The Real Nightmare of a North Korea Collapse & Implosion

By Articles, China, China, Disaster Prep & Humanitarian Aid, Foreign Policy/Geopolitics, International Business, Korean Peninsula, North Korea, North Korea, Northeast Asia, Regional Security/Flashpoints

The Real Nightmare of a North Korea Collapse & Implosion

June 1,  2010 by davidfday  

Some commentators suggest that this Cheonan incident may have created be the perfect storm to elbow the regime over the cliff. The consequences of such a “Diem” strategy towards the DPRK would be disastrous. Even without being elbowed, the regime is still going to implode. It is not a question of whether.  It is simply a question of when—and and serious economic sanctions run the terrible risk of shoving the DPRK right over the edge.

A DPRK implosion will cause a massive disaster crisis on a scale the likes of which the world has never seen before. On the human side, the disaster will involve hundreds of thousands of refugees seeking to breach the Chinese and Russian borders in the Northern part of the country and even greater numbers attempting to cross the heavily- mined DMZ to get to Seoul. There are multi-million numbers involved in human relief efforts that will have to be sustained for a lengthy period of time since there is no economy. Then there are the WMD weapons, expertise, nuclear materials, and rogue military issues also in the equation which will have to somehow be handled with lightening speed before being spirited away into undesirable hands. The current regime is already unstable and approaching a delicate leadership time—a collapse risks an implosion of epic proportions, making Haiti look like a garden party. Russia and China understand this and will not buy into any serious, biting economic sanctions that shove North Korea closer to the brink.

There are two critical points here. The first is that there can never be stability on the Korean peninsula until the DPRK can create a modicum of economic progress. Every day that the country can move a bit towards its 2012 economic goal of “A Mighty and Prosperous Nation” is a win and pushes the implosion nightmare back a notch or two. This will require heavier involvement of the private sector, not less. As a policy goal, Seoul and Washington must find ways to get more of the private sector underway in North Korea. The heroine for peninsula stability last year was Hyun Jung-Eun, chairwoman of South Korea’s Hyundai Group who successfully negotiated the reopening of North-South trade after the Dear Leader shut it down. Hyun Jung-Eun personifies the type of private sector leadership that can brunt or possibly block the implosion nightmare– if given enough time.

The second point is that the current disaster relief efforts in Haiti and the Gulf of Mexico do not even rise to the level of dress rehearsals for a collapse of North Korea. Seoul will have to bear the brunt of the implosion nightmare. Unless the Blue House is sufficiently satisfied watching Washington’s current response to the crises in Haiti and with the BP oil spill, and is convinced that Washington is fully capable of handling a multiple-fold Haiti with lightning speed and minimal hiccups, it would be well-advised to get a massive, DPRK disaster master plan in place yesterday. This means strategic disaster planning, the staging of huge amounts of supplies, disaster management training and development, and repeated, coordinating rehearsals. The response time will need to be in hours, not days or weeks and a blistering fast disaster response cannot be cobbled together on this massive scale when it occurs. It will be way too late.

August 19, 2013
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Vietnam Looking to Elbow a Place with China and India with Foreign Investors

By All Southeast Asia, Articles, Blog, China, International Business, Vietnam, Vietnam

Vietnam Looking to Elbow a Place with China and India with Foreign Investors

By David Day. August 2010

For Vietnam, stepping onto the world stage in recent years has meant admission to the WTO, a Nonpermanent seat on the UN Security Council, launching the country’s first telecommunications satellite (Vinasat 1 built by Lockeed Martin) and hosting the APEC Summit in Hanoi.

Lockeed-Martin’s Vinasat 1

Vietnam continues to weather the global recession in reasonably well with foreign investment possibly doubling to $15 billion this year. Its largest export market is now the U.S. with over $12 billion last year. This Fall will see Intel’s new $1 billion chip assembly plant open outside Ho Chi Minh City.

