Drumpf Diary 3/17/17 - War Zones: Rex Tillerson in Korea and U.S. and Israeli attacks in Syria

1. Travel Ban 2 has been stopped hours before implementation by a federal judge in Hawaii.

2. Rex Tillerson is in Asia. The BBC reports on his statement that 20 years of U.S. patience with North Korea over its nuclear weapon ambitions is "at an end." In my non-expert opinion, the BBC is just a bit sensational in reporting on the fact that Tillerson has stated that pre-emptive military action is "on the table," a statement noted in its headline and Facebook posting, but the article itself notes that the U.S. policy change so far is not noticeably different than that under Obama.

The Associated Press offers a good analysis of U.S./North Korea relations (or lack thereof), including historical context. An excerpt:

attention-demanding problems are increasing: 

—The U.S. and South Korea are currently holding their biggest-ever annual joint military exercises, which are seen by the North as a dress rehearsal for invasion. Washington and Seoul claim the maneuvers are purely defensive, but they bring a rise in tensions that increases the possibility of a clash, either intentional or in response to an accident or misjudgment in the field. 

—North Korea just last week fired four ballistic missiles into the Japan Sea, reportedly coming to within just 200 kilometers (120 miles) of Japan's shoreline. 

—The U.S. and South Korea are planning to set up the state-of-the-art missile defense system known as THAAD, which along with the predictable opposition from Pyongyang has antagonized Beijing because it can monitor activity in China as well. 

—North Korea says it is in the final stages of developing an intercontinental ballistic missile that could reach the U.S. mainland, and fit it with a nuclear warhead. More tests of both nuclear devices and long-range missiles are almost a certainly on the near future, though no one can predict when. 

For Tillerson and Trump — and for America's nervous Asian allies looking to them for leadership — acknowledging past failures will without doubt be a lot easier than finding future successes.

Reuters reports on a Japanese fishing town holding new civilian evacuation drills in response to recent saber-rattling by North Korea.

3. The U.S. bombed what it called an Al Qaeda target in Syria, killing human beings it conveniently labels "suspected terrorists." Initial reports were much more devastating, claiming that a mosque had been hit during prayers. That was claimed initially by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and reported by Al Jazeera. The SOHR had stated that it did not know who was behind the airstrikes, only that they occurred, as hours went by and it got near and past midnight in most parts of the U.S., the U.S. claimed responsibility for the air strike. Now in the U.S. morning hours, latest reports suggest the U.S. is stating that the mosque was not struck. There is some suggestion that there may have been a raid on the mosque after the bombing. Who carried out the raid is unknown. This will probably be an episode puzzled over for a while. Here is a recent Al Jazeera report. It includes video from Bilal Abdul Kareem, who has posted videos straight from Aleppo for some time now.

4. Israel has carried out air strikes in Syria. A Haaretz article declares it "the most serious incident between the two countries since the outbreak of the Syrian civil war six years ago." Syrian army high command called it an act of aggression and Syria retaliated with anti-aircraft missiles, one of which was intercepted by Israel. It sounds like Israel may have been targeting shipments of weapons it believed were headed to Hezbollah in Lebanon. The Haaretz article suggests that Israel has taken action like this in the recent past, this is the first time they seem to have acknowledged doing so, and Syria has responded.