North Korea Nuke Test Threat Connected to Ban Ki Moon
North Korea has announced that it will conduct a nuclear test, and few doubt its resolve to do so.
To some degree, the escalating temper-tantrum that North Korea is engaged in has to do with its irritation that the United States is not talking to the failed communist state. Kim Jong Il and his government seem willing to ratchet up the threat of regional conflict if it doesn't get America back across the table.
But this nuclear brinksmanship is also about Ban Ki Moon, South Korea's former Foreign Minister, who is on the verge of ascending to the Secretary Generalship of the United Nations.
Ban Ki Moon's likely appointment as Kofi Annan's successor will represent the most serious legitimacy crisis for the North Korean leadership -- perhaps since the ascension of Kim Il Sung's son to the premiership, and perhaps even greater than that transition.
For a senior member of the South Korean diplomatic elite to be "elected" to a position that really does help run the world, many average North Korean citizens (i.e., victims of their own thug-ridden government) will feel pride in Ban Ki Moon.
In addition, Moon will have to wrestle with North Korean nuclear misbehavior in his UN role -- and the reality of collision between the UN and North Korea is very high.
America should be talking to North Korea and trying to assemble a strategic game plan that provides the North Korea leadership a way to back out of its current lunacy. Frankly, we should be doing all we can to embrace the North Korean people with economic opportunity and the chance to improve their lives. We should be helping to fragment the North Korean governing elite by making some rich and others jealous.
But just waiting for a cataclysmic collapse or sitting by while all sides prepare for armed conflict in Northeast Asia would be disastrous for the U.S.
We need to talk with North Korea -- and then we need to plot a strategy that really undermines the internal and external legitimacy of Kim Jong Il. Right now, we seem to be doing the things that add to his power and control of the state.
-- Steve Clemons is Senior Fellow and Director of the American Strategy Program at the New America Foundation and publishes the popular political blog, The Washington Note
Any idea how Ban Ki Moon will address nuclear weapons, be it NK, Iran or even Israel, India and Pakistan??
October 3, 2006 3:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
many average North Korean citizens (i.e., victims of their own thug-ridden government) will feel pride in Ban Ki Moon.
On what do you base this claim? How many "average" North Koreans need ever learn that the new SecGen of the UN is Korean? How many average North Koreans even know what the UN is?
"All governments lie, but disaster lies in wait for countries whose officials smoke the same hashish they give out." - I.F. Stone
October 3, 2006 7:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
Mr. Clemons, what is the nature of the current North Korean lunacy? Is it their arming themselves with nuclear weapons in defiance of US and other opposition? Can you explain a "rational" North Korean approach?
October 3, 2006 9:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
You would be surprised how well information moves around in totalitarian countries. Information is scarce so people pay attention and pass it around. Official propaganda is also not that effective. People just tune out. Just ask any Russian who was an adult in the bad old days of the USSR.
It takes the constant media overload of a consumerist democracy to produce a truly uninformed populace. To degrade signal to noise ratio, it’s much easier to raise the noise than lower the signal.
No, you can't have your own facts!
October 3, 2006 9:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
Mmm, simple.
There is one guy and the sole purpose of the country around him is to guarantee his survival and his well-being. The guy is seriously paranoid and devoid of any form of scruples, perfectly ready to sacrifice his entire country rather than expose himself to any risk.
So there are 2 solutions:
1) Convince him that there better ways to ensure his survival and increase his well being than military escalation.
2) Take him out. To paraphrase Stalin : "Man, problem. No man, no problem"
2) may involve taking out the whole country.
Your choice ?
No, you can't have your own facts!
October 3, 2006 9:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
Having lived in the USSR and, currently, in Vietnam, I would not in fact be surprised. North Korea is far more effective than either of those countries at shutting out foreign media. More important, it is an agrarian state with miserably low levels of education. I doubt many "average" North Koreans will be aware of the election of a South Korean as UN GenSec, though elites probably will be. Of course, "average" people are pretty irrelevant in political terms; it's what the elites think that matters. And there, it's true that South Korean prestige may be a blow.
