[House Hearing, 106 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
NORTH KOREA: LEVERAGING UNCERTAINTY?
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON
INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
MARCH 16, 2000
__________
Serial No. 106-126
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on International Relations
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.house.gov/
international--relations
______
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
65-823 CC WASHINGTON : 2000
COMMITTEE ON INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
BENJAMIN A. GILMAN, New York, Chairman
WILLIAM F. GOODLING, Pennsylvania SAM GEJDENSON, Connecticut
JAMES A. LEACH, Iowa TOM LANTOS, California
HENRY J. HYDE, Illinois HOWARD L. BERMAN, California
DOUG BEREUTER, Nebraska GARY L. ACKERMAN, New York
CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey ENI F.H. FALEOMAVAEGA, American
DAN BURTON, Indiana Samoa
ELTON GALLEGLY, California MATTHEW G. MARTINEZ, California
ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida DONALD M. PAYNE, New Jersey
CASS BALLENGER, North Carolina ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey
DANA ROHRABACHER, California SHERROD BROWN, Ohio
DONALD A. MANZULLO, Illinois CYNTHIA A. McKINNEY, Georgia
EDWARD R. ROYCE, California ALCEE L. HASTINGS, Florida
PETER T. KING, New York PAT DANNER, Missouri
STEVE CHABOT, Ohio EARL F. HILLIARD, Alabama
MARSHALL ``MARK'' SANFORD, South BRAD SHERMAN, California
Carolina ROBERT WEXLER, Florida
MATT SALMON, Arizona STEVEN R. ROTHMAN, New Jersey
AMO HOUGHTON, New York JIM DAVIS, Florida
TOM CAMPBELL, California EARL POMEROY, North Dakota
JOHN M. McHUGH, New York WILLIAM D. DELAHUNT, Massachusetts
KEVIN BRADY, Texas GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York
RICHARD BURR, North Carolina BARBARA LEE, California
PAUL E. GILLMOR, Ohio JOSEPH CROWLEY, New York
GEORGE RADANOVICH, California JOSEPH M. HOEFFEL, Pennsylvania
JOHN COOKSEY, Louisiana
THOMAS G. TANCREDO, Colorado
Richard J. Garon, Chief of Staff
Kathleen Bertelsen Moazed, Democratic Chief of Staff
Peter Brookes, Professional Staff Member
Joan I. O'Donnell, Staff Associate
C O N T E N T S
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WITNESSES
Page
The Honorable Wendy R. Sherman, Counselor, U.S. Department of
State.......................................................... 4
The Honorable Douglas Paal, President, Asia Pacific Policy Center 22
Mitchell B. Reiss, Director, Reves Center for International
Studies, College of William and Mary........................... 25
Scott Snyder, Representative of Asia Foundation/Korea............ 27
APPENDIX
Prepared statements:
The Honorable Benjamin A. Gilman, a Representative in Congress
from New York and Chairman, Committee on International
Relations...................................................... 38
The Honorable Wendy R. Sherman................................... 41
The Honorable Douglas Paal....................................... 49
Mitchell B. Reiss................................................ 52
Scott Snyder..................................................... 57
NORTH KOREA: LEVERAGING UNCERTAINTY?
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THURSDAY, MARCH 16, 2000
House of Representatives,
Committee on International Relations,
Washington, DC.
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., in room
2200, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Benjamin A. Gilman,
(Chairman of the Committee) presiding.
Chairman Gilman. The Committee will meet once again to
review U.S. policy toward North Korea. This is the fifth
hearing on the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, the DPRK,
in the last 18 months held by our Full Committee on
International Relations.
Today's hearing will focus on the status and the prospects
for our policy toward North Korea in the aftermath of Dr. Bill
Perry's report to the Congress last October. We are pleased to
have gathered a distinguished group of witnesses to discuss
this very important national security issue.
Regrettably, our concern about North Korea and our policy
still remains unabated. Let me discuss why we feel that way.
The CIA reported in Congressional testimony last month that
North Korea is continuing to develop the Taepo Dong II--an
intercontinental ballistic missile--despite a test moratorium,
and could launch that missile this year should it decide to do
so.
The intelligence community, CIA, further states that a
three-stage Taepo Dong II would be capable of delivering a
several-hundred kilogram payload anywhere in the United States.
The CIA has also concluded that the DPRK is the world's major
supplier of ballistic missiles and technology, primarily to
South Asia and to the Middle East. Their transfers to Pakistan,
Iran, Syria, and Libya pose a significant threat to our
national interest, to our American forces, and to our allies.
It has also been alleged that North Korea may be pursuing a
uranium-based nuclear weapons program while the cost of heavy
fuel for the 1994 Agreed Framework is likely to top $100
million this year. There is a continuing concern about being
able to get the IAEA into North Korea to conduct its assessment
of their nuclear program, as well as finding willing
underwriters for the nuclear reactor project.
In recent testimony, the Commander of U.S. Forces of Korea
called North Korea ``the major threat to stability and security
in Northeast Asia, and the country most likely to involve our
Nation in a large-scale war.''
General Schwartz further stated that North Korea's goal is
to unify the peninsula by force. American military dependents,
Embassy staff, and their families in Seoul were recently issued
14,000 gas masks because of the North Korean chemical weapons
threat.
According to our Commander in Chief of the Pacific, North
Korea conducted its largest conventional force exercise in
years this past winter. Admiral Blair went on to say that North
Korea continues to divert a disproportionate share of their
meager national wealth to their military programs.
The DPRK recently declared the nullification of the
Northern Limit Line, where they fought a sea battle with South
Korea last summer, and Pyongyang bought 40 Mig-21 fighter jets
from Kazakhstan for some $8 million.
Recently, the Japanese police seized 250 kilograms of
amphetamines believed to have originated in North Korea. That
seizure, with an alleged street value of 15 billion yen, or
$139 million, was the fifth largest single haul of illegal
drugs ever seized in Japan.
Confronted with impossible access to the most vulnerable
groups of North Korean citizens, the French NGO, Action Against
Hunger, withdrew from North Korea after 2 years. Their press
release stated, ``We are convinced that the international aid
flowing into North Korea is not reaching the people most in
need, and that thousands of people continue to die despite the
massive food aid provided to that government.'' In their press
conference announcing their decision, the French group said
that international food aid is undoubtedly being diverted to
the military and to the civil servants.
The Director of Central Intelligence said that instead of
pursuing real reform, North Korea's strategy is to garner as
much aid as possible from overseas, and has directed its global
diplomacy to that end. This means more people will needlessly
starve as Pyongyang chooses ideology over reform.
Our State Department is considering removing North Korea
from the list of state sponsors of terrorism despite the fact
that North Korea abducted Japanese citizens for use in their
intelligence apparatus, continues to harbor Red Army hijackers,
and is reportedly involved in political assassinations abroad.
DPRK agents recently may have also kidnapped a South Korean
clergyman working in China near the border.
The DPRK continues to severely oppress its citizens, and
the international community has not spoken out forcefully
enough about the day-to-day horrors of the North Korean gulag.
In a highly celebrated case, several North Korean defectors
were forcibly repatriated from China to a certain death.
Diplomatically, North Korea is willing to talk with anyone
but South Korea. They talk with Rome, Canberra, and Tokyo, but
not with Seoul. Despite numerous overtures toward Pyongyang,
Seoul is rebuffed time and time again.
Furthermore, it was reported this morning that talks in New
York over a visit to the United States by a high-level North
Korean official have broken off without any agreement. This
visit was first proposed by Dr. Perry almost a year ago. These
recent developments are hardly encouraging.
As the North Korea Advisory Group pointed out in its report
last October, before all of this took place, the threat to the
United States and global interests of North Korea continues to
grow, despite almost 6 years of engagement and close to $1
billion in aid.
It is clear that the challenges presented by North Korea
are significant, and managing the threat is a tremendous policy
undertaking. We look forward to today's testimony on how we
plan to deal with the ever-widening and deepening threat
presented by the DPRK to our own interests.
We want to thank our good Ambassador Sherman for being with
us today.
Allow me to yield time to Mr. Gejdenson, our Ranking
Minority Member.
[The prepared statement of Chairman Gilman appears in the
appendix.]
Mr. Gejdenson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I, too, welcome
Ambassador Sherman. She was an able advocate for the State
Department when she headed up their Legislative Affairs Bureau.
If she could handle Congress, we know that she will be able to
handle North Korea as well.
I think there is clearly a case that while there is great
consternation here and elsewhere in how to deal with North
Korea, and there is a great sense that it poses a threat to the
United States and many in the international community, few of
us have any real solutions on how to deal successfully with the
North Koreans.
The North Koreans have aggressively pursued programs that
have harmed millions of their people, leading to starvation and
leaving their population decimated. Unfortunately, their
nuclear missile programs, which began in the 1980's, are still
a potential threat, even if some of that has been stalled.
It seems clear that the North Koreans, with their missile
flight tests and other policies, tend to use these to leverage
their position in the international community.
We are in a difficult position. Millions of North Koreans
are starving, with a government that seems to care little for
its own population. Maybe they sense that our own humanity
prevents us from simply walking away and trying to be more
confrontational. However, I think that the one thing the North
Koreans have to know is that there is a limit to the patience
of the U.S. Congress and the American people.
Their failure to move forward in this new round of
negotiations is a very bad signal, and I think that both
Democrats and Republicans alike in Congress are losing patience
with the North Korean government, which believes it can
continue to live in this wonderland where its irresponsible
policies threaten the world and threaten their own population.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Gilman. Mr. Bereuter.
Mr. Bereuter. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the words of my
two colleagues and the introduction of Ambassador Sherman.
However, I will defer my comments prefering first to hear from
our witnesses.
Chairman Gilman. Thank you very much.
With that, I would like to welcome our first panelist,
Ambassador Wendy Sherman. It is a pleasure to welcome you back
to our Committee as one of the State Department's leading
policymakers on North Korea.
Wendy Sherman was confirmed by the United States as
Counselor, Department of State, with the rank of Ambassador,
for the tenure of her service in July 1997. Prior to assuming
that position, from April 1996 to 1997, Ambassador Sherman was
President and CEO of the Fannie Mae Foundation.
From 1993 to 1996, Ambassador Sherman served as Assistant
Secretary for Legislative Affairs in the Department of State.
From 1991 to 1993, Ambassador Sherman specialized in strategic
communications as a partner in the political and media
consulting firm of Doak, Shrum, Harris, and Sherman. Prior to
that, she directed EMILY'S LIST.
We thank Ambassador Sherman for being with us once again.
You may feel free to summarize your remarks and submit your
entire statement for the record. We have asked our Members to
withhold their questions until your testimony is complete.
Ambassador Sherman, please proceed.
STATEMENT OF THE HON. WENDY R. SHERMAN, COUNSELOR, U.S.
DEPARTMENT OF STATE
Ambassador Sherman. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, Ranking Member Gejdenson, and Subcommittee Chairman
Mr. Bereuter, for being here this morning. Thank you very much
for the opportunity to discuss the Administration's North Korea
policy.
