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The Journal of Strategic Studies Vol. 29, No.

6, 1015 1040, December 2006

Coercing to Reconcile: North Koreas Response to US Hegemony1


NARUSHIGE MICHISHITA*
National Institute for Defense Studies, Tokyo, Japan ABSTRACT Since 1993 North Koreas response to US hegemony has been a seemingly paradoxical attempt to bandwagon with the United States by means of military coercion. However, after more than a decade of effort, North Korea has failed to normalize its relations with the United States. In the years ahead, it can either pursue more proactively the strategy of bandwagoning with the United States, shift its strategic focus to China, or embark upon a policy of equidistance between the United States and Japan on the one hand and China on the other. KEY WORDS: North Korea, United States, hegemony

On 12 October 1993 North Korean diplomats presented their US counterparts a memorandum entitled, Resolution of the Nuclear Issue: Elements to be Considered. The memo demanded that the United States agree to: 1. Conclusion of a peace agreement (or a treaty) to include legally binding assurances on non-use, non-threat of forces [against the
*The views expressed in this article are the authors own. 1 For the history of North Koreas use of force, see the authors Calculated Adventurism: North Koreas Military-Diplomatic Campaigns, The Korean Journal of Defense Analysis 16/2 (Fall 2004), 181226 5www.kida.re.kr/english2005/publications/ kjda2004.htm4; Calculated Adventurism: North Koreas Military-Diplomatic Campaigns, 19662000, a dissertation submitted to the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, May 2003; North Koreas Second Nuclear Diplomacy: Rising Risks and Expectations, and Korean Peninsula in the Renewed Process for Change, in The National Institute for Defense Studies (ed.), East Asian Strategic Review 2004 (Tokyo: Japan Times 2004), 5www.nids.go.jp/english/ dissemination/east-asian/e2004.html4; and North Koreas First Nuclear Diplomacy, 199394, Journal of Strategic Studies 26/4 (Dec. 2003), 4782.
ISSN 0140-2390 Print/ISSN 1743-937X Online/06/061015-26 2006 Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/01402390601016576

1016 Narushige Michishita Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea (DPRK)] including nuclear weapons. 2. Take responsibilities to provide the DPRK with LWR [light-water reactors] to nalize the resolution of N [nuclear] Issue. 3. Full normalization of diplomatic relations [between the DPRK and the United States] to assure the mutual respect for sovereignty and non-interference in internal affairs. 4. Pledge on a policy of balance towards the N & S [North and South] of Korea with a view to supporting the peaceful reunication.2 Since 1993 North Koreas response to US hegemony has been an attempt to bandwagon with the United States. North Korea seems to have decided in the early 1990s that its foreign policy should be focused on relations with the four surrounding great powers, namely the United States, Japan, China and Russia, of which the United States was of utmost importance. In order to bandwagon with the United States, however, North Korea resorted to military coercion. As a result of its effort, the United States and North Korea signed the Agreed Framework in October 1994. Toward the end of the Clinton administration, the United States and North Korea came close to normalizing or at least substantially improving their relationship. However, the incoming of the Bush Administration in 2001 altered the US approach to North Korea. In addition, the revelation in 2002 that North Korea had engaged in an additional covert nuclear program based on highly enriched uranium pushed the United States towards a more hardline policy. By initiating another round of nuclear crisis, North Korea attempted to draw US attention and improve its relations with the hegemon. Since then North Korea has been repeating the game it played in the 1990s. However, the United States is not responding to North Koreas actions in the way it did back then. So far, North Koreas attempt to normalize relations with the hegemon has not produced a major breakthrough. This article will discuss North Koreas political objectives, strategy, foundations of the strategy, and its effectiveness. North Koreas goal of ensuring regime survival by improving relations with the United States and Japan remains intact, and deterrence and compellence constitute the main ingredients of its strategy. North Korea succeeded in achieving its bottom-line objective the survival of the Kim Jong Il regime but failed to normalize its relations with the United States.
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Resolution of the Nuclear Issue: Elements to be Considered, 12 Oct. 1993, provided by C. Kenneth Quinones on 23 July 2003.

North Koreas Response to US Hegemony 1017 Political Objectives It has become a cliche to say that North Korea has two major policy goals: one is regime survival and the other is unication of the Korean Peninsula. There is a widely held consensus that survival is the regimes most important policy goal. However, there is a debate as to how serious North Korea is in achieving the unication. Based on North Koreas past behavior, it seems that forceful unication has receded to the backburner in its priority list. In fact, North Korea has not once attempted to attack the South Korean leadership since its agents tried to kill then South Korean President Chun Doo Hwan in Rangoon, Burma in 1983. Prior to that, North Korea had attempted to assassinate the South Korean president in 1968, 1970, and 1974. When the United States became a sole superpower with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, North Korea was forced to contemplate how best to ensure its own survival in a world dominated by the United States. North Koreas answer was simple: Bandwagon with it. Even before the Soviet Union collapsed, North Korean attempts to improve its relations with the United States and its ally, Japan, were apparent. In 1989 North Korea invited Shin Kanemaru, vice president of Japans ruling Liberal Democratic Party, to Pyongyang in order to initiate normalization talks. As a result, ofcial Japan-DPRK discussions began in 1991. In 1992 Kim Yong Sun, the North Korean Workers Partys secretary for international affairs, met with Arnold Kantor, the US undersecretary of state for political affairs. However, these talks ended in failure that same year when it became clear that North Korea was developing nuclear weapons and was not responding positively to the International Atomic Energy Agencys (IAEA) demands that it be allowed to conduct necessary inspections of North Korean nuclear facilities. When the cooperative diplomatic approach to normalizing relations with the United States and Japan failed, North Korean leaders decided to use coercion to achieve the same goal. On 12 March 1993, the DPRK government announced its withdrawal from the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). North Koreas strategy of using coercion to normalize relations with the United States produced its rst tangible results in October 1994 when the two countries signed the Agreed Framework. The United States promised to provide North Korea two light-water reactors via an international consortium, gave formal assurances against the threat or use of nuclear weapons against North Korea, and offered to improve US-DPRK relations. North Korea, for its part, promised to freeze its nuclear development and to accept full nuclear inspections in the future. For the four years that followed, the two countries maintained a

