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Hither and Yon

South Korea’s champion-class baseball fans

Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
American baseball fans, maybe U.S. major league baseball in general, have some lessons to learn from the way that diehard Koreans cheer on their teams.
At the final game of the Korea Series, I was surrounded wherever I hung out in the stands by  Read More 
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Don't Repeat the Mistakes of Vietnam

OPINION, Wall Street Journal

By DONALD KIRK
Updated April 28, 2005 12:01 a.m. ET
HO CHI MINH CITY -- Being back in old Saigon 30 years after it fell conjures up an almost otherworldly image. Maybe it's all those bright red flags with the yellow stars that brings memories to one who lived and worked here for  Read More 
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The behind-the-scenes fixer who has North Korea’s ear

MONDAY 10 NOVEMBER 2014
The Independent, UK
News > World > Asia
With no official position, Kun ‘Tony’ Namkung seems to have played a central role in the sudden release of three American prisoners
DONALD KIRK

SEOUL

SUNDAY 09 NOVEMBER 2014
Few people know how or why Pyongyang decided to release two American prisoners over the weekend. Acts of leniency  Read More 
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America’s political ‘takeaway’: A Congress that has abdicated its responsibility for the U.S.

Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
The U.S. exercise in democracy is a drama that’s turning from success story to farce, and may wind up in tragedy.
That’s the “takeaway” — a word that’s come into vogue for wrapping up everything from delivery of fast food and winding  Read More 
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South Koreans: Too stressed to appreciate their new status as coolest Asians

Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
A lot of Koreans don’t know it, but Korea is cool.
Three newly published books say so. Two of them even have “cool” in the title — “The Birth of Korean Cool” by Euny Hong, who describes herself as having “spent her childhood in Chicago and in  Read More 
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Hong Kong’s battle with Beijing: Where are the other righteous Asian protesters?

Special to WorldTribune.com
By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
The demonstrations in Hong Kong are at a critical stage. In the spirit of democracy movements in Korea, the Philippines, Indonesia and Thailand, these protesters are not giving up.
Unlike demonstrators elsewhere, those in Hong Kong have come up with a defense that I never  Read More 
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Cane or swagger stick? We report, you decide

By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
Why do the North Koreans simply refuse to follow the logic and needs of foreign analysts when it comes to the timing of great events?
Here everyone was saying that Kim Jong-Un had to show up for the 69th anniversary of the founding of the Workers’ Party one week  Read More 
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Unbelievable: Take your pick of unlikely North Korean power play theories

By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
The world seems to be missing Kim Jong-un.
The porcine image of this overweight 30-something reviewing his troops or wagging a finger at a map or “ordering” a missile test had become a media staple until he vanished from view in early September.
Oh, we also like to read  Read More 
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A tale of two Hong Kong demonstrations

By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
The democracy demos in Hong Kong evoke so many memories going back to the late 1960s when I saw thousands pouring on to the streets of what was then a British crown colony brandishing copies of Mao Zedong’s “little red book.”
That was the era of the Great  Read More 
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U.S. At War Again

By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com
WASHINGTON — The eyes of the world are upon the new U.S. war in Syria and Iraq, and that’s not just because people want to know how or whether aerial bombardments and missile strikes are really knocking out the bad guys.
One question is whether such high-tech attacks  Read More 
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