Fourth, those who hope for a "win-win" solution to the North Korean nuclear impasse must recognize the plain fact that Pyongyang does not now engage in win-win bargaining, and never has. The historical record is completely clear: Pyongyang believes in zero-sum solutions, preferring outcomes that entail not only DPRK victories, but also face-losing setbacks for its opponents. From the DPRK's perspective, win-win solutions are not only impractical (because they leave adversaries unnecessarily strong), but actually immoral as well.

Finally, those who believe that a peaceful and voluntary denuclearization of the DPRK is still possible through further rounds of international conference diplomacy or through some future negotiating breakthrough must be ready to consider how such an outcome would look from North Korea today--that is to say, from the standpoint of the real, existing North Korean state, not some imaginary DPRK we would rather be talking to.

No matter how large the pay-off package, no matter how broad and comprehensive the attendant international formula for recognition and security, the Western desideratum of "complete verifiable irreversible denuclearization" would irrevocably consign North Korea to a world in which the metrics of peaceful international competition matter most--and thus irrevocably to an international role for the DPRK more in consonance with the size of its gross national product. No North Korean leader is likely to regard such a proposal as any bargain.

Even worse from Pyongyang's standpoint is that a genuine agreement to denuclearize might well undermine the authority and legitimacy of the North Korean state. Since its founding in 1948, the DPRK has demanded terrible and continuing sacrifices from its population, but it has always justified these in the name of its historic vision for reunifying the Korean race. Today, however, forswearing its WMD options would be tantamount to forswearing the claim to unify the Korean Peninsula on Pyongyang's own terms. Shorn of its legitimating vision, what would be the rationale for absolutist North Korean rule?

The unsettling thrust of this analysis is not just that the North Korean leadership today may positively prefer a strategy that augments the government's WMD capabilities. It may also positively fear a strategy that does anything less. Kim Jong-il is doing his best to make the world safe for the DPRK. Our task, by contrast, is to make the world safe from the DPRK. This will be a difficult, expensive and dangerous undertaking. For America and its allies, however, the costs and dangers of failure will be incalculably higher.

Essay Types: Essay