At North Korea’s ninth plenary meeting two weeks ago, Kim Jong Un broke with decades of official policy and declared reunification with South Korea “impossible,” describing the two Koreas as “belligerent states” at war.
In his diatribe, Kim took particular aim at South Korea’s relationship with the United States, saying, “South Korea at present is nothing but a hemiplegic malformation and colonial subordinate state whose politics is completely out of order, whole society tainted by Yankee culture, and defense and security totally dependent on the U.S.”
He also threatened to annihilate South Korea and the United States if they provoked North Korea.
Whether Kim concocted these words himself, or if it was his propagandist younger sister, Kim Yo Jong, the sentiment is striking and paints a grim outlook for a region at the center of U.S. foreign policy.
By officially defining South Korea as an “other,” Kim has eliminated one obstacle inhibiting him from aiming his nuclear weapons at what his father and grandfather considered part of a larger Korean family.
Naturally, this rhetoric and the potential for escalation that it brings require a thoughtful response from Washington. Especially given the Korean Peninsula’s strategic geographic location at the intersection of U.S.-China relations.
The only question is, what should that response be?
Publicly, the best response is no response. While Washington undoubtedly understands the implications of Kim’s policy reversal, the American public won’t have much of a reaction. After all, bellicose threats from Kim are so commonplace they’ve become somewhat of