I have submitted a fuller written version of my testimony
for the record, and I will try to summarize my comments and
make time for your questions.
Just this last September, Dr. William J. Perry presented
the findings and recommendations resulting from his 10-month
long review of our policy toward North Korea. I have been very
privileged to be part of the policy review team as the senior
government official who worked most closely with Dr. Perry, and
I chair an interagency working group responsible for
implementing the report's recommendations.
Mr. Chairman and Members, I completely agree with you: the
Korean Peninsula remains one of the most volatile areas in the
world. Our overarching goal there is simple--achieving lasting
peace and stability and removing the threat that it poses for
the United States, for our allies, and for the world.
Since 1994, the Agreed Framework has been at the center of
our DPRK policy, and key to any ultimate success in achieving
our goal. Two events in 1998, however, called that policy into
question. That summer we found ourselves in protracted
negotiations with the DPRK to gain access to a site at
Kumchang-ni that we suspected might be the future site of a
nuclear reactor.
If confirmed, the existence of such activities would have
violated the Agreed Framework and jeopardized its continued
viability. A visit to the site last May demonstrated that it
was not involved in such activities, and we will revisit the
site this spring. As was confirmed in the talks that Ambassador
Kartman just completed in New York, we will return in May.
The experience, nonetheless, demonstrated the need for a
mechanism to address similar concerns should they appear in the
future, at least until such time as the DPRK comes into full
compliance with its IAEA obligations under the terms of the
Agreed Framework.
Separately, in 1998, North Korea fired a long-range
missile, the Taepo Dong I, over Japan in an apparently failed
attempt to launch a satellite. Even though missile controls are
not part of the Agreed Framework, this test firing rightly
provoked a storm of protest in both the United States and
Japan, and led to calls in both countries to end support for
the Agreed Framework.
There is no doubt in my mind, however, that had we aborted
the Agreed Framework, the DPRK would have responded by
reopening its nuclear facility at Yongbyon. This would have
placed the DPRK in a position to resume production of weapons-
grade plutonium, and eventually to arm those very missiles with
nuclear warheads--the very worst of all possible worlds.
During that period in 1998, the Congress called for a
review of policy toward the DPRK. President Clinton and
Secretary Albright agreed with the Congress and asked Dr.
William J. Perry to assemble a policy review team. Over the
course of 10 months, we met with experts inside and outside of
the U.S. Government, including all of you on this panel and
many Members of Congress and their staffs.
We traveled several times to East Asia to consult with our
allies in the Republic of Korea and Japan, and with China's
leaders. We also exchanged views with the EU, Russia,
Australia, and other interested countries. We visited Pyongyang
to talk with the leadership of the DPRK, and we have reported
to this Committee on that visit.
Through many long sessions with our ROK and Japanese
allies, we discussed how best to pursue our common goals of
peace and stability, while taking into account our respective
interests. After many months, we reached a common approach and
a common understanding. The Perry Report is the result.
The comprehensive approach recommended by Dr. Perry, and
developed in close consultation with our two allies, gave
highest priority to our security concerns over DPRK nuclear
weapons and missile-related programs. The strategy he
recommended envisioned two paths.
On the first path, the U.S. would be willing to move step-
by-step in a reciprocal fashion toward comprehensive
normalization if the DPRK was willing to forego its nuclear
weapons and long-range missile programs.
Alternatively, if North Korea did not demonstrate its
willingness, by its actions, to remove these threats, the
United States would seek to contain them by strengthening our
already strong deterrent posture.
Because the second path is both dangerous and expensive,
but most importantly because it is so dangerous, we and our
allies all strongly prefer the first alternative, if we can go
down that road.
As I have indicated, perhaps one of the most fundamental
things to result from the Perry process has been extraordinary
coordination among the three allies, which is stronger than at
any time in the past. This is largely the result of the newly
instituted trilateral coordination oversight group, or TCOG--
perhaps not the world's greatest acronym--created nearly 1 year
ago to ensure more frequent, close consultation among the
United States, South Korea, and Japan, at the subcabinet level.
I chair our delegation to that TCOG.
We have met nine times trilaterally over the past year,
including a meeting of foreign ministers and a summit meeting.
Allied support for the U.S. approach is strong, in part because
the Perry report is, in essence, a joint project. In January, I
visited Seoul and Tokyo on one of our many trips there. I met
with President Kim Dae-jung, participated in a TCOG meeting,
and met with Japanese leaders.
During our discussions, President Kim again expressed his
full support for our policy as complementary to his own policy
of engagement. We, in turn, fully concur with his view that
North-South dialogue remains central and key to ultimate peace
on the peninsula.
We hope the DPRK leadership will have the foresight to take
advantage of the opportunities before it to address issues of
mutual concern, and to move its relationship with the United
States, the ROK, and Japan, more rapidly down the path toward
normalization and ultimate peace and stability.
There are increasing signs that other members of the
international community would be prepared to increase their
contacts with the DPRK as the DPRK addresses the international
community's legitimate concerns. Italy has recently established
diplomatic relations with the DPRK.
The Australians and the French both recently sent
delegations to Pyongyang. Canada received an unofficial DPRK
delegation. The Philippines is considering establishing
relations, and, as you know, Japan is about, probably at the
beginning of April, to move forward in normalization talks with
the DPRK. We are consulting constantly and closely with our
friends and allies on North Korea policy to ensure that our
approaches are coordinated.
Guided by the Perry recommendations, U.S. policy is making
progress in the step-by-step reciprocal approach recommended by
the Perry Report. In September, the DPRK announced its
intention to refrain from long-range missile tests of any kind,
while high-level discussions were underway to improve
relations. This was a small but important step in dealing with
our proliferation concerns.
In September, we announced our intention to ease certain
economic sanctions against the DPRK. More recently, the North
accepted Dr. Perry's invitation for a reciprocal visit to
Washington by a high-level DPRK visitor. From March 7th to just
yesterday, March 15th, in New York, Ambassador Charles Kartman
and Vice Foreign Minister Kim Gye Gwan held their third round
of preparatory talks for the high-level visit. Further
preparatory talks will be needed before the visit occurs.
The DPRK did agree yesterday in New York to recommence
talks related to our concerns about the DPRK's missile program,
and to begin a new negotiation on implementation of the Agreed
Framework. As you know, as part of the positive path outlined
in his report, Dr. Perry proposed talks to deal with our
continuing concerns about DPRK missile-related and nuclear
weapons-related activities. We are glad that the DPRK has now
agreed to proceed with those negotiating tracks.
Finally, the DPRK reconfirmed yesterday its agreement for
another visit to Kumchang-ni in May of this year. The
negotiations leading to a DPRK high-level visit have been
difficult, and, knowing North Korea, will remain difficult, as
are all negotiations with the DPRK. These discussions continue.
Nonetheless, we and our allies remain convinced that the
visit would advance our interests. We view the visit as an
opportunity for both sides to demonstrate their intention to
proceed in the direction of a fundamentally new relationship.
It would be an important, but, as Secretary Albright said, a
modest step, and would make clear to the DPRK that as it
addresses our security concerns we are prepared to reciprocate
by taking other steps to improve ties with the DPRK.
As we move forward in our relations with North Korea, the
Agreed Framework will remain central to our policy. The turnkey
contract, the light water reactor construction, was signed on
December 15, 1999, and became effective on February 3rd. This
means that construction can now, as soon as winter is over,
begin in earnest.
As you know, the ROK in Japan committed respectively to
providing 70 percent of the actual costs--that is the Republic
of Korea--and the yen equivalent of $1 billion for Japan, based
on the current estimated cost of $4.6 billion. Since the
turnkey project became effective, South Korea has already
disbursed nearly $120 million, and Japan over $51 million, to
KEPCO, the primary contractor for the project.
We believe the Framework continues to be our best means of
capping and eventually eliminating the threat of DPRK nuclear
weapons by replacing the dangerous and frozen graphite-
moderated reactors with proliferation-resistant light water
reactors.
Faithful implementation of the Agreed Framework by all
sides is absolutely essential to keeping the DPRK's nuclear
activities at Yongbyon and Taechon frozen, and to the
maintenance of stability on the peninsula.
We do need, and have appreciated, the Congress' continued
support in order to continue to live up to our side of the
bargain by helping to provide heavy fuel oil, even as fuel oil
prices, as you all know very well, are painfully high and have
a difficult impact on our project as well.
In doing so, we will, of course, continue to hold the DPRK
strictly to its own obligations and commitments under the
Agreed Framework, including the rapid conclusion of spent fuel
canning and resumption of North-South dialogue.
While we are striving to advance our nonproliferation
goals, we remain committed to addressing other issues of
concern with the DPRK. We have and will continue to do all we
can to improve the monitoring of food aid and other
international assistance to North Korea. We will continue to
monitor, condemn, and work multilaterally to gain improvement
in the DPRK's dismal human rights record. We will support
UNHCR's effort to address the plight of North Korean refugees.
As suggested in the Perry Report, we will pursue our
serious concerns about the DPRK's chemical and biological
weapons multilaterally. We will also continue to seek
information on the alleged North Korean drug trafficking and
other illegal activities.
Bless you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Gilman. Thank you.
Mr. Gejdenson. Is that part of your official statement?
Ambassador Sherman. Absolutely.
Chairman Gilman. I like that.
Ambassador Sherman. I am also very personally committed to
ensuring that we resolve, as fully as possible, the status of
the American soldiers who remain unaccounted for from the
Korean War. As we approach the 50th Anniversary of that
conflict, this is absolutely critical.
The DPRK has been cooperative on this issue in the past,
but the current lack of progress is more than a disappointment.
This is a very important issue for veterans, for the families
of those still missing, and for all Americans. We have an
obligation to continue to press the DPRK to work with us on
this very critical issue.
Let me stress, as I seek to conclude, Mr. Chairman, that we
are attempting to pursue a constructive dialogue with the DPRK
that addresses our central security concerns and leads us more
rapidly down the path toward full normalization only as those
concerns are addressed.
The Cold War still exists on the Korean Peninsula. We hope
that our dialogue will be a crucial step toward ending it. We
are under no illusions that it will be an easy path. We
recognize fully that everything we and our allies do in
diplomacy requires, first and foremost, the maintenance of a
strong allied deterrent posture. This is fundamental.
In fact, the Perry Report stresses, and Dr. Perry has said
directly to the DPRK, that there would be no change in our
conventional forces. Congress' support of our forces in the
region remains essential. The presence of 37,000 U.S. troops in
South Korea and 47,000 in Japan demonstrates our commitment to
stand with our allies against any threat of aggression.
With our South Korean and Japanese allies, however, we
believe that this comprehensive two-path strategy recommended
by Dr. Perry offers the best opportunity to change the
stalemated situation on the Korean Peninsula in a fundamental
and positive way. Through these efforts, we hope to lead the
Korean Peninsula to a stable, peaceful, and prosperous future.
