A Reward Approach to N. Korea

The White House has announced that the North Korea government is finally ready to sit down for talks with the Bush administration. But the administration does not appear geared up to wage diplomacy on the Korean peninsula. We need a multi-pronged approach that confronts the political and economic issues in North Korea, as well as the military threats. It is clear what the administration does not like about North Korea: nuclear weapons, ballistic missiles and heavily armed troops within range of Seoul, all made more ominous by the repressive character of the North Korean regime.

And over these threats looms another specter: North Korea’s erratic regime could give weapons of mass destruction to terrorist groups such as Al Qaeda.

Removing these dangers is a high priority. Succeeding in doing so will require a concerted and coherent U.S. strategy--one so far not in evidence--pursued across a broad front for as long as it takes.

North Korea’s military threats are real, both in its conventional component and in the dangers posed by its nuclear, biological and chemical weapons programs. But the scope of U.S. strategic thinking about North Korea should not be defined only by the military threats. We also should try to induce societal change. Only that will yield genuine peace. The regime in Pyongyang will resist it. It saw what happened to East Germany. Still, the U.S. position should be to reward North Korean policies that promote positive change. These are likely to be in the economic sphere initially.

To succeed in this ambitious overall agenda, Washington needs to improve the process it uses to deal with North Korea. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, while a private citizen, urged that “the U.S. point person should be designated by the president in consultation with congressional leaders and should report directly to the president.... This step also aims to move the issue to the highest possible level of decision-making in North Korea.” He was right.

We also need a new policy track that focuses directly on the threat of missiles and weapons of mass destruction. Previous attempts have produced results. But they are running out of steam.

It should not be impossible to get North Korea to end its missile program. Pyongyang already has announced a missile flight-test moratorium until 2003 and proposed giving up its long-range missile program altogether if another country would launch its satellites. China or Russia could do this.

The United States has a well-tested method of encouraging dismantlement of nuclear weapons. Three U.S. administrations and successive U.S. Congresses have strongly supported the Nunn- Lugar cooperative threat reduction program, which provides assistance for weapons dismantlement and blocks the spread of weapons of mass destruction. This program has been confined to the former Soviet Union, but Sen. Richard G. Lugar (R-Ind.) has introduced a bill that would expand it.

Such a program in North Korea could be used to redirect technological efforts to civilian purposes and to dismantle facilities related to weapons of mass destruction. It could be used to block North Korea’s dangerous missile exports and its missile development work.

Our ally South Korea needs a new policy track to promote peace on the Korean peninsula, and so does the U.S.

In the near term this should consist of military measures to deal with miscalculations by either side and to enhance crisis management. Over the longer term, South Korea and the U.S. should move toward achieving a stable balance, with reduced force levels that accentuate nonoffensive postures and that reduce the heavy concentration of North Korean firepower just north of the demilitarized zone. The all-important context would be an eventual peace settlement, not a demand for unilateral concessions.

The outlook for this is not bright at the moment. But South Korea and the U.S. should have a shared vision for achieving peace and reunification, even if there were no prospect of negotiating with North Korea, because our diplomatic campaign would be weakened if we were not seen to be standing for something positive.