Neither the Bush nor the Kerry campaign has chosen to make U.S. policy toward North Korea a central part of its election platform -- and for good reason. Both sides recognize that it may no longer be possible to peacefully resolve the dispute over that country's nuclear-weapons development, and a debate over whether to wage another controversial war would hardly appeal to the electorate.
The fundamental problem is that North Korea believes it needs a sizable nuclear arsenal. Politically, such an asset would transform the country into a regional power whose views on international issues must always be taken seriously. Militarily, the possession of a large number of atomic weapons would bolster North Korea's security by discouraging intimidation of the sort Washington employed in 1994, when it forced President Kim Jong Il to shut down his plutonium-based arms program.
Most compelling, however, is Pyongyang's financial situation. The North Korean economy is so dysfunctional that it cannot reliably generate enough wealth to sustain the state. Kim and his colleagues have dabbled in reform, but they apparently realize that the degree of liberalization necessary to produce strong GDP growth would coincidentally release a wave of popular animosity sufficient to wash the government away. Thus, the safest course of action is to leave the economy unreconstructed while securing a constant stream of foreign aid.
Since Pyongyang needs leverage to obtain this support, it is determined to amass a big nuclear force. The international community would then have no means of persuading North Korea to abandon its weaponry short of risking catastrophic war and would consequently be reduced to bribing the Kim government not to use its new capabilities.
Moreover, if the flow of aid were interrupted, Pyongyang could garner the foreign exchange it requires by selling its new technology, fissile materials or even a few of its bombs.
What this implies is that despite its rhetoric to the contrary, North Korea does not really want to trade its nuclear program for economic assistance and a security guarantee. Pyongyang would plainly prefer to embark on diplomatic talks with nuclear weapons in hand. This is why it cheated on the 1994 agreement by enriching uranium and why it resumed reprocessing plutonium in early 2003. But to realize his strategic aspirations, Kim must still prevent the United States, China, Japan and South Korea from forming a coalition that imposes crippling sanctions before his armament effort has reached fruition.
Driving wedges between the other regional powers is not as difficult as it might seem. Paradoxically, perhaps, the United States is the only relevant country that views the achievement by North Korea of significant nuclear status as absolutely unacceptable.
Tokyo and Seoul are worried about that eventuality but conversely fear the geopolitical instability and refugee crisis that would ensue if economic or military pressure caused the Kim regime to collapse. Beijing shares these immediate concerns and additionally worries about the longer-term possibility that a united Korean Peninsula might incline toward the United States.
Only by alleviating these anxieties can the U.S. government unite East Asia against North Korea.
Washington, however, is constrained by its own internal rift. On the one hand are those doves who want to exchange aid and a security arrangement for the termination of North Korea's nuclear projects, on the other are the hawks who oppose all diplomatic contact with the Kim government. The conflict between these two camps has paralyzed Bush administration policy, leaving Pyongyang more or less free to proceed with its nuclear gambit.
If the doves err in overestimating Pyongyang's flexibility, the hawks are guilty of the more serious mistake of thinking that a refusal to negotiate with mendacious states is an actual diplomatic strategy.
In fact, the talks advocated by the doves are an essential step toward the application of coercive force. It is only by offering reasonable deals, and having the Kim government reject them, that Washington can demonstrate to Beijing, Tokyo and Seoul that Pyongyang cannot be bought off with money and a verbal guarantee of its security. This recognition, in turn, is critical both to building a coalition against North Korea and, alternatively, to reducing the political costs of unilateral U.S. military action.
The better course has therefore always been to negotiate earnestly with Pyongyang in the hope that it would accede to a peace agreement while knowing that its failure to do so would facilitate the adoption of more assertive measures, if necessary, at a later date.
Yet rather than taking every opportunity to interact with Kim's representatives, the Bush administration has limited its diplomacy to desultory exchanges at multilateral conferences and only put forward a detailed settlement proposal in June. Pyongyang has exploited the opening created by this stubbornness fairly effectively. It has capitalized on anti-American sentiment in South Korea by persuading Seoul to cooperate economically and militarily while also prevailing upon Tokyo to resume large-scale food aid and seek an early exchange of ambassadors.
In the occasional six-party talks with delegations from China, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States, Pyongyang's objective has been to stall for time. Its diplomats have postponed specific meetings many times; then behaved so egregiously that the other participants were relieved when the North Koreans consented merely to engage in future negotiations. Those too, however, would soon be rescheduled.
Washington has inadvertently abetted these tactics through thoughtless insults -- canceling, for instance, informal exchanges between U.S. and North Korean officials at the last minute -- which Pyongyang could then cite as proof that the United States was not acting in good faith.
North Korea has also benefited from the awkward developments that inevitably arise when sensitive dialogues are delayed. Seoul's recent declaration that it had reprocessed a small volume of nuclear material is one such event; Pyongyang may use that admission to complicate the next round of six-party discussions. Thus the Kim government buys more time for its nuclear technicians to continue their work.
It is true that North Korea has committed some blunders over the past two years, but it has played its cards more adroitly than the United States. The members of a potential coalition are largely going their own way now, and the odds that those countries will unite behind any U.S. strategy, peaceful or otherwise, have diminished considerably.
So, unless the winner of the November election acts quickly and with better judgment than Washington has so far, the United States may soon be forced to choose between launching military strikes without foreign support and letting Kim attain the nuclear status he desires.
ROBERT MADSEN is a fellow at the Asia-Pacific Research Center, Stanford Institute for International Studies. He wrote this article for Perspective.