In closing, Mr. Chairman and Members, I would like to cite
a senior Administration military leader on the Korean Peninsula
who told me the following in my most recent trip there. He
said, ``When I came here 18 months ago, I thought I would have
to fight a war. Thanks to the efforts of your team, I see this
as an increasingly remote possibility.''
Mr. Chairman, making war an increasingly remote
possibility, working to address our concerns about weapons of
mass destruction, and addressing pressing human needs--these
are challenging and hard-to-achieve objectives. It will take
time--unfortunately, probably lots of time--to accomplish them.
I know, however, that we share these goals, and, working
together, I believe we can and will succeed in this mission.
I thank you very much, and I am happy to take your
questions. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Ambassador Sherman appears in
the appendix.]
Chairman Gilman. Thank you, Ambassador Sherman, for your
extensive statement. We want to thank both you and Dr. Perry
for your good work in trying to find a peaceful solution to the
problems in North Korea.
Ambassador Sherman, it was reported this morning that the
talks on a high-level visit by senior North Korean officials to
Washington have broken down. This seemed to be a critical
milestone in the Perry process. Can you tell us why those talks
failed? How does that delay your intentions to begin missile
and nuclear talks with North Korea? How does that affect your
desire to get North Korea to sign a written agreement to halt
missile testing?
Ambassador Sherman. First of all, Mr. Chairman, I don't
exactly see what happened in New York in exactly the same way
you do, which probably doesn't come as a surprise. I don't see
it as the talks having broken down or having failed. I see it
as part of a very tough and continuing negotiating process that
we expected to take time.
In the Perry process, and in the Perry Report, we sought to
address two immediate, we thought, highest priority fundamental
concerns. That is, the implementation of the Agreed Framework
and concerns about ongoing nuclear-related activities, and the
missile program that North Korea has. In that report, we
suggested that there needed to be a reintensified missile
negotiation and a new negotiation on implementation of the
Agreed Framework.
Oddly, nowhere in the Perry Report do we suggest a high-
level visit. The high-level visit actually became a concept
that arose out of a discussion with the North and a desire to
reciprocate an invitation that we put on the table when we were
in Pyongyang that they were welcome to come to Washington.
So we are actually quite pleased with the outcome from New
York, as difficult as it was and as difficult as the days ahead
will be, in that we expect very soon to have that reintensified
missile negotiation underway, to have the Agreed Framework
implementation negotiation underway, and to continue our
conversation on the high-level visit. I fully believe that will
take place.
The two negotiations may take place in advance of it, but I
think the sequence matters less than trying to reach our
security objectives.
Chairman Gilman. Has a new date been set for further
discussion?
Ambassador Sherman. A new date has not yet been set, but I
would expect that to happen in the next few days. Ambassador
Kartman had to come back and consult with us. They had to go
back and consult with Pyongyang.
Chairman Gilman. Ambassador Sherman, why did the President
not certify that North Korea has not diverted assistance
provided by our Nation for purposes for which it was not
intended, or that North Korea is not seeking to develop or
acquire the capability to enrich uranium or any additional
capability to reprocess spent nuclear fuel?
Ambassador Sherman. On the diversion of assistance issue,
we believe, based on the Perry Report and reports from within
North Korea, that assistance is reaching the targeted
population. So the President used his waiver authority on that
certification provision.
On the uranium issue, the way that certification is
written, it goes to the intention of North Korea. To tell you
quite frankly, Mr. Chairman, having sat across from North
Koreans, it is very hard to conceive of what their intentions
are. One can hypothesize, one can apply logic, but it is very
hard to know, actually sitting across from anyone, what their
intentions are.
So we felt, again, to be fully accurate to the Congress, we
could not certify as to North Korea's intentions, but, rather,
use the waiver authority which the legislation provides.
Chairman Gilman. Thank you, Madam Ambassador. What were the
results of the recent talks in New York? Why is our Nation now
considering removing North Korea from the terrorism list? What
objectives did you actually achieve? What criteria does our
Nation have for removing North Korea from the terrorism list?
How will we be dealing with the Japanese kidnappings, the
Red Army hijackers, the incursions into South Korea and Japan,
and politically motivated assassinations and kidnapping, such
as the recent one of a South Korean clergyman?
Ambassador Sherman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Ending
terrorism in the world is one of the highest priorities for the
U.S. Government. It poses a substantial threat to American
citizens, as I think America has seen quite painfully in the
last few years. So, it is in the United States' interest to get
North Korea to take those steps which would end its state
sponsorship of terrorism and any terrorist activities that it
might undertake.
There are two ways that a country can be removed from the
list of state sponsors of terrorism. Both contain the concepts
of cessation and credible forbearance of terrorism. I can go
through, if you would like, the excerpts from the law, which I
am sure you know, that specify the kinds of things that must
take place for a country to come off the terrorism list.
I would suspect that our process with North Korea will take
time. Michael Sheehan, Ambassador Sheehan, who is the head of
our counterterrorism office--an office which you, Mr. Chairman,
had a great deal to do with making sure it had prominence,
focus, and the attention of the Secretary of State--met with
the North Koreans in an introductory meeting where he merely
laid out what it took under our law to come off of the
terrorism list, and the process of negotiations that we wanted
to undertake to talk with the North Koreans about taking the
steps they would need to take to no longer be seen as a
terrorist country.
I would suspect that we will have follow-on negotiations
and discussions. I think this will take some time to do. Let me
hasten to add that before Ambassador Sheehan even had the
introductory talks, in the TCOG that I held in Seoul with Japan
and South Korea--both bilaterally and trilaterally--we
discussed the terrorism issue. Bilaterally particularly, I
spoke with both countries about what their particular concerns
were that they hoped we would address.
So we very much have in mind the concerns of our allies as
we undertake this particular discussion. However, it will take
some time, and I would be happy in a closed session to brief
you or your staff about each specific requirement. I don't
think it would be good tactically to have that discussion in
public.
Chairman Gilman. Thank you very much, Madam Ambassador.
Mr. Gejdenson.
Mr. Gejdenson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Who are North Korea's closest allies? Are the Chinese
helping them, either economically or with military technology?
Ambassador Sherman. North Korea is considered an ally of
China, and China of North Korea. China does supply oil and
food. I believe we have very good reason to know, in fact, that
in urging North Korea not to test launch a long-range missile,
and to agree to the moratorium on such launches, that China
played a very positive role in encouraging them to not
destabilize the peninsula further by undertaking test launches.
It is ironic, Congressman Gejdenson--because some of our
goals are probably not the same--that we share objectives in
this area. China has no interest in an arms race on the
peninsula. That is because of North Korea, but that is also,
quite frankly, because of Japan and Taiwan. China has no
interest in people having nuclear weapons on the Korean
Peninsula because it is destabilizing not only for South Korea
and Japan, but for China as well.
So we believe that China has actually played a constructive
role in getting North Korea to end its isolation and to move
forward in working in a somewhat coordinated fashion, though
not in the same way that the ROK and Japan do with us.
Mr. Gejdenson. Now, what are the relationships in the
Middle East? Are they primarily, sales, where the North Koreans
sell rockets of some kind, and the Middle Eastern countries buy
them? Or are the relationships more significant than that?
Ambassador Sherman. I believe, Congressman, the
relationships are largely of exporters and importers. There are
some details of those relationships that I would be glad to
discuss with you in a private session.
Mr. Gejdenson. I would like to have that. Then what about
Russia? Do the Russians have any kind of relationship with the
North Koreans?
Ambassador Sherman. The Russians do have a relationship
with the North Koreans. Foreign Minister Ivanov recently went
to sign a friendship agreement in Pyongyang. He spoke with
Secretary Albright before he went and briefed us when he came
back. In fact, we suggested some messages that he might want to
take, and he did, indeed, do so. We try to stay in close touch
with Russia.
I think it is significant that although I believe the DPRK
was interested in a military alliance with Russia, Russia did
not want to proceed in that direction. There is no longer a
military alliance between Russia and North Korea.
Mr. Gejdenson. Are there any other countries, other than
China, that have a relationship that is significant with North
Korea?
Ambassador Sherman. I think other countries are trying to
develop a relationship, in part because they have adopted the
approach of our trilateral alliance, and of the Perry Report,
to believe that if we can begin to bring North Korea out of its
isolation--out of the closed hermit kingdom that many people
describe it as--that we might have a better chance of getting
them to join the norms of the international community. That is
a hypothesis that we are testing out, and I don't know, to tell
you the truth, what the answer to that will be.
Italy will be visiting. Foreign Minister Dini, is going to
be visiting Pyongyang, and he is stopping here for a
consultation before he goes. I believe that we will probably
see normalization of relations with other countries as well in
the coming days. But all of these countries are doing it quite
slowly, usually by double-hatting their Ambassadors in Beijing,
and then moving very slowly in close consultation with all of
us who are involved in policy toward North Korea.
Mr. Gejdenson. What countries have the most significant
diplomatic relationship at this point with North Korea, and
have an ambassador there, have a significant presence, either
economically or politically, in the country? China, obviously,
would be----
Ambassador Sherman. China obviously, Russia, and then there
are several other countries. I don't know the number.
Do you know the number?
Mr. Gejdenson. Does Vietnam have a significant----
Ambassador Sherman. Yes.
Mr. Gejdenson [continuing]. Presence there?
Ambassador Sherman. They have a presence. They have a
presence, and as does Sweden, and there are a few others. We
can get you the list, Congressman. I don't think we would say
that any of them have a staggeringly significant relationship.
In fact, it is not a post that people clamor to take on.
Mr. Gejdenson. What a surprise.
What are the most significant economic relationships with
the private sector that exist? Are there any large private
corporations--whether it is hotels, industrial, or service
sectors, in North Korea?
Ambassador Sherman. Probably the largest and most
significant economic relationship is with South Korea. Hyundai
opened a tourism project at Kumgang Mountain. They are also
working to put together an agreement for, in essence, what we
might call an enterprise zone. There have been, I think, in the
last year over $300 million spent in North Korea in the tourism
project. Samsung has opened up a project in North Korea.
In fact, I met with the president of Hyundai Asan when I
was last in Seoul. The amount of private sector relationship
with North Korea is growing quite significantly. In my
discussions with President Kim Dae-jung, although the North has
not yet developed a government-to-government relationship with
South Korea in the way that we all would hope it to be, the
private sector relationships, I think, are heading in a very
positive direction, and ultimately will require, probably for
infrastructure reasons, a relationship with the South.
Mr. Gejdenson: I will finish with this. Those private
sector relationships are, indeed, with the government of North
Korea, because if you are doing a tourism project in North
Korea, there is no private land ownership or----
Ambassador Sherman. No.
Mr. Gejdenson [continuing]. Sector that you would sign up
with. So it is an agreement between a corporation in South
Korea and the government of North Korea.
Ambassador Sherman. Correct. With the knowledge and
understanding of the South Korean government.
Mr. Gejdenson. Thank you.
Chairman Gilman. Mr. Bereuter.
