[House Hearing, 115 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
THE TRUMP-KIM SUMMIT:
OUTCOMES AND OVERSIGHT
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON ASIA AND THE PACIFIC
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
JUNE 20, 2018
__________
Serial No. 115-139
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Affairs
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Available: http://www.foreignaffairs.house.gov/, http://docs.house.gov,
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COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS
EDWARD R. ROYCE, California, Chairman
CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York
ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida BRAD SHERMAN, California
DANA ROHRABACHER, California GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York
STEVE CHABOT, Ohio ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey
JOE WILSON, South Carolina GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia
MICHAEL T. McCAUL, Texas THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida
TED POE, Texas KAREN BASS, California
DARRELL E. ISSA, California WILLIAM R. KEATING, Massachusetts
TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania DAVID N. CICILLINE, Rhode Island
MO BROOKS, Alabama AMI BERA, California
PAUL COOK, California LOIS FRANKEL, Florida
SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii
RON DeSANTIS, Florida JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas
MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina ROBIN L. KELLY, Illinois
TED S. YOHO, Florida BRENDAN F. BOYLE, Pennsylvania
ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois DINA TITUS, Nevada
LEE M. ZELDIN, New York NORMA J. TORRES, California
DANIEL M. DONOVAN, Jr., New York BRADLEY SCOTT SCHNEIDER, Illinois
F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, Jr., THOMAS R. SUOZZI, New York
Wisconsin ADRIANO ESPAILLAT, New York
ANN WAGNER, Missouri TED LIEU, California
BRIAN J. MAST, Florida
FRANCIS ROONEY, Florida
BRIAN K. FITZPATRICK, Pennsylvania
THOMAS A. GARRETT, Jr., Virginia
JOHN R. CURTIS, Utah
Amy Porter, Chief of Staff Thomas Sheehy, Staff Director
Jason Steinbaum, Democratic Staff Director
------
Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific
TED S. YOHO, Florida, Chairman
DANA ROHRABACHER, California BRAD SHERMAN, California
STEVE CHABOT, Ohio AMI BERA, California
TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania DINA TITUS, Nevada
MO BROOKS, Alabama GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia
SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida
ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii
ANN WAGNER, Missouri
C O N T E N T S
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Page
WITNESSES
Mr. Bruce Klingner, senior research fellow for Northeast Asia,
Asian Studies Center, The Heritage Foundation.................. 10
Michael J. Green, Ph.D., senior vice President for Asia, Japan
Chair, Center for Strategic and International Studies.......... 23
Mr. Abraham Denmark, director, Asia Program, The Woodrow Wilson
International Center for Scholars.............................. 29
LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING
The Honorable Ted S. Yoho, a Representative in Congress from the
State of Florida, and chairman, Subcommittee on Asia and the
Pacific: Prepared statement.................................... 3
Mr. Bruce Klingner: Prepared statement........................... 13
Michael J. Green, Ph.D.: Prepared statement...................... 26
Mr. Abraham Denmark: Prepared statement.......................... 32
APPENDIX
Hearing notice................................................... 62
Hearing minutes.................................................. 63
The Honorable Brad Sherman, a Representative in Congress from the
State of California: Material submitted for the record......... 64
THE TRUMP-KIM SUMMIT:
OUTCOMES AND OVERSIGHT
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WEDNESDAY, JUNE 20, 2018
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific,
Committee on Foreign Affairs,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:00 p.m., in
room 2172 Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Ted Yoho
(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Mr. Yoho. Good afternoon.
The hearing will come to order. I'd like to thank everybody
for being here today.
For years, this committee has held--has led the effort in
constraining the threat of North Korea's nuclear belligerence.
Congress has worked under successive administrations to
pressure the Kim regime, and in conjunction with the
administration in multilateral efforts, this has occasionally
brought us to inflection points--opportunities to change the
course of this stubborn conflict.
The United States has reached another of these crossroads.
Just over 1 week ago, President Trump met with Kim Jong-un, the
current scion of the dictatorial Kim dynasty.
The word ``historic'' has been endlessly used to describe
the meeting and that much is true. The two countries have never
conducted direct leader-level talks before, and regardless of
how these talks resolve, we can all be grateful that we are
further from conflict than we were at the end of last year, and
I would guess, 2 months ago.
Just over 1 week ago, President Trump met with Kim Jong-un,
as we talked about, but simply holding a summit is not an
accomplishment by itself.
The administration has taken an important first step. But
much work needs to be done. The joint statement that emerged
from Singapore contains few specifics about how these talks
will advance our ultimate goal--the complete, verifiable, and
irreversible denuclearization of North Korea. The statement, as
our witnesses will testify, is generally similar to many
statements North Korea has agreed to in the past, while making
no good-faith efforts toward ever giving up its nuclear
weapons.
While North Korea agreed to nothing new, the United States
took the unprecedented step to indefinitely suspend our joint
military exercises with our ally, the Republic of Korea.
There has been widespread disappointment regardless of
party or affiliation that the United States would make these
concessions when North Korea's only track record is for
cheating and double dealing.
Importantly, nothing would make China and Russia happier
than for the United States to voluntarily scale back our
strategic capabilities in northeast Asia.
The White House has given some assurance that halting these
exercises won't affect readiness, and it's encouraging that
Secretary Mattis and the Pentagon are behind the idea.
But Congress must ensure that our defensive options are not
affected and that the exercises can resume at the first sign of
trouble.
We must be vigilant against threats from elsewhere in Asia.
Our enemies will try to use the ongoing talks to advance their
own goals, which may be at odds with our own. China is already
pressing for the premature end of sanctions when North Korea
has taken no concrete steps and has already eased trade
restrictions along their shared border.
