Barack Obama, the rabbit in North Korea's headlights, is Jimmy Carter II

by Gerald Warner, UK Telegraph Blog

"Obama calls for action on North Korea" reported today's headlines - which is much like a chief constable demanding something should be done about crime. If the President of the United States cannot bring the Pyongyang regime to heel, who does he expect to perform this task? It appears that, along with the bust of Churchill, Harry S Truman's maxim "The buck stops here" has also been banished from the Oval Office.

What was the point of America deploying two missile-killing destroyers, the USS McCain and the USS Chafee, in Japanese waters, only to spectate as Kim Jong-il's Taepodong-2 missile took off? US military sources have made much of the fact that the missile failed to launch a satellite into space or to achieve its stage three flight. That is like being complacent because Iran has not yet quite completed its nuclear armaments programme. It is the unimpeded process of pursuing nuclear weaponry that is threatening. No wonder West Coast Americans feel insecure.

Overnight, posturing and sabre-rattling, formerly the province of Kim, has become the role of America and its allies. Such chest-thumping followed by inaction is deadly dangerous. Do the names Sudetenland and Czechoslovakia not ring any bells? Ironically, Barack Obama was in Prague - the ultimate monument to appeasement - when he heard the news of the North Korean launch. Incredibly, he went on to deliver another turgid oration on the need to scrap nuclear weapons. That must have given them a good laugh in Pyongyang.

It did not take Obama long to emerge from his chrysalis as a fully-fledged Jimmy Carter II. What makes his supine appeasement worse is that the United States, under both Democrat and Republican administrations, has previous when it comes to being suckered by North Korea. Two administrations, Clinton in October 1994 and Bush in February 2007, made identical deals with Kim to freeze the Yongbyon plutonium plant in return for supplies of fuel oil - Uncle Sam bought the Brooklyn Bridge twice from the wide boys in Pyongyang.

Obama should have ordered the shooting down of the North Korean missile, launched in defiance of a 2006 UN resolution. Such ruthless action is the only thing Reds understand. Weakness and moderation excite their contempt and ambition. Instead, Obama is whining that something must be done. Indeed; and the person who should be doing it is you, Mr President. That is what you are paid your 400,000 bucks a year to do.

Obama's PR team is trying to depict him as firm because he still intends to implement the European missile defence shield. Yes; but how long before Vladimir Putin sells him another pup to join the one in the White House? The word has gone round the hard-faced power freaks of the geopolitical demi-monde that here is a US president who makes taking candy from a baby look challenging. Jimmy Carter is back. Be very afraid.