Oh no! It’s attack of the killer “direct talks” monkeys!
In a recent editorial, the New York Times criticizes calls by two former Clinton advisers to destroy North Korea’s Taepodong 2 missile satellite launch vehicle on the ground. Fair enough—I thought it was a bad idea, too. But just to show you that bad advice comes in all flavors, the NYT engages in its own scaremongering as justification for its own questionable policy suggestions.
North Korea hasn’t yet tested its new long-range missile, but some bizarre ideas have already started flying around Washington about the best way for America to respond — including a proposal by two Democratic defense experts to launch a pre-emptive American attack on the missile. While that isn’t likely to inspire greater sobriety in Pyongyang, it has made the Bush administration’s less strident preparations for a possible military response look statesmanlike by comparison.
You know, not to play partisan here, but with the NYT making snide little comments about the administration’s “less strident preparations for a possible military response,” which amount basically to a whole lot of nothing, I can only imagine what the paper must have written when Clinton parked a carrier task force off the Korean coast during the nuclear crisis of 1994.
What would be better still would be for the White House to heed yesterday’s call by senior Republicans on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee for direct talks with North Korea on the issue
OK… but why?
Pyongyang is unpredictable. It claims to have nuclear weapons already. And a successful long-range missile test would mark a significant step down a road that might eventually give it the capacity to deliver nuclear weapons as far as the United States. But the danger, for now at least, is scarcely imminent enough to justify a pre-emptive military response. An American overreaction would do more harm than good.
1) Pyongyang is not unpredictable. They just seem that way because the NYT (and the rest of the U.S. media) pay attention to them only when they do something calculatedly crazy/stupid/bizarre;
2) What do we maintain a nearly 10,000 warhead deterrent for if we are determined to ensure that other states don’t possess anything for us to deter?
There are many good reasons why North Korea should not test an intercontinental ballistic missile. But it has every legal right to do so. Washington, on the other hand, has no obvious legal right to blow up North Korea’s missile on the launching pad. Doing so would forfeit the diplomatic high ground on an issue that in the end will have to be resolved by diplomatic means, and with active Chinese support.
Want “active Chinese support?” Start selling nuclear and long-range missile technology to Taiwan. Or at the very least Japan.
Washington needs to keep two fundamental goals in sight. The first, obviously, is to convince North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons and long-range missile programs. The second is to make sure that neither Pyongyang’s feints nor Washington’s responses touch off a nuclear arms race in Northeast Asia.
Oh, no… Captain American’s gotta swoop in and solve the problem before all those rascally Orientals have their fingers on the button. I’ve yet to be convinced why a nuclear arms race in Northeast Asia is such a bad thing. And more to the point, if a race were such a bad thing, why aren’t the parties that would be most directly concerned taking a more active approach in resolving the trigger that could set it off, i.e., North Korea. You’d think China would have the most to lose, as it currently has a virtual nuclear monopoly in Northeast Asia, a monopoly unwisely enforced by American pressure on its allies Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. But if even Beijing is apparently OK with the region going nuclear, and I can only suppose they are judging from their tepid response to North Korea’s nuclear program, there is no reason for Washington to be concerned. And at any rate, we’ve so far survived nuclear Pakistan and India, who have shot at each another far more than the Chinese and Japanese have over the last 60 years.
For most of its tenure, the administration has refused to engage in serious nuclear diplomacy with North Korea. The exception came during a brief period last summer when American diplomats were actually allowed to engage in substantive talks, which led fairly quickly to a broad agreement in principle. Progress came to a sharp halt after Washington abruptly imposed unrelated banking sanctions and declared them nonnegotiable. North Korea then responded in a very North Korean way by walking away from the nuclear talks.
And when the North Korean actually want to talk, rather than get paid for acting scary, they’ll let us know. Until then, really, who gives a shit?
This is all very symmetrical, except that time is clearly not on America’s side. Now North Korea is renouncing its missile test moratorium, which it had agreed to in the hope of negotiations on that issue.
