Asia Times Online Co, Ltd. Feb 9, 02
PYONGYANG WATCH
Why Bush is scarier than Kim Jong-il By Aidan Foster-Carter

Axis of evil. Three little words; just 10 letters. But they certainly pack a punch. At the very least, George Bush's State of the Union speech on January 29 has heaved a mighty rock into what were already hardly calm waters. Ever since, agitated ripples have spread back and forth. Perhaps, in time, they'll die down. Then again, maybe they won't. Words are just words - but they hint at actions to come. Or are meant to.

Axis of evil. Why did he say this, now? What can it mean? Is it true? And is it helpful? Obviously, my main concern is with North Korea. But like many, I'm puzzled that Iran was named - after its reformers' efforts since September 11 to reach out to the US. Such naming and shaming can hardly help the moderates in Tehran in their ongoing power struggle with the reactionary and viscerally anti-American mullahs. By the same token, naming North Korea is a setback for the sensible party in Pyongyang (whose heads are rarely above the parapet anyhow) - and one up for hawks in the Korean People's Army, who can simply say "Told you so."

Axis. What axis? Axis means alliance. But Iraq, Iran, and North Korea are no such thing. Iraq and Iran are enemies who fought a devastating war. North Korea sided with Iran, to which it sells missiles - and as a result fell out badly with Saddam Hussein. (Let's not forget also that the US and most of the West made the opposite choice; they - we - then backed and armed Saddam.) In a further anti-Iraqi gesture, last year Pyongyang opened ties with Kuwait. Do they not notice these things in Washington, or do they just not care? Not all rogue states are alike, and they're not all on the same side. That's elementary, and important.

Evil. As regular readers of this column know, I have no quarrel with that word as a description of Kim Jong-il's regime. The sky is blue, North Korea is evil; so what else is new? But even in my position as a humble hack, I have choices to make: what to write about, what to say, when to say it, how to put it, and so on. So if I bang on about the DPRK's iniquities, it's usually been to counter the three monkeys effect - see, hear, speak no evil - which has been a regrettable by-product of Kim Dae-jung's "Sunshine" policy.

But I'm not president of the world's sole superpower. George W Bush's choices - or those who think for him - on what and when and how to speak out matter infinitely more. With al-Qaeda still enemy number one and far from finished, and after months of carefully building a coalition against it, why rock the boat and lose that focus by suddenly growling at three quite different states? In real life, unlike Bruce Lee movies, you don't tackle all comers simultaneously. And even Bruce doesn't yell out to an offstage trio to watch out, 'cuz he'll be comin' after them too. Sensible strategists pick off their foes carefully, one at a time.

Speaking of timing, another baffling thing is that Bush loosed off this volley just three weeks before he's due to visit China, Japan and South Korea. That's one ruined trip. China is fed up with North Korea too - aren't we all? - but rightly fears this diatribe will merely reinforce Pyongyang's paranoia and paint it even more into a corner. In Seoul, the worry is the same. Kim Dae-jung blames Bush (though not publicly) for torpedoing "Sunshine". Even Southern conservatives, who a year from now may well be the government, though they demand more reciprocity from the North, fear the US ratcheting up tension on the peninsula. All this will stoke anti-Americanism in the ROK, and may push it closer to China. Is that in US interests?

And if Bush hopes at least Japan is onside, he's in for a shock. As our last column recounted, Tokyo is acting tougher: sinking a DPRK spyboat and stanching yen flows to Pyongyang. Yet Prime Minister Junichio Koizumi's latest big speech to the Diet pledged to work hard to re-open dialogue. The US too, in theory, is still open to talks with North Korea - but branding them an evil axis will hardly bring them scurrying to the table.

As Churchill said, jaw-jaw is better than war-war. If Bush is bothered by (inter alia) missile sales to the Middle East - which are quite legal, as the DPRK is not a signatory to the Missile Technology Control Regime - then why didn't he continue his predecessor's negotiations to curb these? On February 3, talking at the World Economic Forum, Bill Clinton confirmed how close he'd come to a missile deal in his last weeks in office. He would have gone to Pyongyang to sign it, but stayed home to work on the umpteenth Israel-Palestine peace initiative - which fell apart. "I figure I left the next administration with a big foreign policy win" on North Korea, he concluded. He forbore to add: "And then Bush blew it."

Republicans criticize Clinton's outline missile deal as inadequate - failing to defang North Korea, and at a steep price in moral hazard - just as its precedent, the 1994 Agreed Framework, defused but did not fully eliminate the DPRK nuclear threat. But in an imperfect world there are no ideal solutions, only better and worse. Before Bill Clinton opted for engagement, he tried confrontation - which in June 1994 came close to war, until Jimmy Carter went to Pyongyang and saved the day. General Gary Luck, US commander in Korea, later told a Senate committee that a new Korean war would kill a million people, including 80-100,000 Americans, and cause economic losses of a trillion dollars - including over US$100 billion to the US. Is that really a better idea? If he thinks so, then frankly Bush scares me more than Kim Jong-il. The rhetoric may play well in Texas, but in Korea it raises real risk. Let's pray it's just loose talk, and Dubya wises up.
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