Jihadi Du Jour

Kim Jong Il is playing with his nuclear missiles again while his country starves. He's making a lot of people very nervous.

Oct. 4 (Bloomberg) -- South Korea expressed its ``deeply serious concern and regret'' over North Korea's announcement it will conduct a nuclear test and told Kim Jong Il's regime to withdraw its plans.

``We reiterate our policy that we will not condone North Korea possessing nuclear weapons, and urge North Korea to cancel its plans to hold a nuclear test,'' Foreign Ministry spokesman Choo Kyu Ho told reporters at a briefing today in Seoul. ``North Korea's mention of a nuclear test goes against relevant nations' ongoing efforts towards a peaceful resolution.''

South Korea is the latest country to condemn North Korea's announcement yesterday. The U.S. government said a nuclear test would ``pose an unacceptable threat'' to the world while Japan said a test would be ``unforgivable'' and require a severe international response.

U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan made a statement:

"It would bring universal condemnation by the international community and will not help (North Korea) achieve the goals expressed in its statement, particularly with regard to strengthening its security."

U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. John Bolton is urging the U.N. to take more convincing action with North Korea.

Bolton said he urged members to engage in "preventive diplomacy" and hold a brainstorming session "to come up not just with a knee jerk reaction ... but to develop a coherent strategy to convince them that it's not in their interest to engage in nuclear testing."

Experts believe that Pyongyang has enough plutonium for 11 nuclear bombs. The tests that Pyongyang conducted in July 2006, with complete disregard for the condemnation from the international community, proved it had the missiles, two of which are believed to be capable of reaching the United States.

The United States, Japan and South Korea have been trying to get China and Russia to put pressure on North Korea to cease this taunting of the international community. Japan and South Korea have obvious reasons to be extremely concerned about what this irrational and unpredictable dictator might do.

While Kim Jong Il lives in obscene wealth and privilege, his country is starving. His military is taken care of, but the people are not.

If North Korea does indeed have the capability to test nuclear weapons then the game is on. Japan and South Korea will have increasing pressure from within their own countries to arm themselves and enhance their own capabilities for defense. China does not want to see a nuclear armed Japan but is reluctant to reign in North Korea.

All reasonable nations are concerned about what North Korea will do with nuclear weapons. In all likelihood, the weapons would find their way into the hands of Kim's new found friends in Iran and Venezuela.

I imagine that the Korean peninsula is surrounded by American submarines even as I write this. I certainly hope so.

When we see our troops being pulled out of South Korea, it's time to watch for the flash coming from the East.