The indefinite standoff between the United States and a
nuclear North Korea is in China's strategic interest. We can't
forget that Xi Jinping has broken his diplomatic standoff with
Kim to maximize his influence in the ongoing talks.
He certainly wouldn't mind wiping out the progress that we
have made, turning back the clock a year or 2 and maintaining
control over the perpetual threat to the United States that he
can modulate through economic leverage.
So today we start a new chapter in a long-running endeavor
of this committee. Some aspects of Congress' role will stay the
same.
Ranking Member Sherman and I have worked together to press
the administration to go after sanctions evaders large and
small. It'll be more important to maintain our sanctions
pressure as these talks go on.
We have written the administration--there are no banks that
are too big to sanction. Targeting these bad actors will only
strengthen the administration's hand.
But the Singapore summit has left us with many questions
about how the negotiations will proceed in any denuclearization
process that will emerge.
Our objective today is to start formulating recommendations
that we can make to the administration and identify priorities
we must ensure are considered as these talks progress.
We are thankful to be joined today by an expert panel who
will advance their discussions and we look forward to hearing
from you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Yoho follows:]
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Mr. Yoho. And with that, members present will be permitted
to submit written statements to be included in the official
hearing record.
Without objection, the hearing record will remain open for
5 calendar days to allow statements, questions, and extraneous
material for the record, subject to length limitation in the
rules, and the witnesses' written statements will be entered
into the hearing.
I now turn to the ranking member for any opening remarks he
may have.
Mr. Sherman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for holding
these hearings and I appreciate that opening statement.
The question the people are asking is whether this was a
win-win or Kim win. I think it's clear that it is a Kim win,
but this is just the first inning, and it is possible that as
this goes forward it could be a win-win situation.
Let us see what--and I've been considered a dove at the
very edge of the pale of reasonableness by saying that these
negotiations will be successful if we are able to monitor,
freeze, and limit the nuclear program in North Korea and that
we will not get CVID, at least not in my lifetime, and they
tell me I am in good shape. I'll see.
So that--whereas everyone else in the foreign policy
administration has said the CVID, which means complete
irreversible verifiable demilitarization.
So although I've been considered a dove on that, this thing
passes is way more dovish than I am. What did we give up? We
gave up, first, a meeting with the President of the United
States, in Asia, boosting the credibility of the regime.
Most importantly, I think, we, in effect, gave up
sanctions, at least ratcheting those sanctions. For example,
Mr. Chairman, you and I sent this letter--and without
objection, I'd like to put it in the record.
Mr. Yoho. Without objection.
Mr. Sherman. Urging the administration--and this is dated
May 9th of this year--to impose tougher sanctions particularly
on the larger Chinese banks that have been given a pass.
This letter, to my knowledge had not been answered. But if
Singapore is the answer, this letter is dead. We are not going
to be sanctioning more. We are going to be sanctioning less.
We are not going to be making it hard for Kim to breathe.
We are going to be letting our foot off his neck. That is a
huge win for Kim.
And then, finally, and for reasons I do not understand, our
President has branded the exercises--military exercises as
provocative and as war games, and has suspended them, at least
the big ones planned in August.
We--if training isn't important to the military, then
perhaps the Armed Services Committee has it wrong and we can
save many tens of billions of dollars by not doing training and
not doing exercises. That is absurd.
While I am talking about exercises, what we need is
exercises involving Japan, the United States, and South Korea,
and we have to tell our allies to ``get over it.''
The Japanese can't say that they can be the third largest
economy and yet will never do anything to protect South Korea,
and South Korea can't say there were terrible wrongs done over
70 years ago and therefore they won't do exercises with Japan.
These two countries increase the burden on Americans, the
cost to Americans, and the possible death of Americans by
refusing to exercise together, and that--and what we need is
the three countries working with exercises together.
What did we get out of this hearing or, rather, this
summit? We did not get a freeze on the production of fissile
material.
At Yongbyon, both the plutonium reactor and the enrichment
centrifuges are working today. North Korea has more fissile
material today than when the President went to Singapore, and
they will have a little bit more by the end of this hearing.
There is an implicit freeze on testing. But you don't need
to test nuclear weapons constantly once you have demonstrated
that they work. North Korea has demonstrated that they work.
Russia hasn't done a nuclear test since 1990. That doesn't make
me sleep well, thinking that those weapons are unavailable for
use should they, God forbid, be deployed.
What we need is for North Korea to declare all of its
nuclear missile facilities, we need to send inspectors, and we
need a freeze, and if we don't get then all we have is vague
promises and a statement about a denuclearized Korean Peninsula
that apparently means to the North Koreans that will happen
when swords are beaten into plowshares and wherein the entire
world gives up its military forces.
So I look forward to learning from our experts what we can
do to turn this into a win-win, notwithstanding the outcome of
the first inning.
I yield back.
Mr. Yoho. I thank the ranking member. Now we will turn to
other members for opening statements.
Mr. Rohrabacher of California.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Thank you very much.
Let me just say for the record that I am very pleased with
our President and I think that when I look at what's going on
now and especially in reference to what happened in Korea,
forgive me if I say this, but it's sort of like Yogi Berra's
``it's deja vu all over again.''
Having spent time in the Reagan White House and watched the
same unrelenting negativity that the Democrats were playing
against Ronald Reagan, who now they won't admit that--seeing
that he ended the Cold War--but at that time they did
everything they could to cast aspersions and weaken America's
position in dealing with a Soviet Government, which at that
time was our primary enemy in the world.
In fact, Ted Kennedy, when Reagan was up for reelection,
even went to Russia--the Soviet Union--and met with Andropov,
who was the worst of all of their leaders--during the Cold War
and tried to find and to work with him, how can we prevent
Ronald Reagan from being reelected.