1018 Narushige Michishita relatively amicable relationship until 1998 when they experienced the second bump in the road. In August 1998, it was reported that US intelligence agencies had detected a huge secret underground complex, seemingly related to nuclear development, in Kumchangri, 25 miles northeast of the Nyongbyon nuclear site. This site was assessed to house a new nuclear reactor or a reprocessing plant. In addition, North Korea launched a three-stage rocket based on the Taepo Dong 1 medium-range ballistic missile the same month. It was doubly shocking because the rocket ew over the Japanese main island in the direction of Hawaii. These two events prompted the United States to undertake a major review of its policy toward North Korea. The policy review team, led by former Secretary of Defense William Perry, produced the so-called Perry Report in September 1999. The report recommended the US government seek normalization of relations with North Korea if Pyongyang took positive steps on nuclear and missile developments. Subsequently, the United States and the DPRK issued the Joint US-DPRK Statement on International Terrorism and the US-DPRK Joint Communique in October 2000. In the same month, Madeleine Albright visited North Korea for the rst time as US secretary of state. The United States and North Korea thus came close to normalization or, at least, substantial improvement in the bilateral relationship toward the end of the Clinton administration. The Bush administration in 2001 signicantly altered the US approach to North Korea. It demanded North Korea to address not only nuclear and missile issues but also its conventional force posture and human rights. In addition, the tougher US position was compounded by the revelation in 2002 that North Korea had engaged in an additional covert nuclear development based on highly enriched uranium. The Bush administration disclosed that it had developed what it called a bold approach in the summer of 2002, in which North Korea would be required to make substantial concessions on issues including its weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs, development and export of ballistic missiles, threats to its neighbors, support for terrorism, and treatment of the North Korean people. The United States would reciprocate by improving its relationship with North Korea.3 Unfortunately, by engaging in a secret nuclear development program, North Korea raised the hurdle for the bold approach to be implemented. By announcing its withdrawal from the NPT in January 2003, North Korea set in motion its second nuclear diplomacy, the sequel to its 199394 campaign. In an about-face from its earlier pronouncements that
North Korean Nuclear Program, Press Statement, Richard Boucher, Spokesman, Washington DC, 16 Oct. 2002.
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North Koreas Response to US Hegemony 1019 it had no intention to acquire nuclear weapons, it warned that unless the United States abandoned its hostile policy toward North Korea, it would have no choice but to arm itself with nuclear weapons as a deterrent. However, at the same time, North Korea demanded in October 2002 a nonaggression pact and normalization of diplomatic relations with the United States, realization of Japans economic assistance to North Korea, a supply of electricity, and the construction of light-water reactors.4 North Koreas goal of ensuring regime survival by improving relations with the United States and Japan seemed to remain intact. Strategy The North Korean strategy to deal with the United States has two major elements: deterrence and compellence. Through deterrence, North Korea has tried to achieve its most fundamental goal: regime survival. Through compellence, it has attempted to encourage the United States and Japan to normalize relations with and provide economic assistance to the country. Development and deployment of WMD as well as medium- to long-range ballistic missiles has played a central role in enhancing North Koreas ability to exercise these strategies. Deterrence North Koreas deterrent capabilities come mainly from three military assets: conventional and special operations forces, supposed nuclear capabilities, and actual missile capabilities. Contrary to the widely accepted belief that nuclear weapons are the critical element of North Koreas deterrent, conventional and special operations forces have always been the most important pillar of its deterrent. At the height of the 1994 nuclear crisis, the United States considered launching a surgical strike against North Koreas nuclear facilities in Nyongbyon.5 However, North Koreas ability to destroy Seoul and inict enormous casualties on US-ROK (Republic of Korea) forces in case of conict prevented the United States from taking such an option.6 Although all-out war was not highly likely, US leaders expected North Korea to take some form of violent retaliation such as attacks along the

Keynote Speeches Made at Six-way Talks, Korean Central News Agency (henceforth KNCA), 29 Aug. 2003. 5 The operation plan was named OP5026. For details, see OPLAN 5026Air Strikes 5http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ops/oplan-5026.htm4. 6 Don Oberdorfer, The Two Koreas: A Contemporary History (Reading, MA: AddisonWesley 1997), 315.

