By Charles Krauthammer
Thursday, July 06, 2017
Across 25 years and five administrations, we have kicked
the North Korean can down the road. We are now out of road.
On July 4, North Korea tested an intercontinental
ballistic missile apparently capable of hitting the United States. As yet, only
Alaska. Soon, every American city.
Moreover, Pyongyang claims to have already fitted
miniaturized nuclear warheads on intermediate-range missiles. Soon, on ICBMs.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s initial reaction to
this game changer was not encouraging. “Global action is required to stop a
global threat,” he declared.
This, in diplo-speak, is a cry for (multilateral) help. Alas,
there will be none. Because, while this is indeed a global threat, there is no
such thing as global interests. There are individual national interests, and
they diverge. In this case, radically.
Take Russia and China. If there’s to be external pressure
on North Korea, it would come from them. Will it? On Tuesday, they issued a
joint statement proposing a deal: North Korea freezes nuclear and missile
testing in return for America’s abandoning large-scale joint exercises with
South Korea.
This is a total non-starter. The exercises have been the
backbone of the U.S.–South Korea alliance for half a century. Abandonment would
signal the end of an enduring relationship that stabilizes the region and
guarantees South Korean independence. In exchange for what?
A testing freeze? The offer doesn’t even pretend to
dismantle North Korea’s nuclear program, which has to be our minimal objective.
Moreover, we’ve negotiated multiple freezes over the years with Pyongyang. It
has violated every one.
The fact that Russia and China would, amid a burning
crisis, propose such a dead-on-arrival proposal demonstrates that their real
interest is not denuclearization. Their real interest is cutting America down
to size by breaking our South Korean alliance and weakening our influence in
the Pacific Rim.
These are going to be our partners in solving the crisis?
And yet, relying on China’s good graces appeared to be
Donald Trump’s first resort for solving North Korea. Until he declared two
weeks ago (by tweet, of course) that China had failed. “At least I know China
tried!” he added.
They did? Trump himself tweeted out on Wednesday that
Chinese trade with North Korea increased by almost 40 percent in the first
quarter, forcing him to acknowledge that the Chinese haven’t been helping.
Indeed not. The latest North Korean missile is menacing
not just because of its 4,000-mile range, but because it is road-mobile. And
the transporter comes from China.
In the calculus of nuclear deterrence, mobility
guarantees inviolability. (The enemy cannot find, and therefore cannot
pre-empt, a mobile missile.) It’s a huge step forward for Pyongyang. Supplied
by Beijing.
How many times must we be taught that Beijing does not
share our view of denuclearizing North Korea? It prefers a divided peninsula,
i.e., sustaining its client state as a guarantee against a unified Korea
(possibly nuclear) allied with the West and sitting on its border.
Nukes assure regime survival. That’s why the Kims have so
single-mindedly pursued them. The lessons are clear. Saddam Hussein, no nukes:
hanged. Moammar Qaddafi, gave up his nuclear program: killed by his own people.
The Kim dynasty, possessing an arsenal of ten to 16 bombs: untouched, soon
untouchable.
What are our choices? Trump has threatened that if China
doesn’t help, we’ll have to go it alone. If so, the choice is binary:
acquiescence or war.
War is almost unthinkable, given the proximity of the
Demilitarized Zone to the 10 million people of Seoul. A mere conventional war
would be devastating. And could rapidly go nuclear.
Acquiescence is not unthinkable. After all, we did it
when China went nuclear under Mao Zedong, whose regime promptly went insane
under the Cultural Revolution.
The hope for a third alternative, getting China to do the
dirty work, is mostly wishful thinking. There’s talk of sanctioning other
Chinese banks. Will that really change China’s strategic thinking? Bourgeois
democracies believe that economics supersedes geostrategy. Maybe for us. But
for dictatorships? Rarely.
If we want to decisively alter the strategic balance, we
could return U.S. tactical nukes (withdrawn in 1991) to South Korea. Or we
could encourage Japan to build a nuclear deterrent of its own. Nothing would
get more quick attention from the Chinese. They would face a radically new
strategic dilemma: Is preserving North Korea worth a nuclear Japan?
We do have powerful alternatives. But each is dangerous
and highly unpredictable. Which is why the most likely ultimate outcome, by
far, is acquiescence.
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