George Bush’S Great America [EN]: Chapter 149

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“Seriously, what the hell are these guys doing?”

Saudi Arabia’s political circles were in an uproar. Regardless of Afghanistan’s denunciation, it essentially boiled down to the United States applying pressure.

“Did they think they could act like a tiger cub emboldened by its parent and make everyone tremble?”

That wasn’t entirely wrong. However, in this case, it was more accurate to say they were reluctantly doing it because the ‘tiger’ told them to. Of course, Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan were both shouting, ‘We’re not ready yet!’ but the opinions of Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan didn’t matter much, and the United States seemed to think Afghanistan was sufficiently prepared.

“Afghanistan isn’t the important thing here.”

“But why bring it up through Afghanistan? I don’t understand.”

Of course, the United States was also working discreetly to prevent collusion, but it wasn’t doing so openly. It was more like, ‘We will take action to prevent price-fixing in the future.’ They weren’t directly pressuring Saudi Arabia.

“Isn’t this basically saying that Afghanistan is the United States of the Middle East?”

Outside the Middle East, Saudi Arabia might seem like the leader, but in reality, there was a traditional powerhouse that had been unshaken since ancient times: Egypt. Of course, it would be a lie to say it was completely unshaken, but if there was a civilization projecting the most powerful influence in the Middle East, it was Egypt.

In any case, Saudi Arabia was only a rising power. It was a bit ironic that a rising power was virtually monopolizing one of the essential resources of modern society. Anyway, the important thing is that there is a hierarchy in diplomacy. Even though the United States was fully supporting Afghanistan, even at its best, Afghanistan’s standing could never match Saudi Arabia’s.

At best, it was only a mid-sized country that was just beginning to emerge, and to put it harshly, it was a puppet state that couldn’t do anything without the United States. Therefore, anything that could create an enemy should be avoided at all costs, even if it meant making allies.

However, Afghanistan’s unique circumstances didn’t allow for that, so even if it was unavoidable, they were still relentlessly attacking Saudi-Russian oil collusion every single day.

“The U.S. President visited in person, so wasn’t it ordered then?”

“It seems so.”

Here’s the problem.

“Even so, why Afghanistan and not Israel?”

Since they already had Israel, a nation with solid defense capabilities and influence, there was no reason to force Afghanistan, which had just begun to spread its wings, to move.

In fact, Israel, the party in question, didn’t know the reason either, and their insides were as black as any other country. Their anxiety was so intense that it turned into smoke and rose up blackly. They firmly believed that they were the United States’ top ally in the Middle East, but with the astronomical amounts of money and the latest weapons being invested in Afghanistan, their belief was wavering, and this incident shattered that belief.

So now, although it was bitter, they had no choice but to admit it: they weren’t the ‘best’ in the Middle East, at least not anymore. Even when they inquired with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), they only received the response, ‘We don’t know,’ which was absurd.

This applied not only to AIPAC but to all lobbyists. In the very early stages of the administration, lobbying worked very well. The Bush administration once poured money in with shovels, and the ship moved according to the wishes of the financiers, as if they had oiled its neck and fattened it without obstruction. But starting with 9/11, this stopped working at all.

Perhaps that’s why the already strained alliance was being maintained precariously due to the benefits that the United States granted to Israel more than other allies.

However, the person who hated the current situation the most was not Saudi, not Afghan, and not even Middle Eastern. To be specific, it was people with a ‘specific status’ on a global scale.

“Oh, shit. I was writing a paper on Israel!”

“This can’t be happening! My graduation thesis!”

They were graduate students.

“This can’t be! This isn’t right!”

Of course, they might have just been college students, not graduate students. The curriculum and graduation requirements vary from country to country. Still, among them, the people who were most severely affected were Korean graduate students.

“T-This is a dream. Right?”

He couldn’t bring himself to throw away the unfinished thesis in his hand. He wanted to believe it was a dream. But the more strength he put into his hand, the more the pain insisted that this was reality.

「Geopolitics of International Order Change, Israel-United States」

It’s not a pleasant experience to have a thesis you were writing become less than a piece of trash. I said less than a piece of trash, but it really became less than a piece of trash. You can at least use a tissue to wipe something, but you can’t even use this as scrap paper. It’s just flammable garbage that takes up space in the trash can.

“Why is that *hyung* [older brother/male senior] like that?”

“Ah, that *hyung*. I heard he ruined his graduation thesis this time. There’s no hope. No hope.”

“Huh? Why?”

“Suddenly the world situation changed. He said he would be done in a day or two. Sigh. Tsk, tsk.”

At drinking parties, they often joked about messing up someone’s thesis, but they never imagined that a thesis that had taken a long time to produce, with data organized with annotations, would turn into a novel filled with a graduate student’s delusions overnight.

“Ugh, poor thing.”

She was saying poor thing with her mouth, but her eyes were completely smiling. That’s why women are scary creatures. Isn’t it said that life is a tragedy when seen up close and a comedy when seen from afar? A senior she wasn’t even close to was completely unrelated to her.

“Where are you going this summer vacation, *unni* [older sister/female senior]?”

It seemed a bit early to be discussing summer vacation, but so what? Isn’t conversation supposed to flow without context?