1020 Narushige Michishita Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), long-range artillery shell strikes against Seoul, and commando attacks somewhere deep in South Korea.7 Particularly important among these options was North Koreas ability to attack Seoul with long-range artillery shells. North Korea had deployed 170 mm self-propelled artillery along the DMZ, and started to deploy 240 mm multiple rocket launchers (MRL) in 1993. The number of the 170 mm artillery piece has reportedly grown from about 200 in the early 1990s to over 600 in 2001, and that of the 240-mm MRL has increased to 430 by 2001.8 If chemical weapons are loaded on artillery shells, the expected number of casualties would shoot up. It was for this reason that the South Koreans expressed concern when the United States adopted the preemption strategy and decided to move US forces in Korea southward. South Koreans suspected that the United States might rst move its troops out of North Korean artillery range and then launch preemptive strikes against the North, sacricing the South Korean population as a result. The second pillar of North Koreas deterrent capabilities is nuclear weapons. In 1994 the assessment was that North Korea had at most one or two nuclear weapons and that such weapons, if they existed, were primitive and might not have been miniaturized enough to t atop ballistic missiles. Moreover, North Korea had never tested them. And, above all, using nuclear weapons would not have assured North Koreas victory and, instead, it would have meant that the North Korean regime would be wiped out. In fact, General Gary Luck, Commander in Chief, US-ROK Combined Forces Command, assessed in June 1994 that North Korea could be defeated even if it used the one or two nuclear weapons it might have possessed.9 North Koreas nuclear deterrent was simply not credible in 1994. This situation changed by 2006. In 2003 North Korea started to reprocess materials contained in the 8,000 spent fuel rods, and resumed the operation of the ve-megawatt reactor, both of which had been frozen since 1994 under the Agreed Framework. This means that
Joel S. Wit, Daniel B. Poneman and Robert L. Gallucci, Going Critical: The First North Korean Nuclear Crisis (Washington DC: Brookings Institution Press 2004), 244. 8 Hwang Il-do, Bug Jangsajeongpo: Alryeojiji anhneun Daseos gaji Jinsil (North Koreas Long-Range Artillery: Five Unknown Facts), Sindong-a, Dec. 2004, 5www. donga.com/docs/magazine/shin/2004/11/23/200411230500004/200411230500004_1. html4; and Yu Yong Won, Sudogwon-eul Sajeonggeori An-e Neohgo Issneun Bughan-ui Dayeonjang Rokes Mich Jajupo Yeongu (Study on North Korean MRL and Self-Propelled Artillery that Put Seoul Metropolitan Area within their Range), Wolgan Chosun, March 2001 5http://monthly.chosun.com/html/200102/200102280011_ 1.html4. 9 Ashton B. Carter and William J. Perry, Preventive Defense: A New Security Strategy for America (Washington DC: Brookings Institution Press 1999), 130.
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North Koreas Response to US Hegemony 1021 North Korea has probably obtained plutonium enough for ve to six nuclear weapons, and continues to produce enough ssile material, if reprocessed, for one to two bombs annually.10 Moreover, since the Agreed Framework did not prohibit activities related to the weaponization and miniaturization of nuclear devices, North Korea likely has improved its technologies to actually produce deliverable nuclear warheads. In June 2003 North Korea for the rst time publicly discussed the possession of nuclear deterrent force as a policy option,11 and in February 2005 it announced that it had manufactured nuclear weapons for self-defence to cope with the Bush administrations evermore undisguised policy to isolate and stie the DPRK.12 Credibility of North Koreas nuclear deterrent has improved since 1994. In addition, since North Koreas conventional forces are not being modernized and the counter-re capabilities on the US-ROK side continue to improve, the relative importance of nuclear weapons in North Koreas deterrent has grown and will continue to do so in the future. Against this background, North Korea conducted a nuclear test in October 2006. It was a major step forward in North Koreas nuclear development, but it became clear that it is a long way from possessing credible and operational nuclear weapons. The bomb actually exploded, but the magnitude of the explosion fell short of expectations, apparently, because the chain reaction went less than half way through. In a way, the nuclear test has created a window of vulnerability for North Korea in which it has not acquired credible nuclear capabilities, but its intention to possess nuclear weapons has become undeniable. Moreover, North Korea will not be able to get away with using nuclear weapons. The fact remains that using nuclear weapons would result in the end of the North Korean state. In this sense, North Koreas nuclear deterrent is useful only in the extreme scenario in which the United States blatantly invades the country and threatens its regime survival. Nuclear deterrence would be less credible in the face of more limited use or threat of force. The third pillar of North Koreas deterrent capabilities is its ballistic missiles. No matter how many nuclear weapons North Korea might have, they would be useless without ballistic missiles. In this sense, North Koreas deterrent capabilities have been strengthened in the past ten years due to the deployment of more than 100 No Dong missiles capable of striking most of Japanese territory, in addition to over 500
See, for example, Joel S. Wit, Jon Wolfsthal, Choong-suk Oh, The Six Party Talks and Beyond: Cooperative Threat Reduction and North Korea, A Report of the CSIS International Security Program, Dec. 2005, 1 and 6. 11 KCNA on DPRKs nuclear deterrent force, KCNA, 9 June 2003. 12 DPRK FM on Its Stand to Suspend Its Participation in Six-party Talks for Indenite Period, KCNA, 10 Feb. 2005.
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1022 Narushige Michishita Scud missiles targeted at South Korea. North Korea ight-tested the No Dong in 1993 and started deploying it in the late 1990s. Then in July 2006 North Korea launched seven ballistic missiles including six Scud and No Dong missiles, and one Taepo Dong 2 missile in the Sea of Japan. While the Taepo Dong 2 apparently failed to y as it was designed to, the Scud and No Dong missiles were successfully launched. By now, not only South Korea but also Japan has become a hostage to North Korean, potentially nuclear, missile attack. Moreover, North Korea has reportedly ight-tested new solid-fuel mobile ballistic missiles based on the Soviet SS-21 Scarab in May 2005 and March 2006.13 There was also a report that North Korea might have acquired 3,000-kilometerrange Kh-55 cruise missile technologies from Ukraine via Iran.14 On the credibility scale, ballistic missiles are located between the conventional forces and nuclear weapons. Ballistic missiles offer exibility in terms of warhead choices. They can deliver conventional, chemical, biological, or nuclear warheads. As already pointed out, using nuclear weapons would certainly invite massive retaliation. However, using ballistic missiles with conventional warhead in a limited manner will not necessarily result in a major escalation of the situation. In this sense, ballistic missiles provide important exibility in the North Korean deterrent forces. Compellence The second element of the North Korean strategy is the exercise of compellence to encourage the United States and Japan to normalize relations with and provide economic assistance to the country. This contrast between ends and means is one of the most interesting characteristics of North Korean military-diplomatic campaigns. Pyongyangs message is: Unless you abandon your hostile policy and normalize relations with us, we will continue to develop and deploy dangerous weapons, and we might sell them to somebody else or even use them. This approach has produced some limited results. First, North Korea signed the Agreed Framework with the United States in 1994, and the two countries came to the verge of substantially improving the bilateral relations toward the end of 2000. In 2002 North Korea succeeded in inviting Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi to Pyongyang to talk about normalization. Japan and North Korea agreed to make every possible effort for an early normalization of the relations.15
Center for Nonproliferation Studies, Monterey Institute of International Studies, CNS Special Report on North Korean Ballistic Missile Capabilities, 22 March 2006, 3. 14 Sankei Shimbun, 26 June 2005, 1. 15 Japan-DPRK Pyongyang Declaration, Pyongyang, 17 Sept. 2002.
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North Koreas Response to US Hegemony 1023 However, North Korea has yet to achieve its ultimate goal of normalizing diplomatic relations with the United States and Japan. Second, North Korea succeeded in having the United States eliminate some of the sanctions it had imposed on Pyongyang following the Korean War, and in obtaining some economic assistance from the United States and Japan. North Korea received substantial amount of heavy fuel oil from the United States, and acquired food and agricultural assistance. However, it has not succeeded in eliminating all the sanctions that the United States imposes on it. Third, North Korea has decided to freeze some parts of its nuclear and missiles programs, but it did not completely abandon them. North Korea decided to freeze the critical part of its plutonium-based nuclear facilities in 1994 and the freeze lasted until 2003. It also agreed to freeze ballistic missile ight-testing in 1999. However, North Korea has maintained all of its nuclear facilities, and resumed their operations in 2003. It initiated a covert uranium-based nuclear program sometime between 1997 and 2001. And it tested ballistic missiles and nuclear bombs in 2006. All this suggests that North Koreas strategy has been executed halfheartedly and has produced commensurately half-hearted results. The reason behind this is the fact that North Korea is using the same set of tools to achieve two separate objectives. In other words, it is using the same nuclear and missiles capabilities for both deterrence and compellence. On the one hand, since the North Koreans want to maintain deterrence, they cannot discard these military capabilities. On the other hand, if they want to normalize relations with the United States, they would have to abandon them. By continuing to increase their nuclear and missile arsenals, they can strengthen their deterrent and compellent power. But in doing so, they are raising the hurdle for normalization. This is the fundamental dilemma that North Korea faces in dealing with the United States. In fact, North Korea had attempted to solve this dilemma by turning the Six Party Talks into disarmament talks. In March 2005 the North Korean foreign ministry announced, Now that the DPRK has become a full-edged nuclear weapons state, the six-party talks should be disarmament talks where the participating countries negotiate the issue on an equal footing.16 However, the United States simply ignored the North Korean suggestion. Despite the mixed record of the past and the dilemma it faces, North Korea continues to use compellence to achieve its political, economic,
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DPRK Foreign Ministry Spokesman on Denuclearization of Korea, KCNA, 31 March 2005.

