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Kim Jong-Un And The North Korean War

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The situation in North Korea has been tense for many years now, however Kim Jong-Un is upping the stakes and is ordering more and more missile tests and demonstrations of nuclear weapons. The increased frequency of these demonstrations, could be that North Korea is signaling that it is preparing for war, or it could be signaling that they have weapons and to not attack. North Korea in this case using its nuclear capabilities as deterrence to the United States. The United States under President Trump has responded to this threat by bringing an aircraft carrier towards the Korean Peninsula, and one of our more powerful submarines arrived in South Korea. Trump has also increased pressure on China to do something about the situation, stating that …show more content…

Other countries and organizations might see that we mean business and won’t attack. This action could then be a deterrent to prevent others from attacking because they know that we will fight back. This could be a good thing for the United States long term interests by the increased stability all throughout the globe. Unfortunately, there are negative outcomes. We could see escalation in North Korea to try to deter us from bring in more forces. That in turn could create a spiral effect eventually leading to war. Now, the United States would win that war but the costs would be high and the damage to both North and South Koreas infrastructure and population could be devastating even if the war only lasts a day. There is enough ordinance in the region that even a short war should be avoided at all costs. Even if the escalation to war doesn’t occur. The United States could be perceived as trying to provoke a war right now under the Trump Administrations current policy. This perception will likely make other countries think less of us. We are seeing this in Germany right now with their population putting less trust in the United States. This could mean that we have less allies or it could mean less allies support and both harm the United States in the short term, and depending on the eventual outcome and how it is handled could bring that to a long-term …show more content…

In both situations above I believe that the negative outcomes are more likely than the positive. I see the Administration trying to keep campaign promises over making consistent policy that affect more than the short term. This focus on the short term in so many of the foreign policy decisions and saying them in a way to keep those campaign promises and popularity from his supporters is the biggest problem that I see right now. The immigration ban policy (although I think it is bad policy on its own) was seen in such a negative light because of all the talk of banning Muslims beforehand. To the point where even though the proposed policy didn’t explicitly say that we are banning Muslims it was perceived that way. This rhetoric problem is worsening the effect these bad policies (in my view) are being treated by other nations. Europe, as a whole, is becoming less trusting of the US in part because of the extreme rhetoric. This is a problem that I don’t see going away anytime soon in this administration and such I think that the worlds respect for the US will continue to go

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