 North Korean nuclear nightmare
UNITED NATIONS Ñ North Korea has openly and defiantly played its nuclear proliferation cards by snubbing international agreements and by restarting shutdown nuclear reactors. But whether the Pyongyang regimeÕs bellicose brinksmanship is aimed at triggering a regional conflict or prompting pure economic extortion in the midst of its famine, becomes a mystery.
A bigger question remains the response of the Bush Administration on the verge of a probable military conflict with Iraq.
The Korean peninsula forms the vortex of competing , coinciding, and often conflicting power interests among China, Japan, Russia, and the USA. Once again, the powers are being pulled into the geopolitical vortex over North KoreaÕs predictable unpredictability.
In the early 1990Õs North Korea produced one or two nuclear bombs at the notorious Yongbyon facility. By reopening the complex she now has the opportunity to produce enough plutonium to build a few additional nuclear devices by late Spring. North Korea deploys a moderately effective medium range missile capability which could carry warheads to regional targets.
Through the Clinton AdministrationÕs myopic diplomatic deal with the Democratic PeopleÕs Republic of Korea (DPRK) in 1994 was supposed to stop this proliferation, the Framework Agreement actually placed a reckless degree of trust in a rogue regime. The deal proved classic style over substance diplomacy which has come back to haunt us.
Importantly the USA must not overreact but confront North Korea through a two-track policy in the UN and among East Asian states such as South Korea, Japan and especially Mainland China. An entire UN legal and nuclear monitoring process was scrapped by Pyongyang. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has been unceremoniously shut-down in the Stalinist-state.
As to powers, PeopleÕs China has been PyongyangÕs longtime patron; yet in recent years the comradely ties cooled as Beijing moved closer to South Korea for trade. Japan stands the most to lose with loose nukes in North Korea. Why? Because of its white heat hatred of Japan for historical reasons, if DPRK has one shot, they would likely take out a Japanese city. Tokyo knows this but hesitates to acknowledge it. Any second shot would likely target US bases facilities in Okinawa.
Ironically the new South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun acts in the style of GermanyÕs socialist Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder; that is play anti-American rhetoric for cheap rump political gain. RohÕs political posture has clouded strategic equations. Thus Washington is constrained not so much by impending military action in Iraq, but by a hesitant and less than harmonious relationship with the Seoul government.
Significantly, the U.S. maintains a Security Treaty with South Korea dating to the 1950Õs; 37,000 US forces are stationed on the divided peninsula as a Òtrip wireÓ to deter North Korean aggression. Pyongyang is pushing for a non-aggression pact with Washington;
still at the same time North Korea refuses to renounce the use of force against neighboring South Korea.
A non-aggression pact should be signed with South Korea, the longtime target of the North since the end of the Korean war in 1953. Seoul, the South Korean capital remains perilously close to the 38th parallel dividing the peninsula.
Diplomatic and economic sanctions against the DPRK would be purely symbolic, the Pyongyang communists have fostered a self-reliance Juche regimen reinforced by the cult-like adulation of their supreme leader Kim Jong-il. North Korea is isolated from the world evoking communist China in the sunset of the Maoist era in the 1970Õs.
And while cautious political dŽtente between both Korean states, the so-called Sunshine Policy, has brought a limited political thaw in the once glacial relations between the divided nation, this interaction contrasts the much closer contacts between formerly divided Germany or presently between communist China and Taiwan.
Beijing is being courted by Washington for its presumed political influence over Pyongyang. While the Chinese have traditionally been close to the DPRK, in recent years the North Koreans has viewed a nuclear device as gaining more political independence from its erstwhile Chinese comrades as well as bargaining power regionally.
Importantly, as President George W. Bush stresses, the entire Korean peninsula should become a nuclear weapons free zone.
While not overtly overreacting to the Korean crisis, the Bush Administration would be wise to calibrate a singularly focused strategy for the Spring to gain diplomatic support which can build into momentum in the post-Iraq phase. ThereÕs the danger in letting Iraq blindside us, only then to wake up to a North Korean nuclear nightmare.
John J. Metzler is a U.N. correspondent covering diplomatic and defense
issues. He writes weekly for World Tribune.com.
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