The USS George Washington, one of the world’s biggest warships, has joined navy and air force manoeuvres alongside 20 ships, 200 planes and 8,000 US and South Korean personnel in the Sea of Japan, in a show of might.
Reason? To send a clear signal over North Korea’s suspected sinking of a South Korean warship in March. And as expected, North Korea has cryptically threatened a retaliatory "sacred war".
But is the sabre-rattling necessary?
Even if the Obama administration is trying to calm the nerves of its Seoul ally, what about future relations between the Koreas, who have been technically in a state of war since 1953, the Beijing-Pyongyang bond and US-China rapport?
The posturing is bound to raise political temperatures the world does not need. What became of the US President’s inaugural address to chase after peaceful co-existence among nations to the ends of the Earth? Has anyone thought that some of North Korea’s transgressions and bluster about nuclear power capability, despite her inability to feed her people, could be a cry for help?
With a looming $1.47 trillion (Sh111 trillion) budget deficit, can the US afford to open another battlefront? Already, Washington is desperately scrambling to flee the killing fields of Iraq, ostensibly to bolster its muscle in Afghanistan.
Meanwhile Somalia is a festering, unattended wound that only needs $1 billion to tackle, compared to the $1 trillion, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have cost Americans so far, trying to wipe out the rag-tag Taliban and elusive al Qaeda. For Africa, Somalia’s al Shabaab threat is more immediate. In fact, the topic has overshadowed the ongoing AU summit’s official theme, "Maternal, Infant and Child Health and Development". It is clear, a new Korean Peninsula war is one the world can ill afford now.