"All governments lie, but disaster lies in wait for countries whose officials smoke the same hashish they give out." - I.F. Stone
October 4, 2006 2:40 AM | Reply | Permalink
Since pressure would tend to entrench Kim, it's time for the deadly embrace of Western commerce.
Can we agree that it's not weapons that matter, but attitude? Note that Russia's formidable arsenal is undiscussed, same with China.
So instead of bemoaning weapons, let's make nice and the North Koreans will eventually get it--they're going down the drain on this family's watch.
Now if only Americans will get it; the same is happening here.
October 4, 2006 6:06 AM | Reply | Permalink
I had the impression that this situation has existed for about 50 years. Nothing in your comments seems to address what Mr. Clemons calls the "current" North Korean lunacy. in terms of your solutions, they seem to "fit" a current lunacy but it does not seem to belong to North Korea.
October 4, 2006 6:26 AM | Reply | Permalink
Its easy to say that we should embrace North Korea economically, but they don't really seem to want that.
I heard a speaker yesterday who told a story about NK rejecting humanitarian aid for weeks after a disaster because they didn't want the populace to see trucks of South Korean goods coming to their rescue. I can't imagine they would want it filling up their stores (do they even have stores?).
I think economic reform seems unlikely. Both the USSR and PRC changed because at some level they were responsive to the needs of their citizens, and when their political systems could not longer supply those citizens, they had to adapt or look elsewhere. The NK government doesn't seem to have the same problem.
October 4, 2006 1:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
If I may - the current lunacy is an escalating arms race to avoid dealing with fundamental structural problems. If you keep doing something that's dangerous to accomplish something and it doesn't work so you start doing things that are more dangerous, that's lunacy.
North Korea's government, being communist, is broken. It couldn't feed its own people, so it made a deal that it would take food aid in return for not enriching uranium. Then, when it felt like it wasn't getting enough attention, or the deal was going south, it started enriching uranium, and then it tried to scare everyone by launching an inter-continental missile. It still doesn't have the food it needs. So now its threatening to conduct a nuclear test. What will happen when it does this? Its neighbors (ie Japan) will re-arm and the region will be less stable. Will that solve its food and security problems? Nope... what if those neighbors still don't negotiate, will it set off a nuclear weapon? There doesn't seem to be anything left for it to do.
When the US or Russia or Israel or India or Pakistan builds bombs, that's dangerous for the countries around them but for them, it leads to increased security. They can sit on those bombs for a million years and never use them, as long as they aren't attacked. That's a rationale deterrent.
North Korea has to get something out of its bombs - namely, food. If not, it has to keep building more bombs and threatening its neighbors, which increases the chances that they will attack and remove the regime. So the NK government is intentionally following a path that can only lead to a disgruntled starving population or greater chances of attack. That's suicidal, and suicide is, by definition, a form of insanity, or if you prefer Steve's term, lunacy.
October 4, 2006 1:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
I can't speak to NK or Iran, but what is there to address when it comes to Israel, India, or Pakistan?
October 4, 2006 1:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
How about their possession of nuclear weapons which is in itself destabilizing. Certainly Iran has to be quite cognizant that possession of nuclear weapons is security against pre-emptive attacks say from Israel.
October 4, 2006 4:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
You make some sense, but it strikes me as too simplistic. I will think about it before going off half-cocked.
October 4, 2006 4:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
Test the idea by considering the extreme case. Simply give NK so much money that Kim & friends can't spend more than a fraction on themselves.
It's too late, of course. Wouldn't happen, wouldn't be believed. More likely famine will force a change.
October 4, 2006 6:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
I look for political leaders and officials to speak about the various nuclear, closted nuclear powers or almost nuclear powers. Do they hold a common view of the allowability of each type or how do they distinguish, advocating different treatment of the different classes of nuclear powers.
