GEO - POLITICAL AFFAIRS

GEO - POLITICAL AFFAIRS

Why no ‘Military Attack’ on North Korea’
Columnist Muhammad Irshad asks the obvious question in the face of North Korean belligerance.

Since the United States confronted Pyongyang about its secret uranium enrichment programme in October 2002, North Korea has kicked out International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors, announced its withdrawal from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, restarted a nuclear reactor that had been frozen under the 1994 Agreed Framework, and reportedly begun moving spent fuel rods to a reprocessing facility that can produce plutonium. It also recently sought to intercept a US reconnaissance aircraft – possibly with the intention of taking the crew hostage – and has tested naval cruise missiles twice. President Bush was quick to declare this country as a part of 'Axis of Evil', but in-spite of all the North Korean actions, the Americans have refrained from making threats of any military attack and have repeatedly emphasized about 'Diplomacy' being the only possible route to solve the problems.
These American statements are quite in contrast to their actions (say) for Muslim countries of Afghanistan and Iraq, where the two countries were totally ruined by America for reasons which still have not been proved. Is America showing the (extremely rare) soft corner for the love of it or are there other compulsions forbidding the talk of a military action' North Koreans have many problems , similar to the one existing in many under-developed countries, But instead of sitting like a duck and getting a shot, like the case of Afghanistan and Iraq, they have decided to put up a bold face, and this bold face may be an example for many Third World countries to follow.
The North Korean leadership's political decision to acquire nuclear weapons was not made in vacuum. Pyongyang confronts a number of external and internal security problems. Korea is surrounded by major powers, and the peninsula had been subject to many invasions in the past centuries. Colonialism and the Korean War (1950-53) still resonate with policy-makers in Pyongyang, and these experiences continue to influence the perception of the ruling elite and their supporters. A strong military posture and advanced weapons systems not only help the leadership deal with external threats, but they are also popular amongst nationalistic citizens who are constantly reminded of the potential external threats to North Korea.
US military forces (37,000 troops) are stationed in South Korea to deter North Korea, and historical facts provide North Korean leadership with a motivation to acquire capability to strike US targets so that Pyongyang could deter American military intervention in the future. At a minimum, the North Korean leaders want a conventional capability but nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles as a delivery system are the preferred choice. During the Korean war, North Korea and China were subjected to nuclear threats by United States, and some analysts argue that Pyongyang's leaders are motivated to develop nuclear weapons and long range missiles because of this experience.
In December 2001, the US National Intelligence Council reported its assessment that North Korea had produced one to two nuclear weapons. The fissile material for these weapons came from plutonium that North Korean technicians extracted from spent-fuel rods removed from the 5MW Experimental Reactor at the Yongbyon nuclear complex in 1989. While North Korea has not conducted a full nuclear test, various reports indicate that the DPRK has successfully completed the high explosive tests required for nuclear weapons. There has also been speculation that North Korean scientists were present during nuclear tests in Pakistan, and that Pyongyang may have been able to use previously tested designs for their own weapon production. However, creating a first-generation nuclear weapon does not necessarily indicate an ability to produce a nuclear warhead that will work with a given delivery system. While the DPRK's missile development efforts are relatively advanced, its Nodong (range about 1,000 km) and Paektusan-1 (Taepodong-1; range 2,000-2,500 km) missiles have only been flight-tested once, and the Taepodong-2 is still under development. It is unclear if Pyongyang's nuclear devices could be used successfully with these delivery systems, or with any limited-range aircraft in the North Korean inventory.
