Regarding Gregory Clark's Aug. 26 article, "First ban the hawks, then the bomb": With all due respect to Clark, why do I get the feeling after reading his articles that he seems to blame everything on "rightwing hawks" in Japan, while repeating the same points and claims? Trouble with China? Rightwing hawks! Northern Islands dispute unresolved? Rightwing hawks! Failure of the six-party talks? You guessed it.
I am not a fan of rightwing hawks in whatever countries they happen to nest, but it seems to me that Clark has a tendency to go a little overboard. He claims that North Korea has shown a willingness to give up nuclear arms only to be thwarted by those dreaded "rightwing hawks" in the United States and Japan.
How can he verify this "willingness"? Are there no North Korean hawks? Why should Japan, as he frequently suggests, drop the abduction issue if they are not satisfied with North Korean claims on this point? And if those omnipresent "rightwing hawks" crush every dissenter in the media and government, how come Clark is still able to criticize them, ad nauseum?