Topic: North Korea

So the new American ambassador to South Korea, Alexander Vershbow, announced his presence by calling North Korea a criminal regime.

Okay, so North Korea did manage to poke America in the eye, which is what triggered Vershbow's harsh words. North Korea insisted that the US lift economic sanctions, threatening to walk out of the negotiations if we didn't. So Vershbow as explaining why we weren't going to back down on this issue:

This is a criminal regime, and we can't somehow remove our sanctions as a political gesture when this regime is engaging in dangerous activities such as weapons exports to rogue states, narcotics trafficking as a state activity and counterfeiting of our money on a large scale.

Nevertheless, it was totally unnecessary to poke back. We could have said simply that the sanctions, like everything else, could be discussed at the Six-Party Talks once North Korea has dismantled its nuclear program.

Unfortunately, as has so often been the case with the Bush administration, we seem to have decided that a tough stance was worth more than actual progress. What did we gain with our tough talk? If North Korea walks out on the negotiations, we will have succeeded in highlighting our impotence on the Korean Peninsula.

Whatever happened to walking softly and carrying a big stick? At the moment, our big stick is looking stretched and fragile in Iraq, and still our government insists on shouting when a few quiet words would do.

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Topic: North Korea

Slate today has a photo essay on North Korea. Nothing earth-shattering here, but notice that every single picture emphasizes collective activity. In North Korea, no one is ever alone.

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Topic: North Korea

Reuters is reporting that North Korea is ready to scrap its nuclear program in exchange for better relations with the United States, Japan and South Korea. This is a bit of a shift from the DPRK's earlier stance that it would give up its nuclear weapons only if it received a light-water nuclear reactor for power generation, something the United States has been understandable reluctant to provide.

As is so often the case with North Korea, the information arrived in a roundabout way: South Korea's Grand National Party, the main opposition party, announced in a public statement that Ambassador Ning Fukui, China's envoy to Seoul, had said that North Korea was ready to dismantle its nuclear program.

No one yet knows the source of Ambassador Ning's view, or even whether he really said what he's been quoted as saying. If it's true, however, it bodes well for future talks, which will probably start up again within the next month or so.

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Topic: North Korea

I give enormous credit to the creative thinking that led the South Koreans to offer North Korea not just food aid, but also significant amounts of electricity if the North gives up its nuclear weapons. The surprising offer was enough to get the North Koreans back to the six-party negotiating table, although it remains to be seen whether the North plans to negotiate in anything like good faith.

I'm not an expert on the North Koreans, but it seems to me that their demands and concerns have stayed remarkably consistent over time, at least in recent years. Reuters today, quoting from Xinhua, reported an official of the North Korean Foreign Ministry as saying, "Not a single nuclear weapon will be needed for us if the U.S. nuclear threat is removed and its hostile policy of 'bringing down the DPRK's system' is withdrawn." This is in line with previous North Korean statements focused on the threat that they justifiably feel from the large U.S. military presence on their border, coupled with our tough talk about the evil of their regime.

Of course, the United States can't withdraw its nuclear weapons from the Korean peninsula because we don't have any there (or at least that's been our line for years, though there are dissenting views). In any case, nuclear-armed submarines and missiles on Okinawa could make quick work of Pyongyang if we so chose, and North Korea is not likely to get us to withdraw all our nukes from the region, especially because of our security commitments to Taiwan. Nor are we likely to satisfy the North Koreans by withdrawing our troops from the peninsula, or even from the DMZ.

Nevertheless, there is plenty that we can do, much of it at minimal actual cost. We could, for example, end the Korean war. To us, the distinction between armistice and peace is irrelevant, and we would be watching North Korea closely either way. But to the North Koreans it would be deeply meaningful. The North Koreans' evident satisfaction at being called a "sovereign state" by various American officials is a reminder that such recognition has not always been forthcoming. Keep in mind that we only allowed North Korea to join the United Nations in 1991, and it was in 1994 that we nearly went to war with them. One can see why they're nervous, and we could reassure them that our goal is not to topple their regime or destroy their country, but to coax them toward liberalization.

