Editorial

Small, Yet Stubborn

Offence is the best defence. And it is nowhere so vivid and kicking as in the North Korean tangle. What stands in the way of full-scale military onslaught against North Korea otherwise dubbed as a ‘rouge state’ in American strategic perception, is not Russia. Nor is China eager to defend its buffer zone–North Korea–in case of a foreign invasion, by committing weapons and foot soldiers as Mao’s China did during the Korean war. The people of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) are resisting the blockade and sanctions in their own way while challenging the American military might on the Korean peninsula. Not that toilers elsewhere are inspired by political thoughts articulated in the North Korean liberation philosophy of Juche and consider it as something unique universally applicable in communist culture, but how they have defeated time and again the American ploy to destroy the North-Korean regime is definitely unique and inspiring. Of late North Korea’s diplomatic weight has increased as this tiny country, continually threatened by the US and its allies, exhibits more confidence and ambition than ever before. The DPRK projects a multi-dimensional diplomacy on the basis of its self-reliant foreign policy to pursue greater influence in the regional arena. Whether they like it or not North Korea’s assertive diplomacy has put it under the spotlight of international affairs.

Once former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright was candid enough to spell out what she believed to be the reason Iraq was invaded and the DPRK was not. ‘While Iraq did not possess WMD, the DPRK did’. The people of North Korea know very well that the surest hope of peace is to be sought in resolute struggle against American conspiracy to dismantle the North Korean power structure, not in the dream of permanent peaceful coexistence with the American administration.

Strangely, the DPRK quite often risks doing anything that might upset the American game plan to make military advances towards Pyongyang. They created diplomatic tremor once again across the globe by successfully launching a space satellite in December 2012, albeit South Korea, the most favoured military outpost in America’s strategic calculation in the east, had to suspend its own third attempt at a satellite launch.

Not quite unexpectedly America and its Western and Asian allies reacted on usual anti-DPRK lines by condemning and denouncing North Korean ‘belligerence’ and they saw in it an attempt to jeopardise the six-party talks process for giving peace a chance in the place of the ‘no war, no peace’ situation. In truth for a considerable time now, it has been the United States, Japan and South Korea that have refused to resume peace negotiations under one plea or another, notwithstanding repeated requests by China, Russia and the DPRK.

The North Korean satellite Kwangmyongsong3-2, was orbiting a little higher than the International Space Station, reaching about 360 miles. Even the New York Times admitted in no uncertain terms that Pyongyang’s satellite launch was a major breakthrough and a resounding achievement for a beleaguered small nation like North Korea. Faced with the new twist in the Korean theatre, the United States, Japan, South Korea, Britain and other major powers in the West, lost no time to start a campaign to impose further sanctions on the DPRK, preferably using the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) as their rubber stamp. Meanwhile, the UNSC itself described North Korea’s action as provocative and violative of its resolutions passed in 2006 and 2009, after the DPRK conducted successful nuclear tests.

President Obama and his defence analysts have begun to believe the unbelievable that North Korean scientists are really good at ballistic missiles and they can make it. So far American efforts have failed to halt North Korea’s advances in developing long-range missiles fitted with nuclear warheads. As things are today, nuclear threat from North Korea is actually acting as a catalyst for reviving peace talks. The peace process on the Korean peninsula encountered a roadblock in April last year when North Korea launched a rocket less than two months after it agreed to suspend weapons development in return for US food aid. Not for nothing Iran, not China, was forthright in congratulating the DPRK for its satellite launch, implying Teheran’s resolve to go ahead with their own nuclear weaponisation programme amidst sanctions and containment. For all practical purposes sanctions and blockade are of little use in preventing the DPRK from meeting its strategic objectives and diplomatic mileage. Sanctions don’t work in case of Iran as well. Nor does American blockade make any sense to Cubans any more. Negotiations do not necessarily mean concessions and satellite launch precisely sends this message to North Korea’s adversaries.

With American strategic shift from the Middle East to the Pacific East, Washington can ill-afford nuclear threat, though still distant, from North Korea. But the essence of American strategy in Asia is to force China into an uncomfortable choice. Beijing may at best talk about how the White House is strengthening its ‘China Containment’ policy here and there by exaggerating North Korea’s all-round nuclear capability. But this type of harmless murmur is simply ignored by the Uncle Sam. The Chinese believe, and not unsubstantially, that America’s anti-missile efforts from Alaska to the Pacific are specifically designed to keep the fastest growing economic dragon from nudging the United States out of the region. North Korea is an excuse to increase American military presence in the Pacific. The Chinese know it. The people of the DPRK also know it. That American tough talk works appears from China’s mild stance towards probable UNSC sanctions. The Chinese think UNSC’s response should be ‘prudent and moderate’ and conducive to maintaining the peace and stability of the region instead of aggravating crisis there. In other words China is trying to woo the US while sending veiled warning to North Korea that they won’t oppose ‘moderate’ UNSC measures.

Frontier
Vol. 45, No. 31, February 10-16, 2013

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