Most of the key facilities for the DPRK's plutonium-based nuclear programme are located in or near the Yongbyon-kun complex, about 100 km north of the capital Pyongyang. The primary immediate concern is the 8,000 spent-fuel rods in a temporary storage pond in Yongbyon-kun. With International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) monitoring devices removed or disabled and IAEA inspectors having been expelled, North Korea can reprocess these spent-fuel rods into enough plutonium for about five bombs in approximately one month. The reprocessing would likely be done at a reprocessing plant known as the "Radiochemistry Laboratory", which is also in the Yongbyon complex. This Radiochemistry Laboratory is estimated to be capable of reprocessing 200-250 tons of spent fuel and extracting 100 kilograms of plutonium annually, but the possibility that North Korea has additional reprocessing facilities elsewhere cannot be ruled out.
North Korea's 5MW Experimental Reactor, also located in the Yongbyon complex, has been under IAEA safeguards and frozen under the terms of the Agreed Framework. This reactor produced the 8,000 spent-fuel rods that are in temporary storage. Once operational, it could produce about 5.5 kilograms of plutonium per year, or enough for about one bomb. A recent statement by a North Korean representative to the IAEA claimed that the Yongbyon-kun facilities could be able to produce electricity "in a few weeks, not a few months." If this claim is true, the production and extraction of weapon-grade plutonium may occur even sooner than most analysts had estimated.
Another facility of concern is the fuel fabrication plant, which is also in the Yongbyon complex. Prior to the Agreed Framework, this plant was reportedly manufacturing fuel rods that contained 100 tons of uranium per year. This facility is probably capable of producing much more, possibly up to 200-300 tons, which would be enough to supply the 5MW reactor in Yongbyon-kun and two larger reactors that were under construction before being frozen by the Agreed Framework.
Now when the country is known to have nuclear weapons and the ballistic missiles, many other countries are afraid of their possessions. In the case of North Korea, the major players with strong interests in whether the Pyongyang regime develops nuclear weapons and missile systems to deliver nukes are China, South Korea, Japan, and the United States .
While China has not yet taken a firm public stance against North Korean efforts to do WMD development, some of China's national security intellectuals see reasons why North Korea should be prevented from developing nuclear weapons. The biggest motive that China has to restrain North Korea from doing nuclear weapons’ development is that China fears any changes in East Asia security conditions that would prompt Japan to militarize and to more closely align with the United States. While much remains unsaid, the strategic defence community in China is closely watching the morphing of the US-Japan relationship in light of how Article 9 of the Japanese constitution, which renounces war, is interpreted. This process has been going on for at least a year. In August 2001, former Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa affirmed in San Francisco that Japan should lift its self-imposed ban on exercising its right to collective self-defence in the interests of a more effective Japan-US alliance. He spoke of the need for Japan to adapt to changing global realities.
A Japan that feels insecure is a Japan that is going to become more militaristic. Also, a Japan that feels insecure is going to move closer to the United States on security matters. China would like to avoid both of these outcomes. In response to a nuclear ballistic missile threat from North Korea Japan could rapidly build nuclear weapons and increase its cooperation with the United States to build a missile-defence system. There is also a fast-growing body of opinion in Japan saying that that's precisely what the country should do. Latest on that is a "Nuclear Declaration for Japan" by influential Kyoto University international-relations Professor Terumasa Nakanishi (co-author with Fred Charles Ikle, undersecretary of defence for policy in the Ronald Reagan administration, of a widely noted Foreign Affairs article "Japan's grand strategy") and literary critic Kazuya Fukuda calling on the Japanese not to cave in to the North Korean nuclear threat: "The best way for Japan to avoid being the target of North Korean nuclear missiles is for the prime minister to declare without delay that Japan will arm itself with nuclear weapons." They also want Japan to get on with construction of a missile-defence system, post haste.
The threat of this possibility conceivably might prod the strategic thinkers in Beijing to threaten North Korea with aid cut-off if North Korea doesn't stop all nuclear weapons development, turn over all nuclear weapons materials, nuclear weapons manufacturing equipment and nuclear bombs as well as open all of its weapons development facilities to inspection by Japanese, American, and Chinese inspectors. However, the problem with the inspections approach is that it is easy for a government to hide things. Japan is going to feel threatened because it knows North Korea has ballistic missiles and has to fear that North Korea may manage to build nukes even while subjected to an inspections regime. Japan's security would be enhanced much more if the North Korean regime was overthrown and replaced by rule of North Korea by the South Korean government. Hopeful signs in China are the security and strategy intellectuals in Beijing who are arguing that North Korea shouldn't be allowed to have nuclear weapons.
