THERE are hopes that President Bush's meeting tomorrow with President Roh Moo Hyun of South Korea, coming on the heels of the latest North Korean overture on restarting nuclear-weapons negotiations, may lead to a breakthrough. However, anyone who expects the South to help us put pressure on the North hasn't been paying much attention to what has happened between the two countries over the last five years.
South Korea is seeking to keep a tyrant in power against the wishes of his own people. At 63, Kim Jong Il has spent a lifetime in a paranoid and claustrophobic dictatorship. If he were going to become a reformer, we would surely know it by now. And even if against all odds he undertook reforms, he is still personally responsible for a manmade famine that has killed 3 million people over the last decade. Would Pol Pot have been given a second chance if he had vowed to open Cambodia's markets?
I think "bend over and grab your ankles" is more appropriate than "sunshine" policy.
