What Did Kim Jung Il Do and When Did He Do It?

Here's my reply to a Liberal poster who denied that it was the Clinton nuclear plants that produced the material for the North Korean bomb:

Jeremy, my friend … and you are my friend:

I’ll try not to spout off and I appreciate you linking me to the Sig Hecker posts. Be assured that I read them. Unfortunately they don’t support your claims

You are absolutely right that he North Koreans did not get their bomb material from the Clinton reactors. The best summary I was able to get was by Lee Wha Rang.

Having read Sig Hecker’s report to the Senate, he differentiates between what he observed and what he was told. You apparently did not. His group spent one day, from 10:30 AM to 5:15 PM observing the North Korean facilities and speaking with their spokesmen. I was struck by the fact that his observation of the 50 MWe reactor was, and I quote “We drove by the 50 MWe reactor site twice.”

Now you may not have noticed, but Sig Hecker said that his was not an inspection. Driving by a reactor pretty much settles that issue.

So, in summary, I have not reason to disbelieve Sig Hecker. However, there is a phrase in the”Princess Bride” movie that is becoming famous and applies to your tortured interpretation of his report: “To paraphrase: “I don’t think that report means what you think it does.”

So where does that leave us? Well, it probably leaves us with a paranoid little pot bellied runt who inherited the country from his father and who is running it while people are starving and eating the bark off the trees but who is desperately trying to develop a nuclear weapon. Whether he did that this time around is still an open question, but his determination to do so is not in doubt.

I believe that that has been his objective all along and the Clinton/Carter/Allbright agreement gave him enough life support that his economy has managed to survive this long. Oh, the fools I referred to were not alone; the Chinese have a vested interest in keeping this regime afloat because they don’t want 23 million Koreans crossing into China. And South Korea are not particularly interested in stirring the pot since its capital is within a few miles of the border and they would have a hard time with the flood of refugees also. Besides, what would the North Korean military do if the regime collapsed? But Great Leader Kim Jung Il “The sun of the nation and mankind” is determined to be front and center stage and there we are.

Now as to his nuclear ambition, what he did and when he did it, I refer you to this quote from the Congressional Research Service: The Bush Administration disclosed on October 16, 2002, that North Korea had revealed
to U.S. Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly in Pyongyang that it was conducting a secret nuclear weapons program based on the process of uranium enrichment.

And this from North Korea Advisory Group Report to The Speaker U.S. House of Representatives November 1999:
North Korea's WMD programs pose a major threat to the United States and its allies. This threat has advanced considerably over the past five years, particularly with the enhancement of North Korea's missile capabilities. There is significant evidence that undeclared nuclear weapons development activity continues, including efforts to acquire uranium enrichment technologies and recent nuclear-related high explosive tests. This means that the United States cannot discount the possibility that North Korea could produce additional nuclear weapons outside of the constraints imposed by the 1994 Agreed Framework.

Thanks for sharing.