Should North Korea Have Nuclear Weapons?

No.  It should not.

However, two Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives failed to vote to condemn North Korea’s recent nuclear test, Justin Amash and Kentucky’s Thomas Massie (who was endorsed by Ron Paul.  By the way, what is it with Kentucky and libertarians?  Kentucky doesn’t strike me as a very libertarian state, but, with Rand Paul and this guy representing it, it sure elects libertarians).

Anyway, this vote is abhorrent.  I’ve never heard of Thomas Massie before, but Justin Amash often seems like the “crazy” kind of libertarian who doesn’t believe in foreign policy (unless the USA is being attacked, I assume) and doesn’t like “mainstream” conservatives.  Much like Ron Paul.  So this vote isn’t actually that surprising.  It seems that Amash thinks North Korea should be allowed to have nuclear weapons.  In fact, among some libertarians, such a position is considered “principled,” because North Korea is a sovereign nation.

Here is why it isn’t principled.  Every person is entitled to certain rights which come from nature, God, or, as I say, from reason (i.e. reason gives humans the capacity to recognize that these rights exist).  These rights, and the law they come from (natural law), supersede any written law.  Therefore, every single person in the world is, at the beginning of their existence, entitled to them.  And any written law that doesn’t recognize and protect them is illegitimate, which makes the entire government of North Korea illegitimate.  Because the government of North Korea, based on this objective premise, is illegitimate, it is not entitled to do the same things that the United States is.  That doesn’t mean it can’t, it just can’t do so with legitimacy.

I don’t know that this vote has actually does anything or not, but it is important to send a message to countries like North Korea.  The people of North Korea, and Iran, and Sudan, and Somalia, and Turkmenistan, and everywhere else, are entitled to these natural rights.  Obviously, not much can be done right now about the fact that these rights aren’t being granted to them, but it would help if they feared the United States.

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