Mr. Bereuter. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ambassador Sherman, I want to express my sincere
appreciation to you, to Secretary Perry, to Ambassador Kartman,
and to all of the assistants and support people you have, in
focusing on these important North Korean issues for us. I wish
you well, and I hope you will convey that to them.
Ambassador Sherman. I will, indeed. Thank you.
Mr. Bereuter. Ambassador, Secretary Albright, within the
last month, has answered questions before the Committee,
including one I addressed to her. I asked her if the resumption
of missile flight tests of the Taepo Dong II would signify a
decision by the DPRK to follow the path of confrontation, the
second of the two paths that Secretary Perry has put before
them.
Do you agree with her view? Do you know whether or not
Secretary Perry would agree with that view?
Ambassador Sherman. I think what we believe, Congressman,
as I said, we would know if North Korea was choosing the second
path by its actions. There is no question that if they launched
a Taepo Dong II missile, it would be a very serious action, and
we would be in immediate consultation with the Congress and
with our allies on those steps that we would need to take.
I think, more importantly, or as importantly, when the
Taepo Dong I overflew Japan, the response in Japan and here in
the United States, and rightly so, was one of concern. One can
see that you could be down a downward slippery slope quite
quickly. So I think it is a very dangerous situation we would
have to take extremely seriously. I know that Dr. Perry feels
that way as well.
Mr. Bereuter. Do you think it would suggest that they have
decided to take the path of confrontation or to continue on it
perhaps?
Ambassador Sherman. I think it would certainly show that
they, for the moment at least, had chosen not to take the
positive path. What we tried to do in the Perry Report and in
the classified report that was submitted to Congress is to
build a ledge, so to speak, Congressman, because I don't think
we want to go from a missile launch to war, if that can be
avoided.
Although it would certainly mean they were not on the
positive path, we would need to take those actions that would
help us from going on a downward slope quickly toward war and
conflict.
Mr. Bereuter. The second path is basically to prepare our
capacities to deal with a continued or a more militant North
Korea, as I understand it.
Ambassador Sherman. Yes. It includes----
Mr. Bereuter. It is not a matter of war or----
Ambassador Sherman. Right. Not a matter of war necessarily,
but a way, if they took negative actions, that we could
strengthen our deterrent posture, but also what we could do
politically and economically, which sometimes is equally as
important.
Mr. Bereuter. Ambassador, on February 15th of this year, a
memorandum was sent to the Committee which conveyed a
memorandum of justification about the certifications and intent
to waive certifications required under various statutes to
continue our participation in KEDO.
On page 3 of that unclassified memorandum, it says,
specifically, that North Korea's agreement to freeze and
eventually dismantle its declared graphite-moderated nuclear
reactors and related facilities at Yongbyon and Taechon has
halted activities that, had they not been stopped, would have
given the DPRK a nuclear weapons capability.
My question is: Is this suggesting that North Korea does
not have a nuclear weapons capacity, or is it suggesting that
the Agreed Framework has halted the North Korean nuclear
weapons development program? Which is it?
Ambassador Sherman. What it is and what we have said
repeatedly is that the Agreed Framework halted the plutonium
production through graphite-moderated reactors at Yongbyon and
Taechon, which is the quickest and surest way to the
development of nuclear weapons.
Dr. Perry has said in front of this Committee that we
have--we all have concerns about whether, as he calls it, the
physics of nuclear weapons is still occurring, because that
could take place in a room smaller than this.
One of the reasons that we want an Agreed Framework
implementation negotiation, which the North has now agreed to,
is to get at some of those concerns that would be realized in
the Agreed Framework, but would not be realized until all IAEA
full safeguards were in place, which will take some time
because of the steps that are in the process of the Agreed
Framework.
Mr. Bereuter. Then I think that is a misleading statement
in that memorandum because it does say that the agreement has
stopped what would have given the DPRK a nuclear weapons
capability. It appears to me that you are not saying North
Korea does not have a nuclear weapons capability right now.
It is just that the nuclear weapons development program and
the judgment behind the certification has been stopped.
However, the capacity may be there now. At least----
Ambassador Sherman. I think, though, part of it is the
passive verb. There is no question that the facilities at
Yongbyon and Taechon would have given the DPRK a nuclear
weapons capability.
Mr. Bereuter. But they are not saying they don't have one
now.
Ambassador Sherman. But we are not saying anything about
that here.
Mr. Bereuter. Right. OK.
May I have one more question, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Gilman. Without objection.
Mr. Bereuter. Thank you.
Ambassador, this would seem like a question that should
have been asked a long time ago, but maybe it has and I am not
aware of it being asked or the answer to it. Has the Department
of Energy, or any Federal agency, made preliminary decisions
regarding the licensing of nuclear reactors or nuclear
technology to North Korea?
Has Secretary Richardson or his predecessor, Secretary
O'Leary, made any commitments regarding the expedited licensing
of nuclear technology that eventually would reach the DPRK? It
goes to what safeguards would have been put in place or which
would still need to be put in place. Are you aware of the
answer to those questions?
Ambassador Sherman. I think one of the reasons that it may
not have been asked in that way, Mr. Bereuter, is that the
light water reactors that are being built are being built
through KEDO, which is a consortium of countries and an entity
that is responsible for the development of those light water
reactors.
The primary contractor for those light water reactors is
KEPCO, which is a South Korean entity. So I will go back----
Mr. Bereuter. But it is----
Ambassador Sherman [continuing]. What my colleague is
telling me is there are no licenses yet, and we would need to
put a nuclear cooperation agreement in place first, prior to
such licensing.
Mr. Bereuter. Because those are U.S.-licensed
technologies----
Ambassador Sherman. Yes.
Mr. Bereuter [continuing]. That would be put in place
through the South Korean entity, through the KEDO entity, I
believe.
Ambassador Sherman. Yes. As you know, Congressman, there is
a sequence of events that need to take place, the nuclear
cooperation agreement being one of them, before key components
are in place and the construction is complete.
Mr. Bereuter. So you would expect or convey to the
Department of Energy that they need to be in consultation with
Congress to assure that the safeguards that they need to
negotiate yet would meet statutory requirements?
Ambassador Sherman. I am sure they will be, and we will be
in very close consultation with Capitol Hill as we present a
nuclear cooperation agreement at the appropriate time.
Mr. Bereuter. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your indulgence.
Thank you, Ambassador.
Chairman Gilman. Thank you, Mr. Bereuter.
Mr. Royce.
Mr. Royce. Ambassador Sherman, if I could ask you, The Los
Angeles Times not too long ago reported that North Korea has
been conducting major military exercises, showing capabilities
that have caught analysts off guard. The L.A. Times reports
that Pentagon officials have said that these exercises were
being supported by the food aid that the U.S. and others are
providing the regime in the North.
Now, what is your response to this criticism? Is The L.A.
Times wrong in that report, in your view?
Ambassador Sherman. I believe that Admiral Blair testified
in front of this Committee and said quite publicly that the
winter military exercises were quite large, quite
sophisticated, and quite good. I would not differ with Admiral
Blair in that regard.
It is true the scale of operations during the winter cycle
did exceed what had been observed over past years. But I want
to remind the Committee that we have never shrunk from the
fact--and it is part of our grave concern about North Korea--
that their million man army is formidable; that the artillery
and supplies that they have, although not as up to date as they
would like to be, probably without some of the spare parts they
want, could do catastrophic harm to our allies and to our
troops. We take it quite seriously.
As for the food issue, Congressman, it is also my
understanding, though I was not here, that Admiral Blair said
that at the end of the day, food aid did not make a difference,
in his judgment, in the capabilities of that million man army,
and that it was the American tradition to provide such food
aid. He believed it was the right way to go.
There is no question, and we have said this before
publicly, that food aid--food is fungible, and there is no
question in my mind but that North Korea wants to feed its
military first and foremost. They cannot produce enough food
for their own people, and probably the food they do produce
goes first to their military, and then foreign food aid goes to
others in the population.
We do believe, through the monitoring of the WFP, although
it is not perfect and we are always trying for better
monitoring, that, in fact, food is reaching the most vulnerable
populations. Those who have been there frequently have seen,
just with their own eyes, a difference in terms of the health
and welfare of children, women, and the elderly.
Mr. Royce. We were providing some 500,000 tons of fuel each
year. Do we know if that fuel was used in these military
exercises?
Ambassador Sherman. We do not believe so, Congressman. One
of the reasons that we wanted to provide heavy fuel oil was the
fact that it is harder to convert heavy fuel oil to other forms
of fuel. I cannot tell you with a guarantee and a certainty
that they have not gone through the process which would enable
them to do that, but it is one of the reasons that heavy fuel
oil was chosen.
Mr. Royce. If the analysts are caught off guard by the
magnitude of the military exercises, perhaps we should focus on
that question, since we are still providing the fuel.
I recently had the opportunity to travel to Macau, and
there have been reports in their papers about growing illegal
North Korean activities there. North Korea allegedly is using
Macau banks to launder money gained from drug trafficking. It
is also, we heard, using Macau as a base of an operation that
is counterfeiting $100-dollar U.S. bills. Is this a serious
concern, this activity? Maybe you could shed some light on the
counterfeiting of U.S. $100-dollar bills by North Korea?
Ambassador Sherman. I am aware of these reports,
Congressman, and we are very concerned about them. This is a
very sensitive subject because it goes to a number of areas. I
would be pleased to have someone come up and give you a full
brief, but I would rather not do that in a public hearing.
Mr. Royce. The last question I would ask you is the
Administration and our South Korean partners have been engaged
with the North Korean regime for several years now, providing
all types of aid. However, I am a little hard-pressed to see
how the North Korean regime's behavior has been modified.
Do we really believe that this aid is leveraging reform in
North Korea for at least more responsible international
behavior? If that is the case, what are the signs that you
could share with me that this is working right now?
Ambassador Sherman. I am very glad you asked this question.
I happen to have a card here ready for it. It is hard, and it
is very frustrating. I have many colleagues who have been at
this a whole lot longer than I have been. I think to myself on
the days--which is almost every day with North Korea--that I am
intensely frustrated, I think of other parts of the world where
negotiations have taken a long time.
Ambassador Dennis Ross, who is a tremendously able
negotiator, has been working on Middle East peace for 10 years.
We didn't see the end of the Soviet Union for more than 40
years. We tend to think of timeframes in 2, 4, 6, and 8 years.
It has something to do with our election cycle probably. But
North Korea sees life and time in 40-year increments. Somebody
gets to be the head of North Korea for 40 years, and then dies
and his son takes over.
So their sense of time is quite different than ours. Their
approach to proceeding on these issues is quite different than
ours.
That said, Congressman, you have every right to ask, so
what has this gotten us anyway? Let me tell you what I think we
have achieved, even in this very painful, difficult, slow
process.
There is no question in my mind that the Agreed Framework
froze plutonium production, and plutonium production was and
still remains the fastest way to nuclear weapons. If that
reactor, that potential reprocessing plant, were to startup
again today, in months we would have dozens of nuclear material
for nuclear weapons.