And this talk about collusion with Trump, which they have
been unable to prove, and have been put up and treated Ted
Kennedy, after that episode, as if he was some kind of a hero,
is really disconcerting for those who know history and have
been here for a while.
But now we have a President that's trying to bring peace to
Korea. My father fought in Korea. He fought in Korea before I
was born. Actually, I was born in 1947. So he fought in Korea
when I was 5 years old, all right. But I remember when I was
coming back from a little stint in Vietnam when I was 19 and he
told me how chaotic the situation was in Korea and how many
people's lives were being lost.
Years later, he told me he could not believe that after all
those years we had not brought peace to Korea, with all of the
loss of life of the Americans.
Well, let me just put it this way. This President has made
more progress toward bringing peace to the Korean Peninsula
than any other President, any other American leader, in our own
lifetime.
We should be proud of him and we should--it should be
unacceptable that this unrelenting hostility and negativity to
the point that foreigners look at us and believe that the
Democratic Party is trying to wish that our President didn't
succeed in this peace effort. That's how loud and aggressive
and unacceptable that criticism has been.
We should be applauding our President now for what he's
down with Kim because he's opened the door--doesn't mean he's
succeeded--but he's opened the door, just like Reagan opened
the door with the Soviet Union and many of the tactics he's
used have been the same.
So I appreciate that. Three cheers for our President and
what he's done with Korea.
Mr. Yoho. Appreciate your comments, and we pride ourselves
on being bipartisan on this committee, and we are going to have
bipartisan discussions, as you can hear today.
We next go to Mr. Bera--Dr. Bera--from California.
Mr. Bera. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And I appreciate my colleagues. I wasn't in Congress when--
I think I was in high school when President Reagan was, you
know, addressing the Cold War. In hindsight, you know what? I
am happy that the Cold War ended and President Reagan deserves
a lot of credit for that.
I also know someone who's traveled to the Korean Peninsula
three times in the last 10 months who had breakfast with the
vice foreign minister yesterday from Korea.
Look, I'll give kudos to President Trump for engaging in
dialogue. You know, Madeleine Albright said you don't have to
like the person sitting across the table from you but you have
to be willing to start a conversation and a dialogue, and that
conversation has started.
The devil now is in the details and, you know, the Republic
of Korea and the United States, there is no space between how
we are viewing this dialogue.
We are going to be very tough and, you know, I think the
President and, hopefully, the administration will be as tough,
walking hand in hand, with our Korean allies.
The end goal here is denuclearization in a verifiable
manner, and I am not ready to say I trust Kim Jong-un. I think
we can look back on, you know, prior agreements and prior
breaking of those agreements.
But we shouldn't be afraid to engage in a dialogue and move
forward, and we should do so with our eyes wide open. We
should, you know, stick to that end goal of a verifiable
denuclearized Korea.
It may take time, as opposed to hastily rushing through
things for an election cycle or political gain. Let's get this
right, and it shouldn't be Democratic or Republican. This is
about the United States of America and creating a more peaceful
world.
Mr. Yoho. Thank you for your comments.
We will next go to Mr. Adam Kinzinger.
Mr. Kinzinger. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'll keep it to a
minute.
Let me just say there is a DIME thing for getting things
done--diplomatic, information, military, and economic.
When you're working against an adversary, the economic and
especially the military piece is super important to back up the
diplomatic piece, and this is where we are at. We are at the
diplomatic part right now.
But the important part to see success on that is to
continue to keep the economic pressure up and to continue to
have viable and strong and aggressive military action if
necessary. It is that military piece that will compel a
diplomatic solution and it is that economic piece that will
create enough pain to also compel a solution.
So as we go down however long this process is, and we are
going to continue to do oversight of it, it is important that
we not let up on those things that force us to the table in the
first place, to continue to march down to a successful
conclusion and I wish--I know left and right, Democrats and
Republicans, wish this President luck to get it done. We
certainly hope so.
And I yield back.
Mr. Yoho. Thank you for your comments.
Next, we will go to Mr. Gerry Connolly from Virginia.
Mr. Connolly. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and welcome to our
panel.
I just want to say all of us hope that talking directly to
North Korea will have payoff, and that payoff, as set by the
President, has to be absolute denuclearization absolutely
verifiable.
I believe that's a standard that will not be met. I believe
that we have approached this in a naive way in which Kim Jong-
un has gotten all the benefits and we have gotten nothing.
I hope that can be reversed. I hope we can ultimately get
what it is we seek. But to be naive and to develop amnesia
about the history of negotiations--denuclearization
negotiations with North Korea is dangerous for the peninsula
and puts everybody, North and South and the Sea of Japan, at
risk.
So the stakes are very high here and the expectations have
been set by the President in ripping up the Iran nuclear
agreement, which wasn't good enough, even though it was
working.
Well, we don't have anything working with respect to North
Korea, other than a handshake and photo op. I hope to see and
expect much more.
I yield back.
Mr. Yoho. Thank you.
Next, we will go to Ann Wagner from Missouri.
Mrs. Wagner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Pardon me.
I appreciate this hearing on the Trump-Kim summit and I
want to thank our witnesses for being here today.
I was in the Korean Peninsula last August in kind of the
height of North Korea's belligerence and I met with South
Korean President Moon Jae-in, and we discussed our shared hope
for a peaceful resolution to last summer's ballistic missile
test.
We have made tremendous progress since then, trading in
threats for talks, and I believe there is real and genuine hope
that we can move toward denuclearization.
I understand full well the history of the 1994 agreed
framework, the Six-Party Talks, and the Leap Day agreement. So,
of course, the U.S. cannot grant concessions without tangible
steps toward Denuclearization and threat reduction.
