There is a real rogue nation in the world, with at least one nuclear weapon in its possession, but it is not Iran, it is North Korea. It is unclear if the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea was actually successful in their nuclear tests or if they had what is called a “fizzle problem” (which is where the bomb explodes but fails to achieve the prompt criticality that makes weapons of this type so devastating). In any case they have been acting as though they have a weapon which they could deploy against their nearest neighbors for more than a year.

This might be marginally tolerable if it did not seem that the North Korean government was not intent on stirring up further trouble. In March of this year a South Korean corvette, the Cheonan sunk in waters just outside the boundaries claimed by the North. The immediate suspicion that this ship was sunk by a North Korean torpedo have been confirmed.

"Originally posted at Squarestate.net"

The South Korean government did not jump to conclusions in making this assertion. They went to the time and expense to raise the ship on which 46 sailors where killed and subject it to an intense study. With the help of the United States, Canada, Australia, Brittan and Sweden they determined that the only possible cause for the explosion and sinking was an attack by a heavy torpedo.

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Originally published at TomDispatch.com

You can already see a new style of writing about China emerging in our American world.  The New York Times set it off recently by publishing a front-page piece on a $3.4 billion Chinese investment in one of the planet’s last great copper reserves -- in Afghanistan.  In passing, reporter Michael Wines also pointed out that Chinese energy companies had gained a stronger foothold in the future exploitation of Iraq’s massive oil reserves than had U.S. multinationals.  The ironies were legion and painfully visible. 

Our two wars have been sucking us dry in two countries where state-owned Chinese companies have just scored significant economic victories.  “While the United States spends hundreds of billions of dollars fighting the Taliban and Al Qaeda [in Afghanistan],” wrote Wines, “China is securing raw material for its voracious economy. The world’s superpower is focused on security. Its fastest rising competitor concentrates on commerce.”

Already, the follow-up pieces are starting to come out and heady cocktails they are:  one part awe and one part bitterness mixed with one part despair.  In Esquire online, Thomas P.M. Barnett put it this way:  “Worse still: Will the rest of the world end up profiting from our blood and money?... The reason why Obama neglects to mention any regional interests like Pakistan's? Admitting the larger logic of regionalization would make too painfully obvious the nature of our current strategic bankruptcy. Because it would suggest that the only 'victory' to be found would be 'won' by those neighboring powers who did nothing to stabilize the situation. In other words, their 'treasure' and our 'blood.'"  At Foreign Policy online, Stephen M. Walt chimed in:  “While we've been running around playing whack-a-mole with the Taliban and 'investing' billions each year in the corrupt Karzai government, China has been investing in things that might actually be of some value, like a big copper mine.”

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Edward M. Liddy grew up in New Brunswick, New Jersey, earned a bachelor's degree from Catholic University of America in 1968 and a master's in business administration from George Washington University in 1972.  He then began a long career in corporate America, including stops at the Ford Motor Company in Detroit, drug maker G.D. Searle & Co in Skokie, Illinois, and Allstate Corporation in Northbrook, Illinois.

During Edward Liddy's apprenticeship in the buccaneering life he was exposed to the most influential teachers and lasting experiences.  While at Searle, Liddy who was CFO worked for a CEO , Donald Rumsfeld, who has always epitomized the height of arrogance as demonstrated by a successful buccaneer.   When he was at Allstate, Liddy presided over the company during and after hurricane Katrina, and Liddy observed first hand the effects of over exposure to risk and subsequent loss of trust when Allstate was faced with the massive losses suffered by homeowners in New Orleans, and Allstate subsequently canceled insurance policies and exited the business of insuring homeowners against casualty, lucrative as the business might have once been and could be.

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