How Do You Solve a Problem Like Korea

Sorry, couldn't resist the pun.

Anyways, the Economist has a pretty good post about the options facing America after North Korea's artillery assault on the South.

To sum up?

They stink.

In our age of metastatic opinionating, it's rare to find consensus. And yet nearly everyone agrees that America has no good options in response to North Korea's shelling of the South Korean island of Yeonpyeong. Sure, neocons such as Max Boot can always be counted on to suggest that the "ultimate solution" is "regime change". But in this case, at least, even Mr Boot recognises that we have no idea "how to achieve it." That's quite right. Plan A is—as it almost always is—unachievable without unacceptable costs. And on the Korean peninsula there are no viable Plan Bs.

So...Should we keep getting involved in this sort of thing?

On the evening before the holiday of Thanksgiving, with well over a quarter-million American troops stationed around the globe in over 150 nations and territories, with the nation’s budget buckling under the strain of supporting our military obligations, and with tensions on the Korean peninsula arguably higher than at any time since the armistice of 1953, it seems as apt a time as any to ask ourselves: Is it all worth it? Does the United States really benefit from serving as the primary guarantor of security across vast swaths of the globe? There are no easy answers to these questions. But that doesn’t mean they don’t need to be asked.

I have no idea. Personally, I'd be perfectly happy if the extent of our projections into the affairs of other countries was our goods and markets. That's obviously unlikely for a variety of reasons. Another good question: If we were to walk away from our role as 'super-cop', would the vacuum necessarily be filled? Are we sure that other countries would want the headache involved?