Second, we have gotten far enough in our relationship with
North Korea that when we have a crisis, when we have a problem,
we are able to negotiate our way to the other side; Kumchang-ni
being the best example of that. That was a crisis situation.
The Congress, understandably, the intelligence community, the
policy community, the Secretary of State, the President, and
the Secretary of Defense, were quite concerned that Kumchang-ni
was a nuclear reactor site, given its size and given some of
the characteristics of it.
Ambassador Kartman, through very patient and tough
negotiations--he is one of the most tenacious negotiators I've
ever met. You would not want to sit across from him. He can sit
and stare at you for hours and not blink and not move until you
are ready to move in his direction. He managed to gain access
to Kumchang-ni, not just once but as many times as it took to
satisfy our concerns. As I said, the North Koreans just
reconfirmed again the visit in May of this year.
Third, again, through very tough negotiations, the North
Koreans have agreed to suspend their launch and testing of
long-range missiles while conversations and dialogue go on with
us. This is no small action. It is not that they have stopped
all of the development of their missile program. I do not
believe they have. But it----
Mr. Royce. That is the question I have, because I don't----
Ambassador Sherman. Right. It is very, very hard to
continue development of a program if you cannot test. If you
cannot test, it is harder to market your weapons. If you do not
test and you only have one missile, it is hard to give it a
whirl because you don't know whether it is going to work or
not.
So folks who are missile negotiators, who--Bob Einhorn, who
is our Assistant Secretary for Non-Proliferation, would tell
you that the single most important thing anyone can do to slow
down, if you cannot yet stop a missile program, is to stop the
testing.
We have a long way to go. We are very glad that North Korea
has agreed to reintensify the missile negotiation to schedule
the next missile negotiation, because as the Perry Report says,
our goal is to end North Korea's long-range missile program, to
get a verified program to end the development, deployment,
testing, and export, which is critically important. That
remains our objective.
We also now have, as I mentioned, commitments to a
reintensified missile negotiation, Agreed Framework
implementation, which gets to nuclear-related concerns. We will
have ongoing terrorism talks, which is a tremendous interest.
Fourth, or fifth--I don't know where I am in the list--food
aid is very controversial, but it is, as Admiral Blair said,
the American way. We have fed vulnerable, starving-to-death
people, and that is important. It is still important to our
country.
Finally, and I think quite critical to whether we will
ultimately succeed here or not--and I still don't know whether
we will--is that we have constructed and now carried out the
strongest trilateral consultation, I think, in our security,
both military and political, relationship with South Korea and
Japan. We have now proceeded also to further multilateralize
that approach, so that we are in consultation and coordination
with virtually everyone who is approaching North Korea.
Chairman Gilman. The gentleman's time has expired.
Dr. Cooksey.
Mr. Cooksey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, Madam Ambassador. Let me ask you, what is the
main source of financial aid? I understand they receive about a
billion dollars, apparently, a year in financial aid. What
country gives them cash? Do any countries give them financial
aid directly?
Ambassador Sherman. I don't know any country that gives
them hard cash. I would have to consult with my colleagues. I
don't believe so. Our contribution is heavy fuel oil, and some
administrative expenses to KEDO, and our food aid. When the
Congress has monetized that food aid, it gets upwards to
several hundred million dollars.
The EU makes contributions toward KEDO. China gives oil and
food. Hyundai, which is a private corporation that we discussed
earlier, does make payments to North Korea for the mountain
tourism project. But there is no government that I can think of
that gives cash, except those governments which buy missiles
and missile technology from North Korea.
We believe that North Korea exports that technology for
three reasons. First, as status and pride that they, in fact,
can do this. Second, as a leverage in its relationships with us
and others in the world. Finally, for hard currency. We don't
think the hard currency is the primary reason because although
it is substantial, it is not really as much as one would think.
Mr. Cooksey. I would assume that they don't really export a
lot besides missiles and misery. What will it take for them to
collapse financially, to have just a financial collapse?
Ambassador Sherman. It is hard to answer that question,
Congressman, because I think many people would have predicted
that North Korea would have collapsed already. Certainly, I
think, a couple of years ago a lot of analysts thought they
would, but I think virtually every analyst would say today that
they are not going to collapse.
One of the fundamental premises of the Perry Report, which
leads one to certain conclusions, is that we have to deal with
this regime as it is, not as we wish it to be, because it is
not in danger of imminent collapse. That is the view of our
South Korean allies who are quite closer to the situation than
we are, and I think of most analysts.
There is no question that if one believes they are on the
verge of imminent collapse, then one might have adopted one of
the proposals that we outlined in our report which we rejected.
If you thought they were in imminent collapse, one might move
to try to undermine the regime because you might think you
could do it rather quickly.
We rejected that proposal because we don't believe they are
in imminent collapse, and to undermine a regime takes a long
time. During that time they would develop weapons of mass
destruction further, and make it even more difficult to get
them to give up their indigenous program.
Mr. Cooksey. I know that we have given them food and heavy
oil, but you gave me an answer about what the world has gained
from it. I accept that as a reasonable answer and probably a
good response.
I would assume, as I look out over this audience, that
there is someone in here that is a representative from North
Korea. It probably wouldn't be too difficult to guess who they
are. How long will it take for people that are North Koreans to
come to this country and see the way we operate here in an open
forum, to see that there is a better way of doing things? Will
there be people that have seen the outside of North Korean that
would go back and be the basis for a revolt?
Maybe there is someone in this room--is there likely to be
someone in this room--does anybody want to raise their hand
that is a North Korean?
Ambassador Sherman. I doubt it, Mr. Cooksey, because North
Koreans cannot travel outside of a 25-mile radius of New York,
where they have a permanent representative at the U.N., without
permission by the State Department. Those who were with
Ambassador Kartman in New York did get permission to go to
Georgia for a meeting at Georgia Tech tomorrow, but we know
where North Koreans travel in this country, unless, of course,
they are here in ways that we are not aware of.
So I would suspect there isn't a North Korean in this room,
but I couldn't guarantee it.
Chairman Gilman. The gentleman's time has expired.
Mr. Cooksey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, Madam Ambassador.
Ambassador Sherman. Thank you.
Chairman Gilman. Ambassador Sherman, one last request. If I
heard you correctly, you said you were quite pleased with the
results of your New York talks. I am concerned about the New
York talks, the fact that North Korea has rebuffed us once
again on scheduling a high-level visit, and the fact that North
Korea has rebuffed us once again in providing a written
assurance on the ban on missile tests, and the fact that North
Korea has once again rebuffed us on agreeing to the specific
agenda for the follow-on missile and nuclear talks, which
should be part of a joint communique of the recent visit.
So tell us a little bit, what made you so pleased with all
of that?
Ambassador Sherman. When I said I was pleased, it is
because I feel that we are still taking steps forward in this
process. I think probably I get pleased maybe perhaps with less
than would please you, Mr. Chairman, because this is a very,
very difficult process. So if you can take forward steps with
North Korea, then one is ahead in this process.
In the overall scheme of things, there is no question. I
wish we had a date for a high-level visit. I wish we had the
agenda completely nailed down. I wish that we had already had
the missile negotiation, the Agreed Framework negotiation. I
agree with you. I would be even more pleased if those things
had occurred.
However, we did make forward movement in a process in which
forward movement, small steps, one at a time, is the way that
we are going to solve this problem. I wish it were otherwise. I
truly do. I know Ambassador Kartman, who has to sit for hours
and hours and hours with some of his team who are here, across
from the North Koreans wish that more progress would go
forward.
I think, fundamentally, there was no rebuff of our
objectives. There was no disagreeing that, in fact, we are
still proceeding toward a high-level visit. The missile
moratorium remains in effect, which is crucial to meeting our
ultimate objectives around their missile program.
We are still proceeding in very small steps--I agree with
you, very small steps--very slow, small steps. However, we are
still moving in a forward direction, and that, I think, is what
our allies believe is necessary and what we have agreed to with
South Korea and Japan, as Japan is proceeding in its own
bilateral track.
The one last thing I would add, Mr. Chairman, is I had a
meeting yesterday with one of our colleagues from Japan, and
one of the points he made, which I think is quite true, is that
we have to look at the aggregate of what is occurring. We
believe, and Japan and South Korea believe, that any progress
each of us makes is part of the aggregate progress that all of
us are making toward dealing with North Korea because we are
working together.
So, if Japan has its bilateral talks because they are in
such close coordination with us, we are moving forward on the
objectives of the Perry Report. If South Korea moves, both in
its private economic channels and, I hope sometime soon, in
North-South direct government channels, toward reaching those
objectives, we are reaching our common objectives.
I am not as pleased as I would like to be, but we are at
least still moving forward.
Chairman Gilman. Mr. Bereuter.
Mr. Bereuter. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Both the Chairman and I are interested in whether the North
Koreans have agreed to dates certain for talks on missiles. I
would also ask a second question. Since North Korea is the
world's worst proliferator when it comes to missile technology,
and since non-U.S. independent sources indicate that North
Koreans are working on nuclear development programs elsewhere
in Asia, to what extent are we making that an element in our
talks with them to try to get a commitment that they are going
to abandon this kind of third country work on missile
development and nuclear development?
Ambassador Sherman. Without getting into the specifics of
the issues that you are discussing----
Mr. Bereuter. I just want to know if it is being taken into
account--third country.
Ambassador Sherman. Yes, absolutely. The reason for the
Agreed Framework implementation talks, as I said, is to address
our concerns that we either cannot get to soon enough because
of the Agreed Framework implementation guideline and
parameters, or where other concerns have been raised that we
want to address as it was in the Kumchang-ni situation.
In the missile talks, absolutely. We are quite concerned
about the range of activities of North Korea. I cannot today
give you dates for the missile and the Agreed Framework
implementation. As I said earlier, Ambassador Kartman had to
come back to us. Kim Gye Gwan had to go back to Pyongyang. But
we expect those dates to be set very soon through the New York
channel.
Mr. Bereuter. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Gilman. Thank you, Mr. Bereuter.
The Committee stands in recess until the vote is completed.
We will continue very shortly.
Ambassador Sherman, we thank you for your appearance.
Ambassador Sherman. Thank you.
Chairman Gilman. I don't think there is any need for you to
stay.
Ambassador Sherman. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Gilman. Thank you.
[Recess.]
Mr. Cooksey [presiding]. I would now like to welcome our
second panel headed by Douglas Paal. Mr. Paal is President of
the Asia Pacific Policy Center and a former senior staff member
of Asian Affairs on the National Security Council during the
Reagan and Bush Administration. We are glad you could join us
today to give us your perspective on the Korean problem.
Mr. Paal will be followed by Dr. Mitchell Reiss. Dr. Reiss
is the Director of the Reves Center for International Studies
at the College of William and Mary. We welcome your
perspectives on the North Korean policy dilemma as a former
policy advisor at KEDO.
Finally, we will hear from Scott Snyder of the Asia
Foundation. Mr. Snyder represents the Asia Foundation in Seoul,
and recently published a book on North Korean negotiating
behavior. We are glad you could join us today to give us your
perspective on North Korea's negotiating tactics and strategy.
