The Oneida Daily Dispatch (Oneida, NY)
North Korea: The Rubicon is crossed
WASHINGTON » Across 25 years and five administrations, we have kicked theNorth Korean can down the road. We are now out of road.
On July 4, North Korea tested an intercontinental ballistic missile apparently capable of hitting theUnited States. As yet, only Alaska. Soon, every American city.
Moreover, Pyongyang claims to have already fittedminiaturizednuclear warheads on intermediate rangemissiles. Soon, on ICBMs.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s initial reaction to this game changerwas not encouraging. “Global action is required to stop a global threat,” he declared.
This, in diplo-speak, is a cry for (multilateral) help. Alas, there will be none. Because, while this is indeeda global threat, there is nosuchthing as global interests. There are individual national interests andtheydiverge. In this case, radically.
TakeRussia andChina. If there’s to be external pressure on North Korea, it would come from them. Will it? On Tuesday, they issued a joint statement proposing a deal: North Korea freezes nuclear and missile testing in return for America abandoning largescale joint exercises with South Korea.
This is a total nonstarter. The exercises have been the backbone of theU.S.-SouthKorea alliance for half a century. Abandonment would signal the endof anenduring relationship that stabilizes the region and guarantees South Koreanindependence. Inexchange for what?
A testing freeze? The offer doesn’t even pretend to dismantle North Korea’s nuclear program, which has to be ourminimal objective. Moreover, we’ve negotiated multiple freezes over the years withPyongyang. It has violated every one.
The fact that Russia andChina would, amid a burning crisis, propose such a dead-on-arrival proposal demonstrates that their real interest is not denuclearization. Their real interest is cutting Americadown to size bybreaking our South Korean alliance and weakening our influence in the Pacific Rim.
These are going to be ourpartners in solving the crisis?
And yet, relying on China’s good graces appeared to be Donald Trump’sfirst resort for solvingNorth Korea. Until he declared two weeks ago (by tweet, of course) that China had failed. “At least I knowChina tried!” he added.
They did? Trump himself tweeted out onWednesday that Chinese trade withNorth Korea increased by almost 40 percent in thefirst quarter, forcing him to acknowledge that theChinese haven’t been helping.
Indeednot. The latest North Koreanmissile is menacingnot just because of its 4,000-mile range, but because it is roadmobile. And the transporter comes fromChina.
Inthe calculus of nuclear deterrence, mobility guarantees inviolability. (The enemy cannot find, and therefore cannotpre-empt, amobile missile.) It’s a huge step forward for Pyongyang. SuppliedbyBeijing.
Howmany times must we be taught that Beijing does not share our view of denuclearizing North Korea? It prefers a dividedpeninsula, i.e., sustaining its client state as a guarantee against a unified Korea (possibly nuclear) allied with theWest and sitting on its border.
Nukes assure regime survival. That’s why the Kims have so single-mindedly pursued them. The lessons are clear. SaddamHussein, nonukes: hanged. Moammar Gadhafi, gave up his nuclear program: killed by his own people. The Kim dynasty, possessing anarsenalof 10-16bombs: untouched, soon untouchable.
What are our choices? Trump has threatened that if China doesn’t helpwe’ll have to goit alone. If so, the choice is binary: acquiescence orwar.
War is almost unthinkable, given the proximity of the Demilitarized Zone to the 10million people of Seoul. Amere conventional warwould be devastating. And could rapidly go nuclear.
Acquiescence is not unthinkable. After all, wedid it when Chinawent nuclear underMao Zedong, whose regime promptly went insane under the Cultural Revolution.
Thehope for a third alternative, getting China to do thedirty work, is mostlywishful thinking. There’s talk of sanctioning other Chinese banks. Will that really change China’s strategic thinking? Bourgeois democracies believe that economics supersedes geostrategy. Maybe for us. But for dictatorships? Rarely.
If we want to decisively alter the strategic balance, we could returnU.S. tactical nukes (withdrawn in 1991) to SouthKorea. Or we could encourage Japan to build a nuclear deterrent of its own. Nothingwouldgetmorequickattention from the Chinese. They would face a radically newstrategic dilemma: Is preservingNorth Koreaworth a nuclear Japan?
We do have powerful alternatives. But each is dangerous and highly unpredictable. Which is why themost likely ultimate outcome, by far, is acquiescence.