There really are no words

be well and have a good one

Someone calculated the expenditure for US arms contracts by South Korea around 82 dollars per capita. I about fell out of my chair when I heard earlier today an Apache costs 50 to 100 million dollars. Flight time 10,000 dollars an hour?

As far as the reshoring investment commitment extorted out of South Korea with threats of higher tariffs, I could be wrong but the South Korea 20 billion a year would be almost 400 dollars a year per capita. Ostensibly, the investments have to be viable in terms of yield and return of principal. With the Korean won having slipped considerably against the dollar since the US demand was imposed the arrangement seems tenuous. Will there be a slush fund for you know who and his friends? Any sort of chiseling going on will doubtless upset the whole arrangement and perhaps more. You'll wonder where the money went, when you deal with the US president.

"South Korea’s security architecture has become structurally subordinated to an external strategic order that consistently overrides domestic social priorities... weapons purchases are further integrating South Korea into a U.S.-centered military system."https://t.co/I9LJ9YeJUd pic.twitter.com/k2rkH7HaC5

— Gregory Elich (@GregoryElich) June 10, 2026

I'm sympathetic to the dilemma Lee finds himself in. He inherited the arrangement agreed to by Yoon. On the flip side of disconnecting from the US strategic deterrent, is an emerging view that South Korea should go nuclear itself. I recently saw a quote from Lee to the effect that this would be "crazy." Another problem is that Yoon, I think with a false sense of security engendered by the nuclear planning arrangement with the US, felt free to engage in outrageous provocations against NK. One or more persons in the Yoon again crowd appeared to be still trying to provoke North Korea into conflict after Yoon was impeached. Who supported these people? There were a couple of provocative US military exercises that took place after Lee came into office as well.

Yohei Kono, who apologized for Japan's wartime sexual abuses of 'comfort women,' dies at 89 @AP https://t.co/BFasEAbjiT

— Mari Yamaguchi｜山口真理 (@mariyamaguchi) June 10, 2026