Welcome to all of you. I know that many of you have
appeared before Congress previously. For the sake of time, I
would request that you summarize your remarks and have your
full statement appear in the record.
Again, I would ask Members to withhold questions until all
of the witnesses on this panel have testified.
Mr. Paal, proceed.
STATEMENT OF THE HON. DOUGLAS PAAL, PRESIDENT, ASIA PACIFIC
POLICY CENTER
Mr. Paal. Thank you, Dr. Cooksey. It is a pleasure to be
here to present the views, and I will submit a small statement
for the record.
Current U.S. policy toward North Korea remains a
distasteful exercise in dealing with an obnoxious and
threatening regime. With little to no consultation with the
Congress, the Administration reached the Agreed Framework with
North Korea in 1994.
Since then, the Congress has been forced to choose between
overturning a major international undertaking by the U.S.
Government, which in principle would be a harmful act to U.S.
interests, and appropriating taxpayer money every year for use
by a despicable elite in Pyongyang. This is not a welcome
choice, as you well know.
You and your colleagues have tried to steer a course
between these alternatives and have succeeded to a limited
extent in conditioning and monitoring the flow of food and
heavy fuel oil to North Korea. You have also succeeded in
pressing the Administration to organize a more comprehensive
effort under the original direction of former Defense Secretary
Perry, and now under Ambassador Sherman.
How successful has this approach been? In the short term,
it appears to be a mixed result. The most likely source of
full-scale plutonium production in the Yongbyon facility has
ceased operations, though not yet been dismantled or
intrusively inspected. The North has also momentarily ceased
testing long-range missiles with a hint of willingness to enter
into a more formal moratorium.
In the longer term, however, we will not know probably for
at least 4 years whether the North has found another way to
produce nuclear weapons at sites away from Yongbyon. It
stretches the mind to imagine that a key element of the Agreed
Framework--satisfactory special inspections by the IAEA--will
ever be intrusive enough in a secretive society like North
Korea.
To meet a high standard of investigation 8 months to 2
years of inspections are likely to be required. It will be an
important question during that period whether the North will
bend to the international community in order to get the
critical components necessary for the light water reactors
under construction, or the international community, led by the
United States, will bend its standards to keep Pyongyang
cooperative.
Before turning to the outlook for the future, I would like
to note that I have great respect for the hard work and many
frustrations of the civil servants who have had to work this
wet of problems with North Korea. I was one of them myself in
the Bush Administration. They have labored under policy
constraints in the new Administration that leave few options,
and all are suboptimal.
When the Agreed Framework was adopted, the choices before
the Administration were framed as either war or cooperation
with Pyongyang. The absence of major conflict since then,
despite repeated skirmishes, is, of course, an accomplishment
for which the architects of the Framework claim credit.
However, war has been avoided on the Korean Peninsula since
1953 through effective deterrence. The cessation of long-range
missile tests and the arrest of the Yongbyon nuclear facility
are two other outcomes of the Agreed Framework. But as I have
noted in my statement, these are qualified successes.
The problem for the Congress and the next Administration is
that the Agreed Framework and Secretary Perry's efforts have
effectively postponed the ultimate confrontations with North
Korea over nuclear weapons and missiles, and they have yet to
address the fundamentally more serious problem of conventional
arms on the peninsula.
As Admiral Blair noted in his testimony here 2 weeks ago,
despite years of poor economic performance and large-scale
international food aid, Pyongyang surprised observers with the
largest winter military exercise in nearly a decade.
Alliance requirements have also limited the room for the
U.S. maneuver. The election of President Kim Dae Jong, with his
strong commitment to win over or undermine North Korea through
blandishments and economic assistance, has made it more
difficult for any Administration to take a hard line with the
North. There may be some room, however, for a ``bad cop, good
cop'' approach to Pyongyang, with the U.S. playing a heavier
role to the more pacifying role of Seoul.
The preconditions already exist in the different emphasis
Seoul and Washington--that these two capitals give to weapons
of mass destruction, Seoul playing this issue down much more
than the U.S. plays it up.
Going forward, the next Administration and Congress will
need to rig for heavy weather. Sometime in the first year and a
half of the next term, the IAEA will have to inspect at a level
of intrusiveness that would be difficult in, say, Sweden, let
alone North Korea.
The Iraqi experience is a daunting premonition of the North
Korean situation. The level of political support for President
Kim Dae Jong's approach to the North also appears to be
diminishing in South Korea as the economy there returns to
health and the dividends of his Sunshine Policy remain lean.
The next Administration should expect to be tested in a
confrontation engineered by the North, as President Clinton and
South Korean President Kim Young Sam were in 1993, with
Pyongyang's threat to leave the Non-Proliferation Treaty. Here
I will interject that this political component to the behavior
of North Korea, which is very often missing from analysis and
debate--they watch our election cycle much more closely than
they are perceived to do.
They have timed their challenges to leaders when they are
new in office and are unsure of themselves. This happened in
1993, and President Kim of Korea and President Clinton of the
United States responded, in my view, against the previous
Administration's background fairly weakly.
In 1994, when the tensions were rising, they signed the
Agreed Framework on the eve of the Congressional elections,
perhaps believing in their own minds, if not in the minds of
the White House, that this would somehow be a time to strike a
deal when the Administration was looking for victory.
I believe that they are choosing the present time, the May
visit by a senior leader, to come and test the political
environment in the United States and see whether the
Administration is going to be hungrier for a deal when it is up
against a political opponent in our own domestic contests.
I fully expect Pyongyang to try to sweeten the deal or
reduce its cost by confronting the U.S. and Korean leaderships
again with a choice between confrontation or cooperation or
classic appeasement. It will be up to the new team to fashion
an alternative to these choices if we are to resolve our
concerns about Pyongyang's nuclear, missile, and conventional
weapon threats.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Paal appears in the
appendix.]
Mr. Cooksey. Ordinarily, I would go to the other
statements. However, in statement four and statement seven, you
seem to question the position of the State Department. Is that
assumption correct? I get the impression that you don't have as
much confidence that they are doing the right thing as
Ambassador Sherman did. Or do you?
Mr. Paal. There are three choices I believe that the U.S.
Government has as broad categories for dealing with North
Korea. One is a real confrontation. We go to the United
Nations, we try to get votes against them, we try to isolate
them. That was the choice that was put up before the President
in 1993 and 1994. Another option is to work out some kind of
cooperative arrangement with all of the agonizing that goes
along with it, which Ambassador Sherman and her team have had
to go through.
I have always felt that there is a third option, which is
simply to turn a cold shoulder to the North on a political
level, but to give them opportunities to go into the
international economic community. If they want to buy things,
if they want to sell things, they are welcome to do it. We
could lift our sanctions on North Korea, except for things such
as military items, and transfer to the North, and then say,
``Here is our phone number. If you want to do business, come to
us.''
Instead, we find ourselves chasing after them and
proceeding to build a process-driven approach to North Korea,
which yields extremely small dividends at an extremely slow
pace, which is something that is easier for them to do because
they don't operate in the democratic political environment
where representatives, such as yourself, have to go to the
taxpayers and ask for money for a despicable regime's small
lifting of its little pinky when it takes from us.
Mr. Cooksey. Good. Thank you. I am going to come back to
you shortly.
Dr. Reiss, If you would go ahead with your statement. Thank
you.
STATEMENT OF MITCHELL B. REISS, DIRECTOR, REVES CENTER FOR
INTERNATIONAL STUDIES, COLLEGE OF WILLIAM AND MARY
Mr. Reiss. Thank you, Congressman. I would like to thank
the Committee for inviting me to testify here today on this
important issue.
I would like to submit my written testimony for the record
and then offer a brief summary of the major points.
There are currently three myths that influence U.S. policy
toward North Korea and impede our ability to maintain stability
and security on the Korean Peninsula and in the region.
Myth number one: It is impossible to negotiate with North
Korea. Determining how best to deal with North Korea has posed
a serious challenge for the Clinton Administration. However, it
is possible to do business with Pyongyang, as proven by the
experience of KEDO, an international organization that was
created to deal with the North's nuclear weapons program by
building two nuclear power reactors in North Korea.
During the past 5 years, KEDO and the North Koreans have
reached agreements that have produced real and tangible
progress to implement this nuclear project. Many of these
agreements deal with highly sensitive national security issues,
such as direct transportation routes from South Korea to North
Korea, independent means of communication from the work site to
the outside world, and blanket immunity from prosecution for
all KEDO workers doing business in the North.
KEDO has shown it is possible to engage North Korea in ways
consistent with U.S. national security interests. The KEDO
experience also teaches the importance of demanding strict
reciprocity. There is no such thing as a free lunch when it
comes to North Korea. It is possible to take from the North,
but only if you are prepared to give something in return.
It is essential that anyone negotiating with the North not
be afraid to walk away from the negotiating table. They should
never be or seem to be more eager than the North Koreans to
reach an agreement. Hard-headed engagement, which is strongly
supported by South Korea and Japan, can work. By keeping faith
with our allies, the United States will emerge in a much
stronger position should North Korea decide to remain a rogue
state.
My final point here is that it is useful to talk with
Pyongyang if only to make absolutely clear to them the
consequences their actions will bring. In other words, the
United States has a strong interest in preventing North Korea
from ever thinking that its provocative behavior would go
unanswered.
The second myth is that the Agreed Framework nuclear deal
can be attacked without harming broader U.S. national security
interests. Despite all of the criticisms of the Clinton
Administration's handling of North Korea, the reality is that
the next Administration, whether Democrat or Republican, is
unlikely to substantially change U.S. policy.
If there is a Republican Administration come next January,
I would expect to see important changes in policy style and
policy execution, but little change in policy substance, with
the possible exception of addressing the North's military
posture along the demilitarized zone.
Indeed, leading Republican foreign policy experts advising
Governor Bush have already gone on record saying it would be
difficult for a Republican Administration to overturn the
current U.S. approach to North Korea.
These Republican foreign policy experts recognize that the
Agreed Framework and KEDO, Secretary Perry's report, and South
Korean President Kim Dae-jung's Sunshine Policy, provide useful
tools with which to deal with many of the challenges North
Korea presents. This is not to say that the current U.S.
approach is ideal. Far from it. It is the least worst option.
Before dismantling the current approach, it is essential to
formulate a viable policy alternative. Suddenly reversing
Washington's North Korea policy without such a policy
alternative in place would harm our relations with two key U.S.
allies--South Korea and Japan. The likely result of such
behavior would be the weakening of U.S. influence throughout
all of East Asia and perhaps beyond.
Myth number three is that KEDO doesn't need or deserve
strong U.S. support. According to published accounts, North
Korea's work at the nuclear facilities covered by the Agreed
Framework has halted. This nuclear freeze is being monitored
not only by U.S. national technical means, but also by
international inspectors on the ground at these sites in the
North.
