[Senate Hearing 107-54]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 107-54
U.S. POLICY TOWARD NORTH KOREA: WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED SEVENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
MAY 23, 2001
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Relations
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/
senate
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
73-070 WASHINGTON : 2001
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
JESSE HELMS, North Carolina, Chairman
RICHARD G. LUGAR, Indiana JOSEPH R. BIDEN, Jr., Delaware
CHUCK HAGEL, Nebraska PAUL S. SARBANES, Maryland
GORDON H. SMITH, Oregon CHRISTOPHER J. DODD, Connecticut
CRAIG THOMAS, Wyoming JOHN F. KERRY, Massachusetts
BILL FRIST, Tennessee RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin
LINCOLN D. CHAFEE, Rhode Island PAUL D. WELLSTONE, Minnesota
GEORGE ALLEN, Virginia BARBARA BOXER, California
SAM BROWNBACK, Kansas ROBERT G. TORRICELLI, New Jersey
BILL NELSON, Florida
Stephen E. Biegun, Staff Director
Edwin K. Hall, Democratic Staff Director
(ii)
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Biden, Hon. Joseph R., Jr., U.S. Senator from Delaware, prepared
statement...................................................... 10
Downs, Chuck, former Senior Defense and Foreign Policy Advisor,
House Republican Policy Committee; and consultant, McLean, VA.. 11
Prepared statement........................................... 13
Gallucci, Hon. Robert L., dean, Georgetown University, Edmund A.
Walsh School of Foreign Service, Washington, DC................ 2
Prepared statement........................................... 5
Laney, Hon. James T., co-chair, Council on Foreign Relations
Korea Task Force, Atlanta, GA.................................. 7
Prepared statement........................................... 9
Vollertsen, Dr. Norbert, volunteer, German Emergency Doctors,
Germany........................................................ 17
Report and prepared statement................................ 19
(iii)
U.S. POLICY TOWARD NORTH KOREA: WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?
----------
WEDNESDAY, MAY 23, 2001
U.S. Senate,
Committee on Foreign Relations,
Washington, DC.
The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:45 p.m. in room
SD-419, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Jesse Helms
(chairman of the committee) presiding.
Present: Senators Helms, Biden, and Bill Nelson.
The Chairman. The committee will come to order. We have a
rollcall vote on in the Senate, and other members are at least
delayed. I hope some of them will be able to get here, but I
have been authorized by the minority to proceed, which I
appreciate.
This afternoon, the Foreign Relations Committee will be
addressing U.S. policy regarding North Korea. Now, before
getting into the Bush administration's review of this policy, I
think it is worth remembering with whom we are dealing. The
Communist dictatorship in North Korea has been one of the most
evil regimes in this world. In more than 50 years the rulers of
Pyongyang have terrorized, tortured, imprisoned, and murdered
their own people, all of whom, and all of which continues to
this good day, unabated, as we meet here in Washington, DC.
Freedom House has described North Korea as, ``arguably the
most tightly controlled country in the world.'' Now, that
control is exercised through a variety of means, one being a
penal code right out of George Orwell's ``1984.'' According to
the State Department, the North Korean Penal Code stipulates
capital punishment for, and I am quoting, ``crimes against the
revolution,'' and that includes ``defection, attempted
defection, slander of the policies of the party or State,
listening to foreign broadcasts, writing reactionary letters,
and possessing critical material.''
In recent years, upwards of 10 percent of its population
perished from starvation and disease, but the North Korean
regime is continuing to lavish its funds on its huge and
offensively posturing military while watching the distribution
of food by foreign humanitarian groups.
Now, several questions I think must be addressed concerning
the policy of the United States regarding North Korea, but all
of them in my view must be premised upon a clear understanding
of the despicable regime with which we are dealing.
One issue that is properly being reviewed by the Bush
administration is the future of what is called the Agreed
Framework. Now, I have never believed that it has been sensible
to provide nuclear reactors to North Korea, a regime that has a
history of aggression and is a proven proliferator of weaponry.
Now, what conceivable interest does it serve the United States
to give nuclear technology to such a regime?
In late 2000, it was reported that the Clinton
administration sought South Korean and Japanese support for
replacing the nuclear reactors with conventional power plants,
and in March of this year the author of the Agreed Framework,
Robert Gallucci, whom we have with us today, expressed his
preference for the conventional power option.
Last, we must consider the threat posed to the United
States and its allies by North Korea's ongoing missile program.
We already know that from its 1998 test that North Korea has
the capability to deliver a sizable warhead to Alaska and
Hawaii. Moreover, we have yet to deal with North Korea's
missile production deployment and/or exports.
In its zeal to dispense with the nuclear era and missile
threat from North Korea and foster relations with its inhuman
and dictatorial regime, the Clinton administration completely
ignored North Korea's massive conventional army that still
looms just over the border from Seoul, and we will continue to
do that at our own peril.
So those are among the issues that I hope that our
witnesses will examine today, and Senator Biden, when he comes,
and if he is able to come, we will yield to him wherever we
stand in the process.
I am very pleased and proud of the witnesses here today,
and I am grateful to each of you for being here, and if I get
your name wrong, please correct me. Dr. Norbert Vollertsen.
This gentleman is formerly of the German Emergency Doctors, a
humanitarian group assisting North Korea. Mr. Chuck Downs,
former Deputy Director of the East Asian Office of the
Pentagon, and author of the book, ``Over the Line: North
Korea's Negotiating Strategy.'' I had a copy here, and I will
get it back. Ambassador Robert Gallucci, dean of the Georgetown
School of Foreign Service, and last but not least, Ambassador
James Laney, former Ambassador to South Korea.
And I suppose I always believe in starting on the left and
proceeding to the right, so we end up in the right. Dr.
Gallucci, we will be glad to hear from you. I believe there has
been some agreement about our timing so that we can have a lot
of questions. You may proceed, sir.
STATEMENT OF HON. ROBERT L. GALLUCCI, DEAN, GEORGETOWN
UNIVERSITY, EDMUND A. WALSH SCHOOL OF FOREIGN SERVICE,
WASHINGTON, DC
Ambassador Gallucci. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me begin
by saying that I am grateful and honored to have the
opportunity to appear before you today and speak to the
question of our future policy toward North Korea.
Mr. Chairman, with your permission I would like to submit a
slightly longer statement for the record.
The Chairman. Yes, sir. We appreciate that. You can read
from it as you please.
Ambassador Gallucci. It seems to me that we should begin to
address this question by clearly stating that we do not want to
go back to the past, to where we were 8 years ago. It was, in
fact, on May 26, 1993 that I appeared before this committee to
explain the Clinton administration's approach to the developing
crisis over North Korea's nuclear weapons program.
Then we estimated that the Democratic People's Republic of
Korea's [DPRK] existing research reactor, plus two more
reactors under construction and an expanded reprocessing
facility would give the North Koreans the capability to produce
and separate annually roughly 150 kilograms of plutonium,
easily enough for 30 nuclear weapons within 3 to 5 years.
Today, all the facilities we identified as essential to
North Korea's nuclear weapons program are frozen and open to
inspection. The DPRK remains in the nonproliferation treaty,
and, under the terms of the 1994 Agreed Framework, the North
will satisfy the International Atomic Energy Agency [IAEA] on
all inspection issues before it can begin receiving equipment
necessary to construct the light water reactors envisioned in
the framework. Moreover, there has been a noticeable reduction
in tensions between North and South Korea, as well as a
significant amount of diplomatic engagement by the North with a
number of countries around the world.
That said, we are not now where we wish to be with North
Korea, far from it. I would state our objectives in priority
order as first preserving our alliances with Japan and the
Republic of Korea and protecting their security; second,
preventing North Korea from acquiring nuclear weapons and a
nuclear weapons production capability; third, reducing the risk
of a war on the Korean Peninsula; fourth, preventing the North
from further testing, production, deployment, or export of
extended range ballistic missiles and ballistic missile
technology; and fifth, promoting improved relations between
North and South, leading to a reunified nation with a
democratic government and a market economy.
To achieve these objectives, we should try to preserve the
Agreed Framework so long as we believe it is denying North
Korea the capability to produce fissile material for nuclear
weapons. In other words, if we should conclude that there is
good evidence that the North is cheating on its terms by
constructing secret nuclear facilities, as we did in 1998, then
we should do what we did then, insist on whatever access is
necessary to resolve our concerns.
Note here that the access we enjoyed in that case did not
come from any verification provisions in the Agreed Framework.
It came from the political realities of our relationship. The
benefits that flow to the North by virtue of the framework gave
us sufficient leverage to gain access to the site that was the
focus of our concern. This should be instructive as we consider
other arrangements with North Korea where we may wish to have
strict verification procedures.
The alternative to those procedures is not trust--the
Agreed Framework could be considered a monument to the highest
levels of mistrust between two nations--but a carefully crafted
deal that exposes neither side to more harm than it would
suffer absent an agreement, even if the other side does cheat,
and that provides a basis for inspection to resolve concerns
about cheating.
Second, if we conclude that there is virtue in trying to
improve the terms of the Agreed Framework by, for example,
seeking to substitute fossil-fueled power plants for the
nuclear reactors described in the framework, then we should
approach the North only after consultation with, and the
concurrence of, our allies in Seoul and Tokyo, and with no
threat to the North that we would unilaterally abandon the
framework if they did not accept the approach.
The point here is that our treaty allies who were with us
throughout the negotiations of the framework have agreed to
bear nearly the entire burden of the nuclear reactor
construction cost, have put their own domestic political
interests and bilateral relationship with the North at risk,
and are of overriding importance to the United States long-term
strategic goals in Northeast Asia.
As for the acceptance by the North Koreans, that follows
from the first point, that we should not abandon the framework
so long as it is fulfilling its primary purpose.
Third, we should clearly engage the North Koreans in a
negotiation to see if we cannot end the threat that their
ballistic missile program now poses to Japan, will pose to the
United States, and does pose to the stability of South Asia and
the Middle East by virtue of exports to those regions. We
should do this not because we trust North Korea to live up to
an agreement, but because we may be able to negotiate the
verification provisions we need to monitor compliance, or craft
an arrangement that improves our security and that of our
allies, even if we achieve less than what we might want in
inspection procedures.
The policy question revolves around defining available
alternatives to achieve our national security objectives, and
then making the right comparison when assessing a possible
agreement, comparing the best deal that can be made with the
North to making no deal at all, rather than to some notion of
an ideal agreement.
Fourth, in close coordination with our allies from the
South, we should eventually seek to engage the North in
discussions that would reduce the risk of a conventional
conflict on the Korean Peninsula. This would involve the kinds
of confidence and security-building measures proposed and
implemented elsewhere that reduce the risk of surprise attack,
and increase levels of transparency on both sides.
Finally, we should be willing to engage the North in
discussions of political, economic, and security issues, always
in consultation with our allies, with the long-term objective
of reducing tensions on the peninsula and contributing to a
process that would lead to reunification. We should do this
with our eyes open, aware that we do not know what calculations
the leadership of North Korea is making in its recent openings
to the United States, South Korea, and the rest of the world.
Anyone who has read the history of that country over the
last 50 years, or reads the newspaper today, knows that North
Korea has been responsible for war and horrendous acts of
terrorism in the past, and that there are no guarantees about
its future policy, as welcome as some of its policies of the
last few years may be. Moreover, the regime in the North is as
close to totalitarian as any on earth today, and we should not
be optimistic about internal transformations any time soon.
But to conclude from this dismal picture that negotiation
is wrong, that we should not reward North Korea with political
and economic benefits in exchange for the outcomes we seek, is
to retreat to superficially pleasing rhetoric that highlights
the threat posed by North Korea, but offers no plausible policy
to address it. Neither a policy of sanctions nor one that
simply enhanced our defense and deterrent posture in the region
would prevent North Korea from developing nuclear weapons and
ballistic missiles that would directly threaten our country.
Were we to use force to block these programs, we would in
the end no doubt prevail, but at the cost of lives, perhaps
many lives. To do this unnecessarily, without exploring
negotiated solutions, would not be in our Nation's interest,
that of our allies, and certainly not in the best interests of
the 37,000 Americans currently deployed in South Korea.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Ambassador Gallucci follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Robert L. Gallucci
Mr. Chairman and members of the Committee, let me begin by saying
that I am grateful and honored to have the opportunity to appear before
you today and speak to the question of our future policy toward North
Korea.
