It’s Time to Strangle North Korea
It would be better to do this before Kim Jong Il fires a nuclear-tipped missile in our direction.
In the absence of verification, Pyongyang’s promises are worthless. Actually, they have been worse than worthless because they have inhibited Washington from thinking of more effective strategies for disarming the militant state. The United States has been directly talking with North Korea since June 1993. Negotiations since then have been bilateral and multilateral, formal and informal. They have been conducted in the capitals of the participants and in neutral settings. Every conceivable format has been tried at least once. Talks have been everything but successful.
Almost everyone says that diplomacy carries no cost. Yet that is not true. North Korea did not have the bomb in June 1993. Today it does, and its missile program is far more advanced. In short, negotiations have given dangerous despots — Kim Jong Il and his now-departed dad, Kim Il Sung — what they needed most in order to arm themselves: time.
North Korea, despite its statement yesterday, did not end its participation in the nuclear talks and turn its back on agreements because of the Security Council’s weak criticism. Kim Jong Il, unfortunately, inherited the most militarized nation on earth — and then further elevated the position of the army with his songun, or “military first,” policy. North Korea is unique among one-party states in that the ruling Korean Workers’ Party is subordinate to another institution in society. Kim relied on the generals to consolidate his position after the death of his dad in 1994. Now, he is once again dependent on the top brass as he is in ill-health — recovering from one or more strokes last August — and needs its support for his plans to pass power to one of his sons.
North Korea has been trying to weaponize the atom since at least the early 1980s and maybe even as early as the mid-1960s. The generals are not going to give up their most destructive weapon just because Foreign Ministry officials have signed pieces of paper with foreigners. We would like to think we live in a rational age where disputes can be settled by conversation in large rooms. Nonetheless, hostile regimes do not always share our vision of international relations.
Today, there have been the predictable calls for going back to the bargaining table. For example, Harvard’s Hui Zhang contends that we must negotiate because, among other reasons, the North Koreans might sell fissile material or nukes to other countries. Yet while we were talking in Beijing in the six-party context, Pyongyang was transferring nuclear technology to Iran and Syria. The proliferation threat posed by Kim Jong Il is ongoing — and ignored in Washington by both the Obama administration and its predecessor.
So let’s take the North Koreans at their word, walk away from the talks, and strangle their horrible regime. It would be better to do this before Chairman Kim — or some renegade colonel — fires a nuclear-tipped missile in our direction. Or helps the Iranians to do the same.
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Gordon G. Chang is the author of Nuclear Showdown: North Korea Takes On the World and The Coming Collapse of China.
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17 Comments
1. john from cinncinatti:if the little guy doesn’t want to talk ok, but lets not invite him to dinner. just don’t send food. he will get the message. the more we beg the more he plays hard to get.
Apr 15, 2009 - 8:38 am 2. Barry 0351:NO, let The NorKs shoot and hit the United States then unload on their asses. To do otherwise is to invite condemnation from the world and the DHS will have more veterans to declare as “domestic terrorist” who wants their children to go and suffer fighting for a government that will consider them a danger after their service.
Apr 15, 2009 - 10:11 am 3. Patvann:Just a point of clarification. If there is an nuclear accident in N.Korea, the predominant winds go south, and/or southeast depending on the season.
Apr 15, 2009 - 10:50 am 4. Gordon Chang:john from cinncinatti, you wrote: “the more we beg the more he plays hard to get.” Yes, but, surprisingly, Washington does not adjust its policies to take your observation into account. We always fall for Kim’s strategms, so he naturally continues them.
Apr 15, 2009 - 12:47 pm 5. Gordon Chang:Barry 0351, we cannot wait until Kim launches, considering the damage of what even one nuke can cause. But our response now does not have to be military. We haven’t tried effective diplomacy yet.
Apr 15, 2009 - 12:50 pm 6. Gordon Chang:Patvann, I think you’re right about the prevailing winds, but, as Chernobyl showed, radiation travels in all directions.
Apr 15, 2009 - 12:52 pm 7. Nemrod:Gordan Chang, apparently “we” haven’t tried effective diplomacy yet because no-one knows what that might be. I suggest B2 bombers loaded with B61-11 earth penetrating bombs.
Apr 15, 2009 - 2:37 pm 8. Roderick Reilly:Ladies and germs:
I detest Kim Jong Il as much as any of you, and am in favor of the N. Korena people killing and eating the little bastard along with the entire NoKo leadership — I’ll even supply the Kim Chi.
But I have to tell you: N. Korea has no proven nuclear arsenal. I have seen no accounts that confirm the “nuclear test” of a couple of years ago was a success. It seems that effort was an implosion dud that failed to cause fission. If anyone knows better, please let us know. And when you do, please tell us what happened to Saddam’s WMD.
As to the “nuclear-tipped missile,” let me teach you a little rocket science: That pencil-thin rocket couldn’t carry any warhead that N. Korea could possibly produce. Unless they somehow proccured a mini-nuke, AND found a way to make a working re-entry nose cone, they have no capability to deliver a nuke by missile. Got that?
