WhatFinger


It's a violation of the Korean War ceasefire, and no one is sure what happens next.

Amazing Video: North Korean guards cross border into South in pursuit of defender, shoot him four times



Amazing Video: North Korean guards cross border into South in pursuit of defender, shoot him four times I guess the reason we can see this is that South Korea has excellent security video at the border, and from a high enough vantage point that you can see pretty well into the North. Whatever the reason, this is extraordinary.
The defector is a North Korean soldier whose last name is Oh. He's driving full-speed toward the border in what is presumably a North Korean military Jeep. Apparently he makes it right to the border or just short of it before his vehicle gets stuck in the mud, so he jumps out and makes a run for it on foot. That's when the Nork soldiers pursuing him show up and open fire. They hit him, and at about 3:18 you can see that one Nork momentarily crosses the border into the South before quickly realizing his mistake and high-tailing it back to the other side. (Why not defect as well once you've made it that far?) The defector is down, but the Norks are prohibited by the ceasefire from firing any bullets across the border (or I should say any more bullets), so U.S. and South Korean troops are able to come to his aid. He's now out of surgery and doctors say he's going to live, although he's still at some risk of infection. Unreal:

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I wonder what would have happened to him had he not made it, which as you can see was very nearly his fate. Life at hard labor, minimum? These stories we've heard about people being fed to starving dogs? You sure they're not true? You've got to want out pretty bad to risk that. As a member of the military he obviously had the advantage of knowing the routes and protocols that he would have to navigate to make it. He also would have known the rules his colleagues would have to follow - or were supposed to follow - in the event of the inevitable pursuit. It's easy to think that if you lived in North Korea, you'd try it too. I tend to think that, but you have to remember this guy is in his 20s and he's probably never been outside the Hermit Kingdom. We know what freedom is like. He's never experienced it and probably can only imagine what it's like. He probably knows things aren't great where he's lived his whole life, but he has no context for understanding that life on the outside might be like. And he knows what's going to happen to him if he doesn't make it. How bad must things be for him before he's willing to take the risk? You'd like to think the Norks will face some sort of consequence for its soldiers crossing the border and firing across the border, but realistically I don't know what you can add on to what Trump has already done. The Norks are about as isolated as they can be economically, unless China decides to really apply the vise grip, and at least thus far it appears disinclined to do so.

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Usually when one side violates a ceasefire, it means the war is back on. As tempting as it may be to envision South Korea saying the hell with it and sending a massive invading force to take Pyonyang and end all this nonsense, you know they're not going to do that as long as they think there's a scintilla of a chance that Bowl Cut Jr. could hit Seoul with nukes. But maybe the penalty comes in our use of the information Soldier Oh can give us. That should be very interesting. Um . . . if you're an American who's having the insane thought that you might want to visit North Korea, this would be a really good time to grow a brain and reconsider. What the Norks probably want most of all is to force Oh's return, and while you'd like to think that's inconceivable, what would happen if they managed to capture an American and were willing to accept nothing less as the terms for the American's release? Come to think of it, the idea that the Korean War isn't already back on is starting to seem kind of delusional.


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Dan Calabrese’s column is distributed by HermanCain.com, which can be found at HermanCain

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