Then and Now

North Korea's latest military attack on South Korea yesterday and its disclosure of building a uranium enrichment facility continues the tyrannical regime's efforts to extract concessions from the United States and South Korea.

The South Korea responded by saying it would take "stern measures" if attacked again.

Attacked again? But yesterday's attack was the "again" - after sinking the South Korean warship this past spring that killed 46 South Korean sailors.

In a similar vein of wanting to keep tensions to a minimum, the Obama administration initially said it wasn't deploying additional military forces to the region, citing our existing forces in South Korea, Japan, and Guam.

It is instructive to review our response to the Cuban missile crisis in 1962 to see how far we've come in accepting threatening behavior today and attacks on us or our allies.

After the United States discovered that the Soviet Union had deployed nuclear missiles to Cuba, we imposed a quarantine on Cuba - a naval blockade in all but the name.

Vast military forces began to pour into our military bases in Florida and the Gulf coast as we prepared for a possible invasion of Cuba.

Most ominously, our nuclear-armed bombers in the Strategic Air Command greatly increased their air patrols and carried out attack runs aimed at the Soviet Union - each time pulling back before carrying out the attack but intending to intimidate the Soviets.

And the intimidation worked. Because despite the threat of looming war, which typically leads nations to at least prepare for war by deploying its forces accordingly, the Soviet Union didn't move a muscle. After starting the crisis with the deployment of its missiles, it then became terrified with America's overwhelming response and military superiority in the region and in nuclear weapons - so scared it didn't even prepare for war.

48 years ago, we responded to military threats by preparing for the worst, and in doing so, deterred war and obtained a better political settlement.

Today, we and our allies are the ones who are scared of preparing for war, and in so doing, increase the risk of war and of obtaining a worse political settlement.

Our enemies observe this, and plan accordingly. North Korea has had great success in pushing past previous "lines in the sand", only to find we don't really mean it and will appease them with concessions to avoid future provocations. Then North Korea repeats the cycle, crossing new lines in the sand and obtaining new concessions.

Will Barack Obama be up to the challenge to stop this dangerous pattern, that both Bill Clinton and George Bush engaged in?