What about this situation strikes you as symmetrical? North Korea is a poor, starving nation with no friends that has bet its future on convincing some poor sap in the White House to overpay for its nuclear program. And the United States isn’t the side living on borrowed time. It’s the North Koreans who are hard-pressed, because it doesn’t matter how many inedible nukes and missiles they build—they don’t resolve North Korea’s chief security concern, which is its own dying socio-economic-political system.
This gathering crisis is dangerous enough on its own terms. But if mishandled by Washington, it could have potentially disastrous regional consequences, driving a further wedge between Japan and China.
If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it 10,000 times—if the regional consequences of this “gathering crisis” were that potentially disastrous, the regional powers would be doing something, and they’re not, even if, I will admit, Japan might have already pulled an Osiraq on North Korea if Japan had been a “normal country”… which it’s not. If China isn’t willing to twist its ally’s arm and South Korea isn’t willing to sacrifice its improving relationship with Pyongyang to stop North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs, there is no reason for the United States to pay the political and financial costs of doing so. Moreover, there’s no reason for the United States to stop other regional powers from taking matters into their own hands in regards to the potential North Korean nuclear threat.
China, Japan, South Korea and Russia are not banana republics. They are regional and global powers, and it’s high time Washington allow them to act like it.
10 Comments
Nobody takes the New York Times or liberals seriously.
–Remort
Here, here. Good fisking job on the hacks at the NYT, Robert. I agree that the responsibility should lie with the inhabitants of the region. If they don’t seem to have a problem with the whole region going nuke, including Japan, Taiwan and South Korea, then why should the US?
Thanks, snow. It’s been a while since I fisked the NYT. Used to do it seemingly every other day.
Part of me wishes we had given Taiwan the bomb ages ago the way the French gave the bomb to Israel. Then, the only plan for reunification between the island and the mainland would be a peaceful one, and the US wouldn’t have to keep doing the heavy lifting for Taiwan when the Chinese right decides to rattle its sabers in the Strait.
Were Taiwan to develop nuclear weapons now, however, the Chinese might launch preemptive strikes and claim the Iraq War as justification for their action. While I think China could tolerate a nuclear South Korea and a nuclear Japan, a nuclear Taiwan under DPP control would make the CCP go apeshit. On the other hand, if Japan went nuclear, a non-secession-minded KMT leader in Taiwan could get away with launching a nuclear program while saying “nice doggie” to the mainland.
There are very good reasons why China has a nuclear monopoly in east Asia and why the U.S. is not particularly keen on changing it.
The first one is the issue of Chinese nuclear policy. At present, China’s policy is one of minimalist deterrance, quite cost effective I might add. A small counter-value arsenal of 20+ ICBM’s capable of reaching the U.S. and a few hundred more IRBM’s. This means that although the U.S. does have to keep the Chinese arsenal in mind in it’s nuclear planning, it is impossible that China would be able to launch a first strike on the U.S. Thus the nuclear threat to the U.S. is minimized.
If Taiwan, South Korea, or Japan were to go nuclear, it would quite likley neccessitate a change in China’s nuclear posture. The presence of nuclear weapons so close to China under U.S. auspices would likely lead to more pro-active deployment policy on China’s part. Meaning more nukes to increase survivability. The reason that the U.S. and the Soviet Union built tens of thousands of nuclear weapons each was not because it requires that many to destroy one another but rather to increase the chances of survivability to launch a counter-attack should the other launch first. Most U.S. and Soviet missiles were targeted at each other since even a few hundred would be sufficient to destroy nearly all major population centers.
What Japanese/Korean/Taiwanese nukes will mean is that China will likely re-initiate fissile material production, mate warheads to delivery vehicles for quick launch capability, and build many more delivery vehicles. By nuclearizing China’s neighbours, the number of missiles capable of reaching the U.S. could mushroom from 20+ weapons to 2000+, ultimately making the U.S. more vulnerable rather than less.
