuclear stand off. Guess what it is? Give the Norks all my tax payer money they want!

It is par for the course that the US should apologize and withdraw what it said about the DPRK “ending its tyranny” and gives up its hostile policy aimed at “regime change” in the DPRK. It also should make clear its political will to move toward peaceful co-existence. Through all this, the US should put its money where its mouth is.

Earlier in this post this guy talks about how great the system in North Korea is and how it is a system chosen by the people yet this worker’s utopia needs my tax payer money and to top it off an apology for telling the truth? Screw him, he wants peaceful co-existence get rid of the nukes, rot in your crappy country, and have a nice day. He need not worry about an American invasion because like I said earlier one small sized American Army Division is not enough to attack North Korea with. If the US suddenly deployed 10 Divisions to North Korea then he may have something to worry about.

Here is recommendation that is slowly happening:

Third, it is possible to ensure the security of Northeast Asia only when all aggressive forces deployed in this region are completely removed. In order to ensure regional security, US forces along with all its lethal weapons must be withdrawn from this region and US interference in the internal affairs of other countries be terminated.

Now the only aggressive forces I see in this region are the North Korean forces that continue to infiltrate and kill people in South Korean and attack South Korean patrol boats in the Yellow Sea. How come they aren’t part of the recommendation to withdraw? The US Forces have been downsizing. Not the DPRK forces. In fact the US forces are down sizing and Mr. An accuses us of an arms build up. We just can’t win.

Here is the last paragraph that summarizes the column. This may very well be the best laugh of the article:

The DPRK, as a responsible country located in Northeast Asia, will make every possible effort to ensure regional peace and security, as it did in the past.

Responsible country? He must of forgot about that whole Korean War thing. That was obviously no big deal. He must have also forgotten about the commando raid in 1968 on the Blue House, attempted assassination of President Park Chung Hee at a Seoul hotel. Then there was the terorist bombing in Burma that killed most of the South Korean cabinet. Then let’s not forget the Korea Air bombing the year before the Olympics. Then there is still the matter of spy subs, commando infiltrations and killings, plus the Yellow Sea naval battles.

Yeah, some peace loving country. Surely all these above examples are America’s fault some how too.

I think this is the first time that I have heard from Yahoo what I will being doing this week during work:

The commander of the U.S. military based in South Korea on Saturday ordered the suspension of all non-essential training and services for a safety review following a fatal accident involving a local civilian.

“Commanders at all levels will stop non-emergency services and training to review safety procedures, discuss existing measures, and develop improved procedures to prevent vehicular accidents,” Kim said.

Looks like more mandatory classes for me this week. Also I need to point out this inaccuracy in the Yahoo report:

The United States has about 52,000 troops in the South in defence against North Korea, which has 1.2 million active-force troops and is the world’s most militarised country.

There are only roughly 32,000 US soldiers here and the number continues to decline as units are being redeployed stateside.

However, I really believe that these accidents will continue to happen every few years until the camps up here are moved down south in a consolidated area and are colocated next to training land. On a military base in the US you don’t have to drive a military vehicle from camp to camp to get things done like you do here in Korea. Plus on a US base when you go to the field to train, the training land is located adjacent to the camp. This prevents military traffic from driving through urbanized areas with thick traffic and pedestrians. Plus the lack of sidewalks on roads with military traffic only contributes to the problem. Even in areas with sidewalks, often people pulling carts or on a bicycle do not use the sidewalks anyway.

It is extremely hazardous driving up here and the army takes driver’s training very seriously and I have posted before on how USFK traffic accidents have greatly decreased but the driving conditions in Korea make a perfect driving record impossible.

The US In Korea site provides some interesting statistics about the amount of traffic accidents in Korea. Here is an excerpt about deaths involving children:

According to the report based on a survey of the accidental death rate of children below the age of 15, Korea took the first place with 25.6 per every 100,000, followed by 6.1 of Britain and Italy. ”Accidents while walking” are mainly responsible for such a highest rate as they account for 71 percent of the total, compared with Sweden’s 13 percent, and the Netherlands’ 18 percent. Needless to say, the bad habit of not keeping traffic rules has been the main cause of accidents involving children walking on streets.

71% of the accidents involved pedestrians. Shouldn’t that be a sign to somebody that more sidewalks need to be built and that keeping pedestrians off the highways should be enforced by local law enforcement.

If the driver of the LMTV was negligent he will be punished for it. He was on duty so it will more than likely be a court marshal, but I can’t help but feel that this accident is more of a product of the conditions here then negligence. The important thing is to let the investigation play out and report facts not propaganda which is what mostly got reported in 2002.

It appears Presidents Bush and Roh have finally worked out a strategy for solving the nuclear crisis that they can both agree upon. The US is offering North Korea incentives back by South Korea to end their nuclear program:

President Roh Moo-hyun and U.S. President George W. Bush laid out a package of rewards to convince North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons ambitions during their summit on Friday, Seoul’s foreign affairs chief told reporters.

They also stressed their commitment to a peaceful settlement of the nuclear standoff through the ongoing six-party talks.

How come I feel like this spirit of cooperation will not last very long?

ABC News just recently did a report from Pyongyang and of course the Marmot is all over this one. It is pretty obvious ABC News is just pandering to the North Korean leadership to gain further access just in case tensions boil up between North Korea and the US they will be the first on scene in Pyongyang. They may be first from Pyongyang, but are they willing to report the truth?

Judging from how the media reported from Iraq when under control of Saddam Hussein, I wouldn’t bet on it. In the book Embedded the author describes how the media intentionally did not report anything negative to keep access:

— the bribes and gifts from journalists to Saddam’s henchmen, with reporters turning over copies of their stories to show how friendly they were to the regime. “A rigorous system for controlling and monitoring Western journalists has been in place in Iraq for decades, based on a wafer-thin facade of civility,” he wrote in the Times last April 20.

In his “Embedded” article, Burns is more caustic about the payoffs by journalists. He says big shots at the information ministry took hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes from TV reporters, “who then behaved as if they were in Belgium.” Will these unnamed TV reporters be called to account?

Makes me wonder how much money ABC is passing to North Korea for this access.

The most ironic thing about this is that ABC News is so concerned about the alledged Guatanamo Bay prison abuse which the vast majority of the claims are made by terrorists trained to do just that, invent abuse claims to draw press coverage, but while they are in a country that is a living gulag they don’t seem to concerned about prison abuse there. However, they are concerned about their being no American products in the markets. I wonder if it has occurred to them that there are no products in the markets. I have been reading the book Rogue Regime and the author who used to work in Pyongyang talks about how he noticed when walking by grocery stores that the food for sale in the store was in fact plastic. Everywhere he went in Pyongyang was just a big staged show. Will ABC News report anything like that? I wouldn’t hold my breath to long on that.

Kim Jong Il is a lot smarter man than most people give him credit for. He is probably making a quick buck off of this plus getting good propaganda on top of it. I wonder how many other news media outlets will now compete for access to North Korea? Kim Jong Il can make an industry out of this.

UPDATE:
Make sure to read the Korea Sojourners take on this issue. It’s a good read.