The Road to Pyongyang
The Bush administration has arrived at another great moment of decision regarding North Korea. It was reported last week that Kim Jong Il has indicated that he is willing to resume 6-Party talks and that he is prepared to negotiate away his nuclear programs, rejoin the Non-Proliferation Treaty, and welcome back inspectors. No one knows if the North Korean leader is serious – but that is precisely the point. It is time for the United States to step forward and smoke Kim Jong Il out. This is the question that everyone horrified by the growing nuclear dangers on the Korean peninsula is asking: will Pyongyang in fact be willing to exchange security assurances and a pathway back to the international community for the definitive abandonment to nuclear ambitions?
The United States has a huge interest in finding out the answer to this question and it should be prepared to do a lot - a whole lot – to get an answer, including engaging in direct bi-lateral talks with Kim Jong Il, if necessary, and offering whatever assurances are needed. But to get to this point, the Bush administration has got to finally – once and for all – settle its own internal disputes about how to deal with North Korea. For five years the Bush administration has negotiated more with itself – between pro-engagement and anti-engagement factions – than with the dictator in Pyongyang. Condi Rice has got to take control of North Korea policy from the Cheney-Bolton crowd and put Kim Jong Il on the spot.
The best argument I have seen for engaging North Korea directly at this moment is an essay last week in the Washington Post written by veteran Korea hands Donald Gregg and Don Oberdorfer. They point out that the formal American position, as such, is not the problem – the U.S. has indicated that it does not have hostile intent and that it will arrange guarantees once the nuclear issue is resolved. The problem is communicating these assurances directly and in a credible way. They recommend that the Bush administration follow up immediately and directly on Kim Jung Il’s remarks by sending a high level delegation to visit the North Korean leader, perhaps to prepare the way for a visit by Secretary of State Rice. This is the sort of bold move that could turn the diplomatic and political tide in America’s direction.
Gregg and Oberdorfer also report something else that is interesting. They reveal that during a visit they made to Pyongyang in November 2002, the North Korean leader gave them a note to pass on to President Bush that said that if the U.S. "recognizes our sovereignty and assures non-aggression, it is our view that we should be able to find a way to resolve the nuclear issue in compliance with the demands of the new century." The note was passed on, they say, but the Bush administration – preoccupied with preparations for the Iraq war – rejected engagement with North Korea.
The fundamental point is obvious. The United States has an interest in relieving North Korea of its nuclear programs – but Pyongyang has an interest in regime survival. Right now, nuclear weapons look like the best ticket available for North Korea to stay in business. We call it deterrence. Bush’s invasion of Iraq and doctrine of preventive war have made nuclear weapons more rather than less valuable for North Korea as well as for other countries that think they are in the gunsight of the White House. As I argued in an earlier post: "Nuclear deterrence is perhaps the ultimate protection against a unipolar state that speaks openly about solving its security problems through regime change." The Bush administration has got to find a way to alter the underlying logic of this situation. Those who reject direct engagement and deal making with Pyongyang offer three alternative strategies. One is the Iraq strategy – use of preventive force and regime change. Most serious analysts think this is no longer an option. A second option is to embargo and squeeze North Korea – but other countries (most importantly, South Korea) are not willing to cooperate with Washington and, in any event, may experts think it will not generate the desired regime collapse or policy reversal. The third option is to rely on China to pull North Korea back from the nuclear brink. But this strategy has been pursued from several years now with no visible results. It is not even clear that Beijing is totally unhappy with a nuclear North Korea. The Cheney-Bolton anti-engagement faction doesn’t have a credible or workable alternative – all they have is the ability to block the engagement faction. Round and round we go and the nuclear programs in Pyongyang inch forward.
Last month, Representative James Leach (R-Iowa) gave one of the most thoughtful speeches I have heard by a politician on U.S. policy toward Northeast Asia. He urged the U.S. to be flexible in its negotiating strategy and not use the Six-Party talks framework as an excuse for not directly negotiating with Pyongyang. He also argued that the U.S. has to clearly articulate how a North Korea without nuclear arms would be secure and fit into the region. "There is simply no credible alternative to attentive engagement with the North," Congressman Leach notes. "It is entirely conceivable that North Korea is determined to strengthen its military hand with a nuclear weapons capacity. But as untrustworthy as the regime is, it is nevertheless in our interest to use the next round of six-party talks, whenever it may occur, to offer a clearer vision of the advantages that may accrue to Pyongyang if it abandons its march toward nuclearization."
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The Washington Post article you linked to is interesting, not just because it reveals an until-now secret memo ("DMZ memo?"), but becaus the authors also state:
Even if we haven't recognized NK's sovereignty since King-Jon passed along that memo--which of course we have, as well as said we have no intention of invading (option #1)--one has to seriously doubt what doing so would acheive. Kim-Jong doesn't exactly have a good track record of making good on promises and being a good negotiating partner (cf. NPT).
This is where I think 6-party talks are a good idea. NK has survived by playing the major powers against each other, and remarkably, by playing the victimization card.
We can't solve the NK problem on our own. We need to convince other parties to go along with us, especially China, which has been providing NK with energy despite our hard-line stance. One can argue that we shouldn't be taking such a hard-line stance in the first place, and should perhaps be more accomodating to NK in exchange for disarmament, but in that case we need to reach a consensus with the other parties, which can only be done through multilateral talks.