1024 Narushige Michishita and security goals. As a result, the September 2005 Joint Statement of the Fourth Round of the Six-Party Talks provided that: (a) The Six Parties reafrmed that the goal of the Six-Party Talks is the veriable denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula in a peaceful manner. (b) The DPRK committed to abandoning all nuclear weapons and existing nuclear programs and returning, at an early date, to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and to IAEA safeguards. (c) The United States afrmed that it has no intention to attack or invade the DPRK with nuclear or conventional weapons. (d) The non-North Korea parties expressed their respect and agreed to discuss, at an appropriate time, the subject of the provision of light-water reactors to the DPRK. (e) The DPRK and the United States undertook to take steps to normalize their relations. (f) The DPRK and Japan undertook to take steps to normalize their relations in accordance with the Pyongyang Declaration. (g) China, Japan, South Korea, Russia and the United States stated their willingness to provide energy assistance to the DPRK, and (h) The directly related parties will negotiate a permanent peace regime on the Korean Peninsula at an appropriate separate forum.17 The signicance of this joint statement is that it clearly spelled out the end scenario in which all parties would be satised. This was a positive step forward. However, two major difculties still lie ahead. First, since there are so many items included in the joint statement that the focus has been lost. Currently, there is a serious division among the non-North Korea parties to the Six Party Talks. South Korea, China, and Russia advocate a soft accommodative approach to North Korea, whereas the United States and Japan take a tough approach to the country. The joint statement gave ammunition to the soft approach advocates to emphasize normalization, economic assistance, and the permanent peace regime, deecting the pressure on North Korea to address the nuclear issue immediately. At the same time, it gave more room for North Korea to attempt to drive a wedge between the tough and soft parties. As we have seen in the past, the North Koreans are skilled tacticians.18 As a result, a fundamental solution of the issue remains difcult to obtain. Second, the fundamental dilemma that North Korea faces still exists. In order to normalize relations with the United States, the communist
17 18

Joint Statement of the Fourth Round of the Six-Party Talks Beijing, 19 Sept. 2005. Michishita, North Koreas First Nuclear Diplomacy, 199394, 4782.

North Koreas Response to US Hegemony 1025 state should eliminate its nuclear capabilities, which happen to be important part of its deterrent. The partial answer to this question was the security assurances that the United States provided to North Korea. In the joint statement, the United States afrmed that it had no intention to attack or invade the DPRK with nuclear or conventional weapons. However, from the North Korean perspective, no assurance without actual military-strategic reality to support it would be enough. Another argument is that if North Korea normalizes relations with Japan and obtain large amount of economic assistance, which would enable the country to rehabilitate its economic and social life, its survival would be secured. However, this scenario does not distinguish between the well-being of the state and the survival of the regime. The North Korean leaders may not think that the former automatically leads to the latter. In order to implement the joint statement to its advantage, North Korea suggested in the fth round of the Six Party Talks a ve-step road map for denuclearization. According to the road map, North Korea would (a) refrain from conducting a nuclear test, (b) promise not to transfer nuclear materials, (c) stop producing additional nuclear materials, (d) stop nuclear activities and dismantle nuclear facilities based on inspections, and nally (e) return to the NPT and the IAEA.19 North Korea seems to have attempted to maximize its gains by phasing the nuclear dismantlement process. Foundations of North Koreas Strategy To understand the North Korean strategy, one should understand its foundations: why has North Korea continued to use the same strategy for more than ten years? I argue that four factors play important roles: North Koreas political system; weakness; rationality; and luck. Political System The nature of North Koreas political system has enabled its leaders to use coercive strategy for a long time. First, only the highly centralized dictatorship like North Koreas can justify the continued expenditure of the large amount of resources on military buildup that puts an enormous burden on its people. The same characteristics make it possible for the North to be engaged in the long, stressful bargaining process, and to outlast its interlocutors in the protracted negotiation process. Second, the system ensures tremendous exibility. In 1993 North Korea announced its decision to withdraw from the NPT, test-launched
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OhmyNews, 14 Nov. 2005.