It seems to me, that we should begin to address this question by
clearly stating that we do not want to go back to the past, to where we
were eight years ago. It was, in fact, on May 26th of 1993 that I
appeared before this Committee to explain the Clinton Administration's
approach to the developing crisis over North Korea's nuclear weapons
program. Then, we estimated that the DPRK's existing research reactor,
plus two more reactors under construction, and an expanded reprocessing
facility, would give the North the capability to produce and separate,
annually, roughly one hundred and fifty kilograms of plutonium, easily
enough for thirty nuclear weapons, within three to five years. The DPRK
had also announced its intention to withdraw from the Nuclear Non-
Proliferation Treaty, and indicated that it would never accept the
special inspections that the International Atomic Energy Agency said
were necessary to determine how much plutonium it had produced in the
past. In addition, relations between North and South Korea were tense
and intermittently marked by provocations from North Korea, a country
that was essentially isolated from the international community.
Today, all the facilities that we identified as essential to North
Korea's nuclear weapons program are frozen and open to inspection, the
DPRK remains in the NPT and, under the terms of the 1994 Agreed
Framework, the North will satisfy the IAEA on all inspection issues
before it can begin receiving equipment necessary to construct the
light water reactors envisioned in the Framework. Moreover, there has
been a noticeable reduction in tensions between North and South Korea,
as well as a significant amount of diplomatic engagement by the North
with a number of countries around the world.
That said, we are not now where we wish to be with North Korea; far
from it. I would state our objectives, in priority order, as
preserving our alliances with Japan and the Republic of
Korea, and protecting their security;
preventing North Korea from acquiring nuclear weapons and a
nuclear weapons production capability;
reducing the risk of a war on the Korean peninsula;
preventing the North from further testing, production,
deployment or export of extended range ballistic missiles and
ballistic missile technology; and
promoting improved relations between North and South leading
to a reunified nation with a democratic government and a market
economy.
To achieve these objectives, we should first try to preserve the
Agreed Framework, so long as we believe that it is denying North Korea
the capability to produce fissile material for nuclear weapons. In
other words, if we should conclude that there is good evidence that the
North is cheating on its terms by constructing secret nuclear
facilities, as we did in 1998, then we should do what we did then:
insist on whatever access is necessary to resolve our concerns. Note
here that the access we enjoyed in that case did not come from any
verification provisions in the Agreed Framework. It came from the
political realities of our relationship. The benefits that flow to the
North, by virtue of the Framework, gave us sufficient leverage to gain
access to the site that was the focus of our concern. This should be
instructive as we consider other arrangements with North Korea where we
may wish to have strict verification procedures. The alternative to
those procedures is not trust--the Agreed Framework could be considered
a monument to the highest levels of mistrust between two nations--but a
carefully crafted deal that exposes neither side to more harm than it
would suffer absent an agreement, even if the other side does cheat,
and that provides a basis for inspection to resolve concerns about
cheating.
Second, if we conclude that there is virtue in trying to improve
the terms of the Agreed Framework by, for example, seeking to
substitute fossil fueled power plants for the nuclear reactors
described in the Framework, then we should approach the North only
after consultation with and concurrence of our allies in Seoul and
Tokyo, and with no threat to the North that we would unilaterally
abandon the Framework if they did not accept our approach. The point
here is that our Treaty allies were with us throughout the negotiations
of the Framework, have agreed to bear nearly the entire burden of the
nuclear reactor construction cost, have put their own domestic
political interests and bilateral relationship with the North at risk,
and are of overriding importance to the United States' long-term
strategic goals in Northeast Asia. As for the acceptance by the North
Koreans, that follows from the first point, that we should not abandon
the Framework so long as it is fulfilling its primary purpose.
Third, we should clearly engage the North Koreans in negotiation to
see if we cannot end the threat that their ballistic missile program
now poses to Japan, will pose to the United States, and does pose to
the stability of South Asia and the Middle East by virtue of exports to
those regions. This is the course that the Clinton Administration was
on right up until the very end when Secretary of State Madeleine
Albright visited Pyongyang last year. It is entirely consistent with
the course set by former Secretary of Defense Perry in his report on
``where we should go from here'' with North Korea. We should do this,
not because we trust North Korea to live up to an agreement, but
because we may be able to negotiate the verification provisions we need
to monitor compliance, or craft an arrangement that improves our
security and that of our allies, even if we achieve less than what we
might want in inspection procedures. For example, monitoring
commitments not to test extended range ballistic missiles or to refrain
from certain exports of material or technology, might be less demanding
in terms of inspections than monitoring production or even deployment
of those missiles. The policy question revolves around defining
available alternatives to achieve our national security objectives, and
then making the right comparison when assessing a possible agreement:
comparing the best deal that can be made with the North to making no
deal at all--rather than to some notion of an ideal agreement.
Fourth, in close coordination with our allies in the South, we
should eventually seek to engage the North in discussions that would
reduce the risk of a conventional conflict on the Korean peninsula.
This would involve the kinds of confidence and security building
measures proposed and implemented elsewhere that reduce the risk of
surprise attack and increase levels of transparency on both sides.
Finally, we should be willing to engage the North in discussions of
political, economic and security issues, always in consultation with
our allies, with the long-term objective of reducing tensions on the
peninsula and contributing to a process that would lead to
reunification. We should do this with our eyes open, aware that we do
not know what calculations the leadership of North Korea is making in
its recent openings to the United States, South Korea and the rest of
the world. Anyone who has read the history of that country over the
last fifty years, or reads the newspaper today, knows that North Korea
has been responsible for war and horrendous acts of terrorism in the
past, and that there are no guarantees about its future policy, as
welcome as some of its policies of the last few years may be. Moreover,
the regime in the North is as close to totalitarian as any on earth
today, and we should not be optimistic about internal transformations
any time soon.
But to conclude from this dismal picture that negotiation is wrong,
that we should not ``reward'' North Korea with political or economic
benefits in exchange for the outcomes we seek, is to retreat to
superficially pleasing rhetoric that highlights the threat posed by
North Korea, but offers no plausible policy to address it. Neither a
policy of sanctions nor one that simply enhanced our defense and
deterrent posture in the region would prevent North Korea from
developing nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles that would directly
threaten our country. Were we to use force to block these programs, we
would in the end no doubt prevail, but at the cost of lives, perhaps
many lives. To do this unnecessarily, without exploring negotiated
solutions would not be in our nation's interest, that of our allies,
and certainly not in the best interests of the thirty-seven thousand
Americans currently deployed in South Korea.
Thank you Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you, sir.
We have been joined by the distinguished Senator from
Florida, Senator Bill Nelson. Sir, do you have any opening
comments?
Senator Nelson. Mr. Chairman, no. Just, I am ready to
participate in the questioning. I thank you.
The Chairman. We appreciate your coming.
Ambassador Laney. That is a familiar name down in my
country.
STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES T. LANEY, CO-CHAIR, COUNCIL ON FOREIGN
RELATIONS KOREA TASK FORCE, ATLANTA, GA
Ambassador Laney. I want to thank you for the privilege of
appearing here today. I have been involved with Korea since I
first went there in the Army in 1946 in counterintelligence,
later returned as an educational missionary, and more recently
served as Ambassador, so Korea is something that is close to my
heart and to all of our concerns.
In my mind there are three parts to our Korea policy. The
first is to maintain with our staunch ally, Seoul, a robust and
unassailable deterrence, the second is to support the South's
initiatives toward the North in reducing tension and
encouraging Pyongyang to open up to the rest of the world, the
third is for the United States to engage the North in
negotiations designed to end the threat of nuclear weapons and
missiles on the peninsula.
The first, the United States must continue to invest in the
U.S.-ROK security partnership. That alliance has been
extraordinarily successful in underpinning stability in
Northeast Asia not just on the peninsula and establishing a
position of strength from which South Korea could test
reconciliation with the North.
Seoul has clearly stated that the U.S. military will remain
critical to its security even after the North Korean threat has
gone, whenever that might be. It is consistent with Seoul's
efforts at reconciliation for the U.S. and ROK Governments to
point in specific terms to the North Korean threat and to
continue reinforcing deterrence, particularly in the areas of
counterbattery fire missile defense and protection against
weapons of mass destruction. The United States should improve
U.S.-ROK joint readiness in these areas and begin preparing the
alliance relationship for a longer term role in regional
security.
Second, South Korea has made important progress in tension
reduction with the North, and should have U.S. support. Seoul's
strategy of cooperation and reconciliation with North Korea has
moved the political dynamics on the peninsula in a positive
direction. It is true that without a reduction of the North
Korean military threat and improvement in human rights in the
North, diplomacy with Pyongyang can only go so far. That is a
given. However, these should be the goals of our policy and not
preconditions for the South's efforts at tension reduction. Kim
Dae-jung's focus on reconciliation is the right way to begin
the process and is clearly in U.S. interests, and we should
offer full support for his initiatives.
Third, it is in the U.S. interest to negotiate a verifiable
elimination of North Korea's long-range missile program. Last
year, North Korea appeared interested in negotiating a
comprehensive agreement to reduce its long-range ballistic
missiles in exchange for various inducements. Such an agreement
cannot be achieved without lengthy and deliberate negotiations,
followed by effective verification measures. Nevertheless, the
scope of North Korea's proposal was unprecedented, and the
North would have prohibited all exports of long-range missiles
and related items in exchange for in-kind assistance in such
categories as food and medicine.
In addition, the North said it would ban further indigenous
testing and production above a certain range, in exchange,
again, for in-kind compensation. However, in working level
talks the North balked at intrusive verification, did not
address their deployed missiles, and remained vague about the
threshold of the long-range missiles. For that reason, there
were no talks.
The United States should resume talks on missiles in the
near future, but should make the bottom line clear: effective
verification, elimination of long-range missiles, a danger that
the chairman has pointed to, provision of in-kind assistance to
the North that would not include sensitive technology, and a
movement toward subsequent steps to reduce tensions in the
conventional military threat.
If those objectives can be met, a broad agreement with
North Korea on missiles would be significant accomplishment,
and would enhance stability in northeast Asia, and the South's
efforts at reconciliation. In the meantime, I think the United
States should invite its allies to review the Agreed Framework
but without any unilateral changes by any party. For that
reason, I defer to Ambassador Gallucci's comments.
The 1994 Agreed Framework has frozen North Korea's known
nuclear weapons. Any review should focus on both remaining
challenges to full implementation of the Framework Agreement as
well as opportunities to engage North Korea on a revision of
the terms to meet Pyongyang's immediate energy needs. I would
also want to say that the United States would be wise to
continue its energetic trilateral U.S.-ROK-Japan coordination.
Pyongyang's new diplomacy is the result of three
developments, no change of heart, its desperate economic
situation, Kim Dae-jung's patient diplomacy, and closer U.S.-
Japan-South Korean trilateral coordination. A close trilateral
relationship raises the cost for North Korean belligerence and
defines the international community's terms for economic
relations should the North change its stance. The United States
should therefore support the trilateral coordination and
oversight group process.
I think we must be firm and strong in dealing with North
Korea, but I do think that we should avoid unnecessary
bellicosity or demonizing. One of the welcome results of
President Kim's policy has been the elimination of such
language by the North both in the media and along the DMZ,
reducing the hostile atmosphere.
Finally, I think our policy should make it clear to the
North that it is in their interest to work with us in making
the peninsula and northeast Asia a more stable place, and to
enable them to do that finally without losing face.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Ambassador Laney follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. James T. Laney
I want to express my appreciation for the privilege of appearing
before this distinguished Committee today. I have been involved with
Korea since I first went there in 1946 in Army Counter Intelligence,
later as an educational missionary from 1959-64, and more recently as
ambassador from 1993-97. Needless to say, it is a subject close to my
heart.
There are three parts to our Korean policy. The first is to
maintain, with our staunch ally Seoul, a robust and unassailable
deterrence. The second is to support the South's initiatives toward the
North to reduce tension and encourage Pyongyang in opening up to the
rest of the world. The third is for the U.S. to engage the North in
negotiations designed to end the threat of nuclear weapons and missiles
on the peninsula.
1. The U. S. must continue to invest in the U.S.-ROK security
partnership. The U.S.-ROK alliance has been extraordinarily
successful at underpinning stability in Northeast Asia and
establishing a position of strength for South Korea to test
reconciliation with the North. Seoul has clearly stated that
the U.S. military will remain critical to its security even
after the North Korean threat is gone. It is consistent with
Seoul's efforts at reconciliation for the U.S. and ROK
governments to point in specific terms to the North Korean
threat and to continue reinforcing deterrence, particularly in
the areas of counter-battery fire, missile defense, and
protection against weapons of mass destruction. The U.S. should
improve U.S.-ROK joint readiness in these areas and to begin
preparing the alliance relationship for a longer-term role in
regional security.
