The Art of the Deal
The U.S. wants to persuade North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons. Don't bet on it
The administration's internal battling has hindered consensus on its stance in Beijing, dismaying conservative and liberal analysts. "I'm predicting it will be a disaster," says Bill Taylor of the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Adds Selig Harrison of the Center for International Policy, "We do not appear ready to negotiate in a way that will achieve any definitive result. . . . Military pressure--anything that appears to push North Korea into a corner--is counterproductive."
Let's make a deal. But U.S. News has learned that American diplomats this week expect to propose a deal assuring North Korea, in writing, that the United States will not attack, while requiring Pyongyang to reveal and freeze its nuclear activities; Pyongyang would also have to transfer all its plutonium, uranium, and related equipment to international monitors outside North Korea. "They say you can't put the genie back in the bottle," says a senior official. "We're saying, `Give us the bottles.' "
The security pledge would fall short of the nonaggression pact the North wants, but China and the other regional powers would serve as guarantors. Secretary of State Colin Powell has been considering security assurances that would be "noted" by Congress, avoiding a fractious treaty ratification debate. Complex discussions about weapons inspections would be deferred, and U.S. moves to grant the North diplomatic recognition and economic assistance--its other major demands--would follow initial disarmament steps. The talks could last one to two years.
Students of the North's negotiating style caution that bluster and invective remain standard fare. U.S. officials have been prepping for Pyongyang's tactics, with the delegation leader, Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly, joining role-playing exercises. Says a State Department official of the North Koreans, "They might kick you in the shins even as they shake your hand."
The North's envoys may play on their image of being borderline crazy, but their pattern is one of zealous discipline. And the North seeks advantage wherever it can. During the Cold War, one American negotiator at the truce village of Panmunjom noticed that his chair seemed to be getting shorter by the day. It was--the North Koreans were sawing down the legs at night. "Negotiation became war by other means," says Scott Snyder, author of Negotiating on the Edge: North Korean Negotiating Behavior.
Yet the typically somber North Korean diplomats can also show humor and humanity if they believe it's useful. They chuckle at American jokes, and one confided that he likes Arnold Schwarzenegger's movies, recalls former diplomat Joel Wit, who has visited North Korea 15 times. "They're not cardboard characters, and they're not evil geniuses," says Wit, coauthor of the forthcoming Going Critical: The First North Korean Nuclear Crisis. "But we used to fantasize about a negotiating Olympics. We thought North Korea would be in the finals."
SIX-PARTY TALKS
Will North Korea agree to give up its nuclear programs?
Where: Beijing
When: August 27-29
Who: United States, North Korea, China, Russia, Japan, and South Korea
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