Via a reader tip comes news that North Korean border guards have received a special Christmas gift from Kim Jong-un, diarrhea!:
Several North Korean border guards are down with diarrhoea after consuming a special diet ordered by the country’s leader, Kim Jong-un, sources told a radio service.
Kim had reportedly issued the order for better quality food for soldiers after receiving complaints about dietary deficiencies, but some of the supply was reportedly found to be adulterated.
“Under the direction of Kim Jong-un, North Korea’s people’s armed forces increased the supply of materials to improve the diet of border guard soldiers,” a source in North Hamgyong Province told Radio Free Asia, UPI reported. The province is located close to the China border.
The source added that all the soldiers, from a unit of border guards who consumed the new food supply, are suffering from diarrhea. [International Business Times]
You can read more at the link, but like I always do I want to caveat that this story is from an anonymous source so who knows if it is true or not.
What I found of most interest in this article is that US soldiers are training to look for North Korean “mad scientists”. Wouldn’t this be something the ROK Army would be better equipped to do then having random patrols of US soldiers in North Korea trying to find these scientists?:
A soldier with the Fort Riley, Kan.-based 3rd Battalion, 66th Armored Regiment, 1st Armored Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division crouches on a staircase during a drill at Rodriguez Live Fire Range, South Korea, Wednesday, Dec. 7, 2016. The exercise was held with the 501st CBRNE Company as part of training to increase the readiness of troops to confront threat of chemical and biological weapons and nuclear weapons.
The U.S. soldiers donned gas masks as they cleared building after building after receiving intelligence that North Korean scientists were cooking up chemical weapons in the vicinity.
They found the makeshift lab with beakers and tubes filled with a yellow substance in a room off the icy rooftop of a two-story brick building. It was time to call the 501st CBRNE Company (Technical Escort), a specialized unit trained to deal with weapons of mass destruction.
The scenario was part of a training exercise, but the dangers facing the soldiers stationed near the front lines of the divided peninsula are all too real.
North Korea has demonstrated alarming progress in its nuclear weapons program this year, with two underground atomic explosions and two dozen ballistic missile tests.
But the Stalinist state is believed to have vast stockpiles of other nasty stuff, too.
“North Korea has the full spectrum of all types of chemical and biological weapons … and they’ve weaponized all of it,” Lt. Col. Roberto Salas, commander of the 23rd Chemical Battalion, told Stars and Stripes. [Stars & Stripes]
For those that have visited the Yushukan Museum located adjacent to the highly controversial Yasukuni-jinja Shrine, there is definitely an alternative history of World War II taught in Japan. The majority of people in Japan do believe that the Imperial Japanese militarism was a great folly, but there are people who believe the history taught at the Yushukan Museum that Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor was to preempt an American attack on Japan and liberate Asian people from western colonialism:
World War II era Japanese zero fighter aircraft at the Yushukan Museum in Tokyo.
The Pearl Harbor attack that led the United States into WWII is normally a historical footnote in Japan, rarely discussed on anniversaries or in depth at schools.
That changed when Prime Minister Shinzo Abe announced he would visit Pearl Harbor with President Barack Obama on Dec. 27 to offer “comfort to the souls of the victims.”
Most Japanese today view the war as a great folly. The clause in Japan’s constitution that renounces the nation’s right to wage war has taken root so deeply that even new, restrictive laws allowing Japan to defend its allies were viewed with suspicion last year.
However, some divergent perspectives over history remain among two of the world’s closest allies.
Americans are taught that the Dec. 7, 1941, attack on Pearl Harbor was an unprovoked sneak attack.
The view among some Japanese, and particularly among some otherwise pro-U.S. alliance conservatives, is that a Western economic embargo forced Japan’s hand.
By 1941, Japan controlled large parts of China and other parts of Asia. In July, its military occupied parts of Southeast Asia, including a key port in what is now Vietnam.
The U.S., Britain and The Netherlands responded by freezing Japanese assets in their countries, which included access to most of Japan’s oil supply.
“Indeed, the oil embargo cornered Japan,” Emperor Hirohito said in an audio memoir recorded shortly after the 1945 surrender. The memoir was found in 1990 by the Bungei Shunju magazine and then translated by The New York Times.
“Once the situation had come to this point, it was natural that advocacy for going to war became predominant,” Hirohito said. “If, at that time, I suppressed opinions in favor of war, public opinion would have certainly surged, with people asking questions about why Japan should surrender so easily when it had a highly efficient army and navy, well trained over the years.” [Stars & Stripes]
You can read more at the link, but the best book I have read about the period before the attack on Pearl Harbor is Eri Hotta’s: Japan 1941: Countdown to Infamy. I highly recommend ROK Heads read this book to really understand why Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. The Japanese had opportunities to keep parts of their Chinese and Korean colonies if they would withdraw from other areas of China and Southeast Asia as demanded by the US and its allies. How different would things be today if Japan had been allowed to continue the colonization of Korea and parts of China?
There was actually a lot of dissenting opinions in Japan, but the militarists eventually were able to convince enough people they could replicate the success of the Russo-Japanese War with a decisive naval victory against the US at Pearl Harbor. As history has shown the bombing of Pearl Harbor became one of the great misjudgments in military history.
