American acceptance of North Korea as a nuclear state would do nothing to de-escalate the situation or reduce the risk of war, contrary to the assertion by Jeffrey Lewis in an article for the New York Times titled ‘It’s Time to accept that North Korea has Nuclear Weapons’. The proposition Lewis makes is based upon irrational logic. De jure recognition of North Korea’s nuclear weapon program would prevent an amicable resolution to end the conflict around WMDs in North Korea. There are six counter arguments to be made against Lewis’s proposition.
First of all, it is essential to understand the underlying motivations and implications surrounding the DPRK’s nuclear program. The nuclear weapon program facilitates the country’s already hostile foreign policy. Recall Mikhail Gorbachev’s reminder that foreign policy is a continuation of domestic policy, and domestic policy is embodied and regulated by ideology.
In North Korea, the ruling ideology, which is based upon class-struggle, has fostered a hostile foreign policy. This has led to the development of the nuclear weapon program. The DPRK’s nuclear weapon program is a consequence of its hostile ideology, though many experts erroneously believe the reverse.
Consequently, whether the DPRK’s illicit program is recognized or dismantled, it will continue its constant military threats toward the South and others. As the late Georgian president and former Soviet Minister of Foreign Affairs, Eduard Shevardnadze, stated: “returning to the absolute of class origin means to resurrect the ‘image of the enemy,’… Presupposing a totally hostile encirclement means cultivating a siege mentality [and] engaging in confrontations and conflicts without respite.”
Many fail to understand this point. Recognizing the DPRK as a nuclear weapon state and hoping for peace is illogical; as long as hostile ideology prevails, foreign policy will be belligerent. Dismantling nuclear weapons may alleviate the severity of the threat, but the threat will nevertheless remain. In order to achieve permanent peace and stability, the ideology must be abandoned.
The second counterpoint to Lewis’s proposition is that, should the DPRK be allowed to become a nuclear weapon state, which blatantly violates international law, it will propagate massive illicit proliferation of weapons of mass destruction elsewhere.
It goes without saying that accepting the DPRK as a nuclear weapon state would instigate intense armed competition among countries in the region. South Korea and Japan would both initiate their own nuclear weapon programs, undermining world peace and stability.
The third counterargument: the US sees the DPRK’s threat as a regional one, but for South Korea, it is existential. The problem is compounded by the stark variation in economic success. South Korea has a GDP of $1.8trn, whereas the North’s is around $30bn. Per capita income in the DPRK is around $1,000, compared to $35,000 for residents of the South. This extreme disparity creates a rivalry between the two states, and leaves no room for peaceful co-existence. While extreme inequality between the two states persists, there will be no peace. Should aggression transform into war, the conflict would exponentially grow to involve superpowers and regional states, much in the way of the Korean War, many decades ago.
Fourthly, it is widely assumed that warmongering is aimed only at Seoul and Washington, but the DPRK’s nuclear weapons also threaten China and Russia. This underscores why China and Russia voted in favor of severe UNSC sanctions against North Korea in 2017. There is a deeply held mistrust between North Korea and China, with both seeing the other as having betrayed the principles of socialism. The hereditary and monolithic dictatorship of the DPRK and its claim to be the only state to succeed in establishing a worker’s paradise, based upon the Juche ideology, i.e. a scientifically advanced, sublimated form of conventional socialism, clashes with the principles of China’s market socialism.
Should the US recognize the DPRK as a nuclear weapon state, South Korea and Japan, as well as China and Russia, will not follow suit. Acceptance will impinge upon their strategic interests. This exposes the naivety of Lewis’s stance.
Comparisons with India and Pakistan, or Israel, are unreasonable. India and Pakistan are rivals, but do not threaten countries with different socio-political systems. For Israel, nuclear weapons serve as a means of deterrence against foreign invasions. The DPRK is ideologically bound to threaten countries which do not share the same socio-political system.
The fifth counterargument to Lewis concerns his disregard for the DPRK’s desire to reunify with the South, and on its own terms. Since the end of the Korean war, reunification has been an overriding strategic aim of Pyongyang. The unyielding commitment of the US military has thwarted North Korea’s armed aggression.
Finally, there is a misunderstanding among specialists as to why all previous US initiatives to denuclearize the DPRK have singularly failed. The US’s failure to achieve denuclearization stems from its inability to introduce a shared policy, which the stakeholder states would faithfully endorse, and to collectively offer a package deal North Korea cannot refuse.
Acceptance of the package deal would ensure a genuinely better chance of survival for the DPRK as a nuclear weapon free state, while refusal would lead to regime collapse. It should be noted that the nuclear weapon program is a means of survival, not an end unto itself, for North Korea.
A package deal consisting of economic compensation and security guarantees will not ensure a genuine chance of survival, unless dismantling nuclear weapons brings robust economic development. Only the achievement of sustained dynamic economic development with the implementation of viable market-oriented reforms would ensure a genuine chance of survival, and in doing so, preserve the regime’s legitimacy.
Should this deal be consummated by the DPRK, it would pave the way to peace and stability, as well as joint economic prosperity on the Korean Peninsula.
Views expressed in this guest column do not necessarily reflect those of Daily NK.