Without this nuclear freeze, which is due largely to KEDO's
ongoing efforts, it is estimated that Pyongyang would have the
capability to build five to six nuclear weapons a year. In
other words, without the Agreed Framework and KEDO, North Korea
could have a nuclear arsenal of at least 25 to 30 bombs by this
time. Needless to say, this result would be profoundly
destabilizing to all of East Asia and detrimental to U.S.
stature and influence in the region.
Unfortunately, the KEDO nuclear project is an estimated 5
years behind schedule. KEDO needs strong support from the
Administration and from Congress to move the nuclear project
forward. It is useful to recall that under the Agreed
Framework, North Korea has pledged to come clean about its
nuclear past, to disclose how much weapons-grade plutonium it
has separated, only after KEDO completes a significant portion
of the two nuclear reactors it has pledged to build.
Many people, including myself and my friend Doug Paal here,
are skeptical whether Pyongyang will ever place all of its
nuclear cards on the table. We delay testing this proposition
with each day the KEDO project is stalled. We delay forcing
North Korea to choose which path to follow--the one leading to
greater engagement with the outside world, or the one leading
to greater isolation and poverty with the North Korean regime.
In conclusion, I would like to leave the Committee with
four key points. First, it is imperative that the United States
keep its eye on the prize. Our overriding priority is to
maintain security and stability on the Korean Peninsula.
Second, we must keep solidarity with our allies--South
Korea and Japan. Anything that weakens our alliances weakens
our security.
Third, we need to force North Korea to make a choice
through tough negotiating, so we can have a better sense of
which U.S. policy is most appropriate for dealing with the
threats that North Korea poses.
Fourth, and finally, Congress has a crucial role to play in
working closely to help this Administration shape our policy
for North Korea.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Reiss appears in the
appendix.]
Mr. Cooksey. Thank you, Dr. Reiss. It is my understanding
that you were working for KEDO, and you sat down across the
table from the North Koreans and negotiated the agreement that
proceeded with KEDO.
Mr. Reiss. Yes, sir. For 4 years I was the chief
negotiator.
Mr. Cooksey. Where was this where these negotiations----
Mr. Reiss. The negotiations took place in North Korea and
in New York, where KEDO is headquartered.
Mr. Cooksey. What is your opinion of the people you
negotiated with? What was their education level? Were they
tenacious? Were they honest?
Mr. Reiss. They were extremely tenacious and difficult
negotiators. I have explained in other addresses that I like to
describe the North Koreans as smart but not terribly
sophisticated. A lot of what we did was actually explain and
educate the way the world worked, international standards,
technical advances. Their people literally don't get out a lot,
and they are not as familiar as one would hope in terms of what
is current concerning technology levels, international
standards, international practices.
For the first part of many of these negotiations we spent
an enormous amount of time explaining and educating, providing
them with written documents and materials, so they could get up
to speed themselves.
Mr. Cooksey. I will probably come back to some more
questions for you, but thank you, Dr. Reiss.
Mr. Snyder.
STATEMENT OF SCOTT SNYDER, REPRESENTATIVE OF ASIA FOUNDATION/
KOREA
Mr. Snyder. Thank you very much for the opportunity to be
here to address the Committee. I am also going to summarize my
statement by first focusing on contributions of the Perry
review process.
I think the primary contribution has been the alignment of
policies among the United States, Japan, and South Korea, in
favor of working with the North Korean leadership to engage in
mutual threat reduction in return for the creation of a more
benign international environment necessary for North Korea's
regime survival.
The policy coordination effort itself is unprecedented and
has potentially significant implications for the shape of
future security relations in Northeast Asia, including
perpetuation of U.S. alliances with Japan and South Korea as
part of the shaping of that security environment.
Another result of the policy review process has been to
underscore both the practical limits and essentially
unsatisfactory nature of the options available, and the
difficulties of achieving a political consensus on how to deal
with North Korea in the United States, Japan, and South Korea.
The true test of success or failure of the Perry process in
the long-term will depend on whether or not the following
positive developments are sustainable--first, continued
strengthened alliance coordination among the United States,
Japan, and South Korea to prepare along the two-pronged path of
engagement or confrontation; second, the ability of the
Administration to move from the design phase represented by the
policy review process to overseeing an implementation process
while maintaining bipartisan political support; and third, an
ongoing and regularized engagement with North Korean leaders at
higher levels that gives North Korea a stake in and benefits
from an engagement process, so that leaders in Pyongyang
recognize that they have so much to lose that they cannot
afford to walk away.
Although it is necessary to be realistic about the ability
of any external party to influence Pyongyang's process of
policy formation, the relative influence of external actors and
policies toward North Korea clearly has increased during the
past decade from a low-level.
This trend has critical significance for policy toward
North Korea, in my view, because it means that the focus of the
debate increasingly should not be over whether to provide
external assistance, but over how to provide assistance and in
what forms. To be more specific, it seems to me that the issue
of whether or not that assistance is being provided in such a
way that strengthens the current regime is a critical criterion
that one wants to look at in terms of assessing those efforts.
So the critical objective of the U.S. and the international
community is how to increase the pace of positive change in
North Korea, while the objective of Pyongyang's leadership,
focused on regime survival, is to control the pace of change in
ways that do not threaten their political control.
In my view, the single criterion by which all assistance
should be judged is whether or not that assistance increases
the pace of change in ways that facilitate North Korea's
integration with the international community, or whether that
assistance actually reinforces policies or gives new life to
systems in North Korea that have already failed.
This benchmark has critical implications for how food
assistance is provided, how one thinks about issues such as
sanctions lifting for implementation of the KEDO project, and
which actors inside North Korea are best suited to serve as
counterparts to external parties.
The coordinated policy approach toward North Korea that the
Perry process has helped to put into place is important for
several reasons. First, it manages the differences in priority
on specific issues that may exist internally between the United
States and Japan, or the United States and South Korea.
Second, it reduces the ability of North Korea to exploit
differences in the policy stances of allies.
Third, it underscores the importance of containing North
Korea's destabilizing behavior while expanding the base of
resources available as part of an engagement strategy with
North Korea.
Fourth, it diminishes the possibility that precipitous
unilateral action against North Korea by any single party in
the coordination process will lead to the spread of broader
conflicts in Northeast Asia.
Here I would just note that the coordination process is
demonstrated in the way in which the United States, Japan, and
South Korea are working to approach North Korea diplomatically.
It also has extended what I would call comprehensive deterrents
against North Korean destabilizing action. I think this is
particularly evident in some of the Japanese attitudes in the
national Diet, with regards to some of the negative activities
that North Korea is engaging in that impacts Japan in various
ways that were mentioned earlier in the session.
The fundamental irony in engaging North Korea is that
North Korea has also reached a point where its options have
narrowed to the single option of engagement with the outside
world, despite Pyongyang's protracted search for alternatives
to the kinds of engagement with the international community
that will require real changes in their own system.
The Perry process at this point is the best way to test
North Korean intentions and frame hard choices for Pyongyang's
leadership. Gradually, the realities of North Korea's increased
dependence for regime survival on external inputs are being
revealed. I think this reality is well-known to North Korean
diplomats, including one that privately expressed to me his
vision for improved U.S.-North Korea relations as a process
through which two parties, both in danger of drowning, have to
save each other.
So, in summary, North Korea's system is caught in a
contradiction between its long-standing revolutionary
nationalist and socialist ideological aspirations, and the
North Korean reality of a highly traditional dynastic and
feudalistic system, in the words of the highest ranking
defector, Hwang Jang Yop.
North Korea's past approaches to the outside world have
been highly consistent, even if they are often self-defeating.
These days, North Korean approaches to the outside world are
also increasingly tempered by a mix of dependency, desperation,
paranoia, and pragmatism borne of the reality of North Korea's
essential weakness and isolation.
The primary achievement of the Perry review process is that
it has provided an opportunity to manage, and possibly avoid,
renewed crisis with North Korea, but it does not guarantee that
crisis will indeed be avoided. The next equally difficult task
is to test whether there is sufficient political will in
Pyongyang to overcome some of the differences between the
United States, South Korea, and Japan, by pursuing concrete
tension reduction measures. In essence, the question of whether
moving to a normalized relationship with North Korea will also
lead to a normalized North Korea in its relations with the rest
of the world.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Snyder appears in the
appendix.]
Mr. Cooksey. Thank you, Mr. Snyder. Just in summarizing
your message, you are saying that we should indeed provide
external assistance that does not profit the regime or
strengthen it, and yet external assistance that will hasten
this change from an old out-of-date political and economic
model to a modern world, 21st century global democracy, which
they seem to be ions away from right now. Is that, in essence,
what you are----
Mr. Snyder. That is right. External assistance can be used
to facilitate changes in North Korea, although still at a very
limited level.
Mr. Cooksey. Have you been to North Korea?
Mr. Snyder. Yes, I have been there four times.
Mr. Cooksey. Were you involved in the KEDO negotiation?
Mr. Snyder. I have not been involved in the KEDO process.
Mr. Cooksey. How did you happen to go?
Mr. Snyder. These were academic study missions led in three
cases by Professor Robert Scalapino when I was working with the
Asia Society and at the U.S. Institute of Peace.
Mr. Cooksey. There are some critics, and probably some who
may have a political agenda or bias, that feel that the United
States or this Administration has given too many concessions to
the Koreans which put us in a dangerous cycle of political
blackmail.
You don't have to tell me whether or not you agree with
that or not, but do you feel that there is a cycle going
between them making demands and blackmailing us? You don't have
to tell me whether or not you think it is right or wrong, but
do you feel like there is a cycle of political blackmail?
Mr. Snyder. I believe that part of North Korea's strategy
in dealing with the United States is to try to draw resources
to itself without giving very much in return. I would agree
with some of the comments that Mitchell Reiss made earlier on
that note.
Mr. Cooksey. How can we break the cycle?
Mr. Snyder. The basic vehicle by which the--what North
Korea is doing in order to enhance its negotiating capacity
with the United States is trying to show that it has
alternatives to negotiation. It is trying to demonstrate
commitment and maintain control over the negotiating agenda.
Our objective should be to cutoff the alternatives to a
negotiation process, and to try to maintain our own commitment
and control over a negotiating process that leads in the
direction that we want North Korea to go in.
Mr. Cooksey. How long is your book?
Mr. Snyder. Two hundred pages. I will be glad to give you a
copy later.
Mr. Cooksey. I buy a lot of books, but I am so far behind.
It would be interesting to get through it or see as much as
I could. My great passion is reading.
Mr. Paal, do you think in light of the testimony from the
three of you that this Administration or a future
Administration should be tougher, should be more coercive? Is
that the only thing that the North Koreans understand?
Mr. Paal. I would distinguish between the tougher word and
the coercive word. I think we have put ourselves at risk of
many equities in East Asia if we go on a coercive, aggressive
campaign against North Korea. Deterrence has worked for almost
50 years at keeping them from doing large-scale operations that
would destabilize Northeast Asia. Deterrence is being
maintained fairly effectively now by our Armed Forces and the
overall structure of our national defense strategy.
Going after them encourages the process of blackmail in the
sense of trying to win them over, get them to come to meetings.
