North Korea's Missile Ploy: No Good Options

To say that the Bush Administration is exasperated by North Korea's provocations is an understatement. After all, the only thing worse than watching a charter member of President Bush's "Axis of Evil" thumb its nose at the international community, is not having an effective means to respond. And despite all the tough talk emanating out of Washington, the U.S. has few good options for responding to the latest bit of saber-rattling from the hermit Stalinist regime in Pyongyang, this time involving an all-too-real saber: A Taepodong 2 long-range missile, capable of hitting Alaska and Japan, which North Korea appears to be shaping up to test-fire.

Such a test would end a moratorium on missile testing the North Korea adopted in 1998 to create confidence in six party talks over its nuclear program. But with those talks stalled since last November over widely differing interpretations between Washington and Pyongyang over what had been agreed, North Korea appears inclined to reclaim the spotlight from Iran by reminding the international community that left untended, it can cause plenty of trouble.

But if the North Koreans are engaged in political theater with missiles, the U.S. may have decided to respond in kind. U.S. officials reportedly acknowledged Tuesday that Washington's multi-billion-dollar missile defense system has been made operational in the past two weeks, despite the fact that that the system — whose record even in tests rigged in its favor has been so dismal that testing was eventually suspended — has yet to prove capable of actually doing its job. That gesture seemed to sum up the Administration's dilemma: Its policies to pressure North Korea to desist from bad behavior have simply not worked. And now North Korea is raising the stakes.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice stressed that a missile test would be a provocation. "I can assure everyone that it would be taken with utmost seriousness," she warned, although she did not specify what consequence might result. The U.S. would consult with its allies on the next step, she said. Those other parties to the talks certainly share the U.S. alarm at the prospect of a North Korea test — Japan warned that if the missile fell on its territory, it would be regarded as an attack (although it later softened that position), while South Korea urged its neighbor not to "put a friend in danger" by firing a missile, and China called for calm. But it's not clear that any possible consequences would substantially alter North Korea's cost-benefit analysis.

Western economic sanctions mean comparatively little to an economy already largely isolated; and the two countries on which Pyongyang substantially depends, China and South Korea, have long made clear that they have no intention of putting a serious economic squeeze on Pyongyang, for fear that it would topple the regime and spread chaos across the Korean peninsula. Still, China values its ties with the U.S., even as that relationship becomes strained by geopolitical conflicts of interest, and it is therefore reportedly furious at North Korea's tactics. Quiet pressure from Beijing may be the best bet for restraining the North Koreans, but even that is far from a sure thing.

The most perceptive warning, however, may have come from Australia: "North Korea would be gravely mistaken if it thinks that a missile test would improve its bargaining position in the six-party talks," said foreign minister Alexander Downing. If brinkmanship is his game — and the pattern of previous North Korean tactics suggests that the missile threat may indeed be a negotiating ploy as much as anything else — North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il may also be aware that actually going ahead with a missile test (rather than simply dangling the threat of doing so) could weaken rather than strengthen his bargaining position. That's because North Korea has profited diplomatically from the view in Beijing and Seoul that the impasse in the six-party process is as much a result of the Bush Administration's hard line as of Pyongyang's recalcitrance.

A missile test could destroy South Korea's strategy of engagement with the North, and force China to distance itself from Pyongyang, dashing any hope of a breakthrough that would improve the regime's prospects of reviving its sclerotic economy. Kim Jong-il may, however, believe that a missile test will create a crisis that will, as it has repeatedly since 1994, force the great powers to deal with North Korea in ways that ultimately reward his brinkmanship. With the volatile fuel reportedly already in the rockets, it may be a matter of days before the answer is known.