A bargaining chip in Korea

THE PHILIPPINES government seized the ship Jin Teng and its North Korean crew members on March 5 after it docked in the port in Subic, holding it for almost two weeks before it was released. Philippines representative Manolo Quezon described the act as "[the Philippines] having to do its part to enforce the sanctions."

The seizure of the ship, which was released on March 25, is a result of United Nations Security Council sanctions imposed in January in response to North Korea's development of nuclear weapons and long-range missiles. The sanctions target exports of coal, iron, gold and other mineral resources that provide the country with its primary source of income, as well as ban the registration or lease of ships or planes to North Korea.

The resolution was passed unanimously by Security Council members, including China and Russia, which have historically supported North Korea economically and politically since the Second World War.

Following the new round of sanctions, North Korea declared a heightened readiness to respond to attack, with the mobilization of conventional and nuclear forces. In March, the U.S. and South Korea began the largest-ever war games in the region, with a combined total force of some 320,000--they are set to continue through April.

This and other military and political actions are part of an overall strategy to emphasize U.S. influence in the region, where it has been contested by China.

Washington's rhetoric whipping up fear of North Korea can make it difficult to remember the massive mismatch in forces. The North relies primarily on outdated weapons from the Second World War era, as well as a USSR and Chinese Cold War surplus--compared to the U.S. and South Korea, which have access to modern armaments and the largest nuclear arsenal in the world. South Korean military spending by itself is larger the entire North Korean economy.

U.S. INTEREST in the Korean peninsula has continued since the end of Second World War, when the U.S. requested that the Japanese Army stay in South Korea to allow the arrival of American forces and ensure that the USSR and allied forces in the North didn't attempt to unify the peninsula.

The U.S.-backed military dictatorship in South Korea would remain intact until 1987, when widespread protests led primarily by the student and union movements forced the government to concede presidential elections.

The two Koreas have their origin in the last days of the Second World War, with the USSR's invasion of Japanese-occupied Manchuria and Korea, followed by the U.S. occupation of southern half of the peninsula. The USSR and the U.S. would establish only vaguely legitimate governments in their respective regions.

The USSR claimed that the Northern government was a successor to the partisan forces against Japanese occupation, in which Korean communist organizations played a legitimate role. But the leadership in the North was entirely hand-selected by the USSR.

Dictator Kim Il-sung, who ruled the regime in the North for 46 years, was chosen as someone who would toe the party line without question. But Kim Il-sung didn't turn out to be the hoped-for puppet, at least not entirely--he used Korea's position to juggle influence and favor between China and the Soviet Union.

Kim developed the official ideology of "Juche," or self-reliance, which he claimed was a descendent of Marxist-Leninism. In reality, it was a mix of Stalinism, Maoism and nationalism. It emphasized the individual and promoted the development of a strong independent nation state. It also emphasized the supreme leader, helping to establish a one-person dictatorship in North Korea.

In the 1990s, Kim Jong-il, taking his father's place as supreme ruler, used the idea of "Songun," meaning "military first," to justify the regime's massive spending on weapons and soldiers, while North Koreans lived in poverty.

However, the sanctions being imposed on North Korea will do nothing to improve the lives of the 25 million people who live under the North Korean regime and are being used as a bargaining chip by the imperialist powers.

The sanctions and isolation imposed on Iraq and Yugoslavia helped prepare the ground for military intervention and regime change. In Iraq, sanctions in place before the U.S. invasion in 2003 resulted in the death of some 500,000 children, by the United Nations' own statistics.

Likewise, food was used during negotiations with North Korea in the 1990s and early 2000s, when the country was suffering through a famine. The U.S. reduced food aid from 320,000 tons in 2001 to just 28,000 tons in 2005 in order to pressure the regime to accept nuclear agreements.

The nature of military invasions makes the incompatible with humanitarian aims. It isn't possible to liberate people by killing them. And as recent U.S. interventions in Iraq, Afghanistan and Yugoslavia showed, U.S. forces aren't greeted as liberators, but as a hostile occupying force.

As Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky said in a 1938 interview:

In Brazil, there now reigns a semi-fascist regime that every revolutionary can only view with hatred. Let us assume, however, that on the morrow England enters into a military conflict with Brazil. I ask you on whose side of the conflict will the working class be? I will answer for myself personally--in this case I will be on the side of "fascist" Brazil against "democratic" Great Britain. Why? Because in the conflict between them, it will not be a question of democracy or fascism. If England should be victorious, she will put another fascist in Rio de Janeiro and will place double chains on Brazil. If Brazil on the contrary should be victorious, it will give a mighty impulse to national and democratic consciousness of the country and will lead to the overthrow of the Vargas dictatorship. The defeat of England will at the same time deliver a blow to British imperialism and will give an impulse to the revolutionary movement of the British proletariat.

In North Korea, there is no question about the character of the regime in power. But the sanctions and other weapons of the U.S. are not being used for humanitarian purposes. They are part of an international drive of an imperialist country trying to expand its influence and create favorable conditions for its own capitalist class.