2. South Korea has made important progress in tension
reduction with the North and should have U.S. support. Seoul's
strategy of cooperation and reconciliation with North Korea has
moved the political dynamics on the peninsula in a positive
direction. It is true that without a reduction of the North
Korean military threat and improvement in human rights in the
North, diplomacy with Pyongyang will only go so far. However,
these should be the goals of policy and not preconditions for
the South's efforts at tension reduction. Kim Dae Jung's focus
on cooperation and reconciliation is the right way to begin the
process and is clearly in U.S. interests, and we should offer
full support for his initiatives.
3. It is in U.S. interests to negotiate a verifiable
elimination of North Korea's long-range missile program. Last
year, North Korea appeared interested in negotiating a
comprehensive agreement to reduce its long-range ballistic
missiles in exchange for various inducements. Such an agreement
cannot be achieved without lengthy and deliberate negotiations
followed by effective verification measures. Nevertheless, the
scope of North Korea's proposal was unprecedented. The North
would prohibit all exports of long-range missiles and related
items in exchange for in-kind assistance in categories such as
food. In addition, the North said it would ban further
indigenous testing and production above a certain range in
exchange for in-kind compensation and assistance with launching
commercial satellites. However, in working-level talks the
North balked at ``intrusive'' verification, did not address
already deployed missiles, and remained vague about the exact
threshold for ``long-range'' missiles.
The United States should resume talks on missiles in the near
future, but must make the bottom line clear: 1) effective
verification; 2) elimination of long-range missiles already
deployed; 3) provision of in-kind assistance to the North that
would not include sensitive technology transfers; and, 4)
movement toward subsequent steps to reduce tensions and the
conventional military threat. If these objectives can be met, a
broad agreement with North Korea on missiles would be a
significant accomplishment and would enhance both stability in
Northeast Asia and the South's efforts at reconciliation.
In the meantime, the United States should invite its allies to
review the Agreed Framework, but there should be no unilateral changes
by any party. The 1994 Agreed Framework has frozen North Korea's known
nuclear weapons program. Any review should focus on both the remaining
challenges to full implementation of the Agreed Framework as well as
potential opportunities to engage North Korea on a revision of the
terms to meet Pyongyang's immediate energy needs. It is striking, for
example, that the North has recently asked for direct electrical energy
from the South until the light water reactors are ready. The South is
under no obligation to provide this energy and should not do so without
linking it to the North's obligations under the Agreed Framework.
Nevertheless, this new development suggests that some reworking of the
1994 accord might be possible. The United States should stand by its
commitments and its allies and make no unilateral changes to the Agreed
Framework, and not accept any delay in the nonproliferation milestones
contained within it. However, circumstances may require a fresh
collective look at the LWR project.
The U.S. must also continue energetic trilateral U.S.-ROK-Japan
coordination. Pyongyang's new diplomacy is the result of three
developments: the North's desperate economic situation, Kim Dae Jung's
patient diplomacy, and closer U.S.-Japan-South Korean trilateral
coordination. A close trilateral relationship raises the cost for North
Korean belligerence and defines the international community's terms for
improved economic relations should the North change its stance. The
U.S. should support the Trilateral Coordination and Oversight Group
process.
While we must be firm and strong in dealing with North Korea, it
does not follow that we must necessarily be bellicose or employ
demonizing language. One of the welcome results of President Kim's
policy has been the elimination of such language by the North both in
the media and along the D.M.Z., reducing the hostile atmosphere.
Finally, we must make it clear to the North how it is in their
interests to work with us in making the peninsula a more stable place,
and to enable them to do that without losing face.
The Chairman. Thank you, sir. We have been joined by the
distinguished Ranking Member, Senator Biden. Do you have any
opening comments?
Senator Biden. Mr. Chairman, I would ask unanimous consent
my comments be placed in the record. I apologize to the
witnesses for being tied up. I am anxious to hear and ask
questions, but thank you.
[The prepared statement of Senator Biden follows:]
Prepared Statement of Senator Joseph R. Biden, Jr.
Today, the Foreign Relations Committee examines the future of U.S.
policy toward North Korea. This hearing is particularly timely, as the
administration is in the middle of its Korea policy review.
I am glad that President Bush is spending some time to make sure
the administration gets Korea policy right. It's a new administration,
and it is understandable that they will need a few months to get their
feet on the ground.
But I hope the administration will expeditiously complete its
review and that it will conclude, as I have, that the best way to
advance our interests is to join with our South Korean, Japanese, and
European allies in a hard-headed strategy of engaging North Korea and
luring it out of its isolation.
Over the April recess, I asked a member of the staff of the Foreign
Relations Committee to travel to Northeast Asia to explore the
prospects for peace and reconciliation on the Korean Peninsula. He was
the first member of the United States Government to travel officially
to North Korea since President Bush was inaugurated.
In a report released today, he concludes that North Korea is
engaged in a major strategic opening to the outside world, and that
this opening may afford the United States a unique opportunity to rein-
in the North's nuclear and ballistic missile programs.
I urge the administration to test North Korea's commitment to
peace. Specifically, I hope the administration will ``pick up where the
Clinton administration left off,'' on missile talks, as Secretary
Powell pledged prior to the arrival of South Korean President Kim Dae-
jung to Washington last March. North Korea earlier this month
unilaterally extended its missile launch moratorium until 2003.
If that is not a signal of its willingness to talk about this
issue, I don't know what is.
Progress on the missile issue would have profound implications for
U.S. security interests not only on the Korean Peninsula, but around
the world. If we were able to curtail North Korea's development and
export of long-range missiles, we would gain much-needed time and
flexibility in our own deliberations on national missile defenses.
President Bush has wondered aloud whether engaging North Korea is
``naive,'' and he has expressed his skepticism about North Korea as a
negotiating partner. Who can blame him?
One of our witnesses today--Chuck Downs--literally ``wrote the
book'' about North Korea's truculent negotiating tactics, and another--
Dean Gallucci--suffered through months of meetings with ornery North
Korean counterparts.
Ambassador Laney knows the difficult challenges of negotiating not
only with North Korea, but also with our South Korean allies!
I can't speak for them, but I would wager that all of our witnesses
would endorse an approach to North Korea based on President Reagan's
famous maxim of ``trust, but verify.''
In the case of North Korea, perhaps we should ``mistrust, and
verify.'' But we should also remember to keep our eye on the ball.
Advancing vital U.S. interests over time is the objective of
engagement, not a prerequisite for dialogue.
Some may argue that no verifiable deal is possible. There will
always be those who prefer inaction to action, and sometimes their
pessimism is warranted.
But the nay-sayers argued that North Korea would never sign the
Agreed Framework and permit 24-7 International Atomic Energy Agency
monitoring of its nuclear facility at Yongbyon, never shut its
reprocessing plant, never let U.S. military personnel search for the
remains of U.S. servicemen missing from the Korean War, never permit
inspections of a suspicious underground military facility, never
approve Chinese-style economic reforms, never permit monitoring of food
aid deliveries, and never permit travel across the DMZ from Seoul to
Pyongyang.
And they were wrong on all counts.
So I think we should give it a try.
I look forward to hearing from our distinguished panel of witnesses
and to getting their advice on how the United States can best secure
its vital national interests on the Korean Peninsula.
The Chairman. Mr. Downs.
STATEMENT OF MR. CHUCK DOWNS, FORMER DEFENSE POLICY ANALYST,
HOUSE REPUBLICAN POLICY COMMITTEE AND CONSULTANT, McLEAN, VA
Mr. Downs. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate being
invited to discuss this issue with such a distinguished panel.
We should ask from the outset why we are all here today
talking about North Korea. When you look at North Korea from
any distance, you realize that it is a small, resource-poor,
and very unpleasant country to deal with. Nicholas Eberstadt
and Richard Ellings have just released a book today on North
Korea that points out its population is roughly the same as
Romania, and its international trade is essentially the same as
Nepal's. Yet we deal with North Korea as though it is an issue
of great international significance, and it is.
But the reason that we deal with North Korea is because of
its threats and because of its misery. Many have called for the
Bush administration to forthwith resume direct negotiations
with North Korea, presumably on the same basis that the Clinton
administration had pursued its relations with North Korea.
North Korea itself has called for a resumption of the talks,
although North Korea was just a few years ago, extremely
reluctant to enter into talks with the United States. There has
been deep congressional disapproval of past policies that needs
to be attended to before talks can resume.
As you know, I served on the staff of the House Policy
Committee, and I would like to point out some of the actions
taken by the House in recent years. In the 1999 DOD
Authorization Act, the Congress called for the creation of a
North Korea policy coordinator. That began the ``Perry
process.'' In the year 2000, both Houses of Congress passed the
North Korea Threat Reduction Act, which required Presidential
certification that North Korea had complied with the Agreed
Framework and the nonproliferation treaty's commitments.
In this past year there have been efforts, one called
Gilman-Markey, a bipartisan House of Representatives effort
requiring that before nuclear components could be transferred
to North Korea there should be a positive action to approve a
transfer on the part of the U.S. Congress. This passed the
House of Representatives by a vote of 374 to 6. There was also
a provision called Cox-Markey prohibiting U.S. indemnification
of companies involved in the North Korean Nuclear Project. That
measure was approved by 334 Members of the House of
Representatives to 85.
There have been significant concerns voiced in this
process: No. 1, the danger from plutonium that would be
produced by light water reactors, No. 2, the larger question of
enriching the regime with aid even while the regime's people
suffer severely, and No. 3, the question of whether the Agreed
Framework, which provides for light water reactors, can
actually be implemented--that is, whether it is technically
possible to carry out many of the provisions of the agreement.
Talks can always be supported in general terms, but
advanced coordination, as I think Ambassador Gallucci just
pointed out quite articulately, is always essential for the
process. Furthermore, we must be careful not to give the regime
increased leverage as we push for a resumption of negotiations.
In a context of a policy that has, at best, produced mixed
results with North Korea, it is highly valuable for the new
administration to conduct a thorough and wide-ranging policy
review.
The current hiatus in direct negotiations between North
Korea and the United States is not merely an opportunity for
the Bush administration to get its act together. It is also an
opportunity to test North Korea's commitment to fulfill the
rhetoric of cooperation that we have heard so much of in the
last year. Furthermore, it is an opportunity to test the theory
that guided so much of the Clinton administration's approach.
If North Korea in fact recognizes that because of its economic
difficulties it must pursue reform in order to survive, that
commitment on their part should be reflected in their behavior
today.
During this time of review by the Bush administration,
however, Pyongyang has been sending signals that it seeks to
control the pace and substance of negotiations. In a sense,
this is not surprising, and it is certainly consistent with
Pyongyang's negotiating strategy over the long term. North
Korea has emphasized that it can turn the heat higher or lower,
as it sees fit, in moves that appeared generous but was
actually subtly coercive.
For example, Pyongyang said that it would continue its
informal commitment not to test missiles until 2003, depending,
it said, on the outcome of the Bush administration's review.
This is an understandable, perhaps even clever ploy, but it
should be recognized as an attempt to pressure both the Bush
administration and South Korea. In South Korea, the implication
is that the North's apparent cooperation may end when Kim Dae-
jung leaves office.
Similarly, the flap over the Bush administration's
statements on verification and reciprocity has also been
instructive. The notion that there should be verification and
reciprocity is not new. In fact, both terms were used by
Secretary Perry in the Perry report, but this past January,
when now-Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage mentioned
the need for these two objectives, North Korea's official news
service released a stream of invective.
What matters now is thoroughness. The thoroughness with
which the Bush administration addresses the issues, and the
ongoing consultations with our allies and friends must send
strong signals to Pyongyang about the character and operational
sophistication of the Bush administration. Lengthy
consultations have already begun, and I would argue they have
been quite successful. It would be irresponsible, and, in no
uncertain terms, unresponsive to the Congress if the Bush
administration did not take a good period for the review of our
policy toward North Korea.
Does that bell mean my time has expired? Thank you very
much. I will end on that note, then. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Downs follows:]
Prepared Statement of Chuck Downs
NORTH KOREA'S NEGOTIATING BEHAVIOR
Mr. Chairman, I appreciate your invitation to appear before the
Senate Foreign Relations Committee today to discuss our nation's policy
toward North Korea. Although I have, in the past, served at the
Pentagon and on Capitol Hill, I am not here to speak on behalf of the
administration, the Department of Defense, or the House of
Representatives. As you mentioned, I have written a book about North
Korea's negotiating behavior that tracks their negotiating strategy
over the five decades. I think there are very clear patterns that
emerge from this study that can inform our discussions of how to
proceed with North Korea, and I appreciate the opportunity to share
some of my conclusions with the Committee.
First, we need to recognize how crucial the process of negotiation
is to the North Korean regime. Few nations put such strong emphasis on
the importance of negotiation as a principal instrument of foreign
policy. When other nations have done so, it has often been because they
entered negotiations from a position of strength. The North Korean
regime, however, pursues negotiation because of its weakness. Simply
put, negotiation is North Korea's means of obtaining benefits its
system cannot provide.
