North Korea

I know nothing about North Korea. Until recently, I'd swallowed the idea put forward in the UK and US media that Kim Jong Un is a bit of a joke. That haircut. Those clothes. That tendency to kill people who threaten him, like his uncle and his half/step brother. Now that I see North Korea has attracted the attention of Donald Trump, I've been having a look at them online.

I've occasionally wondered how North Korea made any money. This is a mainly rural society and it seems they are proud of being self-sufficient. But, of course, they're not. They depend on an export market of $4bn. And just over 75% of the goods they export go to China. Their exports are made up of "minerals, metallurgical products, manufactures (including armaments), textiles, agricultural and fishery products, coal, iron ore, limestone, graphite, copper, zinc, and lead," according to Wikpedia. So North Korea provides the raw materials for the huge Chinese manufacturing industries that are fueling Chinese expansion as a trading nation.

In other words, as far as I can see, North Korea is a puppet state of China.

Does this trade with China finance North Korea's nuclear capability which is baby-sized but growing? And if it does, does anyone plan to call out the Chinese on why they are allowing this to happen? Oh, I know: independent state, can't dictate how they develop, etc. But if anyone should be alarmed at the rise of North Korea as a nuclear state it should be its next-door neighbour China. So why aren't the Chinese bothered? And at what point will China be bothered? When North Korea successfully tests nuclear missiles? An atom bomb?  Thermo-nuclear power? And points them at China?

And why should we be worried, over here in distant Europe? Well, it's the domino effect, innit? And the fact that the USA now has a nutter for president with the codes to the bombs. In the past, the USA and its military 'managed' threats like North Korea. Now they seem to be happy to ramp up the aggression, by dropping the Mother of All Bombs (why is it female, FFS?) on Afghanistan?

Is there anyone left with a bit of sense? The UN maybe? We pay them a lot of money to run a huge organisation. Maybe it's time for payback.