By Michael Mazza, Special to CNN
Editor’s note: Yesterday, GPS heard from Cato Scholar Doug Bandow, who suggested a hands off response to North Korea’s latest nuclear test. Today, American Enterprise Institute research fellow Michael Mazza suggests a very different response. The views expressed are his own.
Tuesday morning on the Today show, senior Barack Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett asserted that North Korea’s nuclear program “doesn’t strengthen North Korea. It makes it more vulnerable.” If only that were so. While the North’s nuclear weapons do contribute to its international isolation, it’s not at all clear that Pyongyang has any interest in joining the “world community,” as the president so often suggests.
In fact, North Korea’s nuclear achievements have, to date, made it feel less vulnerable. First, they provide leader Kim Jong-un with fodder for domestic propaganda, which may help shore up the regime. Second, and perhaps more importantly, they enhance its nascent nuclear deterrent. Kim and his cronies are already confident they can act with impunity, as they did in carrying out deadly attacks – indeed, what should be seen as acts of war – on South Korea in 2010 with the sinking of the Cheonan naval vessel and the shelling of Yeonpyeong island. As they continue to deploy their own nuclear capabilities, that confidence will surely only grow.
By Doug Bandow, Special to CNN
Editor’s note: Doug Bandow is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute and a former special assistant to President Ronald Reagan. He is the author ‘Tripwire: Korea and U.S. Foreign Policy in a Changed World.’ The views expressed are his own.
Pyongyang has dismissed international criticism of its third nuclear test, claiming to be responding to “outrageous” American hostility. The proper response from Washington is a yawn.
The so-called Democratic People’s Republic of Korea has long been an international black hole. Totalitarian, impoverished, belligerent, irresponsible. Yet, while a wreck of a country, it has managed to confound its neighbors and the United States. Despite years of hope that it would either collapse or reform, the Kim dynasty staggers on, a system of monarchical communism seemingly immune to a changing world.
The nuclear test is the latest blow to hopes that Kim Jong-un, the son of Kim Jong-il, heralds a new era of modernization. But this week’s events should not surprise anyone. North Korea doesn’t work for most North Koreans. But it works well for the elite. Its members have little incentive to change. And while it might be nice to rule a wealthier, more powerful nation, opening up the political system risks leaving apparatchiks not only out of power, but hanging from lampposts.
By Heather Williams, Special to CNN
Editor’s note: Heather Williams is a research fellow in international security at Chatham House in London. The views expressed are her own.
Whether the latest North Korean nuclear test destabilizes Northeast Asia in the short-term depends on how it is handled within the U.N. Security Council. The major players in the region have made stability a priority, and are likely to continue to do so. And certainly, if stability is defined as the absence of conflict or risk of immediate conflict, all signs suggest the region will indeed remain stable. After all, China’s continued economic growth is dependent on regional stability, South Korea and Japan are terrified of war with nuclear-armed North Korea, and the United States is anxious about becoming embroiled in another regime change.
But regional players will likely still have to take some sort of action against a belligerent and increasingly aggressive North Korea if there is to be a meaningful chance of maintaining stability in the long term. The hard part, though, is balancing short-term and long-term gains.
By Charles Armstrong, Special to CNN
Editor’s note: Charles Armstrong is the director of the Center for Korean Research at Columbia University. The views expressed are his own.
Anyone who has followed North Korean affairs for the last several years (or the last two decades) could have predicted North Korea’s defiant response to the U.N. Security Council resolution this week condemning North Korea’s rocket launch last December and strengthening international sanctions against Pyongyang. But it should also be clear by now that while carrots only occasionally deter North Korea’s provocative behavior, sticks – whether in the form of sanctions or threats of military action – only make North Korea defiant and more bellicose.