1026 Narushige Michishita the No Dong missile, and then asked the United States to hold bilateral talks. It launched a missile over Japan while holding high-level talks with the United States in August 1998. The two Koreas held the Summit meeting precisely one year after the North-South naval clash (which reportedly killed several tens of North Korean sailors) in June 1999. Contrary to most observers expectations, Kim Jong Il used plausible deniability and acknowledged in September 2001 that his men had actually abducted Japanese citizens back in the 1970s while claiming that he did not know the fact. The North Koreans can refuse to come to the negotiation table one day and call for it on the next. The North Korean leadership also allows its people to defect fairly liberally. There are reportedly more than 100,000 temporary or permanent North Korean defectors living in the northeastern part of China. Allowing potential dissidents to defect seems to have deected the internal pressure, which, if contained inside, might have exploded. Third, the system ensures signicant level of organizational memory. In the North Korean system, a small number of specialists tend to stay in the same position for a long time, resulting in a deep understanding of technical issues and historical background.20 A former North Korean diplomat who defected revealed that there were many aged ofcials in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and that almost 90 percent of the ofcials in the ministry stayed in the same section throughout their lives. Such a personnel management system certainly creates rigidity. However, it also guarantees consistency, continuity, and a signicant level of professionalism.21 It is quite suggestive, therefore, that a North Korean publication characterized the 1968 Pueblo incident and the 199394 nuclear diplomacy as two examples of Kim Jong Ils war of brains, or psychological war.22 After detaining the USS Pueblo, North Korea succeeded in persuading the Americans into holding the rst substantive bilateral talks in the Joint Security Area (JSA) in Panmunjom, which lasted for ten months and resulted in the return of Pueblo crew before Christmas. The North Koreans must have studied the Pueblo affair and reected the lessons learned upon their nuclear and missile diplomacy. One important shortcoming in the North Korean political system is a creation of major human rights problems within the country. Widespread awareness of the dismal human rights record has emboldened
Bong-Geun Jun, interview by author, Seoul, ROK, 16 May 2002. A defected former North Korean diplomat, interview by author, Seoul, ROK, 15 May 2002. 22 Kim Nam Jin et al., Hyangdo-ui Taeyang Gim Jeong Il Janggun [Gen. Kim Jong Il: The Leading Sun] (Pyongyang: Pyeongyang Chulpansa 1995), 397402. The English edition of this book is Kim Jong Il: The Lodestar of the 21st Century, Vol. 2 (Tokyo: Gwang Myeongsa 1997), 405.
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North Koreas Response to US Hegemony 1027 international public opinion and, in particular, conservative political forces in the United States, which has made it harder for the US government to come to terms with North Korea. In December 2005 a resolution criticizing North Koreas human rights situation was adopted in the United Nations General Assembly.23 Weakness as Strength In a paradoxical way, North Koreas weakness has also worked as its strength. Despite the differences in nuance, all of the non-North Korean parties of the Six Party Talks including the United States and Japan ofcially support engagement with the North. The engagement policy was adopted in 1988 as South Koreas ofcial policy toward North Korea, and a more proactive version of engagement policy, or Sunshine Policy, was initiated in 1998. With the adoption of the Sunshine Policy, South Koreas policy toward North Korea became that of peaceful coexistence, even at the cost of precluding early unication. The Sunshine Policy claimed that South Korea would neither harm nor absorb North Korea. Seouls adoption of the proactive engagement policy was a reection of its perception that it had practically won the competition with North Korea, and that collapse of the country had become a more important threat than armed aggression from it. Against this backdrop, South Korea, together with its friends and allies, was forced to walk the thin line between allowing North Korea to possess nuclear weapons and having it collapse with all the negative consequences. Second, implementation of the engagement policy, combined with humanitarian considerations, has encouraged South Korea and China as well as the United States and Japan to a lesser extent to provide humanitarian assistance to North Korea. In the 19952002 period, international assistance provided to North Korea through the World Food Programme (WFP) amounted to $1,156 million, and that provided by non-governmental organizations (NGO) totaled $173 million. Cumulative assistance provided by individual countries including the United States, the European Union, China and Japan by 2002 was $1,080 million.24 Partly due to such assistance, the North Korean economy started to record positive growth in 1999 after experiencing average 4.3 percent negative growth between 1990 and 1998.25 In 2005
Situation of human rights in the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea, A/RES/60/ 173, 16 Dec. 2005, GA/10437. 24 Ministry of Unication, Bughan Gaeyo 2004 (Survey of North Korea 2004) (Seoul: Ministry of Unication 2004), 299. 25 The Bank of Korea, Gross Domestic Product of North Korea in 2004, 31 May 2005. The Bank of Korea assessed that the North Korean economy had grown steadily, as
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1028 Narushige Michishita its grain production grew by 5.3 percent and was estimated to be 4.54 million tons. As a result, grain production has grown for ve years.26 Despite the increasing diplomatic pressure on the nuclear issue, economic pressure has eased. North Korea seems to be in a good position to cope with the prolonged bargaining and negotiation process with the United States and other countries. Third, North Koreas collapse is anathema to not only South Korea but also China. China has a long and loosely controlled border with North Korea, and has already absorbed a large number of defectors from the North. Already experiencing a signicant level of socioeconomic pressure within, China cannot afford another source of instability. Finally, North Koreas relative weakness has put it on the backburner of US foreign policy. Although Iraq became a target for US strategy of preemption, North Korea does not seem to be one. Given the continuing accumulation of ssile materials in the North Korean nuclear facilities, anybody would agree that North Korea is a big problem. However, given the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the situation in Iraq, and increasingly fundamentalist Iran, North Korea has become a lesser threat to the United States in relative terms. Al Qaeda attacked the US homeland. Iraq and Iran posed a threat not only to Israel and the Middle East peace process but also to the international economy. North Korea is developing the Taepo Dong missile with the potential capability to deliver chemical, biological, and possibly nuclear weapons to the continental United States. But the threat was not regarded as imminent. The United States was willing to arrest or kill Osama Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein, but it is negotiating with Kim Jong Il. Of course, this is not necessarily a blessing for North Korea. Although North Korea has not become a target for preemption, it has also failed to become a counterpart for immediate and serious negotiations. Rationality Related to the previous point is North Koreas rationality. In the past ten years, grade given to North Korean leaders rationality has improved from extremely poor to fair. During the 199394 nuclear
energy supply has improved somewhat and efforts have been made to increase production capacity since the implementation of the Economic Management Improvement Measures in July 2002. Education Center for Unication, Bughan Gyeongje, Eodikkaji wassna? [What is the status of North Korean economy?] (Seoul: Education Center for Unication 2005), 212. 26 Rural Development Administration, 2005 Bughan-ui Gogmul Saengsanryang Chujeong Balpyo [Assessment of North Korean Grain Production in 2005 Announced], 29 Nov. 2005.

North Koreas Response to US Hegemony 1029 crisis, the perceived lack of rationality on the part of North Korean leadership seems to have reinforced the effectiveness of their threats. Past actions such as the Axe Murder incident of 1976, the bombing in Rangoon in 1983, and the bombing of a Korean Airliner in 1987 had helped create such a perception. As Denny Roy suggested, the North Koreans seem to have used madman tactics in that they depicted themselves as irrational and dangerous in order to keep the other side on the defensive and put themselves in an advantageous position.27 In the past ten years, it has become clear that the North Korean leaders, particularly Kim Jong Il, are much more rational than previously believed. Despite all the aggressive rhetoric, North Korea has never physically attacked Americans since 1981 when North Korea launched surface-to-air missiles at a US SR-71 reconnaissance aircraft (although they missed it). North Korea has ended its active interactions with foreign terrorist groups. On this point, Richard Armitage said in December 2002, Since 1987, in the explosion of the Korean airliner, as far as I know, North Korea has not been involved in terrorism.28 In recent years, Kim Jong Il has met all of the top leaders of major concerned countries except the United States. Kims frequent international exposure has demonstrated that however idiosyncratic his aims might be, he is a calculating and rational actor. As a result, the situation has been created where the United States and other parties can relatively safely assume that North Korea will not take self-destructive actions such as exporting nuclear weapons to third parties let alone terrorists. This has had two opposite effects on North Korea. On the one hand, the North Koreans have become someone one can do business with. This is why the United States signed the Agreed Framework in 1994 and Madeleine Albright visited North Korea in 2000. Even the Bush administration is negotiating with North Korea without using preemption. On the other hand, the United States has become more relaxed than before in dealing with North Korea. In 1994 the United States planned a preemptive strike against North Korean nuclear facilities when it started to unload 8,000 spent fuel rods, which supposedly contained enough plutonium for several nuclear weapons. In 2003 the United States did not even le a case in the United Nations (UN) Security Council when North Korea started reprocessing the same spent fuel or when it declared the possession of nuclear weapons. The United States did not panic even in the face of highly provocative
Denny Roy, North Korea and the Madman Theory, Security Dialogue 25/3 (1994), 311. 28 Press Conference with Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, Richard L. Armitage, Deputy Secretary of State, Commonwealth Parliamentary Ofces, 13 Dec. 2002.
27

