Over at the Captain’s Quarters, guest poster Senator John McCain discusses North Korea. I like his approach, for the most part:
The President is right to call on the Council to impose a military arms embargo, financial and trade sanctions, and, most importantly, the right to interdict and inspect all cargo in and out of North Korea. I hope the Council quickly adopts these sanctions, and that all members enforce them.
The worst thing we could do is accede to North Korea’s demand for bilateral talks. When has rewarding North Korea’s bad behavior ever gotten us anything more than worse behavior?
He could do without the politicking, however:
I would remind Senator Hillary Clinton and other Democrats critical of Bush Administration policies that the framework agreement her husband’s administration negotiated was a failure. The Koreans received millions in energy assistance. They diverted millions in food assistance to their military. And what did they do? They secretly enriched uranium.
Prior to the agreement, every single time the Clinton Administration warned the Koreans not to do something — not to kick out the IAEA inspectors, not to remove the fuel rods from their reactor — they did it. And they were rewarded every single time by the Clinton Administration with further talks. We had a carrots and no sticks policy that only encouraged bad behavior. When one carrot didn’t work, we offered another.
Like I said with some the Grand National Party nonsense yesterday, it’s not that I disagree with McCain’s criticism of Clinton’s dealings with North Korea. I don’t. But there a time for politics, and this isn’t it.
Anyway, a couple of Democrats fire back here.
13 Comments
When all else fails with Republicans, blame Clinton. Like how the uri party blames Japan for their failures.
What a bunch of school children politicians are…
Or like how U.S. Democrats have been attacking Bush for North Korea. Or how the Grand National Party is blaming Roh.
Seems like there’s enough politicing going around…
And the Dems never blame Bush for anything, lol.
Shiites blame Sunnis…Sunnis blame Iran…Iran blames US…US blames the other party.
Ah, yes, we should all be above mere politics and focus on the technical issue at hand.
Except that the policy debate really is about what policies are best in the circumstances, and plenty of oh so objective democrats, including all the usual suspects principally responsible for the failed ‘94 agreement, are vocally espousing the same approach that failed then. So it’s hardly “mere” scrabbling for political advantage that warrants calling a mistake a mistake and holding the architects of the failure responsible so that neither they or thier surrogates get a chance to reinvent the square wheel.
Diito for the GNP. What possible utility is there in another consensus tsk tsk from Seoul, if it doesn’t have any substance in terms of policy. That’s not going to get the ROK any props from anyone else in the world, except maybe Uncle Kim.
I think it is important to remind folks that the Agreed Framework WAS a failure, least they think that unilaterally dealing with the Norks again will get anything done. Its inspection regime was inadequate and the North Koreans we knew as early as the late 1990s that they were working on nuclear weapons in violation of the agreement.
McCain’s mistake was calling it “Clinton’s” Agreed Framework. Since it was US government policy at the time, he could have just as easily say that “our” Agreed Framework with NK failed. Oh course, that would be much less fun and less likely to get his name in the papers.
Marmot,
Can you explain why you think politics is not appropriate at this time?
It seems quite the opposite to me, since more intense public attention is a rare opportunity to more widely debate the effects of previous policies that got us here, and what those policies should be next. This is a major event of public life, when citizens pay attention and get wiser, as long as there is a vigorous debate. It is exactly the time to score political points, since this is one of the few times in public life when some people change their minds. Why and how can they change them in a debate vacuum? What is your thinking?
parties blaming the other parties. one would think there was an election coming up. oh.
I don’t know if you guys have been watching the US news networks but it has been constant Bush bashing from the Democrats over the North Korea nuclear crisis. McCain is just firing back at the Democrats as well as taking a shot at his potential rival Hilary Clinton in the 2008 election.
Uh, Bush has been in power for how long? The Republicans have controlled Congress for how long? They have had plenty of time to fix things if they so disliked what Clinton and the Democrats did.
Not that I am a fan of how Clinton or the Democrats have handled foreign policy and NK in the past. But if you are in charge and things go wrong, I think you should accept the blame. Buck stoppage.
McCain has become a Bush stooge in recent years. I used to respect the man a lot for his constructive criticism of Bush and for his previous refusal to kowtow to the religious right. Republicans who could do those things had balls of steel IMHO. Lately though he’s been doing the complete opposite, even breaking out the knee pads for Jerry Falwell. McCain’s balls have turned to mush. He’s just like all the other career politicians now towing the party line blindly instead of being the revisionist I used to think he was. It’s truly sad to see how far he has fallen.
The 1994 Agreed Framework was the best that could be gotten at the time, and I don’t fault Clinton for that.
But after than it fell of the Clinton administrations radar. When they asked Pakistan in 1998 about giving nuclear technology, Pakistan denied it and the Clinton admin dropped it; and that was where the Clinton administration failed miserably with North Korea, leaving the legacy we have today.
In 2002 James Kelly said Kang Seok-Ju admitted to a uranium program when confronted with the evidence. Afterwards North Korea denied it, and the Democrats blamed the Bush admin for provoking a crisis and flubbing North Korea policy. Not a word when Pakistan later admitted to exactly what Kelly said they did.
Blaming Bush for North Korea’s belligerence is flat out stupid. If North Korea wanted a deal, they could have had one last September, or even have lived up to their end of the 1994 Agreed Framework and they would have reaped the benefits.
Kim Jong-il isn’t crazy or a moron, but he is evil and will continue to take steps to ensure North Korea’s isolation, and therefore his regime. When that’s understood, the rest is not a mystery.
You know, if Truman had just ignored it when North Korea invaded South Korea, there wouldn’t be the mess there is today.
Yeah, it seems a bit foolish to blame any president for ‘allowing’ KJI to develop nuclear technology. The fact that this happened in Bush’s tenure is just an accident of history — the true failure stems from the entire US policy towards North Korea, starting from the day of its creation.
3 Trackbacks
[...] UPDATE: Others: Tigerhawk: Let the neighbors take out the trash. Hotline: Senator Clinton defends President Clinton. Winds of Change (Joe Katzman): North Korea is a sideshow. The real player here is China. (This is a fascinating read - highly recommended). Encourage Japan/South Korea/ Taiwan to enter nuclear arena unless Kim falls. (Katzman also places blame squarely on Clinton and his policies). Belmont Club: Interesting Choice of medium for McCain's guest blog. The blog comes of age - congrats, Captain Ed! Mac's Mind: A bit of suspicion on the choice of medium. The Marmot's Hole: Wrong time for politics. [...]
[...] At least Sen. McCain spent most of his post making policy suggestions before getting into the Clinton bashing. Perry, on the other hand, had a perfect opportunity to use his space in the WaPo to say something constructive, and instead wastes it on bashing the current administration in a defensive attempt to justify his own record. [...]
Blame It On Dean…
Joshua at OFK fast-checks the US Democratic platform on the DPRK nukes issue, and finds them wanting. On the “Iraq As Distraction” meme he picks on a straw man, Howard Dean (one that could be burned to the ground for all I, as a registered Dem, care)…