You have commented 338 times on Rantburg.

Your Name
Your e-mail (optional)
Website (optional)
My Original Nic        Pic-a-Nic        Sorry. Comments have been closed on this article.
Bold Italic Underline Strike Bullet Blockquote Small Big Link Squish Foto Photo
Korea
North Korea: How Not to Handle a Tyrant
2003-07-31
C’mon, Rantburgers, don’t fade on me yet (lazy eastcoasters)... help me hate this:
There they go again. In a July 31 speech in Seoul, U.S. Undersecretary of State for Arms Control & International Security John Bolton called North Korean strongman Kim Jong Il one of the world’s "tyrannical rogue-state leaders" and mused publicly how Kim lives in luxury while his people starve. It reminds me of President Bush’s statement in March, 2001, that Kim couldn’t be trusted. Infatuated with what they consider candor, the Bush folks too often substitute rhetoric and name-calling for policy. O.K., so Kim is a tyrant and lives in luxury while his people starve. What’s U.S. policy toward North Korea? ...But their language is undiplomatic and counterproductive.
K, a fair and balanced look...
Such name-calling often generates fistfights on playgrounds. But on the world stage, comments like these merely raise the temperature on the volatile Korean Peninsula, enflaming Pyongyang’s paranoia about an imminent U.S. attack. And in the absence of a clear policy, such statements simply undermine America’s national-security interests. Indeed, what passes for North Korea policy in Washington already has been botched.
shoulda let DOD handle it
In pressing for talks with North Korea aimed at defusing tensions, the Bush team first insisted that Kim dismantle his nuclear programs before talks begin, then demanded that discussions take place only with South Korea, China, and Japan present. That was a nonstarter. Indeed, the Bush team already is backing off its demands. It already has met with just the North and China instead of all the parties. And it did so before any dismantling had taken place. The problem was that the Bush team has already met with just the North and China instead of all the parties. And it did so before any dismantling had taken place.
We are not supposed to solve world problems unilaterally... repeat... we must always solve world problems unilaterally
I'm sorry, but that string of statements is redundant and repeats itself and it's redundant. I'm not sure it makes any sense, either. Also. Too...
Further discussions will include the other players, an Administration official said on July 31, but they will take place before any North Korean nukes are taken apart. The purpose of the talks is to discuss ways to achieve a verifiable and irreversible destruction of North Korea’s nuclear program, the Administration now says. Nothing wrong with that — the goal makes perfect sense. My question: Why couldn’t this have happened long ago? I think divisions within the Administration are at least as much to blame for the delay as any intransigence from the Kim regime. The Bush Administration hasn’t had a coherent policy from the get-go....
Who has? North Korea? Ranting and raving and threatening a sea of fire isn't a coherent policy. It's not even coherent. South Korea? "Give them what they want — maybe they won't hurt us" may be coherent, but it's not a policy. China? If they had any idea what to do with their insane stepchild they'd have done it.
...So what should the U.S. do now? U.S. Representative Curt Weldon (R-Pa.), a shrewd foreign-policy expert, recently led a bipartisan congressional delegation to North Korea and came away with some reasonable proposals to break the logjam. To satisfy the North’s security concerns, Weldon suggests a one-year nonaggression pact between Washington and Pyongyang.
...we have one, it’s called an "armistice"
Washington also would recognize Kim’s regime and open a mission in Pyongyang. In return, the North would renounce its nuclear-weapons program, permit inspections of its nuclear facilities, help develop a complete inventory of its weapons and materials, and rejoin the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. And in the final part of the first phase, the U.S., both Koreas, Japan, Russia, and China would hammer out an economic and security arrangement for the Korean Peninsula, with funding of up to $5 billion a year in aid for a decade.
So we meet with the NKORs privately and negotiate a deal that the rest of the world will just show up and sign... simplisme, no?
After all this happens, the nonaggression pact would become permanent. To stop the North’s weapons proliferation, it would be required to sign the Missile Technology Control Regime. The Stalinist state also would have to lay out a timetable for improving human rights and assume observer status with the Helsinki Commission, a U.S. agency that monitors democratic, economic, and human-rights developments. And in one of Weldon’s pet projects, Congress would establish links with North Korea’s parliament to develop programs on everything from agriculture to judicial systems to environmental cooperation. This scheme has much to recommend it. It should allay North Korean fears of a U.S. attack and defang Kim’s nukes. It would give the North Koreans the legitimacy they crave at little cost to the U.S. It also would demonstrate solidarity among North Korea’s neighbors — something the Bush Administration has sought with mixed results so far. The success of the Weldon plan depends on key factors that are also still unknowns: Does Pyongyang intend to develop nukes regardless of what the U.S. does? Can Pyongyang be integrated into the world economic community in this timeframe? Finally, can any deal be verified and enforced? After all, U.S. intelligence knew nothing about the highly enriched uranium program for years. As things stand now, the North could destroy that operation and its Yongbyan facility, and we still wouldn’t know of a third, fourth, or fifth site where nuclear work might be ongoing. Then again, we won’t know the answers until the U.S., North Korea, and its neighbors sit down, talk, draft a proposal, and sign it. The sooner, the better, for everyone. In the meantime, Bush and his aides would do well to stop the name-calling.
AAAAGGGHHH!!!
Please edit, with a bullet. On second thought dump the whole mag. Business Week???
Posted by:Mark IV

