JEJU, South Korea - South Korea's premier warship, the destroyer Sejong,
equipped with the latest United States-designed Aegis counter-missile guidance
system, is cruising near this island off the southern Korean coast en route to
the waters of the East Sea for defense against North Korea's fearsome
Taepodong-2 long-range missile.
The deployment of the Sejong from the southern to the eastern side of
the Korean Peninsula highlights the alarm with which South Korea views North
Korea's determination to show off its prowess in modern weaponry. The North
claims it is capable of raining weapons of mass destruction as far as the US
west coast - and all over South Korea and Japan.
The presence of the Sejong in the East Sea also shows the high
level of cooperation among the military machines of the US, Japan and South
Korea as they wait for North Korea to make good on its threat to launch the
missile between April 4-8. The US has deployed two destroyers carrying Aegis
systems in the area while Japan has one ready to travel if it's not there
already.
There is just one problem with this show of military force: it's largely for
show.
The chances of any of these ships actually firing a missile capable of knocking
out the Taepodong-2 range from minimal to none, and the chances of a
counter-missile missile actually hitting the Taepodong-2 in flight are equally
low. No doubt about it, a successful strike against the Taepodong-2 would be a
sensational story, not just a humiliation for North Korea but a "provocation"
that could actually compel the North to engage in more than a rhetorical
response.
Right now, it's the US that's talking about a "provocation" - or, as Secretary
of State Hillary Clinton characterized the launch of Taepodong-2, "a
provocative act" that would compel a response. The US, she said, would bring up
the matter in the United Nations (UN) Security Council, taking North Korea to
task for violation of UN resolutions.
The threat of that type of response left little doubt that the United States,
Japan and South Korea are not prepared for military action before, during or
after the missile launch. The panoply of military might cruising the waters of
the East Sea, aka the Sea of Japan, may be awesome to contemplate, but its
potential for doing any real harm under the present circumstances is highly
circumscribed.
One reason for this is that the North Korean threat appears rather abstract,
despite the North's success in building missiles - and its accumulation of
nuclear, chemical and biological weapons of mass destruction.
No one seriously questions the view that the reason for launching the
Taepodong-2 is to test its effectiveness in warfare - and not to put a
satellite in orbit, as North Korea has repeatedly said it will do. Still, North
Korea, suffering from problems of hunger and disease, and in the midst of a
shadowy power struggle among generals and relatives of the ailing Dear Leader
Kim Jong-il, is in no position to consider a strike that would indeed invite
more than a rhetorical and diplomatic response from its adversaries.
Another reason is that North Korea's stated determination to put a satellite
into orbit, while possibly in violation of UN Security Council resolutions, is
actually not against international law. Many countries have launched
satellites. North Korea, cooperating with Iran on the technology of satellites
as well as missiles and nuclear weapons, would join a growing club of nations
with satellites in orbit.
The launch of the Taepodong-2, however, is likely to have repercussions that
could well jeopardize peace in the region - not right away, perhaps, but over
the next few years.
For one thing, North Korea has said that if the United States raises the issue
of the missile/satellite launch in the UN Security Council, then the process of
the six-party talks on its nuclear program is dead. North Korea has also said
that if the UN takes action, it will return to producing nuclear warheads, as
it was doing after the breakdown in 2002 of the 1994 Geneva agreement.
Failure of the talks, like so many other attempts to talk North Korea out of
its determination to be a nuclear power, would be an extremely disappointing
step backward, considering that North Korea has already begun disabling its
nuclear complex at Yongbyon on the basis of agreements reached in 2007.
For North Korea, however, to suggest that a Security Council debate would
destroy the process shows its extreme fragility. Obviously, if North Korea can
try to intimidate its enemies into silence, or frighten them away from a debate
in the UN, then probably the six-party process is already doomed.
Then there is the question of North Korea's relations not only with South Korea
but also with Japan.
North Korea's latest rhetorical blast against the South accuses the government
of President Lee Myung-bak of betraying the Korean people by allying with the
US and Japan in condemning its plans to launch a satellite. North Korea is
appealing to Korean national pride - not just that of South Koreans but of all
Koreans. North Korea believes Koreans, North and South, should be proud of the
ability of Koreans to put a satellite into orbit.
That's an appeal that may strike at the hearts of some Koreans in the South,
just as some South Koreans seemed proud that Koreans, North Koreans, were able
to detonate a nuclear warhead when North Korea conducted its first and only
nuclear test on October 9, 2006. The appeal evokes a disturbing reminder,
namely that the North Korean nuclear test was barely three months after the
launch of another Taepodong-2 on July 5, 2006. That mission failed when the
missile arced into the sea 40 seconds after launch, but this time North Korea
seems more certain of getting it right after nearly three years spent
perfecting the technology.
Then there is the question of the Japanese response. It's all very well for
South Korea, the US and Japan to act in concert against the upcoming launch,
but South Koreans will not want to be seen as an ally of Japan in an armed
struggle. And the Japanese will certainly not see North Korea's success in
missile and satellite technology as a point of pride worthy of applause.
In fact, the Japanese are talking about stern defensive measures against
Taepodong-2. Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada has ordered his forces to try to
shoot the thing down if it traverses Japanese territory, as a Taepodong-1 did
when it was launched on August 31, 1998, also on a mission that the North
Koreans said was to put a satellite into orbit.
The Japanese are talking boldly about firing up their ground-based Patriot
Advanced Capability 3 Interceptors and sending not one but two destroyers with
Aegis guidance systems to the waters between North Korea and Japan.
It would be quite surprising, though, if the Japanese were to take pot shots at
the missile when they don't know when the North Koreans will launch it or what
course it will follow. The chances of hitting it from land are if anything
worse than that of striking it down from one of those destroyers in the East
Sea.
The Japanese, though, are filled with more hatred for North Korea than either
Americans or South Koreans. Their governments have been pressing the cases of
Japanese kidnapped from North Korea, generating anti-Korean sentiments that
consciously or subconsciously spring from the centuries of wars between Koreans
and Japanese. These climaxed in 35 years of Japanese colonial rule over Korea
that did not end until Japan's defeat in World War II.
These complex historical factors crystallize in the missile launch - and in the
implications for war and peace in northeast Asia. The region, though, is not on
the brink of war - just in the midst of an outpouring of rhetoric, to be
followed by debate and possibly more negotiations some time after the North
Koreans have had their fun with the launch.
When the display of national pride is done, North Korean strategists will then
have to think about how best to extort more money out of governments willing to
curb their ambitions as usual by paying them off.
Journalist Donald Kirk has been covering Korea - and the confrontation of
forces in Northeast Asia - for more than 30 years.
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