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http://www.tuftsdaily.com/media/storage/paper856/news/2006/10/16/Viewpoints/Sam-Dupont.Red.Sky.At.Night-2351166.shtml?norewrite200610160448&sourcedomain=www.tuftsdaily.com
Sam duPont | Red Sky at Night
Nukes for Dummies
Sam duPont
Posted: 10/16/06
The good news is that, among Northeast Asian capital cities, I'm in the
safest one by far. The better news is that I might have front-row seats
to World War III.
China is in a pissed-off mood after North Korea's nuclear test last
week. Here is why: Japan might just decide to go nuclear. Brand new,
more nationalistic Prime Minister Abe may be looking to solidify his
base with a bold, anti-traditional move.
There is a very real, very scary threat in the neighborhood, and
Japan's anti-nuclear lobby will be particularly weak. If there ever has
been a time for the Japanese to emerge from under the American nuclear
umbrella, it is now.
This kind of conflict and competition is exactly what China does not
want. More than anything else, Beijing is hoping for stability and
continued growth. They want their economy to continue its current
explosion, and they want unfettered trade access to the rest of the
world. The last thing they want is to have two nuclear rivals in the
neighborhood and be caught up in a nasty arms race that will kill
investment and pull resources away from their burgeoning manufacturing
business.
But what of the Americans? Nobody is saying it aloud, but this nuclear
test is a boon for the United States' North Korea policy. True, the
idea of North Korea selling nukes to kooks (read: rogue states and
terrorists) is a scary one, but that is not a new threat. At least the
ball is rolling on something we have long been pushing for.
Also true, we have our hands full in the Middle East, but putting the
lid on North Korea will not require much direct action by the United
States. Besides, a military option is completely out of the question
and has been for years.
We've long suspected that North Korean President Kim Jong-Il has been
sitting on about half a dozen nukes, and recent events only confirm
this. In addition to their atomic resources, North Korea has enough
artillery lined up along the 39th parallel to flatten Seoul in half an
hour. With nearly 10 million South Korean hostages, plus the threat of
the Bomb, nobody has seriously considered an invasion of North Korea in
a long time. This is especially so, given the fact that Kim is totally
bananas and would probably prefer to go down in a (nuclear) blaze of
glory than as a captive of the Americans.
So what is going to happen? And what should happen? Here is an
appetizer to preface my answer: An hour before the North Koreans blew
their nuke, U.S. National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley told
President Bush what was about to happen. Clairvoyance? Nothing so
fancy. In fact, the North Koreans had called Beijing to give them a
heads up about the detonation. When Chinese President Hu found out, his
first action was to send an emergency alert to Washington.
North Korea is an issue on which the Americans and the Chinese
ultimately have similar objectives. As a result, this is a unique
chance for the two states to work together and build a better,
stronger, more trusting foundation to the relationship. Already, the
two states have been cooperating at the U.N.: An often icy relationship
yielded to cooperative negotiation, resulting in the
toughest international sanctions placed on North Korea since the end of
the Korean War.
The new measures will be in effect soon, and as weeks pass, China will
likely continue to tighten the screws. North Korea is virtually
helpless without continued Chinese oil and food aid, and if they choose
to, the Chinese can force the issue. Beijing will not push Pyongyang to
the point of collapse out of fears of a massive wave of starving North
Koreans flooding over the border into China. However, this issue is
important enough to China that they will take relatively extreme
measures to force Kim to denuclearize.
This is where the United States comes in. The primary concession North
Korea has always demanded is an explicit, unambiguous security
guarantee from the United States. The historic reason Kim and his
father have pursued the Bomb is as a protective measure against
American invasion. China must make it politically costly for North
Korea to keep the Bomb, but Washington must make it safe for them to
give it up. We have no choice.
We cannot resolve this crisis peacefully unless the Bush team puts its
"axis of evil" policy in the past and makes a clear offer of security.
For some, this is an unsavory option, as it leaves Kim in power to
abuse his own people and cause more trouble in the future. Regime
change, however, is not an option; there is just no way to go about it
without inviting millions of civilian deaths. And besides, as we have
discovered elsewhere, we are frankly not much good at state building.
According to yesterday's New York Times, there are as many as 40 states
with the ability to build a nuclear weapon. A world in which everybody
and their cousin has a Bomb pointed at someone else is an unsafe world,
indeed. The United States and China must act to take the Bomb away from
North Korea, or we will soon be living on a much less comfortable
planet.
Sam DuPont is a junior majoring in international relations. He is
currently studying abroad in Beijing, China. He can be reached at
Samuel.DuPont@tufts.edu.
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