NightWatch

For the Night of 13 July 2009

Japan: Update. Prime Minister Taro Aso and senior officials of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and its junior coalition partner agreed 13 July to dissolve the House of Representatives early in the week of 19 July and to hold a general election on 30 August, Kyodo reported. The official election campaign would begin on 18 August, according to the election schedule.

Apparently Aso will remain the leader, most likely faute de mieux.

China-UN-North Korea: Update. Chinese Ambassador to the United Nations Liu Zhenmin said 13 July that China would support a travel ban and asset freeze on "some, but not all" North Korean officials that the United States proposed as targets for U.N. sanctions, Bloomberg reported. Liu reportedly would not identify which officials China would sanction, but he did say they hold senior government positions.

This is the first time the Chinese have announced in public their action to enforce sanctions against North Korea.

North Korea – US: For the record. The Los Angeles Times reported today American diplomatic efforts on North Korea are coming under fire within the Obama administration from officials who consider talks futile and instead want to focus on halting the regime's trade in nuclear weapons and missile equipment, U.S. officials said.

The administration's official goal has been to coax the Pyongyang government back into the six-nation disarmament talks that began in 2003, according to the newspaper. Yet privately, many senior officials say they have all but lost hope that North Korea will cooperate, and some are arguing that it is time for a new approach.

Comment: North Korea can be brought to its metaphorical knees by stopping any one of three items: crude and refined oil products; rubber from Southeast Asia; and specialty steel imports, usually from Japan. A cutoff of oil products not only stops the armed forces – the primary user of fuel for vehicles -- but forces them to draw down war time stocks if a cut off were prolonged.

China controls this source of energy and manipulates it for its own advantage. China wants North Korea humble and dependent, but not in collapse. There is no prospect that China will ever simply stop all fuel supplies by pipeline and ship to North Korea.

Rubber is 100% imported, from Southeast Asian nations – think Thailand and Malaysia -- and usually are shipped by rail from Chinese ports, mostly in South China. An international agreement to stop all shipments of rubber and new and used rubber products (mostly from Japan again) would grind North Korea to a halt, literally, in a matter of months. The armed forces would be hurt first, most and worst because they possess most of the vehicles and use them the most.

Mind, were Japan ever to take the time to inventory how dependent North Korea is on Japan’s economy, it would make two findings: that North Korea is almost a Japanese dependency for all modern systems and subsystems and that Japan could single handedly bring it to heel by manipulating the key components of the dependency. The rule of thumb is that anything in a North Korean weapon or other system that contains complex electronic components came from Japan. Specialty steels for nuclear components and other uses also come from Japan.

An embargo of specialty steels, especially for making ball bearings, will destroy all North Korean industry in six months. Everything that moves smoothly, from hydroelectric turbines to diesel electric locomotives to agricultural tractors to roller skates moves on ball bearings. Stop the production of ball bearings and the North Korean armed forces walk; coal cannot be mined or shipped for electricity production; all railroad trains eventually stop; the Pyongyang subway eventually stops and so on.

South Korea and North Korea almost have a single complementary economy. It also can bring down the North Korean economy. Without Japanese and South Korean help, China could not sustain the North.

Forget arms control, for those policy makers who claim to be serious about hobbling North Korea. If they say they are serious but only focus on proliferation, then they do not understand the problem, or are only posturing to appear tough. Economic warfare works.

India: Too good to omit. A senior finance ministry official said today that India can raise 100 billion rupees ($2.05 billion)-120 billion rupees more in tax revenue than estimated by its annual budget, as previous stimulus packages and an easy monetary policy have helped boost consumption.

India is targeting 6.41 trillion rupees of gross tax revenue in the fiscal year that started 1 April, up 2% from the 6.27 trillion rupees collected a year earlier. As reported in an earlier NightWatch, Indian economic growth has been scaled back … to just under 7% this year. Pity.

UK-Afghanistan: British Defence Ministry officials have been reviewing troop numbers in the Afghan province of Helmand and are considering increasing the number of British troops there by up to 2,000, Pakistan’s Dawn news agency reported 13 July, citing a Defence Ministry spokesman. The British Army has 8,000 soldiers in Afghanistan, most near where the 4,000 US Marines are deployed, primarily in Helmand Province.

One brilliant and well-informed Reader noted in feedback: “Their own history stares them in the face and they refuse to look.”

Kazakhstan: For the record. President Nazarbayev signed into law 10 July new controls on the Internet, allowing the government to block Web sites and class blogs and chat rooms as media, Reuters reported July 13, citing local activists. Kazakhstan says the law is designed to prevent unrest and to protect people's rights. …Right.

Germany: Too good to omit. The German Economic Ministry said that the country's recession is over, Der Spiegel reported 13 July. The ministry's second quarter report concluded that growth was exactly 0 percent, using data from April and May 2009 and estimates for June. The Federal Statistics Office will release official growth figures for the second quarter in August. The Economic Ministry added that there was a 4.4 percent increase in manufacturing orders in May and industrial production increased 5.1 percent.

Somalia: Update. AllAfrica.com reported today that spokesmen from the Islamist militia organizations of Hisbul Islam and Harakat Al-shabaab Mujahideen said their forces retook control of positions that the government soldiers captured in yesterday's fighting in north of Mogadishu.

Sheik Ali Mohammed Hussein, the representative of Harakat Al-shabaab Mujahideen for Banadir region said in a press conference from within the Karan district police station in the north that was contested yesterday that his militia recaptured more positions in the north than they lost in fighting with the government soldiers backed by African Union/AMISOM troops.

Similarly, Sheik Muse Abdi, a defense secretary of Hisbul Islam, also held a press conference in Sunday’s zone of fighting and said Hisbul’s militiamen had retaken all the areas they lost on Sunday.

The NightWatch working hypothesis is that the Islamist press statements are closer to the truth than any from the transitional government. This internal instability problem is moving steadily in the direction of a return to power of the Islamists.

The good news is that al Shabaab and Hisbul are also not likely to get along well, but that will be small comfort to the transitional government members who survive.

Honduras: Oscar Cardinal Andres Rodriguez, the leading Catholic prelate, said that dialogue is the best way to resolve the problems that Honduras is facing, but he added that he does not believe that former President Manuel Zelaya can return to office.

He also said that he is very pleased that the United States has corrected its original position and now says that "the OAS acted very precipitately and without full knowledge of the documents." Hunh?

End of NightWatch for 13 July.