Allies urge calm as tempers flare
If willing, U.S., North Korean leaders could take these steps away from nuclear precipice
The prospect of a conflict on the Korean Peninsula is so alarming that U.S. allies and China are urging President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un to soften their rhetoric and start a dialogue to find a diplomatic solution to their standoff.
Several steps toward that diplomatic route, including a halt to incendiary threats and recognition that North Korea is a nuclear-armed state, are possible, experts on the crisis say.
None of those steps would be easy, as Trump underscored Thursday in declaring that his warning to unleash “fire and fury” on North Korea perhaps “wasn’t tough enough.”
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Lower the rhetoric. “The more we threaten, the worse the situation is going to get,” said Jenny Town, assistant director of the U.S.-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. Neither side has backed off the flame-throwing talk. “North Korea better get their act together, or they’re going to
be in trouble like few nations ever have been in trouble in this world,” Trump said Thursday.
Earlier Thursday, North Korea issued its own threats, saying it was developing plans to fire missiles near Guam, a U.S. territory in the Pacific with a major U.S. military presence. uAcknowledge North Korea as a nuclear power. This may be the toughest step to take for the United States.
“Politically, we can’t and we won’t recognize them as a nuclear power,” said David Maxwell, a retired Army colonel who is associate director of Georgetown University’s Center for Security Studies.
In reality, North Korea already is. Kim has dozens of nuclear weapons, and his regime has advanced its missile technology dramatically in recent years to be capable of striking U.S. cities.
“We don’t think having a dialogue where the North Koreans come to the table assuming they’re going to maintain their nuclear weapons is productive,” Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has said.
There are possible openings. North Korea would probably participate in discussions to halt or reduce its nuclear weapons stockpile even if it wouldn’t agree initially to abandon the program, Maxwell said. uSuspend joint military exercises. Once they began talks, the United States and North Korea might agree on other issues. The North has long opposed joint military exercises between the United States and its ally South Korea, where 28,000 U.S. troops are stationed.
The United States has shown a willingness to negotiate over the exercises, although its concession didn’t lead to a diplomatic breakthrough. Team Spirit, a joint U.S.-Korean exercise, was canceled for a time in the 1990s in an effort to get North Korea to halt its nuclear program and allow international inspectors.
uEase sanctions. The United States could suspend some sanctions on North Korea if the regime took action to curb its nuclear program. Economic sanctions over more than a decade have done little to halt the North’s weapons development programs.
Analysts said the economic pressure is not working, mainly because China, North Korea’s largest trading partner, has not been vigorous in enforcing the sanctions. The North’s economy grew 3.9% last year over the previous year, the largest increase since 1999, according to South Korea’s central bank.
“There is always a diplomatic solution,” Town said. “It’s just a matter of if there is a political will to get past the opposition to it.”
“We don’t think having a dialogue where the North Koreans come to the table assuming they’re going to maintain their nuclear weapons is productive.” Secretary of State Rex Tillerson