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Bush's Pyongyang 'appeasement' draws
fire
By Tim Shorrock
WASHINGTON - After three weeks of confusing and
erratic rhetoric from the White House about North
Korea's nuclear intentions, US President George W Bush
finally settled on a strategy last week that combines
diplomacy - although not negotiations - with promises to
Pyongyang of energy assistance and a "bold approach"
involving diplomatic and security agreements. Meanwhile,
Korea's neighbors have stepped up their efforts to
resolve the crisis, climaxed by Sunday's "very
substantive" meeting between Russian Deputy Foreign
Minister Alexander Losyukov and North Korean President
Kim Jong-il.
But now the US reaction to Bush's
policies is setting in, and cries of "appeasement" are
in the air. The outraged response from conservatives to
the administration's focus on engagement rather than
confrontation underscores the difficulties Bush will
have in selling a future agreement to Congress. Its also
a sobering reminder of the partisan political climate
that led president Bill Clinton to delay key elements of
the 1994 Agreed Framework with North Korea - and may
have led hardliners in Pyongyang to believe that they
were misled by the United States when they agreed to
shut down their nuclear program in return for promises
of economic aid and a normalization of ties.
The
sharpest attack on Bush's policies came last Friday from
Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer, who
frequently says in print what right-wing hawks are often
afraid to say in public. "The Bush position on North
Korea," he wrote, "is in total collapse. In less than a
month we have gone from 'tailored containment' to
shoeless appeasement. It usually takes longer." Bush's
offer of economic aid and "even diplomatic agreements
and security guarantees", he went on, "goes far beyond
carrots. This is cake with the cherry on top. Moreover,
it is futile. No carrot or confection will stop the
North Korean nuclear program." The "abject Korea cave-in
is a threat to American credibility everywhere", he
concluded.
Many lawmakers apparently agree with
Krauthammer. Last week, a bipartisan coalition proposed
legislation that would establish a much tougher approach
to Pyongyang. The bill, introduced by Republican
Senators Jon Kyl, John McCain and Jeff Session and
Democrat Evan Bayh, would declare the Agreed Framework
as "null and void" as result of North Korea's "illicit
and deceitful actions". It would also prohibit any
further US assistance to Pyongyang or the Korea
Peninsula Energy Development Organization, the
consortium building the two light-water waters designed
to replace the Soviet-built reactor at Yongbyon that
North Korea started up again in response to the latest
tensions.
The legislation, if adopted, would
declare that North Korea's pursuit of nuclear weapons
"represents a serious threat to the security of the
United States" and impose the strict sanction regime the
Clinton administration lifted in 1999 as part of the
Agreed Framework. And it would require the United States
to intercept North Korean ships carrying missiles and
begin a major buildup of US forces in Asia to ensure
"the highest level of deterrence". Kyl said at a news
conference: "Our goal is to avoid conflict and secure a
verifiable agreement so that North Korea abandons its
nuclear ambitions."
The endorsement of the bill
by McCain, the only major Republican to challenge Bush
in the 2000 presidential primaries, is significant. He
has emerged as the leading spokesman for Republican
hardliners on Korea. Last week he was all over the media
blasting Bush's policies in North Korea as "reckless"
and comparing them unfavorably to Clinton's - a serious
charge for an administration that has done everything it
could to distance itself from its predecessor.
"This administration has got to make it clear
that they [the North Koreans] must comply with the
agreements that they made before we make further offers
of food or oil or anything else," McCain told CNN.
"Particularly odious is propping up a regime that is so
outrageously oppressive." Later on CBS, he warned Bush
against pursuing "the failed policies of the past" and
urged a more confrontational approach. "That means
United Nations sanctions, that means working with our
allies to impose economic sanctions on the North
Koreans, and not ruling out any option," he said.
Such criticisms are not only coming from the
right. At a forum on Korea sponsored last week by the
liberal Brookings Institution, several speakers voiced
dismay at the Bush administration's decision to declare
openly that the United States will not use military
force against North Korea. A military strike is "still
an option we have to consider", said Michael O'Hanlon, a
senior fellow in foreign-policy studies. The United
States, he added, "could at minimum threaten to bomb"
North Korea's reactors, "Osirak style". That's a
reference to Israel's 1981 strike that destroyed an
Iraqi reactor.
Such proposals have largely been
rejected by Democratic leaders in the Senate as well as
top Republicans involved in foreign policy, such as
Senator Richard Shelby, the incoming chairman of the
Senate Intelligence Committee, and Senator Richard
Lugar, who will chair the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee. Both men have endorsed talks with North Korea
that would allow US officials to express their concerns
about Pyongyang's nuclear program while hearing directly
from Kim Jong-il about what the North Korean government
seeks.
Widespread resistance to diplomacy,
particularly in Congress, could seriously jeopardize a
future settlement. Over the past few days, US officials,
including Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage,
have ruled out North Korea's demand for a non-aggression
treaty because of a perception that the Senate would
refuse to ratify it. Instead, "we're thinking of ways
that involve a formal, signed statement from the United
States, and maybe a parallel statement from the [UN]
Security Council," a senior administration official told
the New York Times.
The big question is whether
such a settlement would satisfy politicians and analysts
who prefer a tougher policy that includes broader
economic sanctions, or hope that Kim Jong-il's regime
will collapse before the United States signs a formal
agreement. "The US should treat North Korea as a
violator of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty,
declare it ineligible to receive the technology promised
in the [Agreed Framework] and wait the current North
Korean regime out," Henry Sokolski, the executive
director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education
Center, declared in the Los Angeles Times on Sunday.
At the same time, it is unclear whether anything
short of a non-aggression treaty would satisfy the
hardliners in Pyongyang. Many longtime observers of
North Korea now believe that without a formal agreement
with Washington, Kim Jong-il is dead-set on acquiring
nuclear weapons.
"I think they're going
straightforward with a nuclear option," Don Oberdorfer,
author of The Two Koreas, said at the Brookings
forum. To prevent that, he said, the United States
should consider sending a high-ranking envoy with
international prestige to Pyongyang. "It's going to take
somebody of a fairly senior status" in the US government
to begin the "serious discussions and negotiations"
required to end the standoff, Oberdorfer said.
(©2003 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd. All rights
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