North Korea Tests Nuke

For all the saber-rattling over Iran and its theoretical nuclear weapon, the real problem is North Korea. There have been criminal regimes in other countries throughout history, but the “Democratic People’s Republic of Korea” is not just criminal, it is criminally insane. The fact that it tested a nuclear weapon yesterday merely means that the madmen are even more dangerous. The options are few, they aren’t good, and it’s time to implement them.

The good news is the generally hostile reaction around the North Asian region to the Hiroshima-sized test. The Japanese leadership called it “unpardonable,” the South Koreans picked a different word “unacceptable,” and Russia’s President Vladimir Putin said he “certainly condemns the test conducted by North Korea.” Even the North Koreans’ pals the Chinese said, through their foreign ministry, that North Korea “has ignored the widespread opposition of the international community and conducted a nuclear test brazenly on October 9 [local time, October 8 in Europe and the Americas]. The Chinese government is firmly opposed to this.”

With such unity, it is time for the nations of the world to act, and that means China has to be supported by the other powers of the region. For its part, China has to use its ties to the North Korean security and military structure to remove the current regime. A coup d’etat is never a good option, but it is hard to imagine how a new military regime could be any worse. The only nation with the power to make that happen is the People’s Republic of China.

China, of course, can be pressured into acting, or at least given incentives to act. A re-armed Japan is a serious worry for the Chinese, and Japan should make it clear that a pacifist Japan is conditional on the region being safe enough for a pacifist nation to survive. Meanwhile, the US can make clear that a nuclear North Korea may need to be balanced with a nuclear Taiwan. American support for a “one China policy,” is also conditional.

Sticks without carrots don’t work, though. In exchange for a new regime, the US must guarantee one-on-one talks with the new leadership, and a permanent peace treaty (the Korean War hasn’t officially ended, yet) must be on the table. Membership in the WTO and other bodies has to be available, and food and energy aid needs to be on the docks in hours. North Korea now definitely has The Bomb. Diplomacy and a little statecraft can assure that it has no cause to use it, and the sooner the better.

© Copyright 2006 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.

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