How to live with a nuclear North Korea

How to live with a nuclear North Korea
By Bennett Ramberg
Copyright by The International Herald Tribune
Published: February 15, 2007


LOS ANGELES: Despite the agreement reached in Beijing this week, Pyongyang is not going to give up the bomb. What it will give up for promised fuel-oil stocks are its decrepit nuclear reactor and reprocessing facility, which have reached the end of their useful lives.

The failure of the Beijing talks to include a plan to eliminate the North's nuclear weapons and material and leave the matter to later discussions is a step back from the September 2005 agreement. This reflects a fact of life: For Kim Jong Il, the bomb marks insurance for survival. Nothing can compensate for that.

Still there remain grounds for solace. Washington already has in place two legs of a required three- prong strategy to prevent the North's initiation of a nuclear strike and the dissemination of nuclear material to other rogue nations or terrorists. Under an agreement known as the Proliferation Security Initiative, the Bush administration has enlisted dozens of countries to look for and intercept North Korean nuclear contraband. Should Pyongyang shut down its visible nuclear production program, as the Beijing agreement provides, it will eliminate a source of new weapons material. And, to prevent a premeditated North Korean nuclear attack, both South Korean and American forces maintain an effective deterrent and retaliatory capacity.

However, there remains one glaring loophole, the possibility that Pyongyang could launch an atomic strike prompted by fears of a pre-emptive attack or failed intelligence. This challenge will grow should the North miniaturize its nuclear arsenal for placement on ballistic missiles.

Given this risk, we should prepare a "Plan B" in the likely event the Beijing agreement fails. Confidence- building measures — reflecting North Korea's nuclear weapons reality — provide a practical path.

Confidence building is not foreign to the Korean peninsula. From 2000 to 2003, the two Koreas kept a hot line open. South Korea's sunshine policy of economic and political engagement, which generated aid and investment, promoted the reunification of families and encouraged dialogue between senior officials.

A return to Washington's passive-aggressive course would not serve anyone's security. Plan B would not reward Pyongyang for perfidy, but reflect nuclear reality. Resurrecting and expanding a hot line linking Pyongyang with Seoul, Tokyo, Beijing, Moscow and Washington would be an obvious step. Normalizing relations between Washington and Pyongyang, without preconditions, would enhance communications. It also would give Washington a window into this most secret of countries.

Military confidence building would attempt to apply other elements of the Soviet-American experience: prenotification of large troop movements, military data exchanges, limits on forces near the North- South border, just to name a few. The United States also could provide the North with low-resolution satellite intelligence of the borderland.

South Korea would renew its economic and political engagement policy. Investment and aid for civil development would offer a practical formula to abate Pyongyang's incentive to sell nuclear materials and other contraband to generate hard currency for legitimate international commerce. It also would provide the best means to expose the North's population to the possibilities of economic prosperity, which, in time, could generate political reform.

North Korea is just beginning its learning curve as a nuclear-armed state. Under Plan B, confidence building and transparency steps provide the means to insure that Pyongyang's insecurities do not become our problem.

Bennett Ramberg served in the State Department during the administration of George H.W. Bush.