Kim Jung Il (below, center), who always said that brave soldiers were the main Korean weapon, now wants an atomic bomb
Photo: Mikhail Razuvaev
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The Land of Nuclear Coolness
// Pyongyang contrives an atomic bomb
The Korean Crisis
For the first time yesterday, North Korea's Ministry of Foreign Affairs spoke openly of the development of nuclear weapons in the country. Pyongyang explained this step, like the withdrawal from the six-sided negotiations on settling the crisis around its nuclear program, as a reaction to the threat from the United States. The North Koreans have not presented any evidence of the presence of nuclear weapons in their country, but both Washington and Moscow took their statements seriously.
Weapons for Peaceful Ends
Several days ago, foreign diplomats and journalists accredited in Pyongyang began receiving reports that North Korea was prepared to return to the six-sided negotiations at which it has been discussing ways of overcoming the crisis on the Korean peninsula with South Korea, the United States, China, Russia, and Japan. The first three rounds (August 2003, February and June 2004) ended in failure. And Pyongyang shunned participation in the fourth round scheduled for September, using U.S. hostility and the sensational disclosure of a nuclear program in South Korea as justification for this move. Experts believed that Pyongyang was simply waiting for the election results in the United States so they would know with whom they would have to work. Then the North Koreans waited for George Bush's inauguration speech and then for his annual state of the union address. This could not help but make them happy, since the U.S. president refrained from harsh attacks on North Korea and called for a diplomatic solution to the problem. Therefore, Pyongyang's hints about the possibility of returning to the negotiation process seemed natural and logical.
Yesterday's announcement was more unexpected. “We are in favor of the six-sided negotiations; however, we are forced to break off our participation in them for an indefinite period, until we are convinced that sufficient conditions and atmosphere are created that allow us to hope for results from the dialog,” said the statement of officials of North Korea's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, communicated on Thursday by the North Korean KCNA news agency and the South Korean Yonghap news agency. “The negotiation process has reached a dead end as a result of the hostile anti-Korean policy of the United States. While America brandishes the nuclear club, having made up its mind to destroy our system at any cost, we will enlarge our nuclear weapons stockpile to defend the historic choice of our people, freedom, and democracy.” The statement went on to say that North Korea “has produced nuclear weapons for self defense.”
Nuclear Noncontainment
Pyongyang has never teased the present American administration so openly before this, remembering how more innocent jokes with it turned out badly for North Korea. For example, the North Koreans were able to wangle humanitarian aid and construction of a nuclear power plant from Bill Clinton in exchange for curtailing its nuclear program. But George Bush has decided to use a stick against North Korea rather than a carrot.
It is not hard to find justification for this. In September 2002, the North Koreans announced to U.S. State Department official James Kelly, who had arrived in Pyongyang, that, in the face of threats from the United States, North Korea “had the right to possess not only nuclear, but also more powerful weapons.” After pondering this for a couple of weeks, the Americans declared that this announcement was an admission that North Korea was illegally working to produce nuclear weapons.
This was the start of the present crisis in relations between the United States and North Korea. Both sides have behaved rashly during it. Without bothering with evidence, the United States accused North Korea of one sin after another. And, rather than justifying itself, Pyongyang withdrew from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, expelled IAEA inspectors from the country, reactivated nuclear research reactors, and announced the resumption of processing nuclear reactor fuel to plutonium. Then it announced that it possessed “nuclear containment forces”. But as evidence of this, it showed an American delegation visiting North Korean nuclear facilities empty spent rod containers and some kind of radioactive substance said to be a component of an atomic bomb. The only thing North Korea always rejected were American accusations that it had a uranium enrichment program.
The situation ended in a stalemate. The Americans had no proof that Pyongyang was actually carrying out a military nuclear program or that it had already made a bomb. In any case, they have never produced it for anyone. Therefore, they have no grounds of any kind for taking harsh measures against North Korea, including a military invasion. On the other hand, attempts to bring North Korea to its senses through negotiations have been to no avail, unless you count its statement on nuclear arsenals. Meanwhile, the United States says that the list of complaints against Kim Jong Il includes betrayal of his own people. Thus, he cannot count on either being excluded from lists of untrustworthy regimes or on lifting of the economic sanctions against North Korea or receiving large-scale international aid.
Only South Korea provides currently provides serious aid to North Korea. South Korean businessmen have opened several joint ventures in North Korea and are building a large industrial and economic zone in the border city of Keson. The North Koreans are also trying to help themselves. Economic reforms were started in North Korea in 2003, which included abolishing the ration card system, introducing conversion of the won, allowing the circulation of foreign currency, and encouraging private property. Rich people appeared in the country as a result. But North Korean-style market reforms have very strict limits. Their result has been material stratification of the population, which undermines the regime's main basis of stability, i.e., universal equality (with the exception of partocrats and bureaucrats). In addition, continuation of the reforms requires openness, which carries the risk that the North Korean people will soon realize how badly they live compared not only with South Korea, but also with China, where reforms have been going on for a quarter century already.