It stands to reason that North Korea's leaders have more intimate
familiarity with the failures of their own system than we do. They are
unenviably aware of the conditions Dr. Vollertsen has described to us
today. We talk of the regime's impending collapse, but they have been
burdened with a failing system for fifty years. Their behavior at the
negotiating table reveals their fears about their system.
The negotiating record shows that the North Korean regime has been
overwhelmingly preoccupied with three principal concerns: the regime's
tenuous hold on its people's loyalty, the dismal performance of its
disastrous national economic policy, and the need to enhance the
regime's survival by maintaining military capabilities that can
threaten foreign rivals. Coming to the negotiating table has always
been a means for addressing these severe systemic problems that plague
the regime. North Korea therefore manages negotiations to accomplish 3
objectives: (1) to give esteem and power to the regime thereby
strengthening its oppressive control over its people; (2) to obtain
economic benefits that the regime's Socialist economy is unable to
produce; and (3) to buy time and obtain resources for the development
of threatening military capabilities. The North's military capabilities
can then be used as a means of internal control and international
extortion.
Because North Korea has little to bring to the negotiating table,
it adopts negotiating stances that perpetually increase its leverage
for subsequent negotiations. In How Nations Negotiate, Dr. Fred Ikle
observed negotiations are not merely a question of reaching an
agreement or not reaching an agreement. There are always at least three
options at play, and one of the most important is developing the
prospects for future bargaining. This is where North Korea excels. Even
when no agreement is reached at the negotiating table, North Korea
generally ends up in a stronger position than when it started the
negotiations. In fact, it quite often extracts benefits from the other
side merely for participating in the negotiation itself.
Despite the prevalent characterizations of ``lunacy'' in its
negotiating style, North Korea has been extraordinarily consistent in
how it accomplishes its objectives. It has repeatedly initiated
negotiation by appearing to be open to fundamental changes in its
policies, used its willingness to participate in talks to demand pre-
conditions, benefits and concessions, and terminated discussions when
it has gained maximum advantage, blaming the lack of agreement on the
other side of the table. It manages negotiations so that its
adversaries experience stages of optimism, disillusionment, and
disappointment. Adversaries' disappointment, in turn, paves the way for
North Korea to create an illusion of fresh cooperation in the initial
stage of the next negotiation. It's all about increasing North Korea's
leverage in the next round of talks.
It is worth recalling that not long ago, the United States and
South Korea had to cajole North Korea to attend talks on missile
proliferation by offering to give North Korea humanitarian aid--
primarily food. Now, North Korea complains that the new Administration
is dragging its feet on proceeding with such talks. Little, if
anything, has changed in North Korea's position or its resistance to
restraints on missile proliferation. It certainly is no less committed
to driving a hard bargain; but it knows that complaining about some
perceived slight enhances its leverage by increasing pressure on the
Bush administration.
Almost anything can be used to enhance leverage. A case in point is
the anticipated visit of Kim Jong Il to South Korea in reciprocity for
Kim Dae Jung's courageous visit to Pyongyang last year. The people of
South Korea fervently hope to see it happen, and the outpouring of
emotion if the visit goes well will be unparalleled. Knowing this, the
North Korean regime delays and hedges regarding the proposed visit in
order to increase leverage in its dealings with South Korea. It is on
again, off again, depending on how Pyongyang wishes to express pleasure
or displeasure with South Korea.
Meetings between North and South Korea have diminished since Vice-
Marshal Cho Myung-rok visited Washington last October. At that time,
North Korea shifted its attention from Seoul to Washington.
Nevertheless, Pyongyang recently found a way to put additional pressure
on Seoul and Washington. It said that North-South dialogue would be
``suspended'' until after the Bush administration completed its review
of North Korea policy.
It is common for analysts of North Korea to discuss the gestures
that North Korea made during the past year as though they indicated
fundamental changes in North Korea's character. The hospitality, even
charm, of Kim Jong-Il has been viewed as evidence that North Korea
wishes to change its offensive behavior. Kim Jong-Il's facility in
handling policy discussions, the joint North-South appearance at the
Olympics, the exchange of visits between Pyongyang and Washington, and
the January visit of Kim Jong Il to Shanghai have all been applauded.
Pictures of smiling faces from Pyongyang accompany news of increased
diplomatic ties between North Korea and Italy, Australia, the
Philippines, Canada, Germany, Belgium, the UK, Netherlands, Spain, New
Zealand, and Turkey. Many hope these developments signal a reversal of
years of tension on the Korean peninsula.
At the same time, North Korea's gestures could be inspired by the
opposite purpose--to strengthen the regime, increase its oppressive
control over its own people, and purchase time and resources for the
North's expanding military machine. Although there is certainly a
different tone in the regime's approach to other nations, there has not
been a commensurate change in North Korea's internal or international
policies or actions.
Unfortunately, North Korea's management of similar periods of
``opening'' in the past suggest that North Korea can be expected to
reverse its approach whenever it concludes it has gained the maximum
benefit for its show of charm. There were two earlier promising periods
surrounding agreements in which North Korea was believed to be
``opening up'' toward the outside world: the South-North Communique of
July 4, 1972 and the agreements signed in 1992, one on denuclearization
and another called the basic agreement on North-South relations.
The 1972 communique produced agreement on principles that were
largely identical to the agreement reached a year ago. In the euphoric
words of the 1972 agreement, ``unification shall be achieved through
independent efforts without being subject to external imposition or
interference'' and ``through peaceful means, and not through the use of
force against each other.'' A ``South-North Coordinating Committee''
(SNCC) was established ostensibly to carry out the objectives of the
agreements. At Kim Il-Sung's insistence, however, the implementation
terms required subsequent agreement by both parties. Thus, North Korea
retained an ability to block the enforcement of agreements it had
already agreed to.
In the thirteen months following the 1972 communique, the two
Koreas convened six North-South Coordinating Committee meetings, seven
Red Cross plenary meetings, and numerous related subgroup meetings.
Despite the electrifying momentum behind the communique and the
succeeding months of contact, however, all the talks failed when the
North tired of the process and stopped attending meetings.
Another period of euphoria followed the important North-South
documents signed in 1992. The 1992 agreements were considerably more
detailed than any that have been signed between the Koreas before or
since. In them, the North and South agreed not to ``test, manufacture,
produce, receive, possess, store, deploy or use nuclear weapons'' and
to ``use nuclear energy solely for peaceful purposes.'' Both sides
agreed they would ``not possess nuclear reprocessing and uranium
enrichment facilities,'' and would verify denuclearization of the
Korean Peninsula through mutual inspections. This formal, signed
document stated that South and North Korea would ``establish and
operate a South-North Joint Nuclear Control Commission within one
month.''
Like the implementing arrangements of the 1972 communique, however,
the implementing arrangements for the 1992 agreements required
subsequent mutual agreement and therefore could be blocked by North
Korea. The promising 1992 accords also came to naught.
Advocates of a conciliatory approach to North Korea suggest that
times have changed, and North Korea's economic worries require North
Korea to take a more accommodating approach to the outside world.
The logic behind the Clinton administration's approach to North
Korea rested on a pragmatic belief that the pressure from economic and
political collapse would naturally bring about change in North Korea.
One of the administration's leading experts on Korean issues,
Ambassador Charles Kartman, observed in 1997, ``dire prospects are
pressing the North Korean leadership to review its traditional
isolation, a development we, the ROK, and others want to encourage.''
Madeleine Albright, on her first visit to Korea as Secretary of State,
said the prospects for peace on the Korean peninsula depended
``basically on how much the North Koreans are hurting,'' and concluded,
``North Korea has begun to move, ever so slowly, in the direction of
greater contact and openness with the outside world.''
While Clinton administration officials claimed North Korea's
difficulties would bring about reform, however, they supported efforts
to ameliorate the difficulties that presumably spurred the impulse to
reform. They contributed food and economic assistance to North Korea
that made the Stalinist country the largest recipient of American aid
to Asia. U.S. aid to North Korea went from zero before the Clinton
administration to more than $270 million annually, a total of almost $1
billion over President Clinton's two terms.
This huge amount of aid was meant as a humanitarian gesture that
would lure North Korea out of isolation, but when the regime controls
the means of distribution, any benefit received from the outside can
actually enhance the regime's oppressive control. The regime itself
determines that food supplies, health services, and commercial
investments are provided to those who are loyal and withheld from those
who are not. On September 29, 1998, the charitable organization
Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF-Doctors Without Borders) withdrew its aid
workers from North Korea because it observed the regime ``feeding
children from families loyal to the regime while neglecting others.''
As the defector, former General Secretary of the Korean Worker Party
Hwang Jang Yeop explained, ``North Korea controls the entire country
and people with food distribution. In other words, food distribution is
a means of control.'' External assistance also permits the regime to
redirect its people's labor and resources from addressing desperate
economic problems to strengthening military capabilities.
While American policymakers believe collapse is inevitable, the
policy of intervening to cushion collapse may yet prove it is not. The
danger in providing aid to North Korea is that the United States will
bear responsibility for prolonging the regime's survival. In economic,
political, security, and moral terms, shouldering the burden of helping
the North Korean regime survive is a dubious objective for American
foreign policy.
North Korea, not surprisingly, does not subscribe to the notion
that its collapse is inevitable. As deplorable as it may seem, North
Korea's national objective is not to ensure its people's survival; it
is to ensure the regime's survival. In this regard, weaponry is a more
important investment than agriculture. Just as the North Korean regime
can subvert the world's humanitarian impulses to reinforce its
oppressive domestic policies, it can also take advantage of the world's
confidence in security arrangements to gain time and resources to
develop new military technology.
The Clinton Administration signed, on October 21, 1994, an informal
bilateral arrangement called the Agreed Framework. It promised to
deliver to North Korea light water reactors nuclear electric generating
plants--in exchange for a freeze on construction of North Korea's
nuclear energy facilities.
One of the terms of the 1994 agreement called for the United States
and North Korea to ``work together to strengthen the international
nuclear non-proliferation regime.'' In spite of the North's commitment,
after 1994, North Korea developed an extensive network for the
proliferation of its missile technology.
It was able to sell missile technology to Pakistan, Libya and Iran.
Pakistan put the North Korean technology to use in its launch of the
Ghauri missile, a No-dong derivative, on April 6, 1998. Security
analysts believe that test launch tipped the scales in India's decision
to test nuclear weapons a month later. Iran used the North Korean
technology in its launch of a Shahab-3 missile, a Taepo-dong
derivative, on July 21, 1998. The Shahab 3 has a range of 1,300
kilometers, allowing it to ``strike all of Israel, all of Saudi Arabia,
most of Turkey, and a tip of Russia . . . [and] put at risk all U.S.
forces in the region.'' After the tests, Iran and Pakistan returned
important test data to North Korea that was useful in North Korea's own
missile program.
The degree to which this technical exchange enhanced North Korea's
capabilities was revealed at the time of the fiftieth anniversary of
the founding of the North Korean Workers Party. On August 31, North
Korea launched a three-stage Taepo-dong 1 missile 1,380 kilometers
across Japan and into the Pacific Ocean.
The missile launch was an undeniably threatening act. It revealed
with absolute clarity that North Korea had attained a new capability to
threaten every part of the territory of two American allies--Japan and
South Korea as well as the nearly 100,000 American troops stationed
there. Asia's fragile confidence in America's ability to ensure
security, which keeps South Korea from developing long-range missiles
and Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea from developing nuclear
capabilities, was called into question. The North Korean regime had
apparently decided that lulling the West into a false sense of security
was no longer as advantageous as threatening it.
Contrary to the Clinton administration's view that the agreed
framework heralded a more accommodating North Korean approach to the
outside world, North Korea actually undertook to develop a more
threatening military posture after signing the agreed framework. North
Korea's nuclear program did not stop, according to testimony the
Director of Defense Intelligence gave before Congress in 1998. In fact,
by the time of the Perry report in 1999, the Clinton administration
could no longer claim that the ``verifiable freeze'' Under Secretary
Slocombe had trumpeted in 1994 was still in effect.
The Speaker of the House of Representatives commissioned a special
study of how North Korea's behavior had changed in the years following
the Agreed Framework. That report concluded ``the threat from North
Korea has advanced considerably over the past five years, particularly
with the enhancement of North Korea's missile capabilities.'' These
findings were corroborated by CIA Director George J. Tenet when he told
a Senate hearing on February 7, 2001, ``the North Korean military
appears for now to have halted its near-decade-long slide in military
capabilities and is expanding its short- and medium-range missile
arsenal.''
