Discussing United States policy toward North Korea can seem exhaustingly futile. There are no “good” options, and the North’s behavior appears utterly intractable; yet because of its magnitude, the threat from Pyongyang demands our constant attention.
That threat was thrown into stark relief on March 26, when a North Korean torpedo slammed into South Korea’s Cheonan warship, killing 46 servicemen. It is surely Pyongyang’s most spectacular atrocity since the 1987 terrorist bombing of Korean Air Flight 858, which left 115 dead. The proof of North Korea’s culpability is now overwhelming; indeed, the North’s repeated denials would be comical if the act itself were not so appalling.
In response, the U.S. and South Korean governments have planned joint military exercises, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is working to build support for a fresh round of global sanctions on the Communist regime. We don’t expect new sanctions to topple the dictatorship, nor do we expect them dramatically to alter North Korea’s conduct. However, tightening our grip on Pyongyang’s finances would bolster U.S. leverage at a critical moment in Korean history, with 69-year-old Kim Jong Il in deteriorating health (it is believed he suffered a stroke in 2008) and a shaky leadership transition already under way.
Sinking the Cheonan was a heinous act, and also a desperate one, carried out by a regime that urgently needs hard currency to mitigate a severe domestic economic crisis. Now is the time to do everything possible to choke Pyongyang’s cash flows. Of course, passing a robust Security Council measure will be impossible without gaining Chinese support, and Beijing’s North Korea policy continues to be guided by its twin fears of (1) a massive refugee disaster and (2) a unified, pro-American democracy on the Korean peninsula.
If the Obama administration is unable to win Chinese backing for an aggressive Security Council resolution, U.S. officials should re-freeze North Korean assets at Banco Delta Asia (assets that were originally frozen in 2005 but then released as part of a 2007 nuclear-disarmament accord) and also target specific North Korean entities. Meanwhile, the United States should re-list North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism. Removing Pyongyang from the State Department blacklist was a premature decision in 2008, given that Pyongyang still refuses to account for the untold number of Japanese citizens it abducted during the 1970s and 1980s. Today, the decision seems embarrassing. The Cheonan incident was nothing short of a terroristic massacre; moreover, there is strong evidence that North Korea has been selling weapons to Hezbollah, Hamas, Iran, and Syria.
We don’t have a silver bullet to topple the North Korean dictatorship and should not expect sanctions or moral pressure to trigger a velvet revolution. But the steps outlined above would weaken Pyongyang and boost America’s Asian alliances, while providing incentives for a post-Kim regime to seek rapprochement with its democratic neighbors. Democrats on Capitol Hill could do their part to affirm U.S. solidarity with South Korea by approving the bilateral free-trade deal that was signed in June 2007 and has effectively been held hostage by the United Auto Workers ever since.
We must remember that the key foreign player in the North Korean saga is China, which has long subsidized the Hermit Kingdom with food and fuel aid. The coming weeks will tell us whether the Cheonan incident has finally spurred Beijing to rethink its approach. As a former U.S. Asia hand puts it, “This is a defining moment for China’s foreign policy.” It’s also a defining moment for the Obama administration, which now has an opportunity to avoid the mistakes of its predecessor and embrace a Korea strategy that is tough, forward-looking, and realistic.
Editors at National Review
