On N. Korea...

[vakkotaur]

From http://www.ceip.org/files/nonprolif/templates/article.asp?NewsID=3871 (emphasis added):

6) When did the plant get started/program begin?

"We discovered this problem. I mean, everybody thought the agreed framework froze North Korea's nuclear aspirations. It turned out that it was misdirection. While everybody was watching Yongbyon and seeing that it was frozen, the North Koreans had started moving in a new direction with respect to the enrichment of uranium. And this didn't happen just in the last year or two. It's a decision they made and a program they started four or so years ago, and we found out about it this summer. And we confronted the North Koreans with it."
(Secretary Colin Powell, Fox News Sunday, December 29, 2002)

"They were motivated some four, five years ago, if not earlier, to make the political decision to move down the road of finding a second way of developing a nuclear weapon."
(Secretary Colin Powell, NBC Meet the Press, December 29, 2002)

Comments

[taper.livejournal.com]

Ah, so it's all Clinton's fault. That explains everything. (Well, it's used to explain everything else, too.)

[vakkotaur.livejournal.com]

The "It's Bush's fault for speaking out" line is just as wrong as those who say it say the "Clinton & Carter screwed up" line is wrong.

The party truly at fault is North Korea for not honoring the 1994 agreement and going ahead with uranium enrichment while the world was looking out for plutonium production. People seem to forget that that violated the 1994 agreement. Once that was known, and even admitted to, then the US reacted by ceasing to spend money and effort on what is a broken contract.

[taper.livejournal.com]

You're absolutely right; I apologise for my snippiness.