North Korea and the KEDO Attempt To Stop Its Bomb Program

This was in last week's installment of the Diplomacy Oral History project newsletter. 

Here is a link to an oral history of the first attempt to work out a nuclear deal with North Korea:

http://adst.org/2017/04/first-attempt-limit-north-koreas-nuclear-program/

  

Near the middle, around the graph of KEDO (Korean Energy Development Organization) funding and the picture of the North Korean nuclear plant, is a description of the KEDO funding difficulties.  This article doesn’t mention it, but while I was in Rome, KEDO was having trouble getting funding for the fuel oil it had promised the North Koreans as a reward for them if they would not work on their bomb project while KEDO worked on building a nuclear power reactor in North Korea that would not produce bomb-usable plutonium.  As the article says, the US Congress would not approve the money for the fuel oil.  The main sticking point was the Republican congressman from Mobile, Alabama, (I forget his name) who was on the Appropriations Committee.  Since he would not approve the money, somebody from KEDO came to Rome (maybe Bosworth, I don’t remember) to ask the EU (through the Italians since they held the rotating presidency of the EU) if it would contribute $2 million to help KEDO meet its obligations.  I think the EU eventually said, “No thanks,” although they promised to think about it, and expressed European concern about a North Korean bomb.   

It really ticked me off that the North Korean deal looked like it might fail because the US refused to meet its obligations, thus giving the North Koreans an excuse to go back to building bombs.  Interestingly, Bosworth says here that the North Koreans were not too upset about the funding problems, but in Rome I didn’t know that.  In any case, the KEDO deal fell apart later.  Joel Wit, who worked for Bosworth and was more my level (we had worked together on the Missile Technology Control Regime),has said somewhere that KEDO never missed a payment.  But I think maybe he and Bosworth tend to gloss over the payment difficulties so as not to make themselves look too responsible for KEDO’s failure. 

Trump’s Attack on Syria

Trump's attack on Syria dealt with several issues that should help his popularity:

I creates a contrast with Obama’s publicly drawing a red line on the use of chemical weapons in Syria and then doing nothing about it.  Trump looks strong and decisive in comparison, and it pleases the liberal establishment.  

It helps to overcome Trump’s perceived softness on Putin.  He attacked Putin’s ally, Assad, and even put Russian troops in peril. For the moment at least, he and Putin are on opposite sides in Syria.  

It demonstrates to North Korea that Trump is not afraid to use force, and thus constitutes an implicit threat to North Korea.  

Liberals in general like the attack on Syria because it inhibits the use of nuclear weapons and attacks on civilians and children.  Thus, the attack tends to roll back their perception of him as a far right ideologue.  

Liberal talking heads have expressed concern that Trump has no strategy to bring about regime change or end the war in Syria, but Trump can let this attack stand alone if he wants.  He can describe it as a response to an inhumane violation of international law, not the beginning of regime change.  

Indians on India

An interesting quote from Fareed Zakaria's email newsletter for 4/5/17, since both he and Nikki Haley are Indian Americans.   India to U.S.: None of Your Business

Thanks, but no thanks. That’s the message India delivered to the Trump administration after U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley suggested the United States would “find its place” in efforts to defuse tensions between India and Pakistan, the Hindustan Times reports. Reiterating India’s position that ties between the two are a bilateral matter, External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Gopal Baglay reportedly added: “We of course expect the international community and organizations to enforce international mechanisms and mandates concerning terrorism emanating from Pakistan, which continues to be the single biggest threat to peace and stability in our region and beyond.”

Democrats Push War with Russia

The Democrats believe Trump’s political weakness is Russia.  Therefore, they are vilifying Russia to make Trump’s friendliness toward Russia appear to be treason.  At first it looked like they would try to invalidate Trump’s election, but as time goes on that seems less likely.  

They make Putin look more powerful than he is, and they make Putin appear more aggressive and anti-American than he is.   An example is Fareed Zakaria’s CNN special on Putin, characterizing Putin as the most powerful man in the world.  Putin is a remarkable man who has brought Russia back from the trash heap of history to be a player on the world stage, and he has more nuclear weapons than anyone else in the world, including Donald Trump.  But that does not make him the most powerful man in the world; arguably either Trump or Chinese President Xi Jinping may be more powerful because of their economic power in addition to their military power.  In terms of usable power, Germany’s Angela Merkel, the leader of the most powerful country in the EU, may be more powerful than Putin.  This morning on some news show discussing Merkel’s meeting with Trump, the female reporter described Merkel as the most powerful “woman” in the world.  

In any case the Democrats want to make Putin look like a dangerous enemy of the US so that Trump’s failure to condemn him looks treasonous.  In addition, most Jews hate Russia.  Jews as a race lived in Russia for centuries.  While the word “Ashkenazi” means German, as it is used in describing Ashkenazi Jews, most recent Jewish immigrants have come from Russia or Soviet dominated Eastern Europe, and they brought with them a visceral hatred of Russia because of their poor treatment by ethnic Russian Slavs.  For powerful Jews in American politics and the media, vilifying Putin and Russia has a double benefit of weakening a political enemy, Trump, and an ethnic enemy, Russia.  

This campaign resembles the “yellow journalism” of the 1890s which led to the Spanish-American War in the Philippines and Cuba.  The Democrats, the journalists, and the Jews probably don’t want a civilization-ending nuclear war with Russia, but they want sanctions, political pressure, and maybe some smaller wars in Ukraine or the Middle East.  Small wars could be similar to the Afghanistan War that led to the demise of the Soviet Union.  If these efforts succeed in unseating Putin, it’s unclear who would follow him, but whoever it is, they would almost certainly be weaker than Putin, thus putting Americans and Jews in a more dominant position vis-a-vis the Russian Slavs.  

Trump does not seem particularly concerned about the Jewish aspect of the Russia issue.  He has many Jews in his administration.  So far he has not reversed his position on Putin, although he has been somewhat more cautious about praising him.  Even Trump is not insensitive to the steady drumbeat of anti-Putin propaganda.