I have always enjoyed reading Ron Ben-Yishai's reports. He seems to have a good fundamental understanding of what is going on in current politics. He expresses views, much akin to my own. Thanks for the interesting read!

who listens? and if they listened, do they understand? And if they understood, do they act?

As the Air Force Chief and Director General points out, the danger is not in what it recently launched--it is in the country's capability. And a nuclear-able N. Korea is not one the world can afford to see at this point. Even worse, a nuclear-savvy Iran. One of the most interesting perspectives is China's. Chinese ambassadors have seemed surprisingly relaxed as they point out some of the country's top concerns. They are advocating restraint since the country cannot take any more Korean refugees. There is an interesting summary video with many countries' sources at newsy.com: http://www.newsy.com/videos/north_korea_s_failure_and_success/

Ben-yishai, forgive me but I think you have skipped the most important Nexus of power. That is the relationship between China dn North Korea. North Korea is effectively a Chinese pet. The only way to stop The North Koreans is direct pressure on China. The behaviour of China gives Israel a strategic opportunity: 1) 100% to 200% trade sanctions must be introduced into the democracies for all Chinese exports based on their support of North Korea. This will help get the west out of the economic slump before China's dictatorship. 2) Japan should be sold Israeli anti-missile technology and have assistance in rapid construction of 200 nuclear warheads. Japan needs a nuclear response to China and North Korea. Soth Korea could also use the same technical support. I have a feeling the North Korean problem will cease immediately if China sees Soth Korea and Japan going nuclear with Israeli assistance and the blessing of the Pentagon. This in turn switches off the supply to Iran and Syria. For the first time Israel has serious potential and interest in Asian diplomacy.

The legitimacy of Bahrain is threatened as much as the legitimacy of Israel. If the Bahrain government saw fit to allow several squadrons of Israeli nuclear capable bombers to be based in their country to protect their own sovereignty as well as Israel's, the US would not need to be asked before Israel can strike Iran. This would act as a preventative force against the Iranians and would also increase the security of all the Gulf Countries, not just Bahrain. If Iran expands using military force all the present stakeholders in the Gulf will be evicted to their safe-houses in the EU and the USA; thay have nothing to loose. This would be a significant geo-political shift; but requires a deal with Palestinians to allow the Sunni arabs to consider such a pact openly. (This in turn needs the proper defeat of Hamas, the next provocation from them must be used to reoccupy Gaza and then hand it to Obama, Blair and NATO peacekeepers - Hamas beware). The sad truth is that the only way to deal with Iran is the wide scale deployment of neutron weapons to take out the brains of its nuclear program and missile threat. The only acceptable way for this to be done with regard to world opinion is to cause the Iranians to fire conventional weapons at Dimona. In response Israel can effectively demolish the industrial infastructure of Iran within 24 hours using its capabilities to the maximum. The alternative is Iran threatening Israel, Bahrain and anyone else it likes with nuclear holocaust. This is a classic them or us scenario. With South Korean and Japanese support Israel can easily lead its Arabic brothers against the Persian demon. The Arabs know it. The only solution that must be offered to Iran, North Korea and ultimately their Chinese backers is compliance. The Russians have already destroyed their own economy. The EU are now rapidly building liquid gas terminals to buy gas from Arab States. The Russian gas-game last winter has backfired on them. Further, the bulk of Russian industry is now falling into the hands of Western creditors as their over leveraged economy collapses. Russian foreign currency reserves are down 50% in one year. The Russian s300 system can be easily (and most importantly cheaply) outplayed by the new Israeli Harpy system. No one relying on s300 is safe against Harpy and hacking. The Iranians have set the rules: Kill or be killed. The only people who need deterring after such a conflict is the EU. None of the EU countries can threaten Israel with conventional forces. Only the UK and France need to be deterred with submarines. This is Israel's only option: So consequently I see the North Korean provocation is actually a great opportunity for Israel, if it acts boldy and for its own survival.

Easy, How does anyone without BALLS react, blame the Jews.

nothing to add other than to correct author's misconceptions about Russia and China; North Korea is a joint client of both; it is not a threat to either. As with the case of Iran the Russian and Chinese regimes entice the US into diplomatic dances with NK and Iran under the pretext of mutual concern while in fact preventing diplomacy or economic sanctions from being effective.

DPRK does -not- have several bombs. What they might have is a few maybe bombs, but NO functional ones. What they do have is enough material to produce more than a few bombs. I haven't run the numbers in a long time, but as I recall it was enough for twenty or so hydrogen bombs. Their one test fizzled because igniting a fusion core is fantastically complex. They can produce HE and implode P-239, but igniting the core is another matter altogether. Until they have a successful test, they simply do not have a plutonium bomb. Kim Jong-Il is not a madman, he is only concerned with survival of his rule. He has no interest in starting the apocalypse. All of the rhetoric from NK is just that, rhetoric, for the sake of leverage in dialogue, and that is all. Russia and China are not really threats to global security either, because the real war today is economic. No one with access to "the button" wants to risk the personal economic cost of pressing it. Greed keeps the world safe from glowing purple. This is the true danger of global economic collapse: It removes the financial incentive to avoid armed conflict and invasion. It is only the radical apocalyptic factions that pose a true danger right now, because they regard not money, gold, power, or indeed life itself. Already, Tehran can orbit a nuke if they had one*. Ahmadinejad simply enjoys the limelight, I do not believe his rhetoric is sincere, anymore than Yassar Arafat was. As we found out, Arafat was more concerned with backchanneling money to himself than his own PLO. We need to be more concerned with who might replace Ahmadinejad. Someone who believes their own rantings and has the ability to incite the masses. This is why DC and EU want to placate Iran now: to give them the idea they can pursue a hydrogen bomb while we aren't looking. We want them working on hydrogen bombs instead of uranium, because they probably can't do it, and even if they can, it will take them much, much longer to achieve. Which in turn gives us more time to gather intelligence, the materials are more specific, they are forced to test, and … it gives us more time to do whatever we need to do. Footnote*: For some reason everyone misses the point about satellites and nuclear targets. If a missile can put a satellite into orbit then it can put a nuke -anywhere- on the planet, not just 2,000 km range. Therefore Iran has already demonstrated the capability to target Washington DC. Try to keep that in mind, ok? Footnote 2: The Taepo-Dong 2 probably did not fail but was disabled by an EMP intercept over the Pacific. Japan must have had assurances from US, otherwise Japan would have tried to shoot it down as it entered their airspace. Hopefully thats not classified info. So if I suddenly dissapear, you know what happened, haha.

TALKBACK NUMBER 4. THIS IS WHOLLY CORECT, BUT IT IS TO LATE !!!. Orao.

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