After a 13-month
boycott, North Korea has finally agreed to return to the Six-Party
Talks, which will resume on July 25th in Beijing. First convened in
September 2003, the Talks, which bring together the United States,
China, Japan, South Korea, North Korea, and Russia, have completed
three sessions so far without finding a diplomatic solution to
North Korea's nuclear weapons programs. During the last round in
June 2004, the United States led the other four parties in
proposing a package of security assurances and economic assistance
to North Korea in exchange for comprehensive, verifiable, and
irreversible nuclear disarmament. North Korea has yet to respond to
this proposal. In the coming round Pyongyang is likely to make
demands that will prove problematic, especially for the United
States, South Korea, and Japan. These demands could include the
retention of core elements of its nuclear weapons program, security
assurances that amount to a guarantee of regime survival, and a
renunciation-by the United States, in particular-of policies
reserving the right to respond preemptively to certain kinds of
threats.
In order to
overcome the problems that are likely to result from North Korea's
demands, the Bush Administration should prepare a set of
negotiating strategies that are based on complete disarmament,
narrowly limit U.S. obligations and guarantees, and further
stability on the Korean Peninsula.
Provision No. 1:
Continue to insist on the comprehensive, verifiable, and
irreversible nuclear disarmament of North Korea.
Under no
circumstances should the Bush Administration enter into an
arrangement with Pyongyang that provides diplomatic cover for North
Korea to continue to pursue nuclear weapons. Clearly, North Korea
will seek ambiguous language that provides a fig leaf for some or
all of its nuclear weapons programs. The Bush Administration must,
therefore, insist on a disarmament agreement that contains language
so explicit that it cannot be subject to any form of
reinterpretation in the future. Likewise, the United States and
South Korea should reject likely North Korean demands for the
termination of the U.S.-ROK alliance and the withdrawal of U.S.
military forces from South Korea.
At the same time,
the United States should not assume that the Six Party Talks will
result in North Korea's nuclear disarmament. As such, it should
incorporate the assumption of a nuclear North Korea into its future
strategies in the region-in particular with its alliance partners,
South Korea and Japan. Washington should also continue to back its
diplomatic efforts in the Six-Party talks with the ongoing
restructuring of U.S. and allied military forces in the region and
a comprehensive focus on restricting North Korean opportunities for
aggressive military actions. These preparations should proceed
during the negotiations, with the goal of maintaining peace and
stability in a proliferated setting, and should include:
-
Deploying
effective missile defenses;
-
Deploying
improved counter-artillery capabilities;
-
Improving
biological and chemical defenses; and
-
Issuing a joint
statement by the United States, South Korea, and Japan that the
policy of extended nuclear deterrence is essential to peace and
security in region.
Provision #2:
Security assurances and economic benefits that are offered to North
Korea should be articulated narrowly.
It is reasonable
to extend security assurances and economic benefits to North Korea
in exchange for nuclear disarmament. It is unreasonable, however,
to allow the North Korean leadership and others to claim that such
assurances and benefits are synonymous with a guarantee of regime
survival in Pyongyang under all circumstances. No inherent
contradiction exists between security assurances and economic
benefits, on the one hand, and a policy of regime change, on the
other. Indeed, an agreement that allows the current regime in North
Korea to engage in threatening destabilizing behavior without fear
for its survival in exchange for nuclear disarmament would be
self-defeating.
At most, any
future agreement could imply that the United States and its allies
would refrain from certain approaches to regime change. For
example, the United States could extend a negative security
assurance to North Korea: in exchange for its nuclear disarmament,
the United States would not preemptively attack North Korea with
nuclear weapons. During the end of the Cold War, the United States
entered into arms control and security agreements with the Soviet
Union that did not require the United States to prop up the Soviet
regime. North Korea should not expect concessions that the United
States was unwilling to grant to the Soviet Union at the height of
Cold War tensions.
Refusing to
guarantee unconditional regime survival to North Korea is likely to
raise concerns in Seoul, where suspicions linger that Washington's
motive all along has been to forcibly dismantle the Kim Jong Il
regime. South Korea fears a collapse of the North Korean regime in
the short term because of the immense economic and social costs to
absorb refugees from the North. But President Bush and his
Administration have repeatedly stated that the United States will
not attack North Korea unprovoked. Thus, in order for this strategy
to succeed, the United States must focus on convincing South Korea
and the other Six-Party Talk partners that retention of the
capability of preemption under certain circumstances is not
destabilizing and actually contributes to greater regional
stability in the long term.
Provision No. 3:
Link the Six-Party Talks process to broader follow-on talks.
These follow-on
talks should address issues beyond North Korea's nuclear weapons
program, including its threatening conventional force deployments,
biological and chemical weapons programs, missile proliferation,
illegal activities including narcotics trafficking and
counterfeiting, and human rights issues. Addressing the broader
range of issues is necessary to establish true stability on the
Korean peninsula and in the region. Ultimately, these talks would
aim to achieve a formal peace treaty to end the Korean conflict.
Obtaining a commitment to discuss these issues as follow-on talks
is also important to prevent North Korea from using the nuclear
issue to divert attention away from other relevant security issues
on the Korean peninsula.
The Six-Party
process presents the United States with a classic instance of
confrontational diplomacy. Success requires the United States to
adopt a competitive strategy for the Talks, which includes a firm
articulation of limitations and goals. A truly competitive strategy
begins with an emphasis on success, and the United States and its
allies must be prepared to prevail over North Korea, not
accommodate it. It also requires a clear definition of what will be
achieved and cannot be subject to compromise. In this case,
anything less than the comprehensive, verifiable, and irreversible
nuclear disarmament of North Korea is unacceptable. Finally, it
means establishing viable options should diplomacy fail. The United
States and its allies cannot expect to win a negotiation that they
are unwilling to walk away from should the price be too high.
Baker Spring is
F.M. Kirby Research Fellow in National Security Policy in the
Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for International
Studies, and Balbina Y. Hwang
is policy analyst
for Northeast Asia, in the Asian Studies Center at The Heritage
Foundation.