Keep Korea From Boiling Over

If a shaky North Korea were to come apart at the seams and, through sudden mass migration, drop half its desperate populace on Seoul’s doorstep--hat in hand, luggage in tow--South Korea would become an instant basket case. So without objecting too much to the fixation of some top U.S. officials on the fate of the former Soviet Union, let me say that it’s fortunate that American diplomacy is aware of other problems. Assistant Secretary of State Winston Lord, for instance, believes that drawing the volatile North Koreans into an adult relationship with the South is an urgent task. Agreed. The North Koreans must not only be gotten to the table but somehow locked in the room.

Aside from the fact that the North possesses a nuclear bomb or two, why should we care? Because we have a tremendous, immediate stake in the fate of the Korean peninsula. South Korea is the world’s 12th-largest economy and the fourth-largest export market for California, where it ranks far ahead of Germany and Britain and is starting to nip at Mexico’s heels. Last year, Koreans invested more than $2 billion in the United States ($1.2 billion in California) and at times American exports entering the Korean market surpass even Japan’s. In January the K-Young Development company of South Korea started putting up the first high-rise in five years in Los Angeles County, where more Koreans live than anywhere outside Asia. Far, far more than Russia, Korea has contributed to California’s export-driven escape from recession.

But if North Korea were to collapse onto, or invade, the South, forget about it. Shock unification would cut incomes in the South by one-third; massive new taxes would be needed to subsidize the North. A traumatized South Korea would have to reduce, if not eliminate, foreign investment and costly importing. Regional instability would result: The Chinese and the Japanese would be alarmed by a suddenly chaotic Korean peninsula. Indeed, chaos there has historically caused problems for surrounding countries: It was an underlying cause of the 1894 war between China and Japan and the 1904 war between Japan and Russia.

American diplomacy needs to work, over time, toward a gradual and careful integration of North and South. But will Pyongyang hold together long enough for that? With an economy about as efficient as Egypt’s (and a lot less fun), the regime is a real Stalinist throwback. Its leaders negotiate with the finesse of a schoolyard bully. In fact, North Korean leaders would like it better if they didn’t have to negotiate at all with the South (for whom they are like the embittered inbred wing of a hopelessly divided family). They prefer the company of warm, understanding Uncle Sam, which has been shamelessly (but potentially effectively) working both sides of the Korean street--sometimes to Seoul’s irritation.

It was Washington that put together the unprecedented multibillion-dollar nuclear power deal that will hand North Korea two light-water power reactors in return for its pledge not to bomb anyone and to permit inspectors to verify that the regime has in fact discontinued its nuclear weapons program. And it is Washington that’s been rallying humanitarian aid for the North.

Sometimes Seoul sulks. Two recent reports raise questions about the South Korean-U.S. relationship. One claims that Washington was frozen out of recent secret two-Korea talks in Beijing. Not true, says Winston Lord--the U.S. was in on it. And, he added: “Any time the North and the South are talking, no matter who’s providing the handholding, believe me, we’re absolutely delighted.” Another report claims that because Seoul’s nose is out of joint over Washington’s cozy overtures to North Korea, the gap between U.S. and South Korean policy is widening. Says Lord: “Nah . . . we basically don’t do anything if the South is really unhappy about it. The relationship is in very good shape.”

In fact, last week, on the heels of an announced UN package of $43 million for the acutely food-short North, Seoul, after soul-searching and foot-dragging, agreed to throw northward an additional $3 million in aid. Tokyo and Washington chipped in with about $6 million each. Then Seoul and Tokyo announced a quickly arranged summit, for later this week, on the Korean resort island of Cheju.

You can see why, in this volatile atmosphere, the close attention of the Clinton administration is so crucial. And in their hearts, so can the South Koreans. “We’ve asked the Chinese to work on the North to get them to the table,” a Seoul official tells me, “and we’ve asked the Russians to help out, too. And they are trying. But frankly, right now the nation with the most influence with them is not the Russians or the Chinese but you Americans. Basically, you will have to do it.”

Says Lord: “All of us--the Japanese, Chinese, South Koreans, everyone--need to help North Korea achieve a soft landing if it crashes. It’s too dangerous to let it just collapse. And the North Koreans are inching closer to the bargaining table. But with these guys, who really knows?”

Russia is important. But it isn’t everything, is it?