"Sources inside North Korea"

I think I was a little too early to the party with this post, put up four days ago, about a Korean-American intelligence official who is accused of leaking information to Fox News, because the other main K-blogs have only now gotten around to writing about it.

Rather than slapping an update on that piece, I thought I'd highlight something where I think The Marmot gets it wrong (or at least doesn't seem to appreciate the gravity of the situation). He writes:

Well, leaking secret intel to the media is wrong, but this guy doesn’t sound like Robert Kim, either.

I won't get into it right now about how some wield Robert Kim as a weapon to call into question the loyalty of just about every other Korean-American, but I will say that Stephen Kim's alleged wrongdoings can be quite serious and detrimental even if he didn't have the malicious intent of Robert Kim.

That's right, we do have assets in North Korea, and Stephen Kim's alleged indiscretions may have compromised and endangered them, not to mention eroding our ability to keep a flow of information coming in. For much the same reason the Wiki Leaks information can reveal who has been aiding the US effort — possibly leading to deadly reprisal — or outing Valerie Plame lets our adversaries know that people associated with her may also be secretly working with the US government, it's not up to folks like Stephen Kim to decide what is harmless and what isn't. Seemingly innocuous intel may be anything but.