Vietnam is now poised for yet another breakthrough. Political tensions in Thailand are helping Vietnam to get onto contingent plan target lists of foreign investors seeking political stability. Political stability is one factor working in Vietnam’s favor now. Another is labor costs. Vietnam is attempting to capitalize on the 30 to 40% labor differential with manufacturing plants in China. This is a huge incentive for China-based operations to begin looking to the south. The labor cost differential with China has been compounded by other problems nagging China operations: labor strikes and shortages.

Outside of the tech industry, where Vietnam has done very well in terms of attracting foreign investment, its aging colonial infrastructure has been a hindrance to all kinds of foreign investment.

There are two recent developments in Vietnam that will catapult the country forward in terms of attracting foreign investment at this critical juncture during the global recession. The first is the development of a number of major superhighway systems north of Hanoi that will link into highway systems in southern China. These new highways will allow a supply chain linkage between Chinese and Vietnamese manufacturing operations.

The second is a proposed Shinkansen-like bullet train between Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi. The proposed bullet train, which would be completed by 2035, would travel the 1,600 km from Hanoi in the north to Ho Chi Minh City in the south in less than six hours. Vietnam’s current charming but woefully outdated trains take more than two days to make the trip. While this $56 billion project has recently been rejected by the National Assembly, Japan’s Transport Ministry continues to voice support for the project and has promised assistance should the Vietnamese government ultimately decide to proceed with the project once concerns of National Assembly members are adequately addressed (we believe that this is likely to occur despite the current clamor). Vietnam Railways Corp. was planning to use Japanese technology to build the high-speed train line. Sumitomo Corp. had teamed with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. to bid on the project. Itochu Corp. was heading a competing group with Kawasaki Heavy Industries Ltd.

Proposed Vietnamese “Shinkansen” Linking Hanoi & HCMC

Given the importance of a high-speed rail link between Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, and the challenges Vietnam Airlines, and its related carriers have in meeting the staggering business traffic demands between the two cities, a Vietnamese “Shinkansen” would be an enormous contribution to the national infrastructure. No question that Vietnamese officials are eyeing the success of the Tokyo-Osaka Shinkansen as a precedent for a sorely needed rail upgrade in their own country.

Financing the north-south linkage is another matter.

August 19, 2013
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New Business Models, IP & Corruption

By Anti-corruption, Articles, Blog, China, China, Intellectual Property, International Business

New Business Models, IP & Corruption

April 18, 2009 by davidfday

These two Videos, both dated April  17, 2009, illustrate the broad ends of the intellectual property spectrum vis.a.vis copyright infringement.  Google setting up free downloads in China in concert with music labels in effort to capture part of share of advertising revenue.  Essentially, this  is the “Free” business model developing in the digital world.

http://edition.cnn.com/video/#/video/showbiz/2009/04/17/chang.china.google.w.music.cnn

On the very same date, contrast Google’s new tactic in China with the 2nd video which is the conviction of 4 persons involved in the Pirate Bay website in Sweden for the crime of copyright violations. This is the “classic” intellectual property prosecution which may become a thing of the past if the Google model in China really takes hold.

http://edition.cnn.com/video/#/video/international/2009/04/17/curry.pirate.bay.verdict.cnn

August 19, 2013
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China’s Confrontation in the Yellow Sea — Part of a Broader Strategy?

By All Southeast Asia, Articles, Blog, China, China, Energy, Energy, Foreign Policy/Geopolitics, Resource management/Extraction, Vietnam, Vietnam

 

China’s Confrontation in the Yellow Sea — Part of a Broader Strategy?

May 6, 2009 by davidfday

This most recent PRC interference with a U.S. Navy ship in the Yellow sea these past few days appears consistent with an ongoing, stepped-up PRC policy looking towards an expansion of its territorial claims well into international waters. To be sure, China’s territorial waters claims are not new, it is just that we are now seeing more aggressive and confrontational action on the part of the PRC. This most recent China/U.S. naval confrontation in the Yellow Sea follows last month’s nearly mirror-image confrontations of the U.S. Impeccable in the South China sea. These events bear careful watching as they pose the risk of misunderstanding, miscalculation and injury not only to the U.S. and China, but to competing territorial claimants in the Region as well as international maritime players.