June 28, 2005 7:13 AM | Reply | Permalink
Nice post & links, John. The WH has been playing a losing hand with NK so far, essentially conceding the terms of the debate to the regional players. Nonaggression assurances should be a nobrainer, but the neocons have boxed themselves in. Their hope is that NK will pull a Lybia and disarm on their own. Fat chance. Bush's policy has ensured that playing the nuclear card was the only option left for NK (Lybia was offered a bushelful of carrots.) Appalling thinking.
June 28, 2005 9:00 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think China, or more specifically, the strained US-China relationship, is being overlooked. The US influence on Chinese economic policy is deciedly waning -- can the same be said for any political influence the US may have?
How, if at all, do the escalating tensions regarding the renminbi and textile quotas affect China's behavior at the bargaining table with North Korea?
June 28, 2005 12:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
Gregg and Oberdorfer also report something else that is interesting. They reveal that during a visit they made to Pyongyang in November 2002, the North Korean leader gave them a note to pass on to President Bush that said that if the U.S. "recognizes our sovereignty and assures non-aggression, it is our view that we should be able to find a way to resolve the nuclear issue in compliance with the demands of the new century."
"Interesting?" Perhaps interesting in the sense that Mr. Bush brazenly branded DPRK an "axis of evil" 10 months earlier, which he subsequently burnished by adding "preemptive nuclear strike" to America's North Korean vocabulary.
More interesting to us is why DPRK, evoking the spirit of Mr. Cheney, wouldn't tell the administration to "Go fuck itself" given bankupt demands for credibility or else. Or does Pyongyang perceive, as some do, a lame duck White House increasingly sensitive to radioactive fallout from foreign policy ineptitude -- or worse?
Otherwise, Pyongyang's reaction was fairly predictable, consistent then as now. Unlike the administration. Excerpted from North Korea Admits Secret Nuclear Weapons Program by Paul Kerr for ACA, November 2002:
If KEDO/the Agreed Framework weren't in a persistent vegetative state, one might almost imagine DPRK's sane, rational, self-preserving interest in its revival (or a comparable substitute).
Outgoing lead KEDO negotiator Charles Kartman should know, as reported by Reuters two weeks ago:
Then again, Kartman is reportedly leaving (this August) at the urging of administration hard-liners unreceptive to Kartman's emphasis on engagement. Leaving the U.S. where in negotiating posture, intent, continuity, credibility, clarity? Gilligan's Island? Again?
June 28, 2005 1:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
In a sense (twisted, yes, alas) the DPRK's nuclear program is a gift, one for which we should give thanks to Kim Jong-il.
The DPRK's nuclear program is piddling: the far greater threat to world stability is Iran's nuclear program. Iran's enriched uranium and plutonium production lines are well-financed thanks to oil and gas revenues, are huge in scale, are spread out over the breadth of Iran and are hurtling forward in complete conntempt of the concerns of the international community. Efforts to curb Iran's nuclear ambitions both through threat and through negotiation have failed.
One credible means of restraining the Iranians would be to convince them that the production of HEU or the separation of plutonium would lead to a collapse, not an enhancement, of their security. Should some untoward event occur after Iran declares itself a nuclear power--such as the explosion of nuclear device in Tel Aviv--then Israel and most likely two Los Angeles class submarines in the Arabian Sea would immediately launch their missiles, annihilating Iranian civilization. No questions would be asked, no investigations would be undertaken; no responsibility would be assigned--Iran would get it.
The Iranians would assert that while it may be true that the U.S. or Israel might seek to blindly retaliate against Iran in the event of a Mideast nuclear terror event, the chances of such an event happening are miniscule as Iran itself would never transfer its nuclear deterrent to others. Against this, the negotiators would play their ace-in-the-hole: "Ah yes, but the North Koreans you see also possess the means to produce nuclear weapons--and they will sell anything to anybody. You can perhaps control what your people do but nobody can control Pyongyang. For your own survival, it would really be a good idea for Iran to not even make gestures in the direction of joining the nuclear club."
June 29, 2005 5:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
From the viewpoint of a charter member of the Axis of Evil, why should NK agree to role over in such a way as a "first step" in negotiations. And as to "track records," our president Bush gave all sorts of assurances that he had no 'intent' to invade Iraq when we now know he did. It seems to me that unless we are willing to negotiate some sort of bilateral treaty with NK that links all these issues together we are not serious about reaching an agreement. The real question is whether we could assure NK that it could rely on even a full-blown Senate-ratified treaty.
June 29, 2005 5:59 AM | Reply | Permalink
June 29, 2005 4:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
I am posting this WAY after the entry was posted, but I just wanted to express my vocal support of Jim Leach. He is a great man and a powerful moderate voice in an overwhelmingly extremist caucus. Yet, the DCCC is targeting him as one of their top chances for a seat pick up. Chances are that a Democrat that beats him will not have his gravitas on foreign policy or his moderate outlook. He may be a Republican, but I will take one Jim Leach over a dozen low level Dems. Check out his voting record, he is a true Rockefeller Republican who routinely bucks his party leadership, but we want to replace him with some inexperienced party ideologue
July 8, 2005 7:55 PM | Reply | Permalink