Last year, at the height of the US presidential elections, I wrote about the long-running problems on the Korean peninsula. My article concluded: “Trump’s… threat of blunt coercion is what makes him so uniquely dangerous in the history of American politics. His temperament and demonstrable unpredictability raise genuine doubts about his suitability to deal with a crisis in the Korean peninsula without unleashing a nuclear holocaust. He and Kim Jong-un are a catastrophe waiting to happen.”
Twelve months later, the threat posed by North Korea has entered a new phase, one that President Trump seems prepared to go to war to end. US defence analysts have argued that a military strike against North Korea is unfeasible, not least because Seoul, a city of 10 million people, sits within range of Kim Jong-un’s artillery. American troops in Guam, Japan and South Korea would also be targets. Twenty years ago the military commander of US forces in South Korea estimated that a war with the North would cost a million lives. Since then, North Korea has acquired nuclear weapons.
There is still hope, however, that nuclear war may be averted. For the first time since Kim Jong-un embarked on his reckless sprint for a nuclear bomb, China and Russia have joined with the West in an attempt to restrain him. The sanctions recently agreed in the United Nations Security Council are the mark of a new seriousness about the threat he poses to global security.
The Security Council agreement on a total ban on North Korean coal exports will cut the regime’s annual export revenue of $3 billion by a third. The economic impact will be massive. But the Security Council’s imposition of sanctions must be tempered by the news that American intelligence has concluded that the pariah state has indeed produced a nuclear warhead small enough to be fitted inside a ballistic missile – some two years earlier than had been predicted.
There is no clear agreement about what happens next. If North Korea can be brought to the negotiating table, if it freezes and then scales back its nuclear ambitions, if a nuclear exchange can be averted, then the blunt instrument of a trade embargo will have served its purpose. Much will depend on China implementing this action against what is effectively its client-state.
China has been reluctant in the past to sign up for a wide-ranging sanctions regime for fear that the economic collapse of North Korea would bring a chaotic end to the regime, propel a flood of refugees to its borders and be the first step towards a united Korea under American tutelage. This runs directly counter to China’s long-term aim, which is to lever the US out of Asia.
Whatever is going on in Kim Jong-un’s head, Trump has no alternative but to take his threats seriously
As Kim Jong-un launched his second intercontinental ballistic missile last month, it became clear to Beijing that there was another reason to be nervous. The possibility that Trump could order a pre-emptive attack on North Korea’s nuclear command centre rather than wait for Kim Jong-un to develop and deploy his weapons hung threateningly in the air. Such a strike, even if it left the North Korean regime intact, would be equally damaging for Beijing and would fundamentally destabilise Asia.
China has therefore opted to support sanctions. For now, China’s hope is that the US will agree to end joint military exercises with South Korea in return for Kim Jong-un verifiably scaling back his nuclear programme. China was part of the international agreement with Iran and believes there could be scope for a similar deal with North Korea. But it may be underestimating the impetuous character that is Trump and the resolve of his administration to disarm Kim Jong-un’s regime entirely.
Diplomacy should not be dismissed. Concerted political, economic and military efforts can be an expression of strength rather than weakness. But the fact is that Kim Jong-un has a spectacular record of broken promises. He does not care if his people starve. If he suspects that members of his regime are giving away too much in talks with the West, he will not hesitate to have them put to death. Talks will only succeed if Kim Jong-un immediately stops work on missiles that can cause nuclear destruction to South Korea, Japan and the US.
Some US analysts believe that Kim Jong-un will resist negotiations. He may be influenced by the fate of Colonel Gaddafi who was toppled after giving up his nuclear arsenal. But China, whose enforcement of sanctions will be crucial, has already urged North Korea not to violate the UN’s decision by conducting more missile launches or nuclear tests.
More importantly, Trump must persuade China that they should find a joint strategy that goes beyond sanctions and leads quickly to persuading this dictator that it is in his urgent self-interest to stop testing nuclear weapons. China is the key.
It is reported that the Pentagon has drawn up two contingency plans for dealing with the nightmare scenario that now may be imminent. The first is a pre-emptive military attack to destroy as much of Kim Jong-un’s nuclear facilities as possible. And simultaneously to deploy anti-missile defence systems capable of hitting a North Korean ICBM heading for the US. The military attack option poses huge challenges as Trump would have to unleash an overwhelming military response, using every weapon at his disposal.
Trump’s thinking therefore has to be underpinned by the credible statement that all options, including a range of military action, remain open. That is not so much sabre-rattling – much as Trump’s inconsistency worries us – as an articulation of deterrence theory. It makes the assumption that the West is dealing not with a madman, but with an amoral rational actor who cares only about his own survival. To avoid any scintilla of doubt, all attempts at a dialogue must be backed by a clearly stated readiness to deploy force should Kim Jong-un try to cheat his way to a bomb.
The questions that American intelligence will be asking are: what are Kim Jong-un’s intentions? Does he really intend to launch a nuclear attack on an American city? If so, what does he expect to gain by doing so?
Kim Jong-un is convinced the US wants to destroy his regime and, therefore, his only option is to act toughly and threaten a devastating nuclear attack on the US: “The day the US dares tease our nation with… sanctions, the mainland US will be catapulted into an unimaginable sea of fire.”
Whatever is going on in Kim Jong-un’s head, Trump has no alternative but to take his threats seriously. It is worrying, however, when he says: “North Korea best not make any more threats to the United States… they will be met with fire, fury and frankly power the likes of which this world has never seen”.
I lived through the 1962 Cuban Crisis. But the language used by Kennedy and Kruschev was never as intemperate and scary as this.