China's Claim to the South China Sea

Complicating this picture, we need to be mindful that Hanoi, having finally resolved a 30-year northern border dispute with China, is beginning now to focus on its age-old dispute with China over the South China sea’s Paracel and Spratley Islands. While, to be sure there are other national interests claimed over these islands, the Vietnamese are the most likely to pose intense resistance to China’s claims in the South China Sea.

Known Oil fields Overlayed with Competing Territorial Claims

August 19, 2013
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American Eyes Inside North Korea’s Nuclear Facilities and Others

By Counter-Terrorism, Critical National / Regional Security Issues, Developments in Technology, Disaster Prep & Humanitarian Aid, Economic Development, Economic Security/Development, Energy, Food Security, Foreign Policy/Geopolitics, International Business, Intl Business in Asia, IT/Computer/Software, Korean Peninsula, Military, North Korea, North Korea, North Korea, Northeast Asia, Nuclear, Our Media
Nicole FinnemanFormerly, Korea Economic Institute, Washington, D.C.

Nicole Finneman
Formerly, Korea Economic Institute,
Washington, D.C

 

 

 

Hosted by David Day, this television program aired statewide in Hawaii and features, as its special guest, Ms. Nicole Finneman, formerly with the Korea Economic Institute in Washington, D.C.  Ms. Finneman, an American eyewitness inside North Korea’s Yongbyon nuclear facility and other fascinating facilities and locations throughout the country, talks about those experiences.

The conversation turns from the Yongbyon visit to the potential business and commerce development in North Korea and references American firms now lining up to do business in North Korea in the future, including the Korean-American-owned, Pyongyang University of Science and Technology (a private university).

Ms. Finneman talks about her visits to various commercial enterprises, the Koryolink mobile phone explosion in the country, and the market/commercial developments within the country. (Koryolink, a joint venture between the Egyptian company Orascom Telecom Holdings and the state-owned Korea Post and Telecommunications Corporation, is North Korea’s only 3G mobile operator.)

Nicole also discusses  her visit to the digital libraries at Kim Il Sung University and their remarkable high tech facilities which many universities in the U.S. currently do not have…but only connected to an intranet–no internet.

Finally, Ms. Finneman and David Day talk about the infrastructure for commerce and foreign investment that is now being put into place in North Korea and her crystal-ball view of the potential for change in that country.

August 15, 2013
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Fall of Saigon: What Did We Accomplish and What have we learned?

By All Southeast Asia, Counter-Terrorism, Foreign Policy/Geopolitics, Military, Our Media, PRC/China, Vietnam

April 30, marks the 38th anniversary of the Fall of Saigon and the end of the Vietnam War for the United States. This year is also the 40th anniversary of the signing of the Paris Peace Accords. This program looks at the linkage between these two momentous events and how they impacted American and Vietnamese lives, Southeast Asia, as well as the Cold War.

Gene Castagnetti USMC Col. (Ret.) Director, U.S. Memorial Cemetary of the Pacific

Gene Castagnetti
USMC Col. (Ret.)
Director, U.S. Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific

In this conversation,  former combat USMC (ret) Col. Gene Castagnetti and Stanford’s Nguyen Van Canh examine the background of the U.S. involvement in Vietnam, the impact of the Paris Peace Accords, and then the collapse of the government and country of South Vietnam on April 30, 1975. Wars, like elections, have consequences, and the discussion includes a look at the downside of the U.S. withdrawal and the losses on the South Vietnamese side, the genocide, imprisonment, executions, re-education camps and then the bloodbath in Laos and Cambodia that followed. Both guests talk about the victory in Vietnam that has gone unrecognized and unappreciated as well as a theme of betrayal of our men and women in arms by our own political leadership.

Prof. Nguyen Van Canh Stanford University

Prof. Nguyen Van Canh
Stanford University

 

 

Hosted by David Day

August 5, 2013
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Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgement that something else is more important than fear

Ambrose Redmoon
March 6, 2013
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The Sweetest WordPress Themes Around.

http://www.themenectar.com
December 29, 2012
Love61

If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe.

Carl Sagan
November 5, 2012
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