In such a context, the South Korean electricity offer is a step in the right direction. What is needed, above all, is economic engagement with the North, which would gradually raise living standards — and expectations — among its people, at the same time creating webworks of interdependency that would make bellicosity too costly. I have read that many North Koreans want a war with the South, and soon: they are starving anyway, they figure, and they've always been told such a war is inevitable, so if they have to die, they might as well get it over with. Even a small amount of economic opportunity would go far in alleviating this popular sentiment in favor of suicide.

This is, more or less, the model that the West followed with China, and it has been enormously successful. No, China is not democratic, and yes, it violates human rights on a massive scale. But hundreds of millions of people have been lifted from dire poverty to middle-class comfort, while China's complex economic interdependence with the West means that it must consider the consequences before it makes any dramatic move. And certainly a North Korea that resembled today's China would be a massive improvement on what we've got now.

This kind of engagement with North Korea can only happen if the United States is willing to assure the North that its survival is not in doubt. I don't see why this should be a problem so long as North Korea agrees to dismantle its nuclear weapons and allow thorough inspections for verification. We could still keep our troops at the ready, and there is nothing in such an assurance that would stop us from defending South Korea, or anywhere else, should the North Koreans commit an act of aggression. At present, our main motivation for attacking the North first is to disable its nuclear weapons. If they give them up, why shouldn't we give a security assurance?

The talks begin on July 25. We'll see what comes of them.

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Topic: North Korea

It's happening again.

When I was in South Korea, a statistic came out that in 2000, South Koreans threw away more food than North Korea ate. This was perhaps a sign of profligacy on the South's part, but it was also a sign that the North was starving.

Now, after a couple of years of relative plenty, meaning bare subsistance for many, North Korea is again slipping into famine. To see what this means in human terms, click here, here and here. (Warning: the images are deeply disturbing.)

The return of famine is sure to be a subject of discussion in renewed talks with South Korea ? talks that mark the first meaningful progress with North Korea since the last round of the Six-Party Talks broke off last June. And it highlights the sickening evil of the North Korean regime, which cannot find the means to feed its people but nevertheless goes on spending precious resources and political capital on nuclear weapons.

It reminds me of a cartoon I saw after India tested its nukes: it showed a giant missile being pulled by a donkey cart. But while some 450 million Indians were said to be malnourished at the time, India at least has not had a major famine since independence. And its nuclear program was a major plank in the platform of a democratically elected government. Even so, India's fear mongering and its gigantic waste of resources on nuclear weapons and on soldiers to defend Kashmir are deeply shameful.

How much more so, then, for North Korea, which seems intent on defending its people to the death.

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Topic: North Korea

Ever wonder what it's like to grow up in North Korea?

When Jenny and I were in South Korea, we got a kick out of a curious TV show called Peninsula Scope, a half-hour news magazine about North Korea broadcast on Arirang, South Korea's government-sponsored English-language TV channel. This was, of course, a dicey affair. The show was established during a thaw between the two Koreas, so it bent over backward to find nice things to say, remaining relentlessly upbeat about reconciliation and reunification even as the political situation worsened. (The show was cancelled at the end of 2004.) But it couldn't be too nice, because South Korea's harsh Security Law remains in force, threatening "Up to 7 years in prison for those who praise, encourage, disseminate or cooperate with anti-state groups [read: North Korea], members or those under their control [read: North Koreans]."

But by far the best part of Peninsula Scope came at the end of each episode, when they would show a North Korean cartoon. They're not good exactly, but they're fascinatingly weird. You can check them out at Peninsula Scope's video on demand page (free registration required). They're definitely worth a look.

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Topic: North Korea

According to the lede in today's Times, China has ruled out using economic sanctions against North Korea to pressure it to return to the six-party talks. This means that the one really viable tool the US might have had against North Korea is off the table.