But negotiations with the Kim regime are a serious
opportunity to reduce the risk of war in the Asia Pacific and I
look forward to tangible outcomes as the two parties continue
negotiations.
I yield back.
Mr. Yoho. Thank you for your comments.
And here we are. We are getting ready to have you guys.
Welcome to the Trump-Kim summit outcomes and oversight and--
okay.
And before we get into that, Mr. Chabot has a comment he
wants to make.
Mr. Chabot. I'll be very brief. I wasn't going to talk but
then I think I better.
For the last year and a half, many of the President's
critics literally were warning that he was going to trigger
World War III with respect to some of the aggressiveness toward
North Korea.
He substantially ratcheted up the sanctions against North
Korea along with the United States Congress and it actually
worked to a considerable degree. We are not there yet, but I
think it's heading in the right direction.
President Trump warned that, unlike previous U.S.
administrations, both Democrat and Republican, North Korea
would abandon its nuclear weapons.
Again, we haven't seen it actually happen yet. But I hope
and pray that we are on our way because I think we all do want
to avoid war, if at all possible.
So my advice to the President would be to keep the
ratcheted-up sanctions in place. The nuclear weapons and his
program has to go first before any of the sanctions are
relieved. But we shouldn't trust this government in North Korea
as far as we can throw them, as far as I am concerned.
They think nothing of starving and torturing and killing
their own people and throwing them into gulags and just
essentially forgetting about them.
So if you're going to do that to your own people, lying and
cheating with an adversary--the United States and our allies,
in this case--they won't think twice about that.
So we need to be very wary. That being said, I give
President Trump great credit for surprising a lot of people who
thought he was going to take us into war and may actually end
up in peace for the region and the world, and that's what we
hope happens.
I yield back.
Mr. Yoho. And I appreciate those comments and, you know,
like I said, this is the Trump-Kim summit--the outcome's
oversight--and as we were talking about earlier, so many of the
things that you guys tell us goes into written form, whether
it's resolutions or President--or letters to the President or
to Treasury or to the State Department, and so I look forward
to having your input, because we know what hasn't worked in the
past.
And so I think it's time for outside of the box and this is
pretty much outside of the box thinking and techniques, and,
you know, people aren't familiar with that or used to that or
comfortable with that.
We know, like I said, in the past what didn't work and we
had career diplomats negotiating and negotiating, and here we
are with the threat of a nuclear war on that peninsula further
than we have ever been.
So we are thankful today to be joined by Mr. Bruce
Klingner, who has been in front of this committee often, who is
the senior research fellow for Northeast Asia at the Heritage
Foundation Asia Studies Center.
Prior to working at the Heritage Foundation, Mr. Klingner
served 20 years in the CIA in the Defense Intelligence Agency.
Thank you for being here.
Dr. Mark Green, who is the senior vice president and Japan
chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and
director of Asian studies at the Edmund Walsh School of Foreign
Service at Georgetown University.
Previously, he has also served on the staff of the National
Security Council. Thank you for being here.
And Mr. Abraham Denmark, who is the director of the Asia
program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for
Scholars. Prior to joining the Wilson Center, Mr. Denmark
served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for East Asia
and has held several positions in the U.S. intelligence
community, and more importantly, another person here is Ms.
Denmark, your mother, who's going to be watching you.
So we are expecting big things out of you. Thank you,
ma'am, for being here.
And with that, you guys have been here enough. You know how
the timer works. You know how the lights work. Press your
button so we can hear you, and Mr. Klingner, go ahead. Thank
you.
STATEMENT OF MR. BRUCE KLINGNER, SENIOR RESEARCH FELLOW FOR
NORTHEAST ASIA, ASIAN STUDIES CENTER, THE HERITAGE FOUNDATION
Mr. Klingner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member
Sherman, and distinguished members of the panel.
It's truly an honor to be asked to appear before you again
on such an important issue of national security. The U.S.-North
Korea Summit was historic, and the first step of what would be
a long process to cut the Gordian Knot of regime security
threats to the United States and its allies.
Hopefully, this time is different. But it is a well-trod
path that has previously led to disappointment. The summit was
heavy on pomp and circumstance but light on substance. There
was nothing new in the Singapore Communique, as you pointed
out.
Each of the four major components was in previous accords
with North Korea and were stronger or more encompassing in the
previous iterations.
Most notably, the North Korean pledge to work toward
complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula is weaker
than the September 2005 Six-Party Talks joint statement.
And despite pre-summit statements by the administration
that North Korea was moving toward accepting the U.N.-required
concept of CVID, there was no evidence of that in the
Communique.
The joint statement did not include any reference to
missiles, BCW, verification, or human rights--all topics that
the administration stated would be discussed during the summit.
Also of concern was President Trump's unilateral decision,
without consulting our allies, to cancel what was deemed the
``provocative'' U.S.-South Korea ``war games,'' terms that
Washington had always rejected when North Korea used them.
This was a major unilateral concession to Pyongyang for
which the U.S. received nothing in return. North Korea did not
codify its nuclear and missile test moratorium in the Singapore
Communique nor did Pyongyang reciprocate with a freeze of its
own large scale annual winter and summer training cycles.
For years, the U.S. had correctly rejected North Korea's
freeze for freeze proposal in which North Korea would suspend
its prohibited nuclear missile tests in return for Washington
and Seoul suspending the allied conventional military
exercises.
As I wrote in 2015, canceling the combined exercises would
degrade U.S. and South Korean deterrence and defense
capabilities, necessitated by North Korea's previous attacks
and threats.
Last week, my Heritage Foundation colleague, retired U.S.