Here’s what that demented stroke-crippled midget is doing: He is playing a bluffing game that he has determined works against the West and Japan. He realizes that he doesn’t need a working bomb or a working, delivery-capable missile. He can send our metrosexual, striped-pantsed diplo-idiots into a swoon by performing a series of technical-failure stunts. It’s working for him isn’t it?
And speaking of midgets, many N. Korean soldiers are only 5 ft. tall due to malnutrition. While a N. Korean invasion of the South would wreak havoc, N. Korea would lose this new war badly.
Amazing what a little knowledge done by gleaning and reading can do to put things in perspective, isn’t it?
Apr 15, 2009 - 2:52 pm 9. Blackhorse Doc:Ah, million man army, right next to the South Korean capitol. You might want to take some care!
Apr 15, 2009 - 9:21 pm 10. typos_R_us:“Ah, million man army, right next to the South Korean capitol. You might want to take some care!”
Wake up Blackhorse! This is the 21st century. A one million man army just means a higher body count. Those 1 million men are barely armed. No C3 to speak of. No night vision gear, no modern aircraft, no modern armor. Very little fuel, ammo or food.
Apr 16, 2009 - 5:24 am 11. Gordon Chang:Cannon fodder.
We have nothing to fear except fear itself.
ROK has around 600,000 men. Armed with state of the art armor, more modern aircraft, lots of food and as much fuel as they need.
Nemrod, we know what effective diplomacy looks like. For example, see this: http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/disarming-north-korea-once-in-a-generation-opportunity/
Apr 16, 2009 - 12:27 pm 12. Gordon Chang:Roderick Reilly, yes, but time permits the improvement of all weapons. The time to deal with him is now, when his weapons are still in their initial stages.
And although we are focused on missiles at this moment, Kim does not need one to deliver a bomb. He can use one of his rusted merchant ships or a pickup truck.
Apr 16, 2009 - 12:33 pm 13. Roderick Reilly:“”"”"Roderick Reilly, yes, but time permits the improvement of all weapons. The time to deal with him is now, when his weapons are still in their initial stages.
And although we are focused on missiles at this moment, Kim does not need one to deliver a bomb. He can use one of his rusted merchant ships or a pickup truck”"”"”
Gordon, appreciate your reply. I do agree that dealing with a potentially dangerous adversary while they’re still weak is a good strategy — no argument there. I was pointing out — perhaps not clearly enough — that we have to be clear-eyed about what capabilities N. Korea does and does not have. I have no problem with getting tough with Kim Jong Il and his gang, but the world’s leaders do, and they are being buffaloed into a silly game by N. Korea by ascribing capabilities to N. Korea that it doesn’t have; as a result, he gets concessions from them even though they bluster about “consequences”. Wouldn’t it make more sense for negotiators to sit down and tell the N. Koreans that we know they’re weak, that we know they’d lose a war, that we know their “missile” is useless, and we know they have no working nukes, so cut the crap, and oh — by the way — we’re giving you NOTHING. Bye. I think we’d be amazed and gratified at what would happen.
As to the “rusted merchant ship” or pickup truck, again, he needs to have an actual bomb, and not a “dirty bomb,” (dirty bombs are for terrorists — he fancies himself a major player) but one that’s an actual fission weapon. Also, he would need to be able to sneak it into a harbor somewhere. If he has a third-party try this stunt, he first needs to be able to deliver it to them. While Western, Japanese and Chinese surveillance and intelligence systems may have flaws and holes, such activity — especially with N. Korea — are monitored and looked for. Also, I don’t think that “Lil’ Kim” would be willing to give up a single one of his nukes, because, again, they function as his “blackmailer’s Fort Knox” rather than the bombs he may eventually posess being intended to ever be used. WHEN he eventually has any real bombs, they’ll never leave “the vault.” THAT is his game. And forget the pickup truck. The geography and border security in those areas make that option problematic for N. Korea — not impossible — but not a viable option. Again, he’s going to sit on any nukes his people may manage to actually build.
Again, by all means, we should work hard to bring him down, and DO let him know that WE KNOW he’s weak and vulnerable.
Apr 16, 2009 - 3:25 pm 14. Gordon Chang:Roderick Reilly, many thanks for your sensible comments. I agree with your negotiating strategy. I encourage you to write widely about it.
I agree that Kim will try to keep his weapons, but he may not care what happens in some circumstances. After all, is not always deterred by mass death, as we saw in the great famine last decade. When he had the means to save everyone, he adopted policies that could only have resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands–and perhaps millions–of his fellow Koreans. And that is in fact what happened.
Apr 16, 2009 - 7:59 pm 15. Roderick Reilly:Thank you, Gordon, for your kind comments. Yes, you are correct that Kim cares not for his people. Somehow, somewhen, the other shoe is going to drop on N. Korea. It remains to be seen what the consequences will be.
Apr 17, 2009 - 2:36 pm 16. gh:Gordon.
I am so impressed by your comment section that I will try to start reading your blog regularly. Heard about you from Derb on NRO.
Apr 18, 2009 - 10:06 am 17. Gordon Chang:gh, thanks for your encouragement. I learn tons from commenters in this forum.
Apr 19, 2009 - 1:06 pm