As the article continues, though, it suggests that pretty much every part of the current situation is ambiguous. Are the North Koreans planning to test a nuclear weapon? No one is sure what the satellite pictures indicate, nor whether the North Koreans are bluffing. Has China really ruled out cuts to its oil and food shipments to North Korea, which are pretty much all that is keeping the regime afloat? Some officials think the Chinese may be making sanguine statements in public but privately telling the North Koreans a different story. What does it all mean? No one knows.

I can understand China's position. They've already got a problematic trickle of refugees coming across their border with North Korea, and a regime collapse could turn that into a massive wave. Nor is China entirely certain of its own ethnic Koreans living in Manchuria, whom the Chinese fear could develop separatist ambitions. For China, nail-biting stability is perhaps preferable to the chaos that might be triggered if the North Korean regime is substantially weakened.

Still, if China is unwilling to cut off supplies, then there is essentially nothing the rest of the world can do with North Korea except wait and cajole, or else go to war. So far, fortunately, no one seems to be leaning toward the latter option, which would be disastrous on a scale the West hasn't had to deal with since the Second World War.

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Topic: North Korea

So it looks like North Korea is getting ready for a nuclear test, and the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Mohamed ElBaradei, is now warning of serious consequences if North Korea goes ahead with the test.

What, I wondered, might those consequences be? I went and asked one of my colleagues about the situation, and he said that a nuclear test would probably lead to "discussion" of North Korea in the Security Council, possibly leading to sanctions.

Oh.

The good in this is that no one seems to be talking about launching military strikes against North Korea, as people do rather casually about Iran. Any military action against North Korea can be expected to trigger massive retaliation against South Korea, not to mention Japan and possibly even China, all of whose capitals are within range of North Korea's missiles. As such, the only conceivable justification for an attack on North Korea would be a North Korean attack on someone else. This is a nightmare scenario to be avoided by pretty much any means possible.

Short of war, then, what can the world do? Talk tough and impose sanctions. North Korea doesn't have much to lose economically — it's hard to get much poorer than starving — but it does rely on China for fuel, and without that, it's not clear how long the regime could keep going. That's something that could actually scare Pyongyang. The problem, of course, is that no one knows what happens next if the regime does indeed collapse.

The best hope for all involved is that the threat of sanctions brings North Korea back to the negotiating table, and that indeed may be what all this fuss is about in the first place. At the same time that it's preparing for a nuclear test, North Korea is also saying it would like to talk. Kim Jong-il seems to enjoy escalating crises before stepping back, so we'll see.

My colleague told me that June is the critical month, because June will mark one year since the North Koreans pulled out of the Six-Party Talks. So if there is no nuclear test now, watch to see what happens then.

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Topic: North Korea

Christopher Hitchens argues in Slate that North Korea is a slave state, worse than the dystopia of Orwell's 1984, where the entire population is not only enslaved but starving.

Hitchens concludes with a set of recommendations:

It seems to me imperative that the human rights movement, hitherto unpardonably tongue-tied about all this, should insistently take up the case of North Korea and demand that an underground railway, or perhaps even an overground one, be established. Any Korean slave who can get out should be welcomed, fed, protected, and assisted to move to South Korea. Other countries, including our own, should announce that they will take specified numbers of refugees, in case the current steady trickle should suddenly become an inundation.

I think he's on the right track. We may not have a solution to the North Korea problem immediately at hand, any more than we had a solution to the Soviet problem in the 1980s, but the policy then of highlighting human rights abuses, shaming the Soviets and supporting dissidents was morally and tactically the right one, and the same should be true for North Korea today.

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Topic: North Korea

So have you been itching for a vacation, but uncertain where to go? Why not try North Korea! This fascinating post on Boing Boing provides links to a must-watch Flash movie put out by the [North] Korean Friendship Association, along with some bizarre exchanges they had with the North Korean organization regarding bandwidth.

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