1030 Narushige Michishita missile and nuclear tests in 2006. If North Korean leaders are rational, the containment policy might work well enough, and neither preemption nor engagement will be needed. Luck Luck is one of the important assets that North Korea has enjoyed in the recent years. Of particularly importance has been the rise of China, change in South Korean politics, and the situations in Iraq and Iran. First, the rise of China seems to have given the North Koreans leeway. Throughout the 1990s, China played the role of the ultimate guarantor of the North Korean regime. However, it was relatively passive in doing so. Chinas future was still unpredictable. China was still suffering from the aftermath of the Tiananmen incident of 1989. Some argued that China would grow into a strong and rich nation while others contended that it might disintegrate due to mounting political and socioeconomic pressure. In the mid 1990s, it also experienced crises across the Taiwan Strait. China was busy taking care of itself, and did not have room to make a substantial commitment to North Korea. In addition, China established diplomatic relations with South Korea in 1992, depriving North Korea of its traditional special relationship with Beijing. This seems to have changed in recent years. By now, Chinas rise has become a solid assumption on which major powers base their foreign and security policies. One of the expressions of deepening Chinese commitment is its leadership in organizing and convening the Six Party Talks in 2003. China started to play an active role in bringing North Korea and other parties, especially the United States, together. Moreover, in October 2005, Hu Jintao visited North Korea as the General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party. Chinese top leaders visit to North Korea took place for the rst time since Jiang Zemins visit in September 2001. Wang Jiarui, head of the International Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, said that China would not only provide North Korea with economic aid, but also help it build factories, and that it would render help to the best of our ability when North Korea faces difculties.29 In return, Kim Jong Il went to China in January 2006 and visited major special economic zones in the country. Since 2000 trade between China and North Korea has grown annually by 30 percent on average, contributing to estimated 3.5 percent annual growth rate for the North Korean economy. In 2005 Chinas trade with North Korea totaled $1,305 million, up from $488 million in 2000. (Trade with China amounted to 40 percent of North Koreas total trade in 2004, about
29

Xinhua News Agency, 31 Oct. 2005.

North Koreas Response to US Hegemony 1031 twice the size of the inter-Korean trade in the same year. The trade between North Korea and Japan was $195 million in 2005, down from $1,298 million in 2001. This sharp decline was partly due to the reluctance of the Japanese consumers to buy North Korean goods since the abduction issue became widely known in 2001 and Japans ban on the entry of ships weighing over 100 metric tons without insurance into its ports.)30 China has become the most important external partner for the North Korean economy. Second, sea change in South Korean politics has helped North Koreas position. In the 2002 presidential election in South Korea, the widespread e-politics and an accident in which two South Korean schoolgirls were killed by a US armored vehicle helped the unlikely progressive presidential candidate Roh Moo-hyun win the election. Based on his Policy for Peace and Prosperity, Roh strongly promoted a proactive and accommodative engagement policy toward North Korea. As a result, economic transaction between the North and the South has increased from $111 million in 1991, $425 million in 2000, $642 million in 2002 to $1,056 million in 2005. In 2005 the South-North Korea trade surpassed $1 billion for the rst time, up 51.5 percent from 2004. Transactional trade has diminished, but non-transactional trade increased owing to aid for construction of South Korean-led Gaeseong Industrial Complex and Mt. Geumgang Tourism District in the North.31 The two Koreas are engaged in joint development projects in North Korea, including reconnection of railways and roads,32 tourism in Mount Geumgang,33 and development of the Gaeseong Industrial Complex.34 In February 2006 the Hyundai Asan, one of the
Lee Young Hun, Bug-Jung Muyeog-ui Hyeonhwang-gwa Bughan Gyeongje-e Michineun Yeonghyang (Current Status of North Korea-China Trade and its Impact on North Korean Economy), Institute for Monetary and Economic Research, 13 Feb. 2006; Ministry of Unication, Peace and Prosperity: White Paper on Korean Unication 2005 (Seoul: Ministry of Unication 2005), 54; and Ministry of Unication, Trade Volume between North Korea and Japan, 2 March 2006. 31 Ministry of Unication homepage 5www.unikorea.go.kr/en/EPA/EPA0101L.jsp4; Ministry of Unication, Inter-Korean Trade Volume from 2000 to 2005 (23 Jan. 2006), 5www.unikorea.go.kr/en/EPA/EPA0101L.jsp4; Korea International Trade Association, 2005 Inter-Korean Trade Exceeds a Historic High US$1 Billion, 26 Jan. 2006, 5http://global.kita.net/kita/kitanews_viw.jsp?no4824; and the Bank of Korea, Gross Domestic Product of North Korea in 2004. 32 Ministry of Unication homepage 5http://www.unikorea.go.kr/en/EUF/ EUF0101R.jsp4. 33 Ibid.; and Ministry of Unication, Achievements and Prospects of the Participatory Governments Policy toward North Korea after the First Half of its Term, 26 Aug. 2005. 34 Ministry of Unication, Achievements and Prospects.
30

1032 Narushige Michishita Hyundai Group companies and a major investor in North Korea, decided to invest additional $2.26 billion in the Mount Kumgang project. Moreover, South Korea regularly provides humanitarian assistance to North Korea. In 2005 it sent 350,000 tons of fertilizer and 500,000 tons of rice to North Korea. South Korea has been seeking to mediate between the United States and the DPRK since the Six Party Talks began. On the one hand, South Korea urged North Korea to abandon its nuclear programs. But on the other hand, it urged the United States to become more exible in its approach to North Korea. In November 2004 President Roh stated that the North Korean contention that their nuclear weapons and missiles constituted a means of safeguarding their security by deterring threats from the outside was understandable, and argued that the North Korean nuclear issue boiled down to whether security would be provided to the North, and whether or not it would be given an opportunity to overcome its plight through reform and openness.35 In this context, it is noteworthy that in 2005 Roh Moo-hyun started to espouse the view that South Korea should become a balancer in Northeast Asia. The denition of the balancer is not totally clear, but it basically means that South Korea would take more equidistant policy toward the neighboring countries. In other words, it would distant itself from traditional friends the United States and Japan and come closer to new friends China and North Korea. Recent developments will likely reinforce such a tendency. In July 2005 South Korea proposed that it provide 200 megawatts of electricity to the North every year if the nuclear issue is resolved. It was part of Seouls attempt to encourage Pyongyang to come to a deal. The bolstered China and South Koreas commitments could have two somewhat contradictory effects. On the one hand, feeling more relaxed about its security and survival, the North Koreans are in a better position to make a strategic decision to eliminate their nuclear weapons programs. On the other hand, now that North Koreas political and economic situation is better served by Chinese and South Korean support, it is encouraged to wait out the Bush administration that has been reluctant to negotiate a deal. Finally, events in other parts of the world seem to have helped North Korea. Particularly important are the situation in Iraq and the nuclear issue arising from Iran. The situations in Iraq and Iran loom larger in US foreign policy than North Korea for several reasons. Whereas North Korea is a marginal player in Northeast Asia, Iraq and Iran are critical actors in the politics of the Middle East. Whereas North Korea has
Address at a Luncheon Hosted by the Los Angeles World Affairs Council, Cheong Wa Dae, Ofce of the President, Republic of Korea, 12 Nov. 2004.
35

