Gridlock and infighting stalk collapse of Agreed Framework 2.0

You could  write the epitaph for the President Bush’s North Korea policies in six words:  There are worse things than gridlock.  Now that Agreed Framework 2.0 has reached its failure point  and not even  sympathetic media  can still deny it, the New York Times reports that the same  old factions have formed up  to battle about the fruitlessness of dealing with Kim Jong Il. 

With North Korea sending signals that it may be trying to wait out Mr. Bush’s time in office before making any more concessions, administration officials are grappling with how the United States should react.  The debate has fractured along familiar lines, with a handful of national security hawks in Vice President Dick Cheney’s office and at the State Department arguing for a more confrontational approach with Pyongyang.  [Helene Cooper, N.Y. Times]

Well, this was about as predictable as the sunrise; still,  can  anyone  deny that I am the  Nostrafriggingdamus of Korea bloggers?  This time,  my  predictive powers were eerie enough to border on the paranormal.  Not that I  mean to  overstate this.  Anyone intelligent enough to be  reading this already knows that  Robert Downey, Jr. can  say no to  crack longer than Kim Jong Il can keep an agreement.  And unlike Kim Jong Il, Downey can  probably manage  ten whole minutes of  abstention on  his way  home from  rehab … unless he had the foresight to  stash a rock in the ashtray of his limo.

JOHN BOLTON, ARE YOU READING THIS?

Bush is now right back where he started in 2001, except that North Korea’s nuclear capability, though still primitive, has advanced to the point of demonstration.  Bolton says, “It’s like groundhog day; we’ve lived through this before.    (Ambassador Bolton, if you’re reading this, I’d happily waive my copyright infringement claim for an interview here.)  

The State Department  counsels patience as the clock runs out, but the sticking points are a  wee bit elemental:

Mr. Bush said the two countries needed to resolve three sticking points: the number of warheads that North Korea has built; the amount of weapons-grade nuclear material produced by North Korea; and the need for North Korea to disclose that it has passed nuclear material to others.  [N.Y. Times]

Someone remind me just what the hell they even agreed to do, if not those things.  Doves are making much of the partial disablement of Yongbyon, but as I’ve pointed out here repeatedly, Yongbyon was probably a used-up wreck before this deal was even signed, and its replacement, which would take less than two years to complete,  will generate 50 megawatts, not five.  Wanna see it?  You know you do:

Did I forget to mention the 200-megawatt reactor?

The key point being:  the North Koreans aren’t disabling either of those facilities.  Recall that on his return from Pyongyang last December, Hill said that he had visited, “all three sections of the facility there. That is, the fuel fabrication facility, the reactor, and then finally the reprocessing center. There is disabling activity going on at all three.”   That means these three facilities only:

The big new reactors are being watched by the IAEA, but they’re  not being  dismantled or demolished.  North Korea hasn’t accounted for the nuclear materials needed to make those  facilities operable.  For all we know, they’re under a pile of sand in Syria.  Let’s not pretend we’re any safer.  We aren’t.

Conservative opposition gained strength from  four key developments:  the Syria revelations; North Korea  accidentally sending us a sample of the enriched  uranium it denied having; the passage of the December 31st deadline; and Chris Hill getting caught in a lie  after denying that North Korea had offered a  false declaration last November.   As a result, several very bad ideas have waned.   North Korea can probably forget about  being taken off the terror-sponsor list.   We can probably also forget about Secretary Rice visiting Pyongyang.   The probability of ferocious opposition made it impossible for Chris Hill to accept a patently false North Korean nuclear declaration in November. 

In case you’re keeping score,  those who oppose this deal,  or whose skepticism is tantamount to opposition to it,  include John Bolton, of course,  plus candidates  John McCain, Mitt Romney, and  Fred Thompson; influential Republican senators John Kyl (the Minority Whip), Sam Brownback, Charles Grassley, and Jim Bunning; and  independent Joe Lieberman. (… and Larry Craig.)   If Bush tried to ram legislation through Congress today to either de-list North Korea, ratify a deal, or appropriate funding for one, it might not survive an up-or-down vote.  I wouldn’t have said that a month ago.

LEFKOWITZ:  FINDING HIS VOICE?