"There is increasing recognition here that if North Korea is finally armed with nuclear weapons, it will be a big threat to China," said Zhu Feng, director of the international security programme at Beijing University's School of International Studies. "I have a strong sense at this crucial moment, my government will change its mind to resort to another approach rather than just, say, use the veto right to block any UN -imposed sanctions against North Korea." Keep in mind that the academic policy specialists are not speaking for the Chinese government. The Chinese government has yet to provide any public indication of resolve on this issue.
Some in the Bush Administration, the US military, and the US Congress argue for US military withdrawal away from the DMZ that separates North and South Korea, followed eventually by a withdrawal from South Korea entirely. "It's a no-lose proposition," noted one conservative congressional staffer. "If we get our troops out of range of the North's guns, our freedom of action for acting against the North is greater. And if Roh gets worried about being left to the tender mercies of [North Korean leader] Kim Jong-II, that gives us more influence."
Such a withdrawal would fulfil a long-term ambition of North Korea to get the United States out of South Korea. The North Korean regime thinks it could then finally invade and unite the Korean Peninsula under Northern rule thus assuring the survival of the Northern regime. While the regime probably would lose in a conventional war against the South it might be able to win if it has nuclear weapons or if it can first convince the South to reduce the size of its military. The North Korean regime believes the existence of two separate governments on the Peninsula is not sustainable. Its view is basically that it has to win the unification struggle or the regime will cease to exist.
Just because North Korea would welcome US withdrawal that is not necessarily a reason to rule it out. If the US withdrew and the North then attacked this would provide the opportunity for the US to finally unleash its full military might against the North. One risk of that approach is that the North might by then have ICBMs with nuclear warheads capable of striking the US. Hence North Korea might be able to deter the US from coming to the aid of the South. The decision to withdraw has uncertain benefits and uncertain costs.
The US view is that North Korea could become a Nuclear KMart selling nuclear weapons to anyone with the cash. The US would like help from other nations to make North Korea stop developing nuclear weapons. Washington also worries that soon North Korea may be able to reach the mainland of the United States with its Taepo-Dong II missile which could be tipped with chemical, biological or even crude nuclear weapons. Nobody is sure. Furthermore, the United States treats North Korea as a terrorist state ( and has declared it as a part of ‘Axis of Evil'), for selling missile technology to other rogue nations. In 1994, North Korea had to be bribed to abandon its plutonium producing nuclear programme in return for two safer light water reactors. That programme has now stalled. Washington would require North Korea to freeze its nuclear and reprocessing facilities, re-admit international inspectors, and account for any plutonium taken from Yongbyon in exchange for US assurances that it will neither attack the North nor impede the flow of international assistance for as long as the interim agreement remains in effect.
Asian Times writer Francesco Sisci thinks its conceivable that China could back a US preemptive strike against North Korea. This seems unlikely. Even if the Chinese were willing, the problem with such a move is that North Korea could retaliate by raining artillery shells (possibly carrying biological or chemical weapons) on Seoul's northern suburbs. The North has thousands of artillery pieces dug into caves (i.e. very hard for US air power to knock out) that are in range of highly populated areas of South Korea and North Korean artillery could very quickly (within hours) could cause tens or even hundreds of thousands of South Korean casualties. South Korea's current government can, therefore, be expected to oppose such a plan.
