APNorth Korea says it conducts nuke test

[bevin]

The problem is simply this.

The USA wants to make North Korea (and Iran, for that matter) dependent on the USA's good will. Unfortunately the USA has a long established habit of pulling the plug whenever it doesn't like what a country is doing - so the USA is trying to make North Korea dependent on USA technology. Consider, for example, what happened to the military equipment we sold Iran - now unusable because we won't sell them replacement parts.

The NK's are too paranoid and not stupid enough to let themselves become dependent on the good will of American politicians.

I am reminded on Xenophon's response when asked by the Medo-Persians to surrender his 10,000 warriors weapons. He replied

"either we are your friends, in which case we can keep the weapons, or we are your enemies, in which case we need the weapons, so we will not surrender them".

Consider how stupid the USA's negotiating position actually is. We ask them (both NK and Iran) to "stop doing FOO now, and then we'll talk about you not doing FOO ever again." What is in this for NK or Iran? Nothing.

The USA is simply not a reliable partner. We promised the NK's that, if they did not use Russian Reactors, we would build them Light Water ones. Then we looked for an excuse to get out of building any at all.

The only way out of such an impasse is for each side to make SMALL concessions. The SK and NK governments realized this and started making a series of small moves. Clinton supported them. Then the Bush administration, with its utter incompetence at international affairs came along and blew the whole thing away.

The Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty requires the signatories, including the USA, to give up their nuclear weapons. They have not. Therefore the other countries have the right to acquire them.

/Bevin

http://archives.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/east/12/15/nkorea.us/index.html

Quote:

Monday, December 16, 2002

ROTTERDAM, The Netherlands -- Former U.S. President Bill Clinton says he had plans in the early 1990s to attack and destroy North Korea's nuclear facilities after the secretive communist state was found to be producing weapons-grade plutonium.

At the time, he said, North Korea had plans to produce between six and eight nuclear weapons per year.

"We actually drew up plans to attack North Korea and to destroy their reactors and we told them we would attack unless they ended their nuclear program," Clinton told a security forum in the Dutch port city of Rotterdam Sunday.

"We were in a very intense situation," he said.

His statement came days after North Korea announced that it planned to restart its nuclear reactor after Clinton's successor, President George W. Bush, announced he was halting supplies of fuel oil to the country.

The United States had been providing North Korea with the oil under the terms of a 1994 agreement, ending the first crisis over the North's suspected weapons program.

Under the deal, known as the Agreed Framework, the North had agreed to mothball its reactor and abandon efforts to construct nuclear weapons, pending the construction of two advanced reactors that do not produce weapons-grade material.

However, in October North Korean officials told a visiting U.S. delegation they had continued with their weapons program in contravention of the deal. (Why did they do this?)

Highest bidder

Last week Pyongyang said it planned to restart its nuclear reactor to cover the energy shortfall created by the cutting of fuel supplies.

Commenting on the North Korean announcement, Clinton said the move made it imperative that Pyongyang be persuaded or forced to halt its weapons program.

"Make no mistake about it, it has to be ended," Clinton said.

"You do not want North Korea making bombs and selling them to the highest bidder because they cannot feed themselves through the winter," he added.

However, he said it was more likely North Korea would use the nuclear issue to bargain for more aid rather than put weapons on the market.

Two years later...

Quote:

North Korea Reactor Plan Suspended Until 2005

Associated Press

Saturday, November 27, 2004; Page A16

NEW YORK, Nov. 26 -- An international consortium said Friday that it has extended for another year a freeze on a project to build two light-water nuclear reactors in North Korea.

The four main partners in the New York-based Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization -- the United States, Japan, South Korea and the European Union -- had previously suspended the project for a year through Dec. 1, 2004.

The freeze will be extended until Dec. 1, 2005, the group said in a statement.

Reports from South Korea and Japan in recent months have said the United States sought to kill the program outright but could not persuade Seoul or Tokyo to adopt that stance. The two countries are heavily invested in the $4.6 billion light-water reactor program, which is about one-third complete.

Yep, the Bush administration has no clue about how to cope with such situations.

[Bravus]

http://bravus.port5.com/blog/?p=654

[Dr. Shane]

Quote:

North Korea announced that it planned to restart its nuclear reactor after Clinton's successor, President George W. Bush, announced he was halting supplies of fuel oil to the country.

Why did it do this?

Here is North Korea's SPIN (if one chooses to believe it)

Quote:

Last week Pyongyang said it planned to restart its nuclear reactor to cover the energy shortfall created by the cutting of fuel supplies.

In 1998, one week after the Clinton Administration anounced North Korea didn't have a ballistic missle program, North Korea launched a missle that landed off the coast of Alaska.

Clinton sent North Korea hundreds of millions of dollars in aid, food, oil and even a nuclear reactor but did not require verification. The aid sent by the US was not used for the North Korean people but instead was used to build the military and some speculate that to include the nuclear program. During this time China allowed Pakistan to sell nuclear technology to North Korea. So when Bush arrived at Washington, North Korea had already resumed its nuclear program with the help of China and Pakistan and were still recieving money from the US! Clearly the Agreed Framework was a failure.

North Korea didn't resume their nuclear program because Bush cut off aid - Bush cut off aid because North Korea had resumed their nuclear program.

The US has little influence over North Korea. The US can hardly be blamed for what North Korea is doing. The US does have influence with Japan, South Korea and Tawain and those nations have not developed nuclear weapons. Russia and China have more influence over North Korea and the fact that North Korea has, or is on the verge of developing, a nuclear weapon is more of a failure on the part of China or Russia. Sure, there might be a little SPIN there but why should the US be expected to stop nations from making nuclear weapons? Russia and China both have a seat on the UN Security Council and should exert more influence on their allies.

[Neil D]

North Koreans don't know that....

[Dr. Shane]

China is the key player. North Korea gets a lot of their oil from China. China has controlled North Korea before by shutting off their supply of oil. China has nuclear weapons. If China agreeded to defend North Korea, North Korea would not feel the need to have nuclear arms.

Getting China on board, like the six-party talks would and perhaps will do, is nessasary. If Clinton had been able to get China on board we wouldn't be where we are at. This puzzle cannot be put together without China.