North Koreas Response to US Hegemony 1033 practically terminated its terrorist connections, Iran maintains its relationship with terrorist groups. And whereas North Korean leaders are regarded as relatively rational, Saddam Hussein was and Iranian leaders are perceived as reckless and potentially dangerous. However, these events cut in both ways. On the one hand, since the US policy has been focused heavily on Iraq and Iran, North Korea will not likely become a target of the preemption strategy. However, on the other hand, the communist state remains at best rst in the second tier items of US foreign policy priorities. Under such circumstances, North Koreas deterrent works well, but compellence does not. Moreover, it is not clear how long these trends will last. The Taiwan issue remains. Chinese growth appears to be steady, but ongoing socioeconomic changes in China are so dynamic that things might get out of control more easily than widely expected. Presidential elections are scheduled in 2007 in South Korea, and currently conservative candidates are running ahead of their liberal counterparts. The situation in Iraq continues to be volatile, and the Iranian nuclear issue remains very active. However, situations change, and nobody can deny that the international environment can become a more difcult one for North Korea in the future. Evaluation: Limits of the North Korean Strategy So far, North Koreas strategy to deal with the United States has proved to be fairly successful. It has not achieved major success, but it has not made big mistakes either. It has failed to normalize relations with the United States, and Japan for that matter, but successfully avoided creating the situation where its regime survival was seriously threatened. Given the relative power position of the two countries in 2004 the US gross domestic product was 531 times larger , and US defense spending 254 times bigger36 North Koreas success is fairly remarkable. In the years ahead, there are broadly two different paths that North Korea could take to deal with the US hegemon. At one end of the spectrum, the DPRK could pursue more proactively the strategy of bandwagoning with the United States, and decide to make the strategic decision to renounce nuclear weapons. If this were the case, US policy would be a single most important factor determining the outcome of North Koreas strategy. Even if North Korea makes a major concession, it would not be reciprocated unless the United States makes its own strategic decision to accept non-ideological, traditional-realist policy of solving the nuclear issue at the cost of having to downplay human
International Institute for Strategic Studies, The Military Balance 2005/2006 (London: Routledge 2005).
36

1034 Narushige Michishita rights and other liberal agendas. At the other end, North Korea would shift its strategic focus away from the hegemon to the old Chinese friends. If North Korea chooses the old friend scenario, it might mean that it will attempt to balance, in conjunction with China, against the United States and Japan. The DPRK would go back to the future to the days when it and China were close communist allies. Somewhere between the two extremes lies the scenario in which North Korea follows a policy of equidistance toward the United States and Japan on the one hand and China on the other. In another, more moderate scenario, Pyonyang would attempt to simply wait out the Bush administration to negotiate a strategic deal with the next, preferably Democratic, US president. Reluctant Patron Candidates: The United States and Japan Currently, the Bush administration is taking a long-term strategic approach to the North Korea issue rather than a short-term tactical approach (although it might be a result of disagreements over the North Korea policy). The US demand for North Korea to make a strategic decision as well as the fact that the Bush administration once named its North Korea policy as a bold approach or bold initiative indicates this.37 In other words, the Bush policy seeks a broader and more conclusive solution to the North Korean nuclear issue than the Agreed Framework. In order to encourage North Korea to make a strategic decision, the United States would use wide-ranging policy measures such as the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI) and cracking down on the money laundering, drug trafcking, and counterfeiting that the North Koreans have long engaged in. These are part of so-called smart sanctions targeted against North Koreas leadership. They are expected to dry up sources of income for that leadership while minimizing negative effects on its people.38 The US Treasurys decision in September 2005 to designate Macao-based Banco Delta Asia as of
37 North Korean Nuclear Program, Press Statement, Richard Boucher, Spokesman, Washington DC, 16 Oct. 2002; President Bush Discusses Iraq, Remarks by President Bush and Polish President Kwasniewski in Photo Opportunity, Ofce of the Press Secretary, 14 Jan. 2003; and Dealing With North Koreas Nuclear Programs, Prepared Statement of James A. Kelly, Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacic Affairs, Senate Foreign Relations Committee, 15 July 2004. 38 According to David Asher, North Koreas criminal sector may account for as much as 3540 percent of its exports and a much larger percentage of its total cash earnings. David L. Asher, The North Korean Criminal State, its ties to Organized Crime, and the Possibility of WMD Proliferation, Remarks to the Counter-Proliferation Strategy Group, Woodrow Wilson Center, 21 Oct. 2005.

North Koreas Response to US Hegemony 1035 primary money laundering concern was an important recent example of such a policy.39 In addition, the US Congress passed the North Korean Human Rights Act in October 2004. The problem of this approach is that it is not clear whether such indirect pressure will produce expected results in time. From North Koreas reaction, it is widely assessed that the Banco Delta Asia case affected the leadership signicantly. However, it is not clear whether that pressure will convince the North Koreans to come back to the table and seriously negotiate a denuclearization deal in the Six Party Talks. While the United States puts additional pressure on North Korea, Pyongyang produces additional ssile materials on its soil. In June 2006, it was reported that North Korea might have possessed eight to seventeen nuclear weapons.40 A growing nuclear arsenal might or might not help the Asian states bandwagoning strategy with the United States. On the one hand, a larger nuclear arsenal might provide a stronger bargaining position. On the other hand, the larger arsenal might make a negotiated settlement more difcult, preventing the United States and North Korea from reconciling. We are yet to see which effect will prove to be stronger. The US proposal demands North Korea eliminate its nuclear program in a short period of time. However, concerned about the loss of its deterrence and bargaining power, North Korea will not likely give up its nuclear programs easily. In addition, both the Bush administration and the Congress remain tough on North Korea, and more concerned about the situation in Iraq and Iran than North Korea. However, the Democratic victory in November 2006 mid-term election might change the attitude of the US Congress toward North Korea. More fundamentally, it is not clear what the ultimate US policy goal is: to encourage the DPRK regime to take positive diplomatic steps, or to undermine the regime. It appears that US policymakers are divided on this point. Unless this internal division is eliminated, the grand bargain with North Korea will not be possible. Despite the bold initiative that the Japanese government took in September 2002 when Prime Minister Koizumi visited North Korea and signed the Pyongyang Declaration calling for normalization, the revelation that the North Korean authorities had actually abducted Japanese citizens and the reemergence of the nuclear issue prevented the two countries from normalizing relations quickly. First, resolving the abduction issue is not easy. For one, the North Korean authorities
Treasury Designates Banco Delta Asia as Primary Money Laundering Concern under USA PATRIOT Act, JS-2720, 15 Sept. 2005. 40 David Albright and Paul Brannan, The North Korean Plutonium Stock Mid-2006, Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS), 26 June 2006, 1.
39

