Some Good Advice We’d Follow if We Were Smarter

What our negotiations with North Korea have always lacked was structure — starting with spine — but also deadlines, benchmarks, clear expectations, and clear consequences for reneging on agreed terms. As a result, two decades of American nuclear diplomacy have accomplished little except to solidify and reward North Korea’s instincts for stalling, lying, cheating, and moving the goalposts, often in ways that pose grave dangers to our national security.

Occasionally, enough Americans notice this pattern that American politicians feel compelled to make tough-sounding empty threats. But when North Korea reoffends, American diplomats reliably tolerate North Korea’s transgressions. Here, it’s helpful that diplomats get plenty of cover from the Fourth Branch of our government: the news reporting industry.

The common denominator of all of our failures is the the temptation of the path of least (immediate) resistance. The other side of the same coin is the temptation to declare diplomatic “progress,” even when it comes without any real modification of North Korea’s offending behavior.

(Much of this, I think, is arrogance: diplomats and silky politicians tend to believe that they, and they alone, possess the Jedi mind-control power to reason with the North Koreans … if only we offer just the right incentives to bring out their softer side and enlightened self-interest.)

Heritage’s Bruce Klingner does a fine job of assembling Barack Obama’s tough-sounding campaign statements about the consequences that North Korea should face if it fails specific conditions, but which Obama has never quite called for when North Korea flunked them. Still, I should cut Obama some slack; he hasn’t even been inaugurated yet. Even so, I suspect this will be just one more way in which there will be very little Change, except for the worse. It’s unfortunate that our diplomatic class lacks the mental or moral clarity to follow advice such as this:

# Use all of the instruments of national power (diplomatic, informational, military, and economic) in a coordinated, integrated strategy. While it is important to continue negotiations to seek a diplomatic resolution to the North Korean nuclear problem, the U.S. and its allies should simultaneously use outside pressure to influence North Korea’s negotiating behavior.

# Realize that talking is not progress. The U.S. should favor resolving issues rather than repeatedly lowering the bar simply to maintain the negotiating process. North Korea should not be treated differently from every other country in the world. You should insist that North Korea abide by international standards of behavior and not be allowed to carve out another “special status” within the NPT and IAEA Safeguards.

# Define redlines and their consequences. The Bush Administration’s abandonment of its stated resolve to impose costs on North Korea for proliferating nuclear technology to Syria undermined U.S. credibility and sent a dangerous signal to other potential proliferators.

# Establish deadlines with consequences for failure to meet them. North Korea must not be allowed to drag out the Six-Party Talks indefinitely in order to achieve de facto international acceptance as a nuclear weapons state. Repeatedly deferring difficult issues in response to Pyongyang’s intransigence is not an effective way to achieve U.S. strategic objectives. [Bruce Klingner, Heritage Web Memo]

The entire piece is a must-read.