Army Lieutenant General Thomas Spoehr concluded that
``canceling military exercises before North Korea has taken any
concrete steps to demonstrate its intentions would be
troubling. These exercises are necessary to ensure the
interoperability and integration of operations and ensure
readiness and preparedness.''
General Spoehr assessed that ``suspending these large joint
exercises for an extended period of time, particularly for more
than 6 months, could erode the readiness of U.S. and South
Korean forces to successfully work together to defend South
Korea. If the pledge by the President encompasses lower level
exercises, the negative impact on readiness will be more
immediate and severe.''
Now, as we move forward, U.S. diplomats will now work to
add meat to the bones of the Singapore Communique, and I'll
summarize a few of the recommendations in my written testimony.
CVID--North Korea should unequivocally and publicly accept
the U.N.-required abandonment of the regime's nuclear missile,
and BCW programs in a complete, verifiable, and irreversible
manner.
Require detailed, carefully-crafted text. Past negotiations
with North Korea were flawed because the final agreement was
short, vague, and didn't clearly delineate the definitions and
responsibilities, as was the case with arms controls treaties
with the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact.
And the two sides differ over seemingly straightforward
phrases such as ``denuclearization'' and the ``Korean
Peninsula.''
We need to get it in writing. There has been a long history
of American negotiators believing North Korea agreed to
something based on our perception of a discussion or a verbal
assurance by the regime. Oral agreements with North Korea are
not worth the paper they are printed on. Distrust but verify.
North Korean cheating on previous agreements makes it even more
important to have more robust and intrusive verification regime
than in the past, and again, I would point to the arms control
treaties we had--START, INF, and CFE--with the Soviet Union as
an example.
We need to maintain pressure until significant progress is
achieved. U.S. negotiators should make clear the differences
between negotiable trade sanctions such as constraints on
resources, import and export of the U.N. resolutions, and
nonnegotiable U.S.-targeted financial measures, which are law
enforcement measures.
The North Korea Sanctions and Policy Enhancement Act
Sections 401 and 402 allow the U.S. to suspend sanctions for up
to 1 year or remove sanctions only if North Korea has made
progress on several stipulated issues.
The U.S. and South Korea should not sign a peace treaty
until the North Korean nuclear threat is eliminated and the
conventional threat reduced. The North has extensive military
forces along the DMZ and we should use measures such as those
in the CFE treaty and the CSBM agreement to minimize that
threat.
There should be no normalization of diplomatic relations
without progress on human rights. The U.N. Commission of
Inquiry concluded that North Korea's human rights violations
were so widespread and systemic and egregious that they
constituted crimes against humanity, and Kim Jong-un is on the
U.S. sanctions list for human rights violations.
In conclusion, the U.S. and its allies must keep its shield
up and its sword sharp until the threat necessitating their
need is removed or reduced.
President John F. Kennedy declared the cost of freedom is
always high, but Americans have always paid it. We share common
values and common cause with our South Korean ally.
So yesterday, today, and tomorrow (foreign language spoken)
``we go together.'' Thank you again for the privilege of
appearing before you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Klingner follows:]
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Mr. Yoho. Thank you for that.
Dr. Green.
STATEMENT OF MICHAEL J. GREEN, PH.D., SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT FOR
ASIA, JAPAN CHAIR, CENTER FOR STRATEGIC AND INTERNATIONAL
STUDIES
Mr. Green. Chairman Yoho, Ranking Member Sherman, and
members of the committee, thank you for inviting me back this
time to talk about the outcomes of the June 12th summit.
I hope I can add some clarity on what was achieved, what we
failed to achieve, and what we may have unleashed in terms of
broader geopolitics in Asia with this summit. In each of these
areas I think there is an oversight role for Congress, which I
will touch on in my remarks.
As several of the members of the committee have noted, Kim
Jong-un has certainly achieved two of his objectives--first, he
is now able to claim de facto U.S. recognition of this nuclear
weapons status.
When I was in the White House under President Bush, the
North Koreans wanted a summit with George W. Bush. They tried
to get one with Bill Clinton. They tried to get one with Barack
Obama.
Those Presidents said no because they thought the North
Koreans were doing this to try to claim de facto status for
their nuclear weapons.
Kim has checked that box. We can debate about whether it's
worth it, but that's one accomplishment.
Second, as has been mentioned, Kim has successfully blunted
sanctions. Not necessarily U.S. sanctions but China's
imposition of sanctions. China counts for 90 percent of North
Korean trade.
What did the United States achieve? North Korea has stopped
testing ballistic missiles and nuclear weapons. Kim probably
knows that if he resumes testing the President will put back
together the maximum pressure of international coalition of
sanctions, if not military options.
But we should also acknowledge that North Korea had
violated every freeze in the past and could do so again at any
time, and as others have mentioned on the committee, a freeze
in testing is not a freeze in production and development of
weapons and fissile material.
The language, as my colleague pointed out, in the June 12th
summit falls far short of previous agreements. Kim's firm and
unwavering commitment to complete denuclearization of the
Korean Peninsula is a line I heard and saw in documents in many
negotiations with the North.
When they say this, they mean we'll denuclearize when you
denuclearize, meaning when you stop protecting Japan and Korea
stop sanctions.
The North Koreans look at the nonproliferation treaty of
1968 with the U.S. and other nuclear power's promise to get rid
of nuclear weapons and I think Pyongyang realizes that's what
you say to get membership in the nuclear weapons club.
So like Mr. Klingner, I don't put much value on that
particular statement. It's possible Secretary Pompeo will be
able to produce more details than we've seen. I certainly hope
so.
The pattern in the past has been for North Korea to
prevaricate and not implement after the ink dries, and I think
Congress can help Secretary Pompeo get more leverage in that
difficult process.