In the context of a policy that has, at best, produced mixed
results, it is highly valuable for the new administration to conduct a
thorough and wide-ranging policy review. The current hiatus in direct
negotiations between North Korea and the United States is not merely an
opportunity for the Bush administration to decide what course it will
pursue as it sorts out these and other issues surrounding American
policy toward North Korea. It is also an opportunity to test North
Korea's commitment to fulfill the promise contained in the rhetoric of
cooperation that has flourished in the year since the summit between
Kim Dae Jung and Kim Jong Il. Furthermore, it is an opportunity to test
the theory that guided so much of the Clinton administration's
approach. If North Korea recognizes that it must change in order to
survive, that effort should continue even without direct talks between
Washington and Pyongyang.
During this time, Pyongyang has been sending signals that it
controls the pace and substance of negotiations. It has subtly
emphasized that it can turn the heat higher or lower as it sees fit. In
a move that appeared generous, but was actually coercive, Pyongyang
said it would continue its informal commitment not to test missiles
until 2003, depending on the outcome of the Bush administration's
review. This is an understandable, perhaps even clever, ploy, but it
should be recognized as an attempt to pressure both the Bush
administration and South Korea where the implication is that the
North's apparent cooperation may end when Kim Dae Jung leaves office.
Similarly, the flap over the Bush administration's statements on
verification and reciprocity was also instructive. The notion that
there should be verification and reciprocity in arrangements with North
Korea is not a new idea--in fact, both terms were used in the Perry
Report--but in January when (now) Deputy Secretary of State Richard L.
Armitage mentioned the need for reciprocity and verification, North
Korea's official news service unleashed a stream of invective. At about
the same time, when Secretary Powell pointed out Kim Jong Il is a
dictator, something Madeleine Albright had also done, Pyongyang pushed
back by calling Powell a ``gangster-like criminal.'' It is valuable to
recognize the relative unimportance of such posturing.
What matters is the thoroughness with which the Bush administration
addresses the issues surrounding policy toward North Korea. The
questions raised about the technical feasibility and proliferation
dangers of proceeding with the construction of the light water reactors
are among the questions that demand a serious re-assessment. For the
Bush administration to have proceeded without a substantive review
would have sent the wrong signals throughout Asia and weakened
America's prestige.
Moreover, the depth of on-going consultations with our allies and
friends is sending strong signals to Pyongyang about the character and
operational effectiveness of the Bush administration. Lengthy,
collegial consultations between officials of the Bush administration
and the government of the Republic of Korea have already demonstrated
how strong and resilient the foundation of the U.S.-ROK alliance is. An
additional meeting of American, Japanese and Korean officials is
planned next week. The conclusions of the Bush policy review are
expected to be announced in June. Nothing meaningful has been lost
during this review, but much has been gained. This period of review is
laying the foundation for the difficult tasks that lie ahead in dealing
with North Korea.
The Chairman. Mr. Vollertsen.
STATEMENT OF DR. NORBERT VOLLERTSEN, VOLUNTEER, GERMAN
EMERGENCY DOCTORS, GERMANY
Dr. Vollertsen. Mr. Chairman, Senators, ladies and
gentlemen, first I want to apologize for my poor German
doctor's English. I do not want to sound stupid because this
problem is so serious, but I am not a native language speaker.
Sorry for that.
Senator Biden. We noticed, doctor, none of us are speaking
German, so you are not the stupid one.
Dr. Vollertsen. I was a member of German Emergency Doctors
who entered North Korea in July 1999 to carry out humanitarian
assistance. I remained in North Korea for 18 months, until I
was expelled on December 30, 2000. Early during my stay I was
summoned to treat a workman who had been badly burned by molten
iron. He was one of my patients. I volunteered my own skin to
be grafted onto this patient. For this action I was nationally
acclaimed by the media, many, many journalists, television,
like here, and I was awarded in the end as the first Western
foreigner the Friendship Medal of the North Korean People.
Together with this medal I was issued, and that was much more
important, a so-called VIP passport and a private North Korean
driving permit which allowed me to travel to many areas
inaccessible to foreigners and even to the ordinary North
Korean citizens.
Because of my so-called VIP status, I also was invited many
times by the authorities of the government, and I learned about
their nice lifestyle, in Korean, fashionable, fancy
restaurants. A lifestyle like this, I was invited to those
guesthouses. I know about their lifestyle. I learned about
fancy restaurants, guesthouses, the casino, even a Chinese
night club in Pyongyang.
When my driver was hospitalized because of a fractured
skull, I learned that there are special hospitals for the elite
in Pyongyang which are well-equipped like a German hospital, X-
ray, MRI, ultra-scan, EKG, Japanese newest models.
On the opposite side I saw the children in the hospitals of
the countryside starving and dying. For 1\1/2\ years I took
care of 10 hospitals, 3 orphanages, and several hundred
kindergartens all over the countryside. Every hospital was
crowded with around 200 patients, and I saw no improvement in
the general condition of these people because of a lack of food
still going on, despite the enormous help of the outside world,
and I wondered about the contrast. Where is all of the food aid
going?
As an emergency doctor, I also took care of all the victims
of any accident in and outside Pyongyang. In combination with
my Friendship Medal and VIP passport, I got a lot of access,
and I learned about the real life of the ordinary people. I
traveled around 70,000 kilometers in this country.
My basic medical diagnosis was that all of these people in
North Korea are mainly depressed. They are fed up, exhausted,
and they are suffering from a so-called burn-out syndrome. They
are fed up, and they are all extremely afraid. They are full of
fear, and we were never allowed to prove why. We got no answer.
I only was allowed to make pre-announced monitoring in
order to look at where the food is going to, like all the other
humanitarian NGO's and aid workers in Pyongyang, and many of
those persons, the NGO's, were my patients too, because they
were all suffering under the unreal scenario of unreal
monitoring.
During my 1\1/2\ year stay, the children in the hospitals
were starving in the beginning and in the end of my stay. Even
me, I was not allowed to travel to all areas in North Korea in
order to count all the dead people. I do not know, 2,000,
200,000, 2 million dead people, I do not know. I was never
allowed to prove it.
I saw one soldier who was obviously tortured, and I was not
allowed to take a picture of this soldier, and so I do not have
any evidence, no photos. I do not have any evidence about those
so-called reform institutions. This is the criminal law of
North Korea, and I can prove it, as you, Mr. Chairman, quoted
it. It is written here what is the minimal punishment in this
reform institution.
In order to get the knowledge, if there is any reason for
this frightenedness, I looked around. I tried to speak to all
those people. I tried to get the journalists interested in this
question. I arranged a private trip for all of those
delegations, all of those journalists who accompanied Mrs.
Albright when she was in Pyongyang, and I arranged a private,
secret trip, and I showed them around the hidden things in
North Korea.
After I was expelled because of my actions, after all of
those trips, I interviewed around 100 refugees in South Korea
and Seoul, and I got the knowledge that there is something
cruel going on. I got the evidence. I got the reports, the
written accounts of all those refugees, and because my time
here is limited to 5 minutes I cannot talk 5 hours about North
Korea. I wrote a book about this. It is published in Japan now,
the Japanese edition. It will be soon published in Korea, and
then hopefully here in the United States.
I believe in the power of information. My approach is to
open the country by journalists. I believe that there is
engagement, and maybe a degree of pressure by brave journalists
who try to enter the country. I think we have to care. Look
into the eyes of those children, and then try not to care.
Those are the victims of this government and they are starving
and they are dying, and it is my duty, especially as a German.
You know about German history. We were all accused that we
did not care about rumors of concentration camps in Germany, so
I think it is my duty to learn from history that even when
there are rumors about concentration camps in North Korea, that
I have to care, and I beg you all, do the same. Try to help
those people, because the North Koreans are nice, warm-hearted
people. They are the victims of this government. They are not
devils. They are not enemies. They are those who are suffering.
Try to help them.
Thank you very much.
[A report and prepared statement of Dr. Vollertsen
follows:]
LIFE UNDER THE RED STAR
A Prison Country
(By Norbert Vollertsen)
A Report From Inside North Korea
Tuesday, April 17, 2001 12:01 a.m. EDT
I know North Korea. I have lived there, and have witnessed its hell
and madness.
I was a doctor with a German medical group, ``Cap Anamur,'' and
entered North Korea in July 1999. I remained until my expulsion on Dec.
30, 2000, after I denounced the regime for its abuse of human rights,
and its failure to distribute food aid to the people who needed it
most. North Korea's starvation is not the result of natural disasters.
The calamity is man-made. Only the regime's overthrow will end it.
Human rights are nonexistent. Peasants, slaves to the regime, lead
lives of utter destitution. It is as if a basic right to existt--to
be--is denied. Ordinary people starve and die. They are detained at the
caprice of the regime. Forced labor is the basic way in which ``order''
is maintained.
I will recount some of my experiences. Early in my spell in North
Korea I was summoned to treat a workman who had been badly burned by
molten iron.
I volunteered my own skin to be grafted onto him. With a penknife,
my skin was pulled from my left thigh and applied to the patient. For
this, I was acclaimed by the state media--the only media--and awarded
the Friendship Medal, one of only two foreigners ever to receive this
honor.
I was also issued a ``VIP passport'' and a driver's license, which
allowed me to travel to areas inaccessible to foreigners and ordinary
citizens. I secretly photographed patients and their decrepit
surroundings. Though I was assigned to a children's hospital in
Pyongsong, 10 miles north of Pyongyang, I visited many hospitals in
other provinces. In each one, I found unbelievable deprivation. Crude
rubber drips were hooked to patients from old beer bottles. There were
no bandages, scalpels, antibiotics or operation facilities, only broken
beds on which children lay waiting to die. The children were emaciated,
stunted, mute, emotionally depleted.
In the hospitals one sees kids too small for their age, with hollow
eyes and skin stretched tight across their faces. They wear blue-and-
white striped pajamas like the children in Hitler's Auschwitz. They are
so malnourished, so drained of resistance, that a flu can kill them.
Why are there so many orphans? Where are all the parents? What passes
here for family life?
In North Korea, a repressive apparatus uncoils whenever there is
criticism. The suffocation, by surveillance shadowing, wire-tapping and
mail interception, is total. Most patients in hospitals suffer from
psychosomatic illnesses, worn out by compulsory drills, innumerable
parades, ``patriotic'' assemblies at six in the morning and droning
propaganda. They are toilworn, prostrate, at the end of their tether.
Clinical depression is rampant. Alcoholisim is common because of
mindnumbing rigidities, regimentation and hopelessness. In patients'
eyes I saw no life, only lassitude.
Once, I had an opportunity to visit my driver, a member of the
military, who was in the hospital because of injury. The authorities
were vexed that I wanted to see him, but I was able to overcome
objections. As was my custom on hospital visits, I took bandages and
antibiotics--basics. On this occasion, I was embarrassed to see that,
unlike any other hospital I visited, this one looked as modern as any
in Germany. It was equipped with the latest medical apparatus, such as
magnetic resonance imaging, ultrasound, electrocardiograms and X-ray
machines. There are two worlds in North Korea, one for the senior
military and the elite; and a living hell for the rest.
I didn't see any improvement in the availability of food and
medicine in any of the hospitals I worked in during my entire stay. One
can only imagine what conditions are like in the ``reform
institutions,'' where whole families are imprisoned when any one member
does or says something that offends the regime. These camps are closed
to foreigners.
My initial naviete that the starvation was the result of weather
conditions disappeared when I saw that much of the food aid was being
denied those who needed it most. Before Cap Anamur came to North Korea
other agencies such as Oxfam and CARE pulled out because they weren't
allowed to distribute aid directly to the people. They had to turn it
over to the authorities, who took complete charge of distribution.
Monitoring is imposible. Nobody really knows where the aid is going,
except that it is not going to the starving citizens.
If a doctor's diagnosis is that North Korea suffers from society-
wide fear and depression because of the cruel system, he has to think
about the right therapy and to speak out against repression. The
international community, especially humanitarian groups, must demand
access to the shadowy world of labor camps, hidden from us by the
system.
The system's beneficiaries are members of the Communist Party and
high-ranking military personnel. In Pyongyang, these people enjoy a
comfortable lifestyle--obscene in the context--with fancy restaurants
and nightclubs. In diplomatic shops, they can buy such delicacies as
Argentine steak, with which they supplement their supplies of food
diverted from humanitarian aid. In the countryside, starving people,
bypassed by the aid intended for them, forage for food. Pyongyang is
fooling the world.
As a German, I know too well the guilt of my grandparents'
generation for its silence under the Nazis. I feel it is my duty to
expose this satanic regime, which has deified ``Dear Leader'' Kim Jong
Il, just as it did his late father.