#5  Thanks, guys... sometimes, it gets late, and ya think you're the only one.

11-alpha, you're right, this really defies comment. You can zero in on "unknowns: Does Pyongyang intend to develop nukes regardless of what the U.S. does?"..."Then again, we won’t know the answers until the U.S., North Korea, and its neighbors sit down, talk, draft a proposal, and sign it," and marvel, but then you back up and go through it again, and a whole new world of Korean roulette opens.

Taro-sama nails it... dontcha think all diplospeak is calculated for effect? Even, in their crude and bizarre way, the NKOR's (give us money or we'll make a fuss)?

So maybe ours' means, "no and shut up" or maybe it means "5 bil is too high, let's talk 1.5 and a pretense at human rights". Or maybe it means, "check out Baghdad, and we weren't even pissed at them."

Their dice, their move. Dontcha guess wrong now, y'hear?


Posted by: Mark IV   2003-8-1 12:23:44 AM  

#4  First of all, I am continually amazed that people here complain when we note that Pyongyang is a brutal dictatorship that starves its own people. We are "not helping matters" when we do that.

On the other hand, when North Korea routinely threatens to turn Seoul into a "sea of fire" that is just their quaint way of saying "let's talk."

More basically, I'm simply astounded that people argue that we can trust the psychopaths of Pyongyang. They are SO paranoid that even if we signed a perpetual non-aggression pact and pledged $5 billion a year in aid they'd STILL think the clever round-eyes were plotting to invade!

If they think we plan to invade with a 2-brigade 2nd Infantry Division--or that Seoul would join us--they cannot be convinced we aren't out to get them.

I'm not sure what the solution is but we won't be safe until the regime in Pyongyang is gone.

This decade sucks...
Posted by: BJD (The Dignified Rant)   2003-7-31 11:44:42 PM  

#3  Mark IV: This is so bad and on so many levels, I don't know where to begin. History? Logic? Negotiating 101? I think instead we should leave it alone to stand as a monument to shortsightedness, appeasement, and pomposity. In those ways, it is truly a masterpiece.
Posted by: 11A5S   2003-7-31 11:20:13 PM  

#2  Notice the assumption that the name-calling and it's effect on the Nork negotiations was not deliberate. Nope, that would mean that Administration wasn't just a bunch of simplistic, bumbling, bullies. Couldn't be that the administration is playing a game deeper than Business Week can grasp. Nah just a faux pas from a loose cannon, big-mouthed clumsy Bush team.

Would it be crass at this point to mention that the Norks, and everyone else, is free to talk trash all the time. You know: Imperialist aggressors, running amok, and all that...

Bolton's speech appears to have preceeded the recent announcements about possible 6-way talks. Does anyone know this? It would be interesting if it did. Even more interesting if it didn't.
Posted by: Tokyo Taro   2003-7-31 10:59:59 PM  

#1  You develop them, we'll show you how they work. We'll use Big Kimmie's massive statue as an aiming point. That ought to calm Pyongyang. Permanently.
Posted by: tu3031   2003-7-31 10:57:16 PM  

00:00