Must watch--Richard Engel reports on N. Korea.

http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show At the start of the program, he mentions N Korean arm sales to Burma, now called Myanmar. Engel looks at open source and Middlebury Institute in CA, where experts can look at public footage, for instance of a missile launch, and determine location (geolocation), where the launch site is, using Google Earth, and if the image has been manipulated. They also use social media. What they do is much like what I do, with respect to Burma, but of course what they do is more technical. Engel also reports on an activist who managed to flee from N. Korea, and the number is very small, maybe in the low dozens. One book I have read is Dear Leader, non-fiction, agented (literary agent, not secret agent) by uber agent known as The Jackal, Andrew Wylie. Anyway, this is worth watching. Importantly, Engel says that Trmp's talk of a "pre-emptive strike" is worse than useless, because the N Koreans already have a nuclear warhead that can fit on their missiles (see onder Rachel Maddow program)and so "any strike will lead to nuclear war." Incidentally, Engel and his wife have a seriously brain damaged young child, who will never be able to look after himself. This I learned from reading People magazine, while waiting in my dentist's waiting room, for my interminable dental appointments. In this interview, Engel said that in some ways it was easier for him, than for his wife, because he could "get away" on assignment, and as "it is sometimes dangerous, I have to concentrate (in the moment)." From decades of talking to committed dissidents, from many different countries, (one was from S. Africa), I learned that dissidents don't do what they do because they are rich, well connected and have no problems of their own, or to scratch their butt. I learned from the lady who was working to help Ashin (Rev.) Gambira of Saffron Revolution fame that she had needed a kidney transplant for some time, and was so happy that day I invited her to a formal reception in her home city of Chicago, because she said, her brother had just told her he would donate one of his kidneys for her. It was very strange. I always thought she was quiet and laid back because she was a Buddhist. She worked in the same university as my hosts, and yet, they did not know each other. KM Kaung

3-3-2018