We'll know it's different this time or potentially
different if Secretary Pompeo can get the North Koreans to
produce a statement on North Korea's full weapons and missile
inventory and a verification plan.
We were supposed to get this in the Six-Party Talks I
joined. They were supposed to be part of the agreed framework.
Doesn't mean that they would go down that path but it's the
first necessary step.
Absent real steps toward denuclearization of that kind,
Congress would be right to insist on fuller implementation of
sanctions including secondary sanctions against Chinese or
Russian firms, and I would argue to do so before the September
U.N. General Assembly when Kim Jong-un is expected to be
addressing the international community.
Also, U.S. unilateral sanctions, while they're still on,
are not a passive instrument. It takes active implementation.
Is the administration going to do maritime interdiction
operations when we catch the North Koreans transporting
dangerous materials? Will they be imposing sanctions when they
catch new banks?
I think Congress has an important role in pushing the
administration not only to maintain sanctions but to actively
implement them.
A second area requiring greater congressional oversight is
management of our alliances. All of us who work in Asia were
confused or disturbed by the President's abrupt cancellation of
U.S. joint military exercises.
This was not a unilateral decision, if you were in Japan or
Korea or Australia. This was a bilateral decision between North
Korea and the U.S., proposed by China and Russia, with no
consultation with our closest allies, compounded by the
President's statement that someday he'd like to get out of
Korea altogether.
I think most veterans of North Korea diplomacy, Republican
or Democrats, would say they hope the President succeeds. We
should give Secretary Pompeo the leverage he needs. But it
probably won't work.
What we do know for sure is we are going to need our
alliances. We'll especially need them if North Korea continues
developing dangerous weapons.
We are also going to need our alliances because we are
playing two games of chess in Asia right now. We are not just
playing this game of chess with North Korea. We are playing a
much more consequential long-term game with China about who's
going to dominate the rules and security in this region.
On that chessboard, we make a mistake sending signals of
lack of resolve or potential retreat on our alliances. I think
the administration would be appreciative, perhaps, of Congress
asking how this negotiation is going to advance the strategy
that the President's own national security strategy and the
national defense strategy articulate that we are in a
competitive game with China.
How will our diplomacy with North Korea--how will our
coordination with our allies help us in that other chess game,
which is no less important to our security than what the
President is trying to do with North Korea?
Thank you, and I look forward to your questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Green follows:]
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----------
Mr. Yoho. Thank you for your comments.
Mr. Denmark.
STATEMENT OF MR. ABRAHAM DENMARK, DIRECTOR, ASIA PROGRAM, THE
WOODROW WILSON INTERNATIONAL CENTER FOR SCHOLARS
Mr. Denmark. Chairman Yoho, Ranking Member Sherman, members
of the committee, it's an honor to be invited to give testimony
today to review last week's remarkable summit between President
Trump and Kim Jong-un.
Before I begin, I would just like to emphasize that the
views expressed in this testimony are mine alone and not those
of the Wilson Center or the U.S. Government.
I am a strong supporter of diplomacy with North Korea. I
work this challenge every day during my most recent appointment
at the Department of Defense and I am deeply familiar with the
risk associated with the military conflict with North Korea.
Still, we should remember that diplomacy is a tactic, not a
strategy and certainly not an objective. While the diplomatic
process that has begun--that has begun may yield results
eventually, the unfortunate fact is that the United States got
a bad deal in Singapore.
First, I would like to summarize what happened. The most
geopolitically significant outcome of the summit was to set the
U.S.-DPRK relationship----
Mr. Connolly. Excuse me, Mr. Chairman. Could we ask Mr.
Denmark to pull that mic closer to him? It's a little hard to
hear you.
Mr. Denmark. I apologize, sir.
Mr. Connolly. Thank you.
Mr. Yoho. Not a problem. Thank you.
Mr. Denmark. The most geopolitically significant outcome of
the summit was to set the U.S.-DPRK relationship onto a
diplomatic track.
Additionally, the President suspended major U.S.-ROK joint
military exercises. This gave away a major piece of leverage
while over time weakening the capabilities of our forces
stationed in Korea for no appreciable gain.
I should add that I disagree with the President's
characterization of these exercises as provocative. These
exercises are stabilizing and defensive, and they are essential
for deterrence, reassurance, and readiness.
This is not to say that military exercises are sacrosanct.
Adjusting exercises should be part of a negotiation.
In any case, suspending exercises does not require the
President denigrating their utility. There is also a lot that
didn't happen in Singapore. Most importantly, North Korea made
no new commitments toward denuclearization.
North Korea remains free to manufacture more nuclear
weapons, ballistic missiles, and other weapons of mass
destruction. There is no deadline for them to eliminate their
illegal capabilities or even to freeze their continued
production.
Further, as you can see in the chart I appended to my
testimony, North Korea's denuclearization commitment made last
week was the least specific commitment it has ever made.
Moreover, the joint statement from Singapore made no
mention of verification. Considering North Korea's repeated
history of violating past agreements, there is little reason to
trust them this time.
I would point to four significant implications of the
Singapore summit. One, despite the President's claims, North
Korea remains a significant threat to the United States and our
allies in East Asia.
North Korea has the same ability today to attack our allies
and possibly the United States as it had before the President
met Kim.
Two, the summit was a tremendous propaganda victory for Kim
Jong-un. This is why previous Presidents have refused to meet
with North Korean leaders. Doing so in itself is a major
concession and conveys tremendous legitimacy to the North
Koreans.
Three, the summit injected a new turbulence into U.S.
alliances with Japan and the ROK. The President's effusive
praise of Kim Jong-un and his willingness to meet with Kim and
make significant concessions despite making so little progress
on denuclearization inflamed allied concerns about U.S.
reliability.
