Nuclear madman: Is it Kim Jong-un or Trump?

I think everyone knows what Trump is going to do next. When intimidation fails, he intends to attack North Korea, possibly with “tactical” nuclear bombs.

It’s now reported that that we have a “decapitation” team training in South Korea to attempt assassination of Kim Jong-un if Trump gives the word. With tensions at fever pitch there is a good chance of a Gulf of Tonkin-type incident that Trump will use as a provocation to retaliate. Article 1, Section 8, Subsection 11 of the U.S. Constitution clearly gives war-making power to Congress. Obama never attacked Syria after the “red line” speech because Congress in their wisdom didn’t want a wider war and didn’t authorize it. Part of the deal was that Russia was supposed to dispose of Syria’s chemical weapons, so President Trump’s beef should have been with Putin personally. Trump never asked for authorization to bomb and never will unless Congress shows more courage in reining him in. Syria was Trump’s test of his own power. Now he knows he’s free to do anything, Congress be damned.

North Korea is estimated to have up to 30 thermonuclear bombs. That means hydrogen bombs, in megatons thousands of times more powerful than the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs. They’ve been waiting for this for a long time, especially since Trump’s election, and may have brought some to his neighborhood.

Somehow a minority of voters elected Trump to the presidency through the blatant unfairness of a peculiar charisma that causes people to admire his immorality and increases his power whenever he insults someone and gets away with it (Machiavelli 1469-1527). With the surprise acts of war against Syria he’s now disrespected Congress and the Constitution, which was designed to control this kind of behavior in commanders-in-chief, but can work as a check and balance only if Congress is unafraid to assert its constitutional authority.

When Andrew Jackson was nearing the end of his second term as president someone asked him if there was anything he wished he’d done differently. Jackson said he would’ve “Shot John C. Calhoun and hanged Henry Clay.” Calhoun was Jackson’s vice-president. Those who know Jackson’s reputation can decide if he was joking. The presidency has elevated a number of individuals whose autocratic tendencies could have produced dictatorial regimes but didn’t because of the constitutional checks and balances and the strong countervailing personalities protected by the First Amendment. At this moment, the health of the world depends on H.R. McMaster, national security advisor, Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, all members of our armed forces and their strength of character in refusing to launch nuclear war. China is the natural mediator and has been the voice of sanity, saying, “There will be no winners to war with North Korea.”

There is no immediate crisis here beyond Trump’s unpredictability. Military history has many instances of officers standing on their own judgment, including the Russian sub commander being depth-charged by American destroyers during the Cuban missile crisis who countermanded orders to load a nuclear torpedo (Noam Chomsky, “Who Rules the World”).

What some people may not realize is that you don’t need a missile to deliver a nuclear bomb. A small boat, plane or car will do the job. North Korea has probably had their counterpunches ready for some time. We need to work with China to slow down the Doomsday Clock.

Ron Carter is a resident of Libby.