According to intelligence reports, a war against North Korea would cost tens of thousands of US casualties, an equal or greater number of South Korean military casualties, hundreds of thousands of South Korean civilian casualties, and months to fight. The US lacks a quick and efficient means to knock out the North Korean artillery pieces that are burrowed into caves. Those artillery pieces are within range of the densely populated northern suburbs of Seoul. The North Korean civilians would similarly suffer appalling losses as the fighting moved into North Korea. The military option for dealing with North Korea is quite unattractive.
In 1993, shortly before the last crisis triggered by North Korea's then-unfulfilled quest for a nuclear bomb, a classified Pentagon estimate said a conventional war with North Korea would require four months of "very high-intensity combat" by more than 600,000 South Korean troops and about half a million US reinforcements to the regular contingent of 37,000 US military personnel stationed in South Korea, or about half the total US fighting force. Since then, in some respects, the trends have only deteriorated, according to Army Col. Dean A. Nowowiejski, a federal executive fellow at the Brookings Institution who served as a regional war planner in South Korea from 1995 to 1998. North Korea has been moving more and more troops and long-range artillery, with ever greater fortification, closer to the Demilitarized Zone.
A decade ago, many American policy-makers and pundits blithely talked about military options for destroying the Yongbyon reactor and other North Korean nuclear facilities. Many people, apparently including President Bush, seem to be making the same calculations again. It is not surprising that policymakers in Seoul, within easy reach of North Korean artillery and Scud missiles, have a different perspective. Officials in Beijing, Moscow and Tokyo also worry about radioactive fallout, missile attacks, refugee flows, economic turmoil and regional chaos. Even among the countries in the region most vulnerable to a North Korea with nuclear weapons, there is no constituency for war.
South Korea is particularly adamant. As President Roh Moo Hyun said, "For Washington, their prime interest lies in getting rid of weapons of mass destruction to restore the world order, but for us it's a matter of survival."
Some advocates of military action predict that Pyongyang would not retaliate against a blow to its nuclear facilities. Others propose coupling such a military strike with the use or threat of tactical nuclear weapons against the North's conventional forces. But to attack and assume the North would not respond would be a wild gamble. A military strike might not get all of Pyongyang's nuclear assets, and hitting the reprocessing facility and spent fuel rods could create radioactive fallout over China, Japan, Russia or South Korea.
Moreover, given the official US policy of preemption, designation of the North as a member of the "Axis of Evil" and the Iraq war, Pyongyang might decide that even a limited military strike was the opening of a war for regime change. In that case, it would make sense to roll the tanks. An account by a high-ranking defector, Cho Myung Chul, is particularly sobering. In analyzing Iraq's defeat in the 1991 Gulf War, North Korean military officials concluded that Baghdad was too defensive. Cho related the North Korean view as: "If we're in a war, we'll use everything. And if there's a war, we should attack first, to take the initiative." He estimates the chances of general war at 80% in response to even a limited strike on Yongbyon. Unfortunately, "everything" is a daunting force: In addition to a large army, the North possesses long-range artillery and rocket launchers, up to 600 Scud missiles and additional longer-range No Dong missiles. And it has developed a significant number and range of chemical and perhaps biological weapons. Estimates as to the number of casualties run to more than 1 million.
Also possible would be a limited retaliatory strike against the United States' Yongsan base in the centre of Seoul. The Seoul-Inchon metropolis includes roughly half of South Korea's population, about 24 million people, and is the nation's industrial heartland. Pyongyang is thought to be able to fire up to 500,000 shells an hour into Seoul. Washington could hardly afford not to respond to an attack on Yongsan, yet retaliation would probably lead to general war. Such a scenario might threaten civilian control of the military in Seoul; the perception that South Koreans died because the US acted against the wishes of the Roh administration might create a decisive split between Seoul and Washington.
Thus dealing with North Korea could prove to be one of the most vexing challenges for Bush administration. Military action does not offer a simple solution but rather portends a real war of horrific destructiveness. Probably USA shall be the victor, but with too many body bags of Americans and their allies. The Americans abhor such victory, and thus have no choice but to talk of diplomatic route of negotiations with North Korea.