And four, China got everything it wanted. China has long
sought for the United States to be committed to a diplomatic
process and to suspend its military exercises in Korea.
To conclude, I would like to offer four points on next
steps. On the first, time is not on our side. North Korea can
continue to mass produce nuclear warheads and ballistic
missiles as Kim Jong-un actually called for in his New Year's
speech in January.
There is a danger that the U.S. has entered into an open-
ended diplomatic process which would give North Korea a
distinct advantage.
One way for the United States to address time pressures in
this negotiation would be to achieve a complete freeze on North
Korea's nuclear and ballistic programs as an early step in this
process.
Second, to supplement the President's trust of Kim Jong-un,
the U.S. should insist on strict inspection and verification
regimes to accompany any concession North Korea may make toward
denuclearization.
Third, the United States should prepare for increased
friction with China over maintaining pressure on North Korea. I
expect China will soften its enforcement of sanctions on North
Korea and the United States should expect to be prepared to
hold China accountable, even to the point of enacting secondary
sanctions on China's entities that continue to do business with
North Korea.
And fourth, considering the continued threat posed by North
Korea, the United States should ensure that its military forces
and alliances in the region remain ready and robust.
Any strategy toward North Korea is far stronger if the full
weight of the United States and our allies can be brought to
bear.
Further, the people of the U.S. military deserve the
resources needed to do their job effectively and the ability to
exercise as needed.
Readiness saves lives and ensures that our military remains
the most awesome feared fighting force in the history of the
world.
Going forward, we must remain clear-eyed about how we are
dealing with. The threat from North Korea remains real and Kim
is not to be trusted.
A credible high-quality deal will be very difficult to
achieve and even more difficult to implement and verify. After
the pageantry of Singapore, the difficult work of diplomacy and
denuclearization still lies ahead.
Thank you, and I look forward to your questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Denmark follows:]
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----------
Mr. Yoho. Thanks, everyone, for your testimony. I look
forward to getting into the questions.
You know, you brought up--Mr. Denmark, you brought up a
very good point. It's a tremendous propaganda win for Mr. Kim
and I think most of the world sees that and I think a lot of
people here feel that, too.
But it's also a tremendous opportunity. I was born in 1955.
That conflict has been going on ever since then. You know, we
are operating under an armistice for all those years.
It's time to bring finality to something, and when we get
to that point then you have certainty, and when you have
certainty you can develop trade and all those things in the
economy.
And until we get to that point, we are not going to have
that kind of stability on that peninsula, as I think we all
agree.
What I see with what President Trump has done is he's
changed the dynamics of negotiation, and, you know, whether
it's good or bad, the future will tell us.
But what I see he has given the ball or a pass to Mr. Kim,
and it's an opportunity. What he does with it will determine
the next steps.
You know, some people look at it as a rope--if he does bad
that he'll hang himself with it. Others will see, you know
what, this is a chance that they can change the dynamics on
North Korea--of North Korea and develop an economic engine, and
I can only think, because we were talking about when he was in
Singapore.
Here you have a young leader of a country that doesn't have
much outside exposure. Thirty-four years old--goes and sees Xi
Jinping in China, sees their economic engine there. Goes to
Singapore, sees the economic engine.
The things that he sees, he has to go home thinking why
can't this be my country. Now he's got to deal with how do I
bring this in there. Hopefully, that's what he's seeing, and I
think with the President allowing him--and I don't want to use
the word legitimacy--but allowing him to move into the
negotiations, I think this is, as we've said multiple times,
historic.
Where it goes from here will be based on the next steps,
and it's going to be a step by step process, and I think you
have all brought up a very good point that we have to make sure
that the sanctions stay ratcheted up and so I think along those
lines, as we start negotiation, what I see as one of the most
important things is the definitions--definitions of
denuclearization--what does that mean to the North and what
does that mean to the peninsula and the rest of the world.
Verification--and I want to ask the question, who should do
the verification? Should we rely on the IAEA that I,
personally, don't have a lot of confidence in, or should it be
a coalition of the partner countries--South Korea, North Korea,
us, and maybe for balancing, allow somebody from China or
Russia there?
I would like to have your opinion on that and then we'll
ask you a few more questions. Bruce?
Mr. Klingner. Verification is an issue dear to my heart. I
was a chief of the arms control staff at CIA and I served on
one of the negotiating delegations overseas.
So it's really a two-part thing. One is the measures that
you have in the treaty, in which everyone knows exactly what
their responsibilities are and you provide the details of how
that is done.
And then that's used in conjunction with your national
technical means so that you can verify that. But you do need
on-site inspection.
So with the inspectors, whether it's IAEA or a coalition or
whether we call it other things, I think what you will need to
do is have on any teams at least one American and one Chinese
representative, because the Americans are going to want to have
eyes on where we see if something is a violation or not, and if
we call it a violation China would likely disagree. So you
probably need them there on the same team.
Mr. Yoho. Right.
Mr. Klingner. Now, things--when you get to actual fissile
material and actual nuclear weapons, you would probably want to
restrain that to the five members of the P-5 who have nuclear
weapons.
So if you're getting into that level of radioactive and
nuclear weapons, I think you keep it to a very select few
countries.
Mr. Yoho. Okay.
Mr. Klingner. But the U.S. wouldn't have enough inspectors
to man all of the inspections. So you would need other
countries. But I think we'd have to have U.S. representation on
every team.
Mr. Yoho. All right.
Let me go down to Dr. Green.
Mr. Green. We, in the Six-Party Talks, did considerable
work on this with other nuclear weapon states, principally
Britain and France, but also Russia, which was helpful at the
time, and to a lesser extent, China, which has very limited
experience in arms control.
