The very definition of incompetence
March 1st, 2007 |
In 1994 North Korea was very close to being able to build atomic weapons using plutonium. Sabers were rattled, everyone got super hyped up, there was talk of war. The Clinton Administration entered into negotiations with North Korea to shut down their weapons production and place it under international inspection in exchange for fuel oil shipments and help in building nuclear reactors. The “Agreed Framework” was signed on October 21 1994.
The Republicans took control of Congress in the general elections of 1994 and began stalling tactics on the Agreed Framework. While the North Koreans began to get frustrated that the U.S. end of the agreement was not being met in full, by the year 2000 the funds were in place to begin construction of the reactors. The power plants were set to go online by 2003.
By October of 2002 the Bush Administration had decided to take a hard line towards North Korea. The Administration claimed that North Korea had begun a new weapons program to enrich uranium. North Korea denied that they had began such a program. In November of 2002 fuel oil shipments to North Korea were halted. In December of 2003 construction of the reactors was halted.
One month after work stopped on the reactors North Korea withdrew from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. They kicked out the weapons inspectors and restarted work on the plutonium weapons program that had been dormant for nine years. The Bush Administration, distracted by war in Iraq, let the situation fester for three years. On October 9 2006 North Korea tested their first successful nuclear weapon.
Now, just five months later, U.S. intelligence officials are doubting whether a North Korean uranium program ever even existed in the first place.
So, in summary, because of a uranium weapons program that may have never existed, the Bush Administration goaded North Korea into pursuing work on a weapons program that had previously existed. This has allowed a totalitarian state to join the “nuclear club” making negotiations with this state much more difficult, if not impossible.
This is a perfect example of the quality of work that we have enjoyed since January 20 2001.
It’s a screw-up that staggers the mind. And you don’t even need to know this new information to know that. Even if the claims were and are true, it was always clear that the uranium program was far less advanced than the plutonium one, which would be ready to produce weapons soon after it was reopened. Now we learn the whole thing may have been a phantom. Like I said, it staggers the mind how badly this was bungled. In this decade there’s been no stronger force for nuclear weapons proliferation than the dynamic duo of Dick Cheney and George W. Bush.