1036 Narushige Michishita have claimed that some of the conrmed abductees were already dead. The Japanese government demands convincing evidence of their deaths, but the North Koreans have been reluctant, or possibly unable, to present such evidence. For another, in addition to the conrmed abductees, there are supposed to be a larger number of unconrmed abductees. Since it is practically impossible to nd out the whereabouts of all of them, Japan and North Korea will have to make a political decision that the abduction issue has been resolved at some point. However, it will not be easy particularly for Japanese leaders to put an end to the highly politicized abduction issue. Second, the reemergence of the nuclear issue in 2002 precluded the option for Japan and North Korea to normalize relations without rst solving the nuclear issue. Bilateral talks between Japan and North Korea take place separately from the Six Party Talks, but the former cannot go too far ahead of the latter. Given the issues stated so far, the most likely scenario for the near future is that the United States and Japan take the path of containment spelled out in the 1999 Perry Report. Faced with the stalemate, the two countries are taking steps to bolster their defense capabilities. In 2005 the United States deployed 15 F-117 stealth bombers at the Kunsan Air Force Base in South Korea. In October 2005, the United States and Japan jointly released the Security Consultative Committee Document, entitled, USJapan Alliance: Transformation and Realignment for the Future, in which they agreed to improve several specic areas of cooperation including ballistic missile defense, the PSI, response to WMD attacks, and joint transportation, use of facilities, medical support, and other related activities for non-combatant evacuation operations.41 Japan will start deploying ballistic missile defense systems in 2007. China and South Korea as Alternative Patrons? Despite its rhetoric that the country is self-reliant (Juche), North Korea has always sought to nd great power patrons. In the Cold War period, the Soviet Union and China provided such patronage. After the end of the Cold War, North Korea lost the commitment from these communist friends, and started to seek the alternative patronage of the United States. After ten years of struggle, North Korea has come to realize two things: one is that the United States might not be willing to provide such
US-Japan Alliance: Transformation and Realignment for the Future, Security Consultative Committee Document by Secretary of State Rice, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, Minister of Foreign Affairs Machimura, and Minister of State for Defense Ohno, 29 Oct. 2005.
41

North Koreas Response to US Hegemony 1037 an alternative; the other is that China, together with South Korea, could become a new patron. Both China and South Korea have increased their strategic weight in the past ten years and have become willing to make stronger commitment to the survival of the North Korean regime. The latter might not be able to balance against the US hegemon in conjunction with China and South Korea, however, it might be able to adopt a policy of equidistance toward the United States and Japan on the one hand and China and South Korea on the other. There are limits to this choice, however. First, North Korea must alter its behavior in order to obtain fuller support from China. China would require its neighbor to freeze, or at least slow down, nuclear and missile development, refrain from conducting brinkmanship diplomacy and engaging in illicit activities, and not take any other actions that might destabilize the region. In fact, China seems to have substantially strengthened its pressure on North Korea after the nuclear test. China would be loath to see North Korea give ammunition to the strengthening of the US-Japan alliance and development of its combined missile defense and other defense capabilities. However, without brinkmanship and illicit activities, North Koreas diplomatic inuence would be seriously limited and its leadership vitality signicantly undermined. Moreover, North Koreas economic dependence on China has deepened rapidly. If this trend continues, the smaller countrys freedom of actions will gradually be undercut. In the long run, North Korea should also be concerned about the United States and China cutting a strategic deal to attempt regime change in the North. Second, moving too close to China might make it more difcult for North Korea to normalize its relations with the United States. The United States chose a multilateral forum the Six Party Talks partly because it hoped China would take care of managing North Korea. Heavily engaged in Afghanistan and Iraq, the United States would certainly welcome increased Chinese commitment to North Korea since that would free the United States from the business of engaging with it. It may be that the original US hope comes true. It will also mean that Japan would be discouraged from taking a proactive engagement policy toward North Korea. The latters chance of obtaining substantial economic assistance from Japan will diminish. Third, related to the second point, China might try not to take full responsibility for managing an irresponsible North Korea. Chinese policy has long been that of urging the United States and North Korea to come to a deal and normalize their bilateral relations. China hopes the United States will take care of North Korea just as the United States hopes that China will do it. In the meeting with Kim Jong Il in January

1038 Narushige Michishita 2006, Hu Jintao described the Six Party Talks as an efcient mechanism to solve the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue, and said that China was ready to unswervingly make joint efforts to promote the Six Party Talks.42 There are also limits to North Koreas option of choosing South Korea as a strategic partner. Although the Roh Moo-hyun administration has been strongly committed to a proactive and accommodative engagement policy toward the North, South Korea is still allied with the United States. If pressed hard, South Korea could choose the United States and discard North Korea as a partner (although in an extreme opposite scenario, if pressed hard, president Roh might choose to cut a strategic deal with North Korea by holding an inter-Korean summit). In addition, the South Korean presidential election is scheduled in 2007, and conservative candidates are currently running ahead of their liberal counterparts. While engagement policy will likely to outlive the current administration, a conservative government in South Korea will certainly change the tone and nuance of engagement. Moreover, domestic political rivalry in South Korea might affect its North Korea policy as all but Clinton logic changed US policy signicantly in 2001. Conclusion North Koreas strategy to deal with the US hegemon has worked fairly well in the sense that it succeeded in achieving its bottom-line objective: the survival of the Kim Jong Il regime. North Korea has successfully deterred the United States from taking military actions against it, arranged the Agreed Framework and other bilateral agreements and statements, established formal and informal communication channels, and obtained security assurances. Nevertheless, after more than a decade of effort, North Korea has failed to normalize its relations with the United States. Neither has it succeeded in obtaining substantial economic assistance from Japan. The US-DPRK relationship in 2006 is no better than in 1993 when North Korea embarked on the coercive normalization policy toward Washington. There are signicant limits to North Koreas potential strategic partnership with the United States, China, or South Korea. At the present time, the most likely policy option for North Korea is to continue its traditional, realist policy of playing one against another toward the United States, China, Japan, and South Korea while driving a wedge in their relationships whenever possible. If the power transition from Kim Jong Il to one of his sons is actually underway
42

Xinhua News Agency, 19 Jan. 2006.

North Koreas Response to US Hegemony 1039 in the country as widely reported, North Korea will likely remain cautious on the diplomatic front in coming years. If this is the case, the most likely US strategy will be that of containment as the 1999 Perry Report suggested as the second path (the rst path being that of normalization). In the second path, the United States and its allies will take steps to assure their security and contain the threat.43 The United States, in conjunction with Japan, will continue to crack down on North Koreas illicit activities, strengthen counter-proliferation policy such as PSI, and develop missile defense and other defense measures. In the meantime, China and South Korea will seek to restrain North Koreas misbehavior while preventing Kim Jong Il regimes catastrophic collapse. In 2006 North Korea launched ballistic missiles and conducted a nuclear test, most likely in an attempt to force the United States to seriously negotiate a new agreement with the country. We have yet to see whether this renewed compellent action will make the bandwagoning with the hegemon come true. Acknowledgements I thank Robert Dujarric, Michael Green, and Thomas Mahnken for their invaluable comments on the earlier drafts of this article. This article was originally presented in the panel on Strategies to Accommodate US Military Dominance: Friends, Enemies, and Neutrals, organized by Thomas Mahnken, at the 47th Annual International Studies Association Convention held in San Diego, California, on 24 March 2006.

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43 William J. Perry, Special Advisor to the President and the Secretary of State, North Korea Policy Review, Findings and Recommendations, Unclassied Report, 12 Oct. 1999.

1040 Narushige Michishita


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