Things on the Korean peninsula are heating up by the hour. This latest round of nuclear and missile tests should come as no surprise, given President Obama’s non-response to North Korea’s missile provocations several weeks ago. This time, however, Pyongyang detonated a 20-kiloton device — the ground shook 130 miles away — which is an estimated 20 times more powerful than the nuclear bomb North Korea tested in 2006.
Predictably, the international community bemoaned with platitudinous reprimands — Obama: “gravely concerned”; the United Nations: “deeply worried” — and even more predictably, North Korea responded by threatening war against South Korea, disavowing the 1953 armistice, and swearing to continue production of nuclear weapons. Surprise, surprise.
What should the United States do? The Obama administration seems satisfied with a continued policy of diplomacy and lethargy. Retired Gen. James Jones, President Obama’s national security advisor, claims North Korea is not “an imminent threat.” White House spokesman Robert Gibbs states these actions “won’t get North Korea the attention it craves.” While it is true that North Korea’s escalations often serve the purpose of garnering international attention, the gravity of Kim Jong Il’s behavior should not be downplayed. Each escalation brings with it greater technological advancement and thus a higher likelihood that Kim’s destructive technology will end up in the wrong hands.
Rather than continue the same bilateral and multilateral diplomacy that has failed since 1994, the United States should adopt a much tougher approach. Three ideas come to mind.
First, we should reestablish deterrence with a statement or doctrine of “nuclear culpability.” We should say to Kim: “You’ve been caught proliferating nuclear know-how in black market networks and to our enemies in Iran, Syria, Libya, and elsewhere. As long as you continue this behavior, be forewarned: should a nuclear bomb go off in an American city or that of our allies, we will hold you responsible — along with the culprits. We will assume you were involved somehow, either directly or indirectly.”
This would seriously mess up Kim’s feng shui. It would change all cost-benefit ratios he’s ever concocted inside that tiny, warped brain of his. The little guy is obsessed with maintaining power and by putting him in a position where events would be outside of his control — where he would wake up unsure if someone else’s hostility to the U.S. would lead to his own downfall — we could (and I emphasize could) go a long way in altering Kim’s immediate behavior. This is not a long-term strategy, however: “behavioral change” and “Kim Jong Il” do not belong in the same sentence for any sustained period of time.
Second, we should broadcast radio transmissions into North Korea. Kim Jong Il tells his “subjects” he was born under a rainbow and walked on the moon. According to widespread rumors, he once held a press conference to claim he invented the toaster oven. He wears high heels. He kidnaps Japanese girls, smuggles them to Korea, and chases them around his palaces. In other words, he’s as clinically insane as he is objectively evil. Imagine Charles Manson taking over a country and producing enough plutonium for a nice personal nuke arsenal. Not a pretty scenario.
Yet despite all this — despite the dungeons, the meat grinders, the two million dead from famine, and the widespread malnutrition — the North Korean people, having been subjected to decades of brainwashing and indoctrination, still praise and worship the “dear leader” for every waking moment of their lives.
How could such a nationwide cult-like psychosis be reversed? It would be hard, no doubt, but we should still start a serious reverse-propaganda program of beaming real information into North Korea, similar to Radio Free Europe at the end of the Cold War. We should weaken the tyrant’s rule from within; when done properly, it works almost every time. To paraphrase my friend Michael Ledeen: there are many ways to destroy a dictator when you have his oppressed people on your side.
Third, we should let Japan go nuclear. Charles Krauthammer recommends this approach, which makes great geopolitical sense. We should encourage the Japanese to amend their pacifistic constitution and start popping out A-bombs like Toyotas. A nuclear Japan is no reason to fret: it is a mature democracy, a loyal ally, and a responsible and civilized society. This isn’t the ’40s anymore.
Japan’s nuclearization — which should be temporary and stated as such — would likely worry the Chinese enough to compel them to come down hard on their client state. Getting China to turn on North Korea is the real key and a nuclear Japan would certainly do the trick. Should Beijing remain unfazed by Tokyo going nuclear, maybe President Obama could send Don Rumsfeld on another one of those “special envoy” ambassadorships — this time, to the Far East to call China’s bluff on Taiwan.
Having spent way more time in “diplomacy school” than anyone’s mental health should allow, I can personally attest: active diplomats, retired diplomats-turned-professors, and aspiring would-be diplomats refuse to recognize that some things in this world fall outside of their professional purview. Could we imagine any other profession — say, anesthesiology or lumberjacking — making that same bold claim about itself?
Kim has made a mockery of our diplomacy with him for nearly two decades. He soaked President Clinton for all he was worth, clicking champagne glasses with Madeleine Albright all the while perfecting the art of plutonium production. During the Bush administration, Kim reneged on every preliminary agreement before the preliminary agreement could get its trousers off. And now he’s manhandling Mr. Obama to the point of embarrassment.
Faith is the belief in things unseen and unproven, and Obama certainly has faith in his unproven ability to influence bad actors and bend them to his will. Peter Wehner of Commentary writes of Obama’s faith in diplomacy like so:
During the campaign, whenever asked how he would address a thorny foreign policy issue, Mr. Obama invoked the need for diplomacy — first, last, and always. The failure to reach agreement was found in some misunderstanding, some misperception, some problem of communication that could be cleared up by “talking.” Even those of us who don’t rule out the benefits of negotiating were skeptical about Obama’s seemingly limitless faith in it, or the ease with which he seemed to think these problems could be solved.
Enough is enough. Kim Jong Il has proven he will stop at nothing to produce and proliferate nuclear weapons, and that is a no-no. Diplomacy has failed. Talking for the sake of talking is not working. Serious powers ought to be emphasizing results, not process. “Soft power” is a problem cured by Cialis — not a national security strategy for North Korea. It’s time we started working to bring that twisted, Lilliputian, Chia Pet miscreant down.
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