Bush Pressured to Move on North Korea Disarmament
In the past few days, one more former senior administration policymaker went public with his doubts. Robert Joseph, who resigned earlier this year as the State Department under secretary for arms control and international security, told an audience at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington that he suspects North Korea is manipulating the six-party process to avoid real disarmament. In a speech that apparently sought to tread delicately on the administration he served for more than six years, Joseph suggested that the new U.S. approach might inadvertently "prolong the life of the [North Korean] regime."
A serving senior official agreed that "the longer that this goes on . . . that sort of thinking will become more resonant with people."
In a separate interview with U.S. News, another hawkish previous senior official, former Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton, asserted that North Korean intransigence "increases [the State Department's] proclivity to concede more." Adds Bolton, "I fear that the State Department may now be in a 'save the deal' mode. . . . If you're in the 'save the deal' mode, anything is possible." He also predicted growing pressure to revisit the deal in light of North Korean noncompliance. "A lot of people are feeling the heat," he said.
A senior U.S. official said the administration is trying to show patience and generate collective pressure on North Korea to live up to the deal. But flexibility on the first set of deadlines, the official warned, does not mean flexibility on meeting the substantive disarmament requirements in the agreement.
The stakes in avoiding a permanently nuclear-armed North Korea, all agree, are high. The same U.S. official argues that, "If we're off by a couple of weeks and a few days, that's OK"–as long as the North Koreans do their part.
How much time will President Bush give the North Koreans? He didn't answer directly Friday while meeting with Japan's prime minister, Shinzo Abe.
"Our patience is not unlimited," he said.
Yet Bush hinted at what will follow if the North Koreans do not relent. He said the six-nation structure in place could also serve to hold together countries opposed to North Korea's nuclear aims. "We have the capability of more sanctions," he said.
If North Korean leader Kim Jong Il opts not to honor the agreement, Bush vowed, "we've got a strategy to make sure the pressure we've initially applied is even greater."
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