A UN Secretary should be a key player in the nuclear debate and behavior. A South Korean UN Secretary is likely to find that his international interests are at odds with the interests of his country of origin. Whose interests will he serve and how will his home country accept that?
October 9, 2006 12:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
*bump*
Check out the link in Mr. Clemons' first sentence:
Seoul steps up watch for N-test
Correspondents in Seoul
October 04, 2006
October 9, 2006 5:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
I read the article and there is no reference to Steve. What am I missing?
October 10, 2006 7:03 AM | Reply | Permalink
The test was announced in advance. That's not really being included in much of the current panicked coverage I see; instead, it's shock, shock, shock. That they did something they said they were going to do? South Korea did nothing more than go "on alert." Takes the drama, the "rogueness," down a notch for me.
The analysis in that article is interesting in hindsight, too. Several say it's for attention and concessions from the U.S.
Meanwhile, I thought the main point of the post deserved more attention after the news occurred.
October 10, 2006 7:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
Did you really want to link to Clemons and then have the reader follow his link??
Clemons said on Oct 4:
October 10, 2006 7:30 AM | Reply | Permalink
Agree. headline-grabbing reporting does not need people like Clemons who knowbecause they see and listen.
I started reading him during Bolton nomination I. Since then I read to find a logical mind looking at politics and government. With his serious background in Asia he definitely adds breadth to my understanding.
October 10, 2006 7:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
There is no point in discussing their possession of nuclear weapons by Israel, India, or Pakistan (no matter how destabilizing). None of these three countries is going to give up their nuclear weapons, and none is likely to use them. Without the threat of their being used, as is the case with Iran and NK, no country is going to do anything about removing them.
You might as well ask the UN to talk about the nuclear weapons of the US, Russia, and China. Better yet, ask Superman to take all the nuclear weapons from all the countries and throw them into the sun.
The only conversation I could even see as being possible is trying to get Musharraf to put contingencies/safeguards in place in case he is somehow overthrown. However, that would be rather insulting to him, since it insinuates he doesn't have his own house in order, and I doubt he'd be interested in that discussion.
So again, what is there to discuss?
October 11, 2006 12:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
Actually, I think that having a South Korean is a fairly astute choice. Unlike, say, a Swede, as a South Korean his country has to constantly worry about its neighbors - China, Japan, the U.S. - and that should make him fairly responsive to the major players in the world community. Even Europe, which S. Korea does a good bit of trade with. He may get more done.
In terms of nuclear weapons, I misunderstood your question. Having a general theory of how to treat nuclear countries would be important to undertand. By listing out specific countries, though, I thought you were asking how he would address or negotiate with those countries, and I don't really see anything to discuss on that level.
October 11, 2006 12:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
I wasn't suggesting going off half-cocked, or any course of action. I was merely describing the lunacy.
My own personal view is that they should engage in dialogue toward exchanging food and supplies for a cessation of work toward a nuclear weapon. This both alleviates immediate suffering on the part of the population, and reduces the nuclear threat. However, this does very little toward overthrowing the current government, and I should warn you I'm something of a pragmatist, not an idealist...
October 11, 2006 12:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
"give NK so much money that Kim & friends can't spend more than a fraction on themselves."
Isn't that what Swiss bank accounts are for?
---------
However, on that note, one wonders what would happen if you just tried to buy the country from then. Set him up on some Caribean island with a fat bank account and guarantee him security... maybe he and his friends would prefer that and just leave? Didn't we offer that deal to Saddam at one point?
October 11, 2006 12:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
I raise the list of countries because I have not heard a logical definition of a policy allows any who have nuclear power to do as they wish while those who are late to the game or can't keep it secret are subject to condemnation and sanctions.
The Bush Admistration appears to be testing a policy that the real issue is transfer of nuclear weapon and the technology to other countries and/or nonstate organizations.
As to the new UN Secretary how does his nationality affect the perception of what he does and what he says about nuclear weapons in the various countries?
October 11, 2006 12:48 PM | Reply | Permalink