In 1994, the first time the United States proposed taking the North Korean nuclear question to the United Nations, North Korea announced that any impositions of U.N. sanctions would be considered “an act of war.” In 2006, and again in 2009, North Korea responded to U.N. sanctions not by giving up missiles and nukes, but ratcheting up the rhetoric. In the past, promises of security and economic aid have persuaded Pyongyang to freeze or reduce its missile and nuclear programs: North Korea halted its plutonium program for eight years following an agreement with the United States in 1994, adhered to a voluntary moratorium on missile tests from 1998 to 2006, and shut down its Yongbyon nuclear reactor in 2007 as part of a multilateral agreement. The record may not be terribly encouraging, but carrots do occasionally work.
Michael Auslin is director of Japan Studies at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington. The views expressed are the writer’s own.
By Michael Auslin, Special to CNN
With most countries, one remembers dates, such as 1066 or 1776; with North Korea, one remembers U.N. resolutions. Tuesday, the U.N. Security Council passed Resolution 2087, the seventh since 1993 concerning North Korea’s illicit nuclear weapons and ballistic missile program. Like the other resolutions, it is empty and meaningless, and will do nothing to resolve a growing crisis on the Korean Peninsula. It’s time for Washington to grow up and either decide to put real pressure on North Korea or to admit diplomatic defeat and reserve the right to retaliate for any unprovoked North Korean aggression in the future.
North Korea: New nuclear test will be part of fight against U.S.
There’s nothing new, either, in North Korea’s strident denunciations of the U.N. resolution, except perhaps its clarifying reiteration of the United States as a “hostile power” and enemy of the Korean people. Nor must any observers delude themselves into thinking that, simply because Beijing decided to support this resolution, China is in any way serious about crimping Kim Jong Un’s style. The Kim regime long ago figured out that China would much rather have an obstreperous and unbalanced quasi-theocratic totalitarian state controlling the northern half of the Korean Peninsula than trust that a reunified Korea would not somehow decide to side with the United States and possibly even Japan in the game of global geopolitics in Northeast Asia.
If North Korea stays true to form, then the world should expect a third nuclear test within weeks, as a sign of Pyongyang’s displeasure with the U.N.’s temerity to express, yet again, its opposition to North Korea’s missile and nuclear programs. FULL POST
This is the latest in a series of entries looking at what we can expect in 2013. Guest analysts look at the key challenges facing a selected country – and what next year might hold in store.
By Katharine H.S. Moon, Special to CNN
Editor’s note: Katharine H.S. Moon is a professor of political science and Wasserman Chair in Asian Studies at Wellesley College and an Asia Society associate fellow. The views expressed are the writer’s own.
2013 will be the year of dynastic leadership on the Korean peninsula, and the offspring on both sides of the 38th parallel have to make the best out of the baggage their fathers left for them. They can choose to look back and call forth the ghosts of their dads or look forward and forge their own priorities and a practical vision for economic reforms and peace on the peninsula.
What may surprise many about the two new leaders heading into 2013 is that they have more in common than meets the eye. The newly elected president of South Korea, Park Geun-hye, was elected on December 18 with a full accounting of votes confirming her ascension on December 19. Likewise, North Korea's Kim Jong Un ascended to power on December 19 a year earlier, upon the public release of news that his father, Kim Jong Il, had died.
By John Delury, Special to CNN
Editor’s note: John Delury is an assistant professor at Yonsei University Graduate School of International Studies and a senior fellow for the Asia Society Center on U.S.-China Relations. The views expressed are his own.
South Korean voters are about to choose a new president to lead their country for the next five years. It has been a hotly contested campaign, with opinion polls too close to call and voter turnout expected to be upwards of 80 percent. The race has come down to a dead heat between the liberal candidate, Moon Jae-in, and his conservative opponent, Park Geun-hye, and it’s unclear who will win.
But one thing most people do agree on is that, of all the issues that have been fiercely debated, one topic that is seen as marginal to the outcome is what to do about North Korea.
FULL POST
By Michael Mazza, Special to CNN
Editor’s note: Michael Mazza is a research fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. The views expressed are his own.