Juche Grows Stronger
This is already threatening the regime, whose iron grip has almost certainly weakened in recent years. And there is no returning to the former total control over the minds and behavior of the people with special measures like restricting Internet use or prohibiting cell phones. Kim Jong Il's regime is faced with a threat coming mainly from within. And the international situation cannot be pleasing to the Pyongyang rulers. On Wednesday, Condoleeza Rice, who was on a visit to Luxembourg, warned Iran that its unwillingness to abandon attempts to acquired nuclear weapons could cost it very dearly. This threat resounded, despite all the assurances of the Iranian leadership that their nuclear program was of an unusually peaceful nature. It did not pass unnoticed in Pyongyang. What is more, in North Korea, they remember that vows of nuclear innocence and willingness to cooperate with IAEA inspectors did not save Iraq from an American invasion. And there were reports that the United States was once again pressing for the removal of Mohamed al Badari as head of the IAEA for taking insufficiently tough stands against Iran and North Korea.
Evidently, after analyzing all this, Pyongyang concluded that Uncle Sam would come after them hard on the heels of Iraq and Iran and decided to strike a preemptive blow by demonstrating that North Korea was not afraid of anyone and was prepared to stick up for itself. With nuclear weapons in hand. Once again, the North Koreans did not present any proof of their existence. Therefore, Russian experts, for example, did not believe Pyongyang's statement, considering it yet another manifestation of the policy of blackmail with elements of bluff. Nevertheless, Russia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday considered it necessary to react to both parts of the North Korean statement, calling both the refusal to participate in the six-sided negotiations and the intention to expand the nuclear arsenal “inconsistent with Pyongyang's expressed pursuit of the non-nuclear status of the Korean peninsula.”
The Americans also did not remain silent. At a press conference in Luxembourg, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice said that North Korea's latest move was a cause for regret and could only deepen that country's isolation from the international community. At the same time, she supported the quickest possible resumption of the six-sided negotiations and gave assurances that the United States had no intention of striking or taking over North Korea.
The problem is that the United States' disavowal of an attack on North Korea is not enough to resolve all the problems that could lead to the collapse of the Pyongyang regime.
The History of the North Korean Nuclear Program
In 1956, North Korea and the USSR signed a treaty for training North Korean nuclear specialists. In 1959, Pyongyang concluded cooperation agreements on the peaceful atom with the USSR and China and began construction of a research center in Yonben, where a 2 MW Soviet IRT-2000 reactor was installed in 1965.
Work on producing nuclear weapons started in the 1970s. In 1971, North Korea joined the IAEA. In the same year, Pyongyang turned to China for help in making nuclear weapons; North Korean specialists were allowed onto Chinese testing grounds. On December 12, 1985, North Korea signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. IAEA inspections of the country's nuclear facilities began in June 1992. However, the inspectors were not allowed into a number of facilities, which led to a scandal and North Korea's announcement of withdrawal from the nonproliferation treaty on March 12, 1993. In June 1993, in return for promises from the United States not to interfere in its affairs, North Korea halted its withdrawal from the treaty, but withdrew from the IAEA on June 13, 1994. On October 21, 1994, North Korea and the United States signed an agreement to freeze the nuclear program in exchange for deliveries of fuel oil and help in building a nuclear power plant.
At the end of the 1990s, North Korea acquired two to three thousand uranium enrichment units from Pakistan in exchange for its Nodong middle-range missiles. After visiting Pyongyang on October 3-5, 2002, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State James Kelly claimed that North Korea was enriching uranium; and on December 12, 2002, Pyongyang officially announced the resumption of its nuclear program and the expulsion of IAEA inspectors. By the end of 2002, according to CIA information, North Korea had accumulated from 7 to 24 kg of weapons-grade plutonium. On January 10, 2003, North Korea officially withdrew from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. On January 6, 2004, Pyongyang announced its willingness to freeze its nuclear program in exchange for the lifting of sanctions against it and removal from the list of outlaw states. Negotiations over North Korea's nuclear program, with the participation of China, the United States, Russia, South Korea, and Japan, began on February 23, 2004. On September 12, 2004, a powerful explosion occurred in North Korea, which many analysts took to be a test of a nuclear charge. According to Pyongyang, the explosion was not nuclear and was carried out for industrial purposes. On October 21, 2004, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said that “intelligence cannot say whether there are nuclear weapons in North Korea.” On January 24, 2005, it became known that Kim Ge Gwan, North Korea's deputy foreign minister, had said at a meeting with American Congressman Kurt Weldon that the country possessed nuclear weapons, but they were being employed “exclusively for defensive purposes”.
Andrey Ivanov
All the Article in Russian as of Feb. 11, 2005
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