This is encouraging:
South Korean authorities have seized a Panama-flagged vessel suspected of transferring oil products to North Korea in violation of international sanctions, a customs official said on Sunday.
The seizure was the second to be revealed by South Korea within a few days, as the United Nations steps up efforts to squeeze essential oil supplies to the reclusive North following its nuclear or ballistic missile tests.
But who boards and seizes Russian tankers if they sail for North Korea?
Russian tankers have supplied fuel to North Korea on at least three occasions in recent months by transferring cargoes at sea, according to two senior Western European security sources, providing an economic lifeline to the secretive Communist state.
And then there is the overland route from Russia if somehow somebody does go after Russian ships.
It hopefully seems as if China realizes that a North Korea that goes nuclear is bad for China.
North Korea will aim some at China and other targets of North Korea like Japan and South Korea will go nuclear.
And then Taiwan and Vietnam go nuclear to they aren't the last cool kids on the block to get nukes.
So I suspect China is serious about squeezing North Korea. And if they aren't serious, there is little hope of sanity taking hold in northeast Asia.
But of course, Russia couldn't care less if North Korea goes nuclear if more nukes are pointed at America, Japan, South Korea, and Japan. Russia is weak in their far east and only a balance of terror out there gets Russia left alone--they hope. Let's see if Russia busts a gut to shut down sanctions evaders.
Even without Russia being all Russia-like, I fear there is not enough time to really bring North Korea to their knees economically.
Maybe if this effort had begun several years ago. But it wasn't. And it might even have been a good gamble, really.
But due respect for world opinion that wishes all measures short of war to be tried demands the route be followed.
For a while.
Last year, my understanding was that by early this year North Korea could have long-range nuclear weapons. Today I am hearing within a year. I understand this is difficult to figure out (which is why I hate the standard of only taking military action when a threat is "imminent"--how do we know that with any precision?), but we'd hate to be off a few months the wrong way.
Anyway, it may be useful to review our options.
Have a super sparkly 2018.