The work has been done on what this should look like and
the State Department and the CIA and others would have it.
As Bruce points out, the IAEA has a role in safeguards in
places like Yongbyon, but nuclear weapons they don't do, so
that would require some accommodation of the permanent five and
most likely U.S. and Russia, Britain, and France would be at
the core of it.
As Bruce points out, China has a major equity, and although
they have less experience, should probably be there.
Stanford University did a study that suggested even under a
permissive environment, in the very unlikely event that Kim
Jong-un really wants to denuclearize, this is a 10- to 15-year
process.
And even then, the scientists and engineers have all that
information in their heads and what do you do with them? So the
reality is there is no end date for CVID. It's a constant
ongoing process.
The other problem is precisely because it has to be in
iterations that North Koreans and China will use that to try to
get rewards for small increments and to hold up progress.
So one of the tough challenges for the Secretary of State
is what's an early harvest that shows us seriousness. I think a
declaration is one of them. Getting out fissile material
weapons might be next.
Mr. Yoho. All right. Mr. Denmark--20 seconds.
Mr. Denmark. I don't have much. I thought the answers were
very good. I agree that the IAEA has an important role to play.
But there is a difference between inspection, verification,
and actually pulling the weapons out--that the P-5 is going to
have an important role to play.
The different countries have various levels of capability.
I am especially concerned about China's ability to actually
handle those responsibly.
But overall, I think it's important to make sure that any
verification regime is robust. As Dr. Green said, this is going
to require very intense--very intrusive inspections. That's
difficult for any country to really accept and for a country as
self-isolated as North Korea it's very difficult to see.
But it's going to be an extremely long process. There is
really no such thing a quick denuclearization.
Mr. Yoho. Right. Thank you.
I will next turn to the ranking member, Mr. Sherman of
California.
Mr. Sherman. Thank you. One bit of disagreement with Dr.
Green. It may take 10, 15 years to root out every piece of the
North Korea nuclear program.
But if they stop the centrifuges, dismantle them, ship
fissile material, that is something Iran did in 90 days and
could have done quicker, and that would make us all sleep a
little better.
I do have a comment or two about Mr. Rohrabacher's opening
statement. First is I believe it's President Eisenhower who is
the President who did the most to bring peace to the Korean
Peninsula.
And second, I want President Trump to succeed and, beyond
that, I have defined success with a lower, more achievable
standard not only that any Democrat in the room but any
Republican in the room, although we haven't heard from the
gentlelady from Hawaii yet, but in a much more achievable lower
standard for success than anyone else I know actively involved
in foreign policy.
But as Mr. Green points out, just doing a meeting that's
not an achievement. That's a concession. The last four or five
Presidents were all begged by North Korea to do this meeting.
They all decided it was a concession they were unwilling to
make.
I want to focus a bit, because we have a Japan expert with
us here--Dr. Green. It is very anomalous that you have in Japan
the third largest economy in the world who, as of now, is doing
nothing with its own military forces or preparing to do nothing
with its military forces to defend its own back yard.
Now, the Japanese constitution talks about this or that,
but the U.N.--the mission to defend North Korea is a United
Nations mission, and many countries believe that meeting their
U.N. obligations is something they're legally able to do.
What do we do to have the Japanese military be willing and
prepared to be part of the effort to defend South Korea?
I realize that not all the problems are in Tokyo.
Mr. Green. No, they're enough. First of all, I think you
put that very well.
North Korea could, in a month, in a week, ship out
centrifuges, fissile material, nuclear weapons, and in a month
or 2 ship out all of it.
The full CVID is what's going to take 10 or 15 years. So I
think--I agree with you actually. I think that's an important
point for the record.
Under Prime Minister Abe, Japan has revised the
interpretation of the constitution to allow for the first time
in the post-war period Japanese forces to plan jointly with the
U.S. to move and operate together, and that's a significant
move.
He's moved--he's increased the defense budget a little bit.
Japan should spend more. He's moving--he said he's going to buy
new weapons systems that Japan had never had.
Mr. Sherman. But how do we get those joint trilateral
exercises?
Mr. Green. So that is a problem. The Japanese defense
forces are keen to exercise with Korea. The Korean defense
forces are keen to exercise with Japan because they recognize
what you said. If we are not working together it's dangerous
for all of us.
It's the political level that's the problem. Right now
the----
Mr. Sherman. Is it politically dangerous for a South Korean
President to say hey, we are going to have joint trilateral
exercises? Would that have been dangerous before Singapore? Is
it dangerous after Singapore--politically dangerous?
Mr. Green. I don't think it is. It's not easy, but I don't
think it's difficult and, frankly, if we pushed----
Mr. Sherman. And how difficult would it be for Abe to----
Mr. Green. Abe would do it. The problem is that the South
Korean side, as Bruce and Abe know well, the South Korean side
is not satisfied with the agreement that Prime Minister Abe
made with the previous President about historical issues like
the comfort women, and that's a political and social and other
problem.
But in terms of the militaries--Japanese and Korean realize
they have to work together jointly and, you know, in my view,
the administration should be pushing harder on this.
The exercises we do with the South Koreans are suspended.
The South Korean military is going to go ahead with another
exercise to defend the small island of Dokdo against the
Japanese. That's the wrong enemy.
Mr. Sherman. What?
Mr. Green. The wrong enemy, yes.
So I am glad you flagged it in your opening comments. I
think it should be a priority. I think that the--that the
Japanese and Korean military experts, diplomats, should think
about the North Korean problem, recognize it. It's the
politicians who have to be pushed to increase the collaboration
between the two.
Mr. Sherman. Thank you.
Mr. Yoho. Next we'll go to Dana Rohrabacher from
California.
Mr. