Forget the nukes — nothing worse than the North Koreans dropping a big fat salami on our punk Miguk asses. Courtesy Reuters:
Russia quoted the North as saying it was willing to stop its “military” nuclear programs, but not “peaceful” ones.
Yonhap news agency said the move was designed to be able to extract compensation for both programs during drawn-out negotiations.
“This is a ’salami tactic’ of slicing the sausage very thinly to maximize compensation,” it said.
I skimmed through Yonhap’s reports on the nuclear talks today, and I couldn’t seem to find any “salami” references. I’m really keen to see how they said that in Korean, so if anybody finds the report to which Reuters refers, do link to it in my comments.
5 Comments
I’m betting the original text says “soondae.”
Kevin “sosiji” Kim
I don’t have the link at hand, but an early Friday morning Yonhap analysis carried that sentence and we thought it was 1) very accurate, 2) too colorful not to use and 3) a relatively rare instance in which domestic media “told it like it is” with North Korea rather than put the best possible gloss on things. They did not use “soondae”, they called it “salami jonsul” and used the word “sosiji” (sausage): sosiji ul yalbke charida. I wish I’d thought of that metaphor myself.
I recall hearing somewhere (perhaps Chuck Downs book) North Korea’s (1993-94) tactics of drawing out negotiations in stages to maximize aid described as a “dance of the seven veils”.
It strikes me as the way a good poker player plays a weak hand.
Damn. Another bet lost.
Kevin
North Korea is trying to get a 2-for-1 deal. She has offered to dismantle her nuclear-weapons programs for a security guarantee and “economic compensation,” but she wants to keep her “peaceful” nuclear-energy programs.
I can understand North Korea wanting a security guarantee in exchange for giving up its nuclear weapons programs, but why should she get economic compensation unless she was planning on selling those weapons? Otherwise, what would we be compensating her for?
No matter how North Korea tries to disguise it with her word games, she is trying to use her nuclear weapons as a means of blackmail. The US should counter the North Korean proposal by saying, “We will give you a security guarantee in exchange for your nuclear-weapons program and oil and economic compensation in exchange for your nuclear-energy program. As for normalized relations, we will give you that when you stop imprisoning, torturing, and murdering your own people, give up your drug smuggling, and return the families of kidnapped Japanese nationals.
Thanks a lot for the background to that. I was a bit taken back by the “salami” reference, because let’s face it, salamis aren’t the easiest things to come by in most of Korea. My in-laws, however, mailed us some wonderful Russian salamis that provided a week’s worth of good eating.
It is a perfect term, though, to describe what the North Koreans are doing. If only the U.S. had the balls (and the patience) to play the same game…