North Korea’s Nuclear Policy Is Not Irrational At All
By Dan Plesch, The Guardian – 10-09-2006
North Korea’s nuclear test is only the latest failure of the west’s
proliferation policy. And it demonstrates the need to return to the
proven methods of multilateral disarmament. Far from being crazy, the
North Korean policy is quite rational. Faced with a US government that
believes the communist regime should be removed from the map, the North
Koreans pressed ahead with building a deterrent. George Bush stopped the
oil supplies to North Korea that had been part of a framework to end its
nuclear program previously agreed with Bill Clinton. Bush had already
threatened pre-emptive war – Iraq-style – against a regime he dubbed as
belonging to the axis of evil.
The background to North Korea’s test is that, since the end of the cold
war, the nuclear states have tried to impose a double standard, hanging on
to nuclear weapons for themselves and their friends while denying them to
others. Like alcoholics condemning teenage drinking, the nuclear powers
have made the spread of nuclear weapons the terror of our age, distracting
attention from their own behavior. Western leaders refuse to accept that
our own actions encourage others to follow suit.
North Korea’s action has now increased the number of nuclear weapon
states to nine. Since 1998 India, Pakistan and now North Korea have
joined America, China, France, Russia, Israel and the UK.
The domino effect is all too obvious. Britain wants nuclear weapons so
long as the French do. India said it would build one if there were no
multilateral disarmament talks. Pakistan followed rapidly. In Iran and the
Arab world Israel’s bomb had always been an incentive to join in. But for
my Iranian friends, waking up to a Pakistani bomb can be compared to
living in a non-nuclear Britain and waking up to find Belgium had tested a
nuclear weapon.
East Asia is unlikely to be different. In 2002 Japan’s then chief
cabinet secretary, Yasuo Fukuda, told reporters that “depending on the
world situation, circumstances and public opinion could require Japan to
possess nuclear weapons”. The deputy cabinet secretary at the time, Shinzo
Abe – now Japan’s prime minister – said afterwards that it would be
acceptable for Japan to develop small, strategic nuclear weapons.
It was not supposed to be like this. At the end of the cold war,
disarmament treaties were being signed, and in 1996 the big powers
finally agreed to stop testing nuclear weapons for the first time since
1945. The public, the pressure groups and the media all breathed a great
sigh of relief and forgot about the bomb. Everyone thought that with the
Soviet Union gone, multilateral disarmament would accelerate.
But with public attention elsewhere, the Dr Strangeloves in Washington,
Moscow and Paris stopped the disarmament process and invented new ideas
requiring new nuclear weapons. A decade ago, Clinton’s Pentagon placed
“non-state actors” (ie terrorists) on the list of likely targets for US
nuclear weapons. Now all the established nuclear states are building new
nuclear weapons.
The Bush administration made things worse. First, it rejected the policy
of controlling armaments through treaties, which had been followed by
previous presidents since 1918. Second, it proposed to use military – even
nuclear – force in a pre-emptive attack to prevent proliferation. This
policy was used as a pretext for attacking Iraq and may now be used on
either Iran or North Korea. More pre-emptive war will produce suffering
and chaos, while nothing is done about India, Israel and Pakistan. So we
are left with a policy of vigilante bravado for which we have sacrificed
the proven methods of weapons control.
Fortunately, there is a realistic option. Max Kampelman, Ronald Reagan’s
nuclear negotiator, has proposed that Washington’s top priority should be
the elimination of all weapons of mass destruction on earth, including
those possessed by the US. At the ongoing disarmament meetings at the UN,
the vast majority of nations argue for a phased process to achieve this
goal. They can point to the success of the UN inspectors in Iraq as proof
that international inspection can work, even in the toughest cases. The
Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty that removed the missiles from Greenham
is an example of an agreement no one thought possible that worked
completely. This, and other legacies from the cold war, can and should be
applied globally.
A group of Britain’s closest allies, including South Africa and Ireland,
are trying to broker a deal on global disarmament. Tragically, Britain
won’t be helping. Political parties and the media are deaf to these
initiatives. The three main parties all follow more or less the US
approach. They know that no US government will lease the UK a successor to
Trident if London steps out of line on nuclear weapons policy. The media
almost never report on UN disarmament debates. Disarmament has become the
word that dare not be said in polite society.
Do we have to wait for another pre-emptive war or until the Japanese go
nuclear before the British political class comes to realize that there can
be a soft landing from these nuclear crises?
. Dan Plesch, a fellow at the School of Oriental and African Studies and
Keele University, is the author of The Beauty Queen’s Guide to World Peace
www.danplesch.net
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Today’s Los Angeles Times Opinion Section:
Tuesday, October 10th, 2006
Letters
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Bush Policies Triggered North Korean Nuke
Re: “North Korea Declares Nuclear Test,” October 9th
Suppose you were North Korea and President Bush put you into his
“axis of evil,” along with Iraq and Iran. You saw him invade Iraq, kill
tens of thousands of its people and change its government. Then he began
following the same pattern with Iran. Meanwhile, Bush refused to talk to
you directly about your nuclear program. Wouldn’t you develop and test a
nuke to defend yourself? Thanks to Bush’s dangerous policies, the chickens
have come home to roost.
MARJORIE COHN
President-elect, National Lawyers Guild, San Diego
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It is clear that the Bush administration has no desire to find a
diplomatic solution to North Korea’s nuclear testing. President Bush has
ignored repeated offers by North Korea to hold talks about its nuclear
policy. What hypocrisy! The U.S. demands that North Korea stop testing
while we continue to expand our arsenal of thousands of nukes. North Korea
is the world’s eighth declared nuclear power, not the first. The only way
to reduce the threat of nuclear weapons is for the U.S. to initiate global
nuclear disarmament. That means banning all nuclear weapons in all
countries.
TANJA WINTER
La Jolla
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