We’ve known for a few weeks, since it hit the Washington Post,  that there was considerable opposition to this deal  among the Administration’s nonproliferation experts.  Now we  even have public opposition from  one of  the Administration’s serving officials, and from a guy I’d left for dead long ago.  Listen to this:

In a public departure from administration policy, Jay Lefkowitz, a conservative lawyer who is Mr. Bush’s envoy on North Korean human rights, said this week the North would likely “remain in its present nuclear status” when the next president took over in January 2009.  “North Korea is not serious about disarming in a timely manner,” Mr. Lefkowitz told an audience at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank. “We should consider a new approach to North Korea.   [N.Y. Times]

“It is increasingly clear that North Korea will remain in its present nuclear status when the administration leaves office in one year,” he told a forum in Washington.  Using unusually sharp words, he said North Korea “has not kept its word,” was “not serious about disarming in a timely manner” and “its conduct does not appear to be that of a government that is willing to come in from the cold.”  Lefkowitz also accused Pyongyang of being a “serial proliferator” and using its nuclear arms to “extort” foreign aid, saying there was no guarantee that US military and nuclear strength could prevent it from passing on nuclear arms or technology to Islamists or their backers.  [AFP]

I’m happy  someone say  this, and I’m kicking myself for the fact that I couldn’t be at AEI to hear it in person.  Lefkowitz didn’t just criticize his bosses, either:

Jay Lefkowitz […]  also lambasted China and South Korea for not exerting enough pressure on Pyongyang while the six-way discussions have been seeking for years to denuclearize the North.  [Kyodo News]  

Maybe Lefkowitz  said this because there’s enough division that he can get away with it again.   Maybe he already knew that Nicholas Burns was on his way out.  I had even wondered if the Administration was using Lefkowitz to send a message to the North Koreans that our patience is thin.  After all, his attack  was not a direct comment on North Korea’s human rights record, it struck at North Korea’s bad faith in disarmament.  The White House noticed the same thing, and obviously didn’t want anyone in Beijing speculating the same way I had:

“Let me make it very clear: He is the envoy for issues related to human rights in North Korea,” State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters Friday. “He is not, however, somebody who speaks authoritatively about the six-party talks. His comments certainly don’t represent the views of the administration.   [AP; h/t DPRK Forum]

Procedurally and bureaucratically, Lefkowitz  probably crossed  the line, but substantively, not only were his words factually correct, but after all, it’s the six-party agreement that sidelined his job out of existence.  Most of the news sources covering this story omitted the fact that Lefkowitz did tie his comments directly to human rights:

Lefkowitz said the United States needs to rethink its approach to North Korea to one that links concerns about security with North Korea’s poor human rights record, making improvement on both fronts a condition of better relations with the United States.  Dubbed “constructive engagement,” such an approach would ensure human rights “cannot be discarded in any future rush to “get to yes” in an agreement, he said.

“The way the North Korean government treats its own people is inhumane and therefore deeply offensive to us,” Lefkowitz said. “It should also offend free people around the world. Clearly we want to see an improvement in this, just as we want to see an abatement of the threats to our security created by the regime.”

The six-party talks do not address North Korea’s human rights record but, Lefkowitz said, “there is a valid question of whether this continues to make sense.”  He said the United States should also consider expanding its bilateral contacts with North Korea to discuss such issues, but should also consider “other leverage” against the nation if it doesn’t improve, including restricting the regime’s access to United States and international financial systems. [CNN; h/t Richardson]

The question is just who the White House thinks it’s still  kidding.  They stopped caring about human rights years ago.  Maybe Lefkowitz’s mistake was to believe that he still has a job.  He  has other  options at his disposal, of course; he doesn’t have to take this insult quietly.  Lefkowitz was most recently mentioned here  when Christopher Hitchens wondered whatever happened to him.   Today, at  least  reporters are  quoting him again — they love  contradiction, especially  of Bush  —  and the things  he’s saying  are undeniably true. 

Really, I just feel great sympathy for anyone who brings a conscience into the U.S. Department of State.  At least now I  know Lefkowitz isn’t  the problem.  He stuck his neck out to say the right thing.  Good for him.