We have spent a lot on food aid, and this has been very well
documented. We have claimed humanitarian principles for the
food, but it always tied to a meeting or an element of the
process of making them look like they are being more
cooperative.
This has become very obvious to North Korea. They don't go
to meetings unless they are going to be paid off. Then you are
told this is a humanitarian act; it has nothing to do with the
process.
I think we can get somewhere between the confrontational
and aggressive approach and the one where they are setting the
terms and driving us along. That is where we say, ``Here is
what we need. Here is our phone number. Meanwhile, you are
going to confront a world that is pretty cold and unfriendly.
Unless you change to meet the terms of that world, we are not
going to send you the aid to save yourself.''
Food aid is an interesting proposition. As you probably
know from previous testimony, North Korea cannot feed itself.
It sits on a slab of granite. It can't feed 20 million people
in that climate on that soil.
Mr. Cooksey. They never will be able to.
Mr. Paal. That is right. They have to sell things or
threaten us to give them food. We want to get them into the
position of selling things, and to do that they have got to get
into the international marketplace. You know all of the
complexities and the burdens on societies to change and
modernize and to adapt international standards.
That is the path we want them to go on, and I think doling
out assistance is just--it implies a kind of blessing of the
system as it is, or at least it incurs the risk of some day
discovering who you were feeding who was oppressing somebody
that was not getting fed, when the records become clear. Or it
implies an assumption that the regime is going to fall.
We can no longer make the easy assumption the regime is
going to fall that was made in the early 1990's. They have
proved that they can stand up, so we have to make an adjustment
in the way we approach it.
Now, as I said in my prepared statement, we are also coming
up to deadlines under the Agreed Framework which are going to
force us either to be straight about what we really need from
North Korea or change that and lead them to believe they can
get a special standard and get by again.
Mr. Cooksey. It seems to me, then, that there is a fine
line between propping up this regime and playing the political
blackmail game. Do you think that is a proper assumption, or a
correct assumption? Or let me ask you this: Do you think we are
propping up the regime at all?
Mr. Paal. I think we clearly prop up the regime with the
food assistance. We are not the major contributors to that.
China is the most important contributor. I think that a new
policy toward North Korea would have as an important component
a much more aggressive attempt to get the Chinese to take
responsibility for the misbehavior of North Korea and to do
more about correcting that behavior.
Ambassador Sherman gave a long list today of all of the
good things China is doing. However, those are all our
assumptions about China's behavior. The Chinese have not
demonstrated it, and they have tried to stay out of the
spotlight for a variety of reasons.
We have certain common interests with China right now, but
it is not long-term an abiding common interest. We separate
very quickly when you go down the list of our respective
interests in North Korea. I think we ought to be--at the same
time we try to construct a more stable relationship with China,
we use that stable relationship to get them to do more to help
us achieve our objectives in North Korea.
Mr. Cooksey. You said that North Korea is basically a
country of granite and no ground, no place for----
Mr. Paal. That is an overstatement, but that is the--you
get the general point.
Mr. Cooksey. They just do not have much land that lends
itself to farming, and they never will have. Do you think that
is part of the reason they have been such a belligerent country
all of these years, because they knew they couldn't feed their
people and they were trying to control South Korea, or acquire
South Korea?
Mr. Paal. In the 1950's and the early 1960's, they were
considered the most successful example of a socialist society.
Their productivity had been propped up by barter arrangements
with the Communist Community of States, and they just fell
behind. Their belligerence goes back to the very beginning, and
it has something to do with the system that is in power in
North Korea.
You have got 600,000 people in a nomenclature controlling
the other 21 million. That system is more what dictates the
attitude of the regime, I believe, than the physical conditions
on the peninsula. The physical conditions are not much
different in South Korea, and we have a very different kind of
country in South Korea.
Mr. Cooksey. Dr. Reiss, what can North Korea export besides
missiles?
Mr. Reiss. They can export trouble.
Mr. Cooksey. What good things can they export, that they
can get some hard currency from?
Mr. Reiss. I think there are some natural resources that
they have--manganese. There are some other ores that have value
on the international market. I would like to ask the other
people on the panel if they can think of some other items.
There aren't too many big ticket items that come to mind. I
think ballistic missiles are their single largest source of
hard currency, aside from perhaps counterfeiting or narcotics
trafficking.
I think the big concern that we have is their ability to
export ballistic missiles to countries in South Asia and the
Middle East. Doug was absolutely right in saying deterrence on
the peninsula has worked for 50 years. We have deterred a
large-scale invasion of South Korea by the North.
What we haven't been able to deter is smaller incursions,
terrorist acts, by North Korea. It is unclear to me whether our
current military posture, as strong as it is, without the
Agreed Framework and KEDO would be able to deter the North
Koreans from building a nuclear arsenal, from exporting nuclear
material, putting it on the marketplace along with ballistic
missile technology, as they have done in the past.
So deterrence is important. It is essential. However, I am
not sure that it addresses all of the policy concerns that the
United States has.
Mr. Cooksey. Let me go back to the KEDO process, in view of
your role in the--or your formal role in that organization. If
we are not able to work out a nuclear liability for the LWR
project, what are the delay and cost implications, particularly
if GE backs out?
Mr. Reiss. I think, as I said in my written remarks, that
there would be enormous delays and increase in costs. I don't
have a cost figure off the top of my head to give you. I can
try and find out and provide it to you and your staff. I think
that it would cause a significant delay. There might need to be
some plant redesign work being done. Whoever was found to
replace GE, the same issues of nuclear liability would arise.
Mr. Cooksey. Who could potentially replace GE?
Mr. Reiss. I think there is some thought that there is a
Japanese company or companies that could build similar
technology for the KEDO project.
Mr. Cooksey. Does South Korea, Europe, China, or Russia--do
any of these countries have the potential to replace them?
Mr. Reiss. I think it is possible technically that some
European companies may do so. I am not sure that the Russians,
since they operate a very different type of reactor system,
would be able to step in right away. Anybody who comes in,
though, is going to have to fit their product into the Korean
nuclear standard plant. So, there will be a lot of
retrofitting, a lot of adjustments. It is going to be a very
difficult process to try to put in a new component into an
existing system.
Mr. Cooksey. If their largest export is missiles, do any of
the three of you panelists think that there is any likelihood
that they would give up this single largest export, source of
hard currency?
Mr. Paal. I don't see them doing that. In fact, they have
an unusually good circumstance. As the Rumsfeld Commission
showed, you don't have to test missiles to have them. You can
do a lot of tabletop testing. You can also sell a few. It
reduces the price at which you can sell them, because people
are not as confident they are going to get the bang for the
buck. But if you can't get them anywhere else, you have still
got your market.
So, North Korea, even with the moratorium informal or
formalized, is still in a position to continue to market these
missiles.
Mr. Reiss. If I could offer a slightly different answer. I
think I would reply that we don't know the answer to that
because we haven't put a deal on the table with the North
Koreans. In the early 1990's, there were reports that the
Israelis had worked out an arrangement to buy out some or all
of the North Korean ballistic missile program, at least to
prevent them from exporting to other countries in the Middle
East that threatened Israel.
There also was a statement in June 1998 in which the North
Koreans strongly indicated that they are willing to sit down
and negotiate a price for their ballistic missile program. The
answer currently is that we don't know whether that is sincere
or whether that is posturing, because we haven't been able to
do what we need to do internally, the hard work of coordinating
our side of the table in order to engage seriously with them on
this issue.
Mr. Cooksey. Ambassador Sherman had made a statement that
she does not feel that they are likely to make a lot of
progress in a very rapid manner, that they think in terms of 40
years. I believe it was--wasn't that her? Do you agree with
that assessment, that they will outwait us--that they will be
slower in their negotiations process?
Mr. Paal. They don't have an election cycle and we do, and
it makes a big difference. It makes a big difference.
Mr. Cooksey. Forty-year election cycle.
Mr. Paal. That is right. It makes a real big difference in
how they can approach these issues. Also, they have--they see
negotiators come and go. It is not just the election cycle. Our
cycle doesn't fit neatly over the Japanese and South Korean
cycles either. They have a strong incentive to play us off
against each other and pick and choose the times when they want
to move.
Mr. Cooksey. Do you think they are likely to fire another
missile across Japan in the next 6 to 12 months?
Mr. Paal. I cannot prove the following statement, but I
believe it. I think some day we can prove it. That is I think
China, in pressing North Korea to stop making life worse for
China, by testing missiles that are leading to the theater
missile defense in Northeast Asia, probably gave some pretty
good tradeoffs to North Korea in terms of assistance on their
missile program.
This is so deeply embedded in the secrecy of the relations
between those regimes, and so undetectable by the relevant
intelligence means, that I clearly can't prove that at this
point. But it is in the nature of the way they deal, that this
is likely to be the case, in my personal view.
Mr. Reiss. I would be a little surprised if there was an
actual test, but I don't think we should be surprised if they
rattle the saber a little bit and threaten to do it in order to
ratchet up the negotiating leverage in the talks with the
United States, and perhaps also with Japan.
Mr. Cooksey. Do you think the other missile firing was a
saber rattling, or do you think it was actually a test? Or was
it all of the above?
Mr. Paal. It is difficult to untangle their motive. They
had--an important event took place, and there seemed to be an
effort to launch a satellite that would signal that North Korea
had arrived in some way. It serves the purpose of testing an
international range missile. It serves the purpose of marketing
such a missile. It gave them leverage in dealing with us.
They did things such as digging a hole at Kumchang-ni. Now,
whether that hole had a maligned intent in the initial phase or
not, we may, in fact, have surprised them by coming in with
300,000 tons of food to have a look at that hole in the ground
when they weren't going to do anything but just have a hole in
the ground. It is very hard to understand what their intentions
are.
Mr. Cooksey. I did see photographs of that hole in the
ground. It was an interesting hole in the ground.
I do appreciate your coming, all three of you--Mr. Paal,
Dr. Reiss, and Mr. Snyder--to testify in front of this
Committee. It is one of the many problems that we have got to
deal with, and it is a problem that could impact everyone in
the world. I think there are going to be some rogue nations for
the foreseeable future.
I did read something recently--that at the beginning of
this Century, there was probably less than 5 percent of the
world's population that lived under a true democracy in which
every segment of society could vote. We were not part of that 5
percent.
Today, 48 percent of the 6 billion people in the world are
in democracies and can truly vote. Hopefully, North Korea will
get there someday, but I think they will be the last to get
there at the rate they are going. I think that we are going to
have some inherent costs in that delay.
I personally feel that the quickest way to bring it about
would be for them to collapse economically, or something along
those lines. From everything I have gathered in the information
that we are presented, I don't really know that there are
people there that would move in and be part of an insurrection,
or be part of the leadership, or have the background to be part
of the leadership of a nation that would be able to be
players--reasonable, rational players--with democracy as a
political model and market forces as an economic model.
Thank you for being here today. We are glad to have had all
of you here and look forward to seeing you again.
[Whereupon, at 12:14 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.]
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A P P E N D I X
March 16, 2000
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