THAT NUCLEAR weapons bring extra bargaining power to the states that have them is a regrettable, but accurate reading of the international political landscape. That has been Israel’s and India’s experience and it is attractive to Iranian and Syrian rulers. Yesterday’s news that North Korea has exploded its second underground nuclear test is obviously related to its desire for greater attention and concessions from the Obama administration, and from China, Japan, South Korea and Russia, the other members of its main negotiating group.
On previous occasions North Korea has extracted substantial aid in return for abandoning parts of its nuclear programme. This time it hopes to do the same thing by restarting it.
Whether its interlocutors will tolerate such a threat and be willing to reward it is now the critical policy issue arising from this provocation. They have long experience of the twists and turns made by North Korea’s extreme Stalinist regime in trying to overcome its isolation by pursuing nuclear status. Its strategy is one of managed survival, an approach which suits neighbouring states well. The last thing South Korea or China wants is to see the regime collapse, creating millions of refugees and delivering a severe economic shock to the region – and thus to the world. On this occasion North Korea’s tactics are being read through the evident illness of its ruler Kim Jong-il and the likelihood that a power struggle is going on about his successor. This adds a crucial uncertainty to events.
Seen from Japan, also well within the range of North Korea’s rockets, one of which was tested last month, there is an added military threat which some of its political leaders believe should be responded to in kind. That echoes some of the Bush administration’s instincts when it labelled the regime part of an “axis of evil”. This tune changed at the height of the Iraq war, when North Korea exploded its last nuclear test in 2006. Within weeks it was offered the six power negotiating framework and substantial development aid in return for dismantling its nuclear weapons programme. The perceived failure to deliver on that, and resentment about recent tighter economic sanctions, together with the regime’s belief that it is no longer a major priority for the Obama administration, probably explain the timing of this test.
Despite the sharply critical tone of its reaction to the news yesterday China is unlikely to support much harsher sanctions. It will probably try to reopen talks, working closely with the US. In the longer term it is better to address this problem politically than to risk a prolonged policy of containment, since that would increase the security threat of escalating regional tension or regime collapse.
If that is so North Korea’s rulers may believe this crude gesture has worked for them and be willing once again to bargain their survival for international aid. This issue is as much a challenge for political and diplomatic management as for military threat. Not to take such a stance would risk a greater escalation of nuclear proliferation, the greatest danger from these events.