There is also a secondary reason why the U.S. would not look kindly upon proliferation among it’s allies in the Pacific. That is a matter of control. With the U.S. maintaining a nuclear duopoly in the Pacific, it has more control over it’s allies and ultimately has control should the situation ever escalate to the point of a nuclear standoff. Should one of China’s neighbors develop an independent nuclear capability, that would mean the U.S. has less control and less influence on any situations should the proverbial shit hit the fan.
well reasoned jing. i hadn’t considered that kind of impact on the u.s.
regarding nukes, i’ve always been of the opinion that less is better.
Jing’s statement makes me wonder wehy China isn’t more serious, helpful, constructive, etc in defanging North Korea.
To address Slim, there are again I believe two constraints on Chinese involvement in resolving the North Korea nuclear issue. The first is a matter of intent, the second is a matter of capability.
Forgive me for using a truism, but politics is messy and policy formulations are never clear cut. There is always back and forth weighing on the benefits or limitations of one course of action. I believe China is trapped in a sort of policy dilemma in regards to North Korea. On the one hand, a nuclearized North Korea is not to China’s benefit as it is potentially destabilizing and could affect China negatively depending on the resolution of the situation and the actions of other parties involved. On the other hand however, a nuclearized Korea can serve as a tool to gauge U.S. responses and intent and an erratic Kim Jong Il also serves to divert U.S. attention and to keep “Uncle” otherwise pre-occupied. Whether one policy is ultimately more beneficial than the other in the minds of Chinese policy makers is unknown, and Chinese action, or rather inaction, seems to be a result of this policy dilemma.
On the second issue, I believe China’s political influence on North Korea is grossly overstated. Unlike Baduk, I do not believe KJI is China’s stooge, but rather that he has his own interests at heart, that is the survival of KJI. Historically speaking, Chinese influence in North Korea has waxed and waned depending on circumstance and KJI’s predeccesor played the Soviets off against the Chinese when it suited him. Most of the pro-Chinese North Korean communists have been purged long ago and it is unlikely that KJI enjoys good relations with Beijing. China is also limited in taking concrete actions to affect North Korea because doing so would be destabilizing to North Korea and the ultimate goal of China seems to be stability uber alles. Preserving the North Korean state, but not letting the situation degenerate too far out of control (in Beijing’s reckoning) seems to be the modus operandi of the Chinese.
Jing—Fair enough in terms of Chinese nuclear policy (and the implications of regional nuclear proliferation thereon), but even granting that China would probably come to possess more weapons capable of hitting the United States, such an attack would be suicidal, and if the what’s more, the Chinese arsenal would have to target several potential enemies—Japan, India, Russia, South Korea, Taiwan—not just the United States.
As for the matter of control, of course I agree that the U.S. has looked askance at proliferation partly out of concern of weakening its own influence with its allies. But this determination to maintain its influence over the security policies of its friends in the region comes at an ever increasing cost—the U.S. will need to devote increasing resources keeping its
dependenciesallies safe. Hence you gotta ask yourself if it’s worth keeping your friends weak and inviting their resentment in order to maintain your clout over them. An alliance is only as good as its constituent parts, after all. And at any rate, Britain and Israel developed their own independent deterrents while maintain close security cooperation with Washington, while Washington’s clout over both non-nuclear Turkey and Greece didn’t stop them from mixing it up repeatedly. Is there any reason to believe that Japan or South Korea would be any less cooperative with the United States than they already are were they to acquire security infrastructures commensurate with their national power, or that U.S. influence over said countries could prevent them from grinding their axes with other nations in the region?What if the US just ignored NK? Just quietly went about patrolling the waters for shipments of nukes and missiles, pushed for restrictions on banking with the North and other ‘quiet war’ measures, including deals with China, SK and Japan to tighten the noose (as much as possible)? At the same time, just ignore them and don’t go to any talks of any kind, do not respond publicly to anything the Norks do?