World Politics News   Articles for World Politics Course

It is always difficult to interpret political rhetoric, but the exchanges between Us President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un are especially difficult to analyze.   Zack Beauchamp has written an article which tries to parse out the language and he argues that the most recent exchanges are significant, largely because the North Korean statement signals the first time Kim has personally identified with the statement.  Beauchamp also makes an obvious point: the US needs to stop responding to North Korea’s rhetoric.  Every time it responds, it only increases North Korea’s insecurity.  The best course of action would be for the US simply to stick to behind the scenes diplomacy.   Unfortunately, the US decided to fly two B1-B Bombers over waters close to North Korea but still in international airspace.

Iran has tested a new intermediate-range ballistic missile, ignoring US President Trump’s concerns that such tests violate the “spirit” of the nuclear agreement.  Iran is not constrained either by the nuclear agreement with the P5 +1 or by the Non-Proliferation Treaty to test missile technology.  The Iranian Defense Minister, Amir Hatami, minced no words in defending the test: “As long as some speak in the language of threats, the strengthening of the country’s defence capabilities will continue and Iran will not seek permission from any country for producing various kinds of missile”.  President Trump must report to the Congress on 15 October on whether Iran has upheld the terms of the nuclear agreement.  It will be interesting to see what he does on that date.

Vijay Prashad has resigned from the editorial board of a once-prestigious journal, Third World Quarterly, because it published what he considered to be a “mediocre”  essay entitled, “The Case for Colonialism”.  The essay has subsequently been withdrawn, but Prashad has written a essay for Quartz which delivers a broadside to a rash of publications, beginning with Niall Ferguson’s Empire: How Britain Made the Modern World, which have tried to temporize European imperialism.  There is nothing good that comes from a coercive and violent relationship such as imperialism.  Whatever “benefit” accrued could have been more effectively realized in a peaceful and cooperative relationship.