Even though virtually the entire North Korean economy is geared to
the military, we should help ordinary citizens. But this must be on
condition that aid goes to the deserving. Foreign NGOs, journalists and
diplomats must be free to travel unannounced to the provinces to ensure
that aid isn't misdirected. Only pressure on North Korea can save
lives. The people can't help themselves. They are brainwashed, and too
afraid to be able to overthrow their rulers. That's the medical
diagnosis. Only the outside world can administer the right therapy and
bring about a reformation of this depraved nation.
Prepared Statement of Dr. Norbert Vollertsen
In recent years, there has been a number of credible international
reports expressing grave concern with the human rights violations in
North Korea. However, little evidence has been available on the issue
due to the strict controls on all information by the North Korean
authorities.
However, since 1992, some North Koreans who defected to South Korea
began to inform us of shocking crimes against humanity perpetuated in
North Korea massively and systematically. They include two former
prisoners in one of the detention settlements for political prisoners
(concentration camps), two former guards at several of these life
detention settlements and a prisoner of one of the women's prisons in
North Korea. Unfortunately, their witness accounts have been in Korean
and failed to attract international attention. Attached is a summary
and an analysis in English of their accounts for your consideration.
Surprisingly, their accounts, full of details, have so many
incidents in common even though they were from entirely different
social backgrounds and arrived in South Korea at different times. They
did not know each other and were not aware of earlier allegations when
they told us about what they have actually experienced or witnessed.
In my opinion, further evidence and information is required to
verify their accounts. At the same time, however, the alleged
atrocities appear to be of such serious nature, perhaps the worst
crimes against humanity in the world today, that I call for a special
international scrutiny to be immediately organized in the name of
humanity. Your kind attention and action will be greatly appreciated.
For the sake of credibility, the stories were presented with as
much detailed information as possible (e.g., time, place, and people
involved). Consideration was given to distinguish between eye-witness
account (i.e., what they actually witnessed or experienced) and hearsay
evidence (i.e., what they heard through word of mouth about what
everybody believed).
We believe that all the imaginable atrocities known to humankind
have been exhausted in North Korea's detention settlements and
political prisons. However, we wish to reserve our comments on some of
the allegations of extreme atrocity, such as feeding a newly-born
infant to a dog, and concede that the possibility exists for
exaggeration, misunderstanding, or even falsehood. Nevertheless, we are
convinced that the most abominable and horrifying crimes against
humanity, worse than those of Nazi concentration camps, Soviet gulags,
or anywhere else, have been perpetuated in North Korea for decades.
Although the twentieth century has witnessed terrible bloodshed from
ethnic cleansing and genocide, political oppression, and religious
hostilities, none has surpassed, we believe, the crimes of North Korea
in terms of length, systematic practice, terror, and secrecy. We are
convinced that the worst crimes in the world today are being committed
daily in North Korea.
The allegations of the murderous treatment of prisoners and crimes
against humanity appear credible, as they are consistent with the well-
publicized harsh style of the North Korean government and the various
international reports. Nonetheless; we wish to again reserve comment on
some of the extreme incidents subject to further verification on the
basis of new evidence and further information hopefully to be available
in the near future.
It would be, therefore, inappropriate to generalize the conditions
of political prisoners in North Korea on the basis of these extreme
cases. At the same time, it would be equally inappropriate to simpiy
discredit such allegations for the lack of undisputed evidence. Under
the most conservative estimate, North Korea has committed and is
continuing to commit grave human rights violations and crimes against
humanity massively, systematically and constantly, most likely the
worst in the world today.
In the worst case scenario, the world has entered the new
millennium optimistically but not realizing that in North Korea, the
most blatant, tragic, and heinous acts of the past century continue to
persist. We are only anxious to gather further evidence and information
so that the North Korean prison settlements and everything that goes on
within those cold fences will be exposed to the world and the innocent
prisoners will one day realize that they were not forgotten and there
have been those who sought their freedom.
We wish to bring to your attention once again the criminal nature
of concentration camps under Hitler and Stalin in the past and to the
existence of such camps, worse than anything previous, in North Korea
today.
Hitler and Stalin have returned, hand in hand, with improved
skills of crimes against humanity.
Hand in hand, Hitler and Stalin have joined together and are
now experimenting their improved skills of crimes against
humanity in North Korea before spreading the new skills to the
rest of the world.
North Korea is an upgraded version of Hitler and Stalin put
together.
What Would You Do If Nazi Germany Were Still Reigning and
Asking for Your Help to Feed Its Starving Germans While
Numerless Innocent People, Women and Children, Continued to
Perish in Nazi Concentration Camps Today?
In other words, what would you do if Nazi Germany or
Stalin's USSR were still reigning today but no longer powerful
to defy international pressure, and asking for your help to
feed their starving flood victims today while countless
innocent men, women and children continued to perish in their
concentration camps?
We believe that this is exactly the situation we face when
considering humanitarian assistance to North Korea.
A child is now drowning. Would you not do anything simply
because it is not your mandate?
This is exactly the situation you are up against when you consider
appeals from North Korea for humanitarian assistance. Without prejudice
to your offer of help, we are calling upon you to ask the North Korean
government, out of international humanitarian obligation, whether or
not there are concentration camps in North Korea.
Atrocities and cruelty, far exceeding Hitler's and Stalin's
concentration camps, are daily and routine taking place behind closed
doors in North Korean concentration camps today because the government
of North Korea thinks nobody knows or cares about it. Your simple
inquiry, reveal a worldwide knowledge of their camps, will make a
difference between life and death for many and contribute to the
improvement of conditions there, even though the Government will deny
the accusation and the victims will not be released immediately.
You are in position to make that difference for some 200,000 poor
victims in North Korean concentration camps. At every opportunity,
simply ask, ``Do concentration camps exist in North Korea?''
Human (humanitarian) obligation that transcends one's position or
nationality.
If Germans are starving while innocent peoples are perishinging in
concentration camps under Hitler's Nazis today, how would you direct
your humanitarian assitance to reach innocent victims? This is exactly
what is happening in North Korea today.
I wish to make available to a wide international audience the stark
realities of the existence of concentration camps in North Korea today
and the plight of some 200,000 innocent people, including women and
children. These people have been detained without judiciary process and
live under the most atrocious and cruel conditions, perhaps exactly the
worst in the world today.
Convincing evidence has come to our attention from a variety of
sources indicating that today the worst crimes against humanity are
being committed in these camps on a massive and systematic basis. The
existence of these camps and the bleak conditions and atrocities
committed there are undeniable as seen from eyewitness accounts from
former prisoners and guards.
We believe that unless we stop such crimes against humanity from
being committed in North Korea today they are bound to spread and occur
elsewhere. We call on the international community to intervene in the
situation as a matter of international responsibility by asking the
North Korean authorities, as a first step, to explain their defiance of
humanitarianism. We believe that international intervention works.
We are convinced that the North Korean authorities today continue
what we believe to be clearly a crime against humanity with impunity
behind closed doors because they believe that few know and care about
it. Therefore, you can help some 200,000 innocent people, including
women and children, in concentration camps in North Korea by simply
asking the North Korean authorities today, out of international
humanitarian obligation and human compassion, if indeed there are such
camps in North Korea.
The Chairman. Thank you very much, doctor.
Suppose we have a round of about 7 minutes each and we will
see how we do on that.
I am fascinated by your presentation, Dr. Vollertsen. You
mentioned that the food aid inspection process in North Korea
is rigged, and that the North Korean elites are profiting from
the aid they get from the West. Now, do you have a suggestion
about how to rectify that situation?
Dr. Vollertsen. Try to engage, get more NGO's in, try to
ask for free movement, freedom of the press, free movement for
the aid workers, free movement for the diplomats, and mainly
free movement for the journalists. Let them take the pictures
of how the children are eating.
The Chairman. Well, that is very sensible, and I agree with
you, but should we cease humanitarian aid until North Korea
verifiably allows the aid to go to those who need it most?
Dr. Vollertsen. No. I think try to continue, and even
improve, but try to argue and try to argue for more NGO's so
that there is real monitoring, and the easiest way to do it is
to ask for free movement so that they are allowed to go to any
place in North Korea without any pre-announcement. Now, they
can only go where there is a pre-announcement, and then
everything is prepared, and it is a fake. Everything is
prepared, and no real situation can be proven.
I was an emergency doctor, and whenever there was an
accident there was no prior arrangement. I managed to go into
the hospital when nothing was pre-arranged, and found there was
no food, no medicine, no equipment, and I wondered where all
the food aid is going.
The Chairman. Well, I agree with that, but this business of
getting to it and correcting it, which is not a simple process,
you mentioned that the North Korean people suffer from
psychosomatic illnesses. Do you want to elaborate on that a
little bit?
Dr. Vollertsen. I think everybody can think about himself,
when he is suffering from a bad marriage, or suffering from a
bad job, or suffering from bad education or whatever. He cannot
change the situation he is suffering, so the depression is
intense. He will get depressed, and from a doctor's view, you
can see that he will get stomach problems or ulcers, or
whatever, even cancer.
Throughout my medical life as a medical doctor I realized
that most of the people who cannot change their social
situation get sick. Those people in North Korea, the main
disease is that they are depressed, they are afraid, they are
afraid to speak out because they are afraid for their families
and for their own lives.
The Chairman. Now, I want to move on to Mr. Downs and
others, but on the refugee situation I want to discuss that
briefly.
Dr. Vollertsen. I met those North Korean refugees direct at
the North Korean-Chinese border I examined them. I checked them
in a medical way, and through the translator and some
journalists, brave journalists who tried to get the evidence, I
interviewed them, and they all told me the same thing. They
told me how 9-year-old boys, and 65-year-old ladies, talked
about concentration camps, prison camps, reform institutions
with torture, mass execution, public execution, killing of
babies, killing of pregnant women. They even talked about
cannibalism and I beg you to prove this.
It is not my duty. I am not a policeman, but according to
German law I can go to a police station and accuse when there
is something going wrong and that is the only wish I have.
Prove if there is any evidence for concentration camps, and
when it is proved, then it might be even worse than in Hitler's
Germany.
The Chairman. Well, you have made quite a contribution to
this hearing, and I appreciate it.
Now, the next question goes to any of the other three or
all. Henry Sokoski and Victor Galinsky have identified the fact
that it would take at least 3 years for the IAEA fully to
inspect and document North Korea's nuclear program, something
that is required before key nuclear components can be shipped
to North Korea under the Agreed Framework.
Now, given the obvious fact that we are at the stage
whereby ``key''--and I put quotation marks around key. Key
components will need to be delivered also in about 3 years.
Does it make really any sense to proceed with the Agreed
Framework at this time, and I would like all three of you to
address that.
Ambassador Gallucci. Mr. Chairman, I would like to take a
shot at that.
My recollection of the language of the framework is tat it
says that in effect none of the equipment that is listed on the
trigger list of the nuclear supplier guidelines, which is
really the key equipment for a nuclear reactor, can be
delivered to North Korea until the IAEA is satisfied with
respect to the implementation of the full scope safeguards
agreement. It may be true that an observer can look at the
timeline and say, gee, that should come about in about 3 years,
and gee, therefore the IAEA should start the process.
But this was a political agreement, the Agreed Framework
with North Korea, and North Korea is still acting consistent
with the terms of the agreement to delay the imposition of
safeguards by the IAEA or the safeguards inspections until it
comes time for delivery of that equipment.
Now, something should be quite obvious, which is that in
the end here the time schedule for the construction of the
reactors will be held up to the extent that North Korea does
not cooperate with the IAEA. I do not want to be crude here,
but that is all right with me. I mean, the idea here was to
stop a nuclear weapons program.
We have a lot of other objectives, and you mentioned some
of them in your opening statement. There were discussions about
the conventional forces forward-deployed, about the ballistic
missiles, but the North Koreans, if they wish to go slow with
respect to safeguards, will slow down the construction of the
reactor, and they will carry the burden for that, and that is
not, in my view, necessarily a bad thing.
The Chairman. Senator Biden.
Senator Biden. Thank you very much. First of all, thank you
for being here, and Doctor, for your humanity and concern the
fact that you would give of your time and your effort as a
medical doctor to be in Korea or any other place where you are
trying to change the human condition is admirable, and I admire
your work. I admire what you are doing, and what you were
doing.
Dean, let me ask you about the Agreed Framework for a
moment. Is there any case that can be made that the North
Koreans are violating the terms of the Agreed Framework?
Ambassador Gallucci. Senator, I am not intimately aware of
the discussions that must occur between the IAEA and the
inspectors who go there regularly and the North Korean side. To
my knowledge, I know of no substantive area in which the North
Koreans are acting inconsistent with the framework. One used to
be able to argue that they were not engaging the South in
serious dialog, but now that President Kim Dae-jung has gone
North I think that is a harder case to make, so I think I would
not say there is no substantive violation that has been made
public.
