CALDERON–CARDONA v. DEM. PEOPLE’S REP. OF KOREA Cite as 723 F.Supp.2d 441 (D.Puerto Rico 2010) and captured terrorists, reviews of documents, periodicals, credible news reports, government publications, and scholarly works, as well as from his own discussions with colleagues, observations and experiences living in the Middle East. (Exhibit Nos. 5 and 6) Prof. Rubin, in his affidavit testimony, explained that at the time leading up to the Lod Airport Attack and thereafter, North Korea was a communist revolutionary regime whose goal was to help create additional communist states which would in turn provide North Korea with strategic and economic support. North Korea sought to accomplish these goals by fostering political unrest and instability in noncommunist nations by supporting domestic groups that were striving to overthrow their governments violently. Accordingly, North Korea consistently demonstrated three qualities in particular which qualified it as an active state sponsor of terrorism: (i) its extremist militancy (as compared to other communist nations at that time such as the Soviet Union and People’s Republic of China); (ii) its relative recklessness, as measured by its systematic willingness to shun international law and norms of behavior; and (iii) its desire to carve out an independent role for itself in promoting revolution and developing clients in the Middle East. (Exhibit No. 3, p. 6, ¶ 17) North Korea’s main aspirations were to (a) help create additional communist states which would provide it with strategic and economic support, (b) discredit the United States (primarily by showing that the United States was ostensibly unable to protect its allies), and (c) destroy countries friendly to the United States. (Id. at ¶ 18) The defendants determined that actively supporting terrorist groups to act as their proxies was an effective means of achieving these goals, and specifically that ‘‘Israel fell into that [the above] category both as a direct target and as a symbolic target.’’ (Id.) 447 During the early 1970’s, North Korea waged a battle against its South Korean rival for diplomatic and trade relations with the Arabic-speaking states. The ability to strike against Israel would, North Korean policymakers believed, greatly increase North Korea’s popularity and attractiveness as an ally within the Arab world. (Exhibit No. 3, p. 6, ¶ 19) Prof. Rubin explained in his affidavit testimony that North Korea was ‘‘willing to work with those who no one else would work with, to provide weapons for those who no one else would provide weapons for; and that not only applied to countries, it even applied to terrorist groups.’’ (Trial Transcript, Dec. 2, 2009, p. 55, ln. 9–15) One of North Korea’s key interests at that time was to be a global revolutionary player, and, as Prof. Rubin set forth in his affidavit testimony, North Korea believed that goal would be facilitated by North Korea establishing an effective terrorist network. As Prof. Rubin explained: ‘‘At the time of which we’re speaking, the 1970’s, was a high point in the history of international terrorism. To be a revolutionary player, you had to have terrorist assets. And North Korea was in a weak position because it was a smaller and weaker state than the Soviet Union and China. So for them to get terrorist assets, they could not go, so to speak, with the A-team, the first league. They had to find groups that others were not willing to sponsor, and then use them to project North Korean power by carrying out spectacular terrorist acts which would show the world that North Korea was important, was revolutionary, it was worth courting, and also supported Arab causes, particularly in the Palestinian cause. So there was a perfect fit between the three groups. Each of them needed the others, and each of them—the alliance for each of them lacked alternatives other than an