Jenkins-san: Don’t remove North Korea from terror list

Alright, so they aren’t a member of the NPT anymore, and testing nukes may not fall withing the narrow definition of “terrorism”, even though I did feel a sense of dread and uneasiness when I heard the news.

If I have to give you a list, then this is what google spit back as major terrorist activities.

1968 – North Korean Special Forces attack the Blue House in an attempt to kill the ROK president.
1983 – Burma Rangoon incident. Nork agents attempt to kill the ROK president by bombing while he is visiting the country.
1987 – Bombing of Korean Airlines in an attempt to disrupt the Seoul Olympics.

Since then, there haven’t been any major incidents where they actually caused large-scale damages/injuries.

1993 – fired Nodong-1 missile into Sea of Japan
1996 – fired Taepodong missile OVER Japan and into Pacific. Claimed to be a satellite launch, but even if it was, there was no customary forewarning to neighboring countries or painting the missile/rocket white to distinguish it from military applications.
2006 – fired several missiles into Sea of Japan. One was meant to reach Alaska but apparently fizzled and dropped way short.

I don’t know about you, but even if the 1996 test is barely excusable, the 1999 one falls within my definition of terrorism and the dictionary one of “The unlawful use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons.”

Apart from these dramatic incidents, there are signs they are constantly infiltrating/trying to infiltrate neighboring countries like these recent ones.

1996 – A failed infiltration into Korea by submersible where 5 NK agents committed suicide, 4 more escaped but were later tracked down and killed by SK forces.
1999 – An unidentified ship in Japanese waters ignored orders to stop and warning shots by the Japanese coast guard and ran off into Nork waters
2001 – The coast guard actually opened fire and sunk another vessel after it started firing on the coast guard ship with automatic weapons and rockets.

This list is only for the activities that they botched and were detected, which is why I said “to do who knows what”. One well known reason is to abduct residents to train their spies. Don’t even try telling me they sent heavily armed agents into other countries for sightseeing.
I honestly can’t give you a clear distinction between terrorist and military operations (as they are still technically at war with SK), but seeing as these are asymmetric warfare that do indeed cause fear in the subject societies, I would count them as terrorism even if definitions overlap.

They have consistently conducted covert/overt operations against neighboring countries over many decades. They may leave a few years between activities for people to start thinking maybe they’ve finally given up their terroristic ways, but then they always strike again. That’s why I need something more than “they’ve been nice for a while” as a reason for taking them off the list.