Avoiding a catastrophic military situation with respect to North Korea

Avoiding a catastrophic military situation with respect to North Korea

Circumstances in East Asia are tense: Repeated North Korean nuclear weapon and missile tests, U.S. and South Korean joint military exercises aimed at curbing such tests, and ongoing diplomatic activities between the U.S. and China, the U.S. and Japan, and among the region’s nations, Russia included. All the while, the countries involved engage in a war of words while displaying their latest military might.
Some people take the view that it is all just posturing so nothing major will happen. We sincerely hope this is the case.
However, North Korea has a singular dictatorship system. Furthermore, among the various other countries involved, there are those where no one person wields supreme power as well as those where the person with supreme power makes all the decisions and many positions in the cabinet and below remain empty. In addition, even in countries with both levels of leadership in place, there are countries where internal debate is almost nonexistent as well as countries that have lapsed into rigid thinking after frantic efforts to put out political-scandal fires erupting one after another. We all live under the governments of such countries.
Current circumstances must not be ignored. In tense situations, the momentum of high-handed words and behavior can repeatedly escalate, thereby upsetting calm and cool decision making. History teaches us that the horrors of war can find their way into the world via democratic dysfunctions caused by the short tempers of persons in power. When this happens, it is always the nameless masses who bear the brunt of lost lives and property.
As a writers’ organization that got its start with a direct look at such tragedy, the Japan P.E.N. Club has been buffeted by this kind of history. Looking back on past experiences and deploring the exchanges of violence occurring frequently across the world today, we believe that no one should underestimate the danger of the tense conditions that currently exist.
The North Korean leadership must immediately halt nuclear tests and other military provocations.
In addition, other countries in the region should continue to work only for peaceful solutions without toying with military action.
We ask everyone living in Japan and East Asia as well as all our friends around the world to carefully watch the circumstances involving North Korea, to examine the actions of their own country’s government, and to work to bring about peace, stability, and freedom in the region.

April 24, 2017

The Japan P.E.N. Club
Jiro Asada, President