Rice gets a taste of tough love

[donsu]

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/HJ27Dg01.html


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US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's post-nuke-test tour of Northeast Asia was a failure. While she quieted fears of a nuclear Japan, she failed to drum up support for a more robust action against North Korea. She portrayed Russia and China as being on the same page; China was too polite to demur, Russia wasn't. - M K Bhadrakumar
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Perhaps Rice's mission to Northeast Asia was doomed to fail. She pitched unreasonably high expectations of her mission. Talking to the media at the State Department on October 16, she claimed that during her forthcoming consultations in Tokyo, Seoul, Beijing and Moscow, she would seek additional measures against North Korea and that the US would strive to "collectively isolate" North Korea.

That was, of course, setting a most ambitious target for her mission - almost unattainable. But such grandstanding was needed before the US domestic audience at a time when foreign-policy successes have become extremely rare. Second, Rice promised she would "affirm" to Japan and South Korea the security commitment held out by the United States over the years.

That was a reasonable enough intention and relatively easy to fulfill. In Japan, Rice's assurances of continuing US protection helped nip any incipient discussion whether in response to the North Korean threat perception Japan too should go down the nuclear path.

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At any rate, Lavrov then went on to rebuff the US attempt to draw a parallel between the sanctions against North Korea and the Iran nuclear issue. He said: "Measures of influence can well be discussed. They may be most diverse. But we firmly adhere to the only true understanding which has been reached both in the UN Security Council and in the six that any measures of influence should encourage conditions for talks. We won't be able to support and will oppose any attempts to use the Security Council to punish Iran or use Iran's program in order to promote the ideas of regime change there."

-snip-

The contrived nature of Rice's enthusiasm for China was plain to see. Taking a barely disguised swipe at her distinguished predecessor, Madeleine Albright, she said, "I don't care how many times you visited Pyongyang. China had to be part of this regime to deal with the North Korea nuclear problem, and you're seeing it. Thirty years ago, you wouldn't have been able to get a Security Council resolution on North Korea, and when you get one, it's Chapter 7, it's 15-0 and China is at the center of it. Not bad for a couple years' work."
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it's a too complicated and long article for these paragraphs to portray - read it all

[pwb]

1. i have that list of all her accomplishments here...

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.

[donsu]

2. trying not to LOL with a mouthful of hot tea

nt

[katinmn]

3. Those periods represent all the books that will be written about her

successes.