Senator Biden. Ambassador Laney, if I may ask you, if the
North Koreans--if we were to engage the North Koreans, this
administration, in follow on negotiations where things left
off, if not under the same conditions but just begin to engage
North Koreans after this review that Mr. Downs and others have
spoken of, I assume at some point the administration is going
to say, we have reviewed, we have made a judgment, and we are
either not going to talk to, we are going to talk to, we are
going to talk to under following conditions, whatever. They are
going to say something at some point in the relatively near
term.
Assume they were to follow, after the review, the judgment
initially enunciated by Secretary Powell, and I am
paraphrasing, where Powell said there are some very promising
possibilities--I forget the exact phrase, but that is about it,
some promising possibilities that are worth pursuing, and again
I am paraphrasing. I am not quoting him.
Assume they pursued, they, this administration, pursued
after review along the lines that Powell had stated a month
ago, or whenever the timeframe was, and focused on what was one
of the remaining issues, verification. That is, the
verifiability of the North Koreans that they (a) were not
engaging in a continuation of seeking long-range missile
capability, (b) that they were not producing fissile material
to produce nuclear bombs, and (c) they were not proliferating
the technology they now possess to other countries which they
have in the past, and may be doing now, in return for
something. I want to get to the something later.
But the first thing would be, verifiability. I think any
administration hopefully would conclude that you would need a
verifiable agreement, whatever the terms were. Is verifiability
able to be accomplished? That is, is there any circumstance
that you know of that would make it virtually impossible for
there to be a verifiable agreement, or is it possible to have a
verifiable agreement? Not will they, but is it possible?
Ambassador Laney. It is certainly possible. Given North
Korea's record it is going to be very difficult and, in fact,
that was the reason why the breathtaking offer that North Korea
made was not brought around to any kind of conclusion last
fall, was because it foundered on the very issue of
verifiability.
Senator Biden. That is not what I was told. I spent over 3
hours with Sandy Berger, with the Secretary, with Strobe
Talbott, and with Perry's assistant, Wendy Sherman.
I understand it foundered on practical domestic political
considerations, rightly or wrongly, that since it did not get
sufficiently underway, that is, the verification talks, prior
to the election, and the election had already taken place, that
the sine qua non for the North Koreans moving forward was, they
wanted an appearance of the President in North Korea to sort of
legitimize them. That is something the administration was not
prepared to do unless they had a more concrete assurance as to
what the nature of the discussion relating to verifiability
would be. By the time they got around to that the election had
occurred. The President was, I think rightly, in the position
of suggesting that President Bush had appeared to have won,
although it was being contested. The President did not feel
that it would be appropriate to go forward without consulting
President-elect Bush, or the likely President. And yet to do so
would have gotten the President in the middle of the election
process by, in effect, conferring on Bush the status of being
elected before that was followed through in the courts. That
seems to me different than having arrived, as I understood you
to say, at a judgment that the North Koreans were unwilling to
deal with verifiability.
Dean, do you have a view on that?
Ambassador Gallucci. I do not, on this. I want to make a
plea that as we focus on verification, because nobody wants to
trust North Korea, that we be reasonable about this at the same
time. We have what used to be called national technical means,
but there are no real verification provisions in the Agreed
Framework. We have national means to verify compliance to some
degree, and then, if there is a problem, we have an agreement
of sorts in which the North Koreans have invested to give us
access, to insist upon physical access.
Similarly, I would say when you look at this case, if you
are talking about the ballistic missile components, there are
four. It is the testing, the deployment, the production, and
the export, and the verification requirements for these four
are all different. For testing you do not need very much, for
export we need a little more, arguably for deployment we need a
little more, and for production we need the most. But we should
be looking to compare the right things.
Whatever verification we were able to negotiate, we should
then compare what that gives us to not having the agreement at
all, and not to some abstract notion of perfect verification.
Senator Biden. I was not suggesting there had to be perfect
verification. There are some, like my good friend the chairman
of the committee, and he is my good friend, who often quotes--I
forget who it is you quote, Mr. Chairman, when you say that
whoever it was said ``we have never lost a war nor won a
treaty,'' and there are those like the chairman who feel very
strongly that there is verification, and then there is
verification, and we probably disagree on the degree to which
we have to verify whether we are dealing with Russians or we
are dealing with anyone. That is an ongoing dispute.
But my time is up. I may come back to it, and I wanted to
get to you, Mr. Downs, about verification, not now because my
time is up. I will come back, but just to talk with me a little
bit about what you believe the parameters are, what is required
for verification and whether or not you think that it is worth
attempting to determine whether or not the North Koreans are
prepared to engage in such a dialog. I would be interested to
know your views, but again, please let me give you a heads-up
and I will come back to you on that.
Thank you very much.
The Chairman. I know the media and others will be dying to
know who said that. That was Will Rogers, who could have been
elected from either party, he was that popular. He chose not to
be a politician.
Senator, we welcome you, sir.
Senator Nelson. Mr. Chairman, I am particularly interested
in Korea. On the Easter break I went with Senator Shelby to a
number of countries, including Korea, and I thank you for the
opportunity of this hearing. I am interested to know, in your
view, how should the United States respond to the President of
South Korea's desire to negotiate a North-South peace
agreement?
Ambassador Laney. Well, if I may begin, Senator, I think
that first of all the issue of the peace agreement is one that
lies somewhat in the future. The more immediate issue, I think,
for the President of South Korea is the United States
Government's support for its strong ally, Seoul, and its
attempt to engage the North in whichever ways are currently
underway, and that eventually would include an attempt to come
to some sort of peace agreement or peace treaty.
I think at this point the issue that faces the U.S.
Government is the extent to which it sees its relationship with
Seoul as the primary tie, and the principal foreign policy
piece for the Korean Peninsula, and growing out of that, then
the support for that government's initiatives in engaging the
North.
Parallel with that, I think it is necessary to so engage
the North in terms of trying to negate, as we have been talking
about, the missile threat, and that has many aspects of
verification and so forth.
The issue of how difficult that is going to be, and how
protracted that sort of a negotiation might become remains to
be seen. I am sure it will be both. Whether it is impossible,
or whether it is not worth doing, I think is another issue
altogether, but I think at this point the concern that I have
about the posture of the United States with regard to Korea is
the growing concern in South Korea that we are not fully
supporting them, and they do not want to return to the cold war
mentality.
We can all bring a brief against the atrocities and the
evil aspects of North Korea, but the engagement policy of
President Kim Dae-jung has changed the dynamics on the
peninsula, and even though his popularity has plummeted, it is
way down, there is a broad base--maybe as much as 80 percent of
the populace, in support for a general approach to the North,
some kind of engagement policy that continues reducing tension,
avoiding war, and finally getting rid of the weapons of mass
destruction, maybe leading to a peace treaty.
So in all of that I am saying the first thing is, we need
to let South Korea know that we support them, and in doing that
we encourage them in their attempts to engage, but that also in
our turn we do the things that are necessary for us to do
regarding missiles and weapons of mass destruction, and I think
that would be very affirming, very strengthening for the South.
There have been some very blistering editorials in South Korean
papers about what they feel is a coolness toward the
relationship.
Now, historically I would say for 50 years we have put as a
mantra that our relationship with Seoul is the most important
thing. We need to continue that.
Senator Nelson. And that has been a given, and you are
talking about your concern about the coolness as a result
primarily of the recent visit of President Kim here with
President Bush?
Ambassador Laney. Whether or not it is justified, the fact
is, as I understand it, Deputy Secretary Armitage carried a
letter from President Bush to President Kim supporting his
efforts and I do not know the contents, but in other words, of
giving some affirmation, which I think was very well-received.
That was just in the last couple of weeks. That kind of
affirmation, they do not want to be left out or feel like there
is some sort of distance between us and them, I think.
Senator Nelson. Let me ask you this, any of you. There was
some reaction in the South Korean press to President Kim's
continuing initiatives as if they were not being received or
reciprocated by the North Korean leadership. Give me your
comments on that.
Ambassador Laney. Well, I will speak very briefly, then
turn it over, but that is very true, and this is part of his
decline in popularity. That I think, if Kim Jong-Il of North
Korea returned in a summit to the South, that would greatly
answer that barrage of criticism.
Senator Nelson. That is true with regard to the reaction of
the press, but in your opinion is, in fact, that is true?
President Kim does not think so.
Ambassador Laney. We were talking about public opinion?
Senator Nelson. No. I am talking about what you think about
his initiatives to the North, and if they are being
reciprocated.
Ambassador Laney. Well, I think that they have been
reciprocated. I think in the last 6 months there has been a
noticeable lull, and this is a cause of concern both in Seoul
and in Washington, obviously.
Mr. Downs. If I might, I would offer an alternative view. I
do not think that the initiatives of President Kim Dae-jung
have been reciprocated by North Korea. I think that North Korea
has manipulated every situation to obtain additional leverage,
and as Ambassador Laney said, there has been a reduction in
contacts in the last 6 months, and it goes back to a precise
moment. It goes back to the moment when Vice Marshall Cho came
to Washington.
At that point, North Korea was able to shift its focus from
North-South talks to North-Washington talks. The U.S. always
has a better purse to offer North Korea, so North Korea will
always seek to deal directly with the United States when they
can push South Korea out. In the same way, they will deal with
South Korea when they think they have reached a standstill with
the United States, which is what they did last April.
Senator Nelson. So you would take the cynical view, as
opposed to the optimistic view of President Kim?
Mr. Downs. Yes. There was definitely a difference in tone,
but very little in terms of specifics.
Ambassador Gallucci. I agree about 90 percent with what was
just said, but there is a 10-percent difference. In other
words, I think there is a trilateral political relationship
here, but I would frame it differently. I would say that the
North right now is holding negotiations, and specifically the
visit to the South, hostage, waiting for the United States to
finish its policy review and reengage with the North, that once
we do, then I think we will see a willingness on the part of
the North to engage with the South.
We have made it quite a central feature of our discussions
with the North that there needed to be some parallelism in
terms of reduction in tensions in the dialog with the South. I
do think that the North attempts, whenever it can, to play one
off against the other and use leverage back and forth, but I
think the outcome that would be acceptable to them and should
be acceptable to us is one in which negotiations are proceeding
at the same time, we with the North and the South with the
North.
Senator Nelson. Mr. Chairman, may we get the Doctor's
response?
The Chairman. Sure, go right ahead.
Dr. Vollertsen. I would totally agree with Mr. Chuck Downs,
and recall the subtitle of his book: ``The North Koreans'
Negotiation Strategy.'' They are very, very clever, and I met
all those guys in Pyongyang. I spoke to the Vice Minister of
Foreign Affairs. I learned about their strategy. I was present
during the first diplomatic talks with the leader of the German
Interest Section, and I learned about their strategy to get as
much as they can without giving anything in response.
And my latest news from Pyongyang--via e-mail I am still in
contact with my former colleagues in Pyongyang. I am checking
my e-mail every morning. I get the latest news from Pyongyang.
There is no more free movement for the NGO's, no free movement
for any journalists, no free movement for any diplomats.
There was an agreement, a five-point agreement with Germany
where they guaranteed this when there are open diplomatic
channels. This agreement was signed, but nothing is fulfilled,
and my colleagues told me that it is even getting worse. There
are more military posts on the street. There are more policemen
there at the Chinese-North Korean border. The situation for the
refugees is getting worse.
After all this publicity in the newspapers, in Time
magazine, in Newsweek, it is more dangerous for the refugees to
cross the border because the North Korean soldiers there at the
border, they are very keen to suppress these actions and this
information. So it is going down. All those preparations to
reconnect the railroads, for example, to reconnect the
motorways and whatever else was promised during the last
summit, it is all going down. I think it was only a trap in
order to get the money from the European countries, from Japan,
from the United States, to get the donations.
I know that they are very, very proud about their army.
They are very, very proud about their manpower in the army, and
I know that there are many, many things in North Korea to hide.
I know that they are very, very afraid about a situation of
collapse similar to Romania. They know very well when the
outside world will discover what is going on in the North
Korean concentration camps, there will really be an outrage.
There may be opposition of their own people, even maybe
rebellion, or even maybe the same outcome as in Romania. They
are very aware of this, and they are afraid of this, so I think
they will not change by themselves.
The Chairman. Doctor, I admire your passion, and I can tell
by the expressions on the other witnesses faces that they do,
too.
Let us see, the North Koreans have offered to extend the
current missile test moratorium to when, 2003, or something
like that?
Mr. Downs. Yes, 2003.