“Where am I going? I have to work part-time.”

“Part-time? Where are you going to work?”

At her junior’s question, she smiled bashfully and induced curiosity with her silence. The senior was the owner of a personality so unique that it was hard to find not only in this university but even in the whole world. Anyway, the junior, unable to bear it any longer, poked her in the side and asked her to tell her, and finally, the lock on her mouth was released.

“Pyongyang.”

“Oh, are there part-time jobs in North Korea too?”

“They say it’s starting this month. Our companies are entering a lot. It seems they’re trying to touch the economy first, saying they’re going into economic integration ahead of the North Korean merger.”

Of course, she didn’t care about any of that and only looked into it because the daily wage was enough to save up for a semester’s tuition and still be able to splurge a bit if she saved diligently for a month. However, it felt closer to taking a trip to North Korea.

North Korea was no longer a communist country. It was always a dictatorship, not an orthodox communist regime, but anyway, reunions of separated families were now a thing of the past, and it was now at a level where you could just take a car and visit whenever you felt like it, like going to your relatives’ house for the Chuseok [Korean Thanksgiving] holiday. The railroad construction was almost finished, so quite a few people were booking trips to North Korea. Among the profits that can be obtained from a country with underdeveloped infrastructure, there was no more reliable source than tourism revenue.

“Anyway, I don’t care as long as they pay me.”

Actually, it felt like a trip, but trip or whatever.

“Where are you going?”

“Ah, I’m going to India.”

“India? Why?”

Some people may not know, but India is definitely not a good country for Koreans to travel to. Transportation was one thing, but it was a country that directly violated one of the greatest achievements, ‘hygiene.’ What stood out in particular was the restaurants. As everyone knows, in India, there is a hand for handling the aftermath and a hand that is not. Even if you can overlook that, they use ‘both hands’ when cooking.

Do you get the gist now? When you make curry, it’s not just pure curry. When you recall that the worst hygiene in Korea is just a hair or a fly that accidentally gets in, this is a cultural shock in itself.

“I’m going to eat curry.”

At the junior’s confident reason, the senior was speechless.

“I’ll pass.”

It’s not about disparaging India, but isn’t it true? Of course, the senior’s prejudice against India. Well, whether you should call it prejudice or not, she might get sued for defamation by stating the facts, but who cares? She’ll just pay the fine. The senior would rather die than go to India.

Seeing the senior’s face scrunch up as if saying, ‘Ew, is this India?’ the junior made a rebuttal, not a rebuttal.

“North Korea is just as bad. It’s the most chaotic neighborhood in terms of public safety, except for Somalia.”

“North Korea these days isn’t the North Korea it used to be. It used to be North Korea.”

Due to the presence of the U.S. military, more than half of the North Korean army was disbanded, and the South Korean army was replacing them. In other words, there was now a military assignment to ‘Gaemagowon,’ the worst polar region on the Korean Peninsula. This Gaemagowon is also the reason why South Korean soldiers undergo winter training.

Thanks to this, Cheorwon, which had been rumored to be the worst military unit in the South Korean army for 50 years, was finally pushed into second place. Anyway, the important thing is that even though the public safety wasn’t as good as Korea, where CCTV cameras were installed everywhere in every alley, it was still good enough for people to travel around.

Besides, whether it was because the land was so small or because it was too underdeveloped from the beginning, it was developing so rapidly that the landscape was changing dramatically every time you woke up. It wasn’t just the economy, but also the scientific community. North Korea’s basic science was quite solid, producing quite a few excellent talents. The reason why North Korea was able to develop nuclear missiles in such an isolated situation was also because of these outstanding scientists.

However, where there is light, there is also darkness. The political world was becoming increasingly corrupt. Politicians who had taken money from North Korea were pouring an excessive amount of budget into North Korean land. Even though they were about to be unified soon, the spending was so excessive that it was neglecting national welfare.

It’s fortunate that there is now a positive atmosphere of ‘Let’s suffer for a while for the sake of the soon-to-be-unified, poor North Korean residents.’ Otherwise, there would have been welfare improvement demonstrations pouring out every day. Moreover, people who were originally marginalized in South Korea were being almost ignored. For example, ‘moon villages’ [shantytowns on the hillsides of cities].

“But didn’t you say you were going to China last time?”

“China is now a travel-banned country, isn’t it?”

“When are you talking about? And originally it wasn’t a travel ban, but a restraint. It’s okay there now. It’s dangerous for Westerners. It’s okay for Asians.”

In reality, that was the case. Of course, there was nothing that could be done about people who committed crimes regardless of East or West, but at least the ‘unprovoked violence’ due to race had almost disappeared.

“I don’t want to become disabled while walking down the street.”

Anyway, China was still unstable in terms of public safety.

“Well, summer vacation is summer vacation. Isn’t tomorrow the World Cup?”

“Ah, is that why it’s so noisy?”

“What, you didn’t know?”

“I’m not very interested in news or soccer…”

‘Well, still.’

「Dae-han-min-guk! [Republic of Korea!]」

‘Even though I’m not interested in soccer, I can’t help but feel a corner of my heart warming up at that slogan.’

The 2002 Korea-Japan World Cup was finally prepared.