Asia Times: COMMENT: How to end North Korea's missile program



	June 12, 1999	atimes.com

The Koreas

COMMENT: How to end North Korea's missile program
By Leon V. Sigal

NEW YORK - The recent visit to Pyongyang by former Secretary of DefenseWilliam Perry marks the end of cold war confrontation in Korea and the start ofreconciliation between former foes. Most important, the visit opens the way forNorth Korea to trade in its ballistic missile program for political and economicengagement with the United States.

Some members of Congress want to impede engagement in the misguided beliefthat the way to get the North Koreans to abandon their nuclear ambitions is todemonize them as outlaws and force them to disarm. But acrime-and-punishment approach will not succeed.

The United States has four main objectives:

*Assure that, whatever happens internally in North Korea, the artillery Pyongyang has placed within range of Seoul is never fired in anger;

*Prevent North Korea from acquiring nuclear arms;

*Keep North Korea from developing, testing, deploying and selling any more medium- or long-range ballistic missiles;

*Promote reconciliation between the two Koreas and the peaceful reunification of the peninsula.

The only way to achieve these goals is to test whether North Korea is willing tocooperate. Coercion will not work. In fact, it is likely to encourage behavior that is exactly the opposite of what the United States seeks to encourage.

Some in Congress think it's in the nation's interest to encourage North Korea'scollapse. But this course is too risky, especially if the first three objectives havenot been achieved. Even benign neglect could turn out not to be very benign.

Others want to condition U.S. aid on change or reform in North Korea. Yet changewill come when North Korea lets in more outsiders, who bring with them adviceand assistance. Again, this can happen only with Pyongyang's cooperation.

There is significant evidence that Pyongyang wants to cooperate. If, as mostpeople in Washington believed, North Korea had been determined to acquirenuclear arms in the early 1990s, it could have shut down its nuclear reactor andquickly reprocessed the spent fuel to extract plutonium, the explosive ingredientin bombs.

But it did not reprocess any spent fuel. Neither did it shut down its reactor, untilMay 1994 - long after it was expected to do so. Even then, it allowed internationalinspectors to verify the procedure. That was a strange way to acquire nucleararms. It suggests that, starting in 1991, North Korea was restraining itselfsomewhat in the hopes of concluding a nuclear deal with the United States.

Similarly, if North Korea is determined to develop, deploy and exportlonger-range ballistic missiles, as some in Congress believe, it should have beentesting and perfecting its Nodong, Taepodong-I and Taepodong-II missiles forseveral years.

Yet the North did not conduct any tests from May 23, 1993, until August 31, 1998.Again, that is a strange way to develop new missiles. It suggests that NorthKorea is restraining itself somewhat in the hopes of concluding a missile dealwith the United States. Pyongyang has been expressing interest in such a dealsince 1992.

Why is North Korea showing self-restraint? There is no way to know for sure,but it may want the United States to assure its security against a South Korea itfears, a Japan it hates, and a China it distrusts. What better way to restrainSouth Korea and Japan and have a counterweight to China than to cooperatewith the United States?

While security remains its paramount concern, the collapse of communism in theSoviet Union and Eastern Europe and the economic transformation of China haveled the North to seek aid, investment and trade from the West to deal with itsown stricken economy.

So if North Korea wants engagement with the United States, why does it digsuspicious-looking tunnels and test missiles? Unfortunately, Pyongyang haslearned that threats are the only way to get Washington to negotiate in earnest,a lesson Washington keeps reinforcing by its own inaction in the absence of suchthreats.

But threats to break the 1994 Agreed Framework are not the same as breakingit. U.S. inspectors confirmed on a recent visit that the tunnels are indeed empty,further evidence that North Korea has been punctilious in observing the accord.

North Korea's expressed interest in a missile deal is a sign of its larger purpose:to end its lifelong enmity with the United States. American economic sanctions,dating from the Korean War, are a monument to that enmity. Ending theembargo is the key to a missile deal.

Without meaningful political and economic engagement on the part of the UnitedStates, the North is unlikely to agree to any meaningful military disengagement.How can Pyongyang be expected to deal while the Trading with the Enemy Actremains in force?

(Leon V. Sigal, a consultant at the Social Science Research Council, is the author ofDisarming Strangers: Nuclear Diplomacy with North Korea. This comment was distributed by The Global Beat Syndicate, a service of New York University's Center for War, Peace, and the News Media. (c) 1999 New York University. All Rights Reserved.)

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