The Chairman. Do you think we ought to--well, I will put it
another way. How do you think we ought to interpret that, and I
would ask all three of you.
Mr. Downs. Mr. Chairman, if I could respond to that, I
would like to point out that there is an imbalance--and this
follows up on Senator Nelson's comment as well--there is an
imbalance in the kinds of things we and North Korea bring to
the negotiating table.
They bring promises, pledges, courtesies, kindness,
handshakes, and we respond with food aid, economic assistance,
the removal of sanctions and light water reactors, things of
that nature. We are providing hard, durable benefits the North
Korean regime can use, and they are satisfying us with things
like visits and commitments, as you point out, extending to
2003 the moratorium that they will keep in place as long as
they feel like it. It is an easy commitment for them to make,
and there is a hidden bit of leverage in it, because they will
say that if they can take offense at anything we do, they are
no longer bound by their own pledge.
The Chairman. One of my friends is Ruth Graham, Billy
Graham's wife--excuse me. You wanted to say something.
Ambassador Gallucci. I wanted to comment on that.
The Chairman. Please do.
Ambassador Gallucci. I think I would characterize this
substantially differently than Mr. Downs. I do believe what the
doctor has said, and we all have noticed that the North Koreans
extract everything they possibly can from every discussion. I
would, as a negotiator, expect no less, and therefore I think
when we get into negotiations in which we do not expect to
trust them, we expect a fair amount of cheating when they can
get away with it, and we expect them to extract everything, we
have to think about ending up with an arrangement which is in
the end in our interests.
So I disagree with Mr. Downs that they come to the table
and they get everything and we get nothing. I would observe
that 1993, when the Clinton administration came to office, we
were looking down the throat of a nuclear weapons program that
was going to be producing 30 nuclear weapons a year with the
capability to transfer fissile material and nuclear weapons
around the world, that that program has been verifiably frozen
since 1994. That is not nothing. That is close to, in terms of
negotiating objectives, everything.
Now, we wanted a whole lot of other things after that, but
that is what we went after with the Agreed Framework, and we
got it. Nothing is forever when it comes to this stuff in North
Korea or Iran, Iraq, or anywhere else, so we have to be aware
of that, but we got quite a lot.
You asked, Mr. Chairman, about the moratorium. Now, I do
not consider that nothing either. If there were a test tomorrow
morning, that would be pretty big news. The Japanese would be
very upset. We would be very upset, and it would indicate the
program was moving ahead at a certain pace, depending upon
what, exactly, the test was.
I like the idea that there is a moratorium. I do not
believe we get gifts from the North Koreans, and I am sure
there is a calculation behind it, but it is not nothing.
Ambassador Laney. Well, I agree, Mr. Chairman. I think we
all are deeply concerned about the human rights abuses and the
terrible situation that the Doctor has dramatically set forth,
and we deplore all of this. I mean, you know, we can all agree
to that. The question is, what are we going to do?
We can say, well, we are not going to deal with them. All
right, then we are going to isolate them. Well, what does that
lead to? If we isolate them, then we take away all the leverage
they go back to producing plutonium and they go back to testing
their missiles because we have no leverage on them. Then are we
going to go to war? How are we going to stop that?
The question is not whether, but how we deal with them. I
think this is the issue, and I applaud President Bush's release
of 100,000 tons of grain. This is not a concessions. This is
not rung out of us. It is humanitarian. We all have a heart for
this issue, and we are all perplexed about how to deal with a
regime we do not like, but it is not going to go away, and we
have to think about the fact that while we sit over here on
this side of the Pacific, our allies are 30 miles from the
barrel of the long-range artillery, and we have to be sure that
our actions and our statements and our policies do not further
endanger our allies there and our 37,000 troops.
Now, that is a very significant issue, and this means that
we are not going to simply condemn. We are going to have to
find some way to resolve it. That does not mean we approve it,
it does not mean we bless it, but it means we are going to deal
with it, and we are going to deal with it tough, and we are
going to lay down the law, and we are not going to let them get
away with things, but they have not gotten--we have not been
playing the fool.
We have gotten a whole lot of stuff here. It has been a
meaningful thing, and the South Koreans would agree they do not
want to go back to the status quo ante, to the cold war
mentality. That is a universally held position in South Korea,
and they do not want us to push them in that direction either.
Mr. Downs. Well, Mr. Chairman, with all due respect, I have
tremendous regard for the achievements of Ambassador Gallucci
in his negotiations with North Korea, and in a sense it is not
nothing. But it is the absence of something, and we need to
keep that in mind.
It is the absence of their offensive behavior on the
development of nuclear capabilities. It is the absence of their
violation of previously existing agreements. It is the absence
of their refusal to allow inspections, and the replacement of
them with a promise that in the future they will allow the
inspections that they had agreed to in previous agreements with
the IAEA 5 years earlier. What we are getting out of the North
Koreans is a change in their own policy. Essentially that is
not nothing, but it is not really something. It is a change in
something that they could have decided to do correctly the
first time.
When they behave this way we need to keep it in mind,
because we need to understand the quality of the regime and how
it gets advantages, and we need to recognize that what they get
in return is definitely something. What they get is a new lease
on life. It means U.S. money and U.S. efforts, U.S. diplomatic
sponsorship, and sometimes direct aid that allows the regime to
continue to exist and continue to oppress its people. That is
very definitely something that we have to be concerned about.
The Chairman. Mr. Gallucci.
Ambassador Gallucci. I am not sure I am being responsive
here, but again for the record, Mr. Chairman, I think it is
important to point out that we were looking at facilities being
built in North Korea which were, by the way, not in violation
of any international undertaking. There is nothing in the NPT
or the IAEA that says you cannot build gas graphite reactors,
even though they are the most provocative and dangerous, most
likely to lead to a nuclear weapons program, which we are
absolutely confident they were intended to do, but they were
not in violation.
This is not a matter of theory. The reactor had operated
and produced 30 kilograms of plutonium, enough for five nuclear
weapons. They had that material in spent fuel that was going to
be reprocessed. They had a reprocessing facility that they were
expanding. They had two reactors being constructed as we
watched in slow motion with overhead photography. All that has
been frozen in place. I submit again, please, this is very
substantial. That is what got our attention.
Everything else, virtually, we were aware of, and we knew.
We knew how horrible the regime was, how awful it treated its
own people, how threatening it was to the South, but we sat
essentially confident in a defense and deterrent posture in
South Korea with North Korea contained.
The one thing we could not allow to go unaddressed was the
nuclear weapons program, because of its ultimate possible
impact, catastrophically on not only South Korea and Japan but
the United States, if it was ever mated with the ballistic
missile program, and we acted against that nuclear weapons
program, and we froze it.
The question is now, will we act against the ballistic
missile program and try to freeze that? It will not come free.
The Chairman. Senator Nelson.
Senator Nelson. You know, when I was growing up, Mr.
Chairman, I was taught that partisan politics stopped at the
water's edge, and I think we have two different points of view
that are represented here today that reflect whether or not
this administration did this or that, but the title of your
hearing today is, where do we go from here, and so as a new
member on this committee, I would like to further explore,
given the riveting testimony of the Doctor--one of my closest
friends up here is Congressman Tony Hall, who has told me what
he has seen in North Korea, and how pervasive the starvation is
there.
We have got a problem. We want to help. The Doctor has
shared some testimony that he does not think all that food is
getting there, so where do we go from here?
Doctor, I want to get back to these folks right here, all
right. We have gotten certain progress on the nuclear. We have
got to progress on the missile defense, but what do we do to
support President Kim to encourage his peace initiatives
without yanking the rug out from under him?
Ambassador Laney. Well, I think first of all we need to
reopen our talks with North Korea on the deployment and testing
of missiles, and bring those to some sort of positive
conclusion. I think if that happens that will open the door for
a reciprocal visit of Kim Jung-Il to Seoul, or wherever that
summit might take place.
If I may say so, Senator, I feel that President Kim
realizes he is in the shank end of his term. He is not a lame
duck yet, but he is getting close, and I think he realizes that
the viability of the policy has got to succeed him, not just
what he can accomplish himself, what the broad-based support
for a policy of engagement in South Korea, supported by and
abetted by a strong policy in the United States, and I feel at
this point that working together in that trilateral
coordination with Tokyo, Seoul, and Washington at a high level
is going to work.
Now, I do not predict it is going to work, but I believe it
can, but it has to be at a high level. It cannot be done at a
functionary level. People at that level in North Korea cannot
do anything. They have got to be up at the top, and I think
that the appointment of Bill Perry as special reviewer and
envoy broke the log-jam, and while it did not open every door
it made a lot of difference, and I think it really paved the
way for the summit that Kim Dae-jung was able to have with
North Korea, and so I am very much concerned.
This is not a give-away or anything else. We need to take
up the cudgel on the terms that are acceptable to the Bush
administration, but deal with it and see what kind of deal they
can get. Going into it, there is nothing there.
You have got to engage them, and if we do engage them, I
guarantee you that that will be a support not just for Kim Dae-
jung, frankly. It will be a support for the people of South
Korea, for South Korea itself, and in the long run we have got
to maintain that strong relationship, otherwise we are going to
lose our influence on the Korean Peninsula, and they will fall
into the Chinese orbit. We are talking regional politics here.
We are not just talking about North Korea.
The Chairman. I agree with that. Doctor.
Dr. Vollertsen. Why not think about teamwork? I always
believe in teamwork. Why not think about different approaches,
the combination of all of those different approaches?
I fully support engagement, because only when there is
engagement, when there is talking, you can educate the
opposite. You have to talk to your children. Without any
engagement they will never be a good human being, so you have
to talk, so I believe in engagement policy.
I fully support sunshine policy, because I am from Germany.
I know about German history. There was Willi Brandt, he opened
up Germany by a sunshine policy, by the open hand, but I
disagree with a sunshine policy when they are not allowed to
talk about human rights issues, about concentration camps in
North Korea. Then I disagree.
And I believe in nature. I simply believe in nature. When
there is only sunshine, and when there is no thunderstorm or a
little bit of rain, then there is desert. When there is only
sunshine, then there is no life, and then there are all those
people like the starving children.
So I believe in different approaches. Why not create
teamwork, the nice guy and the bad guy, the nice guy who can
continue a sunshine policy, maybe the fresh one, the brave one,
the United States, the Japanese, the Germans. They can insist
on human rights, and this different approach, maybe it can lead
to something because there is a German common saying, and maybe
it works also in diplomacy, ``when you cannot convince them,
try to confuse them,'' and I learned about the North Koreans,
that throughout their negotiation strategy they always have
this black and white scheme. They cannot deal with anybody who
is friendly on the one side and who is an enemy on the other
side.
After this Friendship Medal they called me their closest
Western friend. Now I am their closest Western enemy, so it is
up to them. I try to confuse them.
Senator Nelson. Mr. Chairman, can I ask Mr. Downs to
respond to Mr. Laney?
The Chairman. Sure.
Mr. Downs. Well, I cannot remember, I confess, all of
Ambassador Laney's points, but I thought many of them were
extremely good and right on target. I think that there is a
certain sophistication that we have to bring to our dealings
with South Korea on trilateral North Korea, South Korea, and
U.S. issues.
Quite often we have to restrain ourselves from rushing in
to replace the role that South Korea would have in its dealings
with North Korea, so we should maintain some distance both to
be true to ourselves here in America and to represent what I
think most American people think about North Korea, and to
allow South Korea to obtain the benefits of the relationship
directly to Pyongyang.
In an ideal world, Pyongyang would be forced to look to the
South for all kinds of diplomatic and economic benefits. We
need to encourage them to do so, and yet they will use every
opportunity to deal directly with the United States, because
they would rather play in our arena than to deal with the
South. The South has tools, cultural tools, language tools and,
I think, intelligence tools that it can use in dealing with
North Korea that we should respect and allow to function fully,
and I think that agrees with many of the things that Ambassador
Laney said.
The Chairman. Well, I have presided over a lot of hearings,
and this one ranks very high on the ones that really have been
of interest to me. I know you gentlemen, each of you came at
the sacrifice of your time. A good record has been made or is
in the process of being made, and the Senators who were not
able to be here are likely to have some questions that they
would like to pose to you in writing, and I am going to suggest
that they do so, and I hope that you can find time to respond.
In the meantime, I am grateful for the time you have spent
to give me a very informative afternoon. I have been the
beneficiary of your coming here.
I have one final question. Have you ever met Franklin
Graham? He is not a doctor, but he is with the Samaritans, and
I can see that you do not know him. I am going to have somebody
give you his name and address.
Ambassador Laney. I know him, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Very well. There being no further business to
come before the committee, with my appreciation to each of you
once more, we stand in recess.
[Whereupon, at 4:10 p.m., the committee adjourned.]