On Monday, North Korea announced it was extending the window for its rocket launch due to a technical glitch. On Tuesday, South Korean intelligence officials announced there were indications that the rocket was being dismantled. On Wednesday, North Korea conducted the missile test, which it carried out successfully. What happened here?
It could be that this false delay was all about China. North Korea originally announced the missile test only a day after a high-level meeting in Pyongyang between Kim Jong Un and Wang Jiarui, head of the Chinese Communist Party’s International Department. Beijing, in the midst of a leadership transition and already dealing with a period of tense relations with its neighbors and the United States, must have been furious.
By Jason Miks
North Korea has defied the international community by launching a satellite into space. But even as questions remain over how much control Pyongyang actually has over the satellite, policymakers are considering how to respond to what the U.S. described as a "provocative" move.
Writing on CNN, Joe Cirincione, president of global security foundation Ploughshares Fund, argued today that although the launch represents a notable technological step for North Korea, it does not pose a serious military threat to the U.S. or other nations.
“If the past is any guide, North Korea's launch of an Unha-3 rocket will have international security repercussions far out of proportion to its military capability,” he wrote.
Still, the launch is being taken seriously by Washington, which is leading the global response, including at the United Nations where the issue is reportedly considered urgent.
By Stephen Yates, Special to CNN
Editor’s note: Stephen J. Yates is former Deputy Assistant to the Vice President for National Security Affairs (2001-2005) and currently CEO of DC International Advisory. The views expressed are his own.
North Korea’s seemingly successful long-range missile test presents a significant challenge to the U.S. and its allies.
This is North Korea’s most successful provocation since demonstrating the ability to detonate a nuclear device in 2006. North Korea has now demonstrated a significant leap in its long-range missile capability, and it would be a mistake to assume further leaps forward are beyond its reach in the not too distant future. New and very young leader Kim Jong Un has succeeded where his father did not – a major propaganda victory for him.
By Charles Armstrong, Special to CNN
Editor’s note: Charles Armstrong is the director of the Center for Korean Research at Columbia University. The views expressed are his own.
North Korea has done it again. For the second time in less than nine months, Pyongyang has fired a long-range missile, this time apparently succeeding in sending a satellite into orbit. What North Korea calls a “peaceful rocket launch,” much of the rest of the world has condemned as a military provocation and a brazen act of defiance against international sanctions. Yet despite tough talk from the United States, Japan, South Korea and other countries, there is little the international community can do to punish North Korea or prevent further such acts. While North Korea’s technological capacity progresses, the policy of sanctions has demonstrably failed. It’s time to take a new approach to North Korea.
It’s important to keep in mind that North Korea has done this primarily for domestic reasons, not to send a “signal” to the world (although there is an element of signaling as well). The timing of the launch is significant. First, it comes just before the first anniversary of former leader Kim Jong Il’s death, and North Korean state media has declared that commemorating the elder Kim’s passing was one reason for the launch. Second, North Korea had declared that 2012 would be the year when the country became a “Powerful and Prosperous Nation,” and a satellite launch was to be a key demonstration of North Korea’s technological progress and power.
By Patrick Cronin, Special to CNN
Editor’s note: Patrick M. Cronin is Senior Advisor and Senior Director of the Asia-Pacific Security Program at the Center for a New American Security in Washington, D.C. The views expressed are his own.
North Korea’s successful missile launch now presents Pyongyang as on the cusp of joining the elite club of nations with nuclear-armed Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs). That is quite a turn around for the young Kim Jong Un, suddenly thrust into power a year ago, whose first attempt at launching a three-stage missile, during the April centennial of founder Kim Il Sung’s birth, was a show that flopped before a global audience.
Shorn of North Korea’s legendary propaganda, the country has been steadily increasing its missile ranges to the point where it can reach not just U.S. bases in Japan, but also those in Guam, Hawaii and Alaska. The estimated range of 3,400 miles for the Unha-3 puts the capability at the gateway of an ICBM. While touted as a peaceful satellite space launch, all that North Korea needs to do is to now marry up its long-range missile with a nuclear warhead. It appears determined to achieve that mark.
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