Regardless of the history involved it is good to see Prime Minister Abe finally make the visit to Pearl Harbor and hopefully put an end to any remaining hard feelings about World War II.
U.S. ten-pin bowler Danielle McEwan delivers her shot at the 2016 Storm Cup Korea International Open Bowling Tournament in Anyang, south of Seoul, on Dec. 22, 2016. She won the tournament. (Yonhap)
South Korea’s foreign ministry said Thursday it will soon initiate the process of confiscating the passport of the daughter of Choi Soon-sil, the long-time friend of President Park Geun-hye who faces charges for meddling in state affairs.
“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs plans to swiftly issue an order for the return of Chung Yoo-ra’s passport, and if it is not returned before a deadline, it will take steps to annul it,” ministry spokesman Cho June-hyuck said in a press briefing.
According to the ministry, a person subject to such an order usually has 14 days in which to return the passport, but, given the gravity of the situation, Chung must return hers within seven days.
The ministry will send its order as registered mail to Chung’s Korean address or to her legal representative. The order will take effect once the letter is received.
If the first order is returned undelivered, the ministry will mail a second. If that one is also sent back, then the ministry will post its confiscation order on its website.
Earlier in the week, the independent counsel investigating the influence-peddling scandal involving Choi and President Park secured a court warrant to arrest Choi’s only daughter, who is believed to be hiding out in Germany. [Yonhap]
Another American fast food restaurant chain is coming to South Korea. It will be interesting to see if Dairy Queen puts a Korean twist on to any of their food offerings:
The U.S. fast food chain Dairy Queen has signed on to expand into South Korea, industry officials said Thursday.
M2G USA Investment said it has signed an agreement with International Dairy Queen Inc., which owns the franchise, to open 50 DQ Grill & Chill stores here over the next five years.
International Dairy Queen is a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway led by famous investor Warren Buffet. Dairy Queen, commonly known as DQ, is a chain of fast food restaurants serving hamburgers, ice cream and other frozen products, with some 6,000 locations worldwide.
A Korean foodservice company Food and Treat will handle operations of the local DQ locations. [Yonhap]
The more I read about the Choi Soon-sil scandal the more I realize that she can arguably be considered a well connected lobbyist taking money from corporations to influence presidential policy. In the United States lobbying is a well respected profession where in South Korea it can be considered bribery:
Chung Yoo-ra, the horseback rider daughter of Choi Soon-sil, President Park Geun-hye’s longtime friend (Yonhap)
Samsung Electronics, the country’s largest listed company, picked up the tab for a sojourn by Choi Soon-sil, the controversial friend of President Park Geun-hye, and her daughter to Germany last year, the JoongAng Ilbo learned Tuesday.
Choi, 60, is a prime suspect in the abuse of power scandal that led to the impeachment of Park earlier this month. The prosecution indicted Choi in November on charges of abuse of power, coercion, attempted coercion and attempted fraud, making clear that the president is a co-conspirator in all of her alleged crimes. Park was impeached on Dec. 9 for alleged violations of the constitution and criminal laws.
Samsung has been accused of generously sponsoring the 20-year-old daughter of Choi, Chung Yoo-ra. Chung was a gold medalist in dressage in the 2014 Incheon Asian Games, and suspicions were raised that the tech giant financed some of Chung’s activities as an equestrian athlete, such as buying a horse, Vitana V, reportedly worth 1 billion won ($838,574). [Joong Ang Ilbo]
Here is what she may have been lobbying for to President Park in return for the money that Samsung was giving her sports foundation:
The independent counsel’s team is trying to find a link between Samsung’s generosity toward Choi and Chung and the National Pension Service’s approval of a controversial merger between Samsung C&T and Cheil Industries last year. The $8 billion deal solidified heir apparent Lee Jae-yong’s grip on Samsung Electronics.
The prosecution investigated whether the Blue House strong-armed the state-run pension fund into backing the merger. It failed to prove the suspicion.
Determining the nature of the money Samsung gave to Choi and Chung — whether it was bribes for favors or not — is the top priority of investigators at the independent counsel, a source from the law enforcement authority told the JoongAng Ilbo.
Two Koreas, same day. In NK, soldiers bow to dead dictators. In SK, citizens peacefully protest against their president. Dec 17, 2016. pic.twitter.com/m97qAbZpF7
Nursing officer Cho Yeo-ok, who worked at the presidential office Cheong Wa Dae on the day of the tragic Sewol ferry sinking, arrives at the National Assembly in Seoul on Dec. 22, 2016, for a parliamentary hearing. Cho, who is in the United States for an academic program, was called to the hearing as the parliament probes the whereabouts of President Park Geun-hye on the day that the ferry sank on April 16, 2014, killing more than 300 people. Different speculations abound about the seven unaccounted for hours, including claims that she was getting a cosmetic procedure. (Yonhap)
. I highly recommend ROK Heads read this book to really understand why Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. The Japanese had opportunities to keep parts of their Chinese and Korean colonies if they would withdraw from other areas of China and Southeast Asia as demanded by the US and its allies. How different would things be today if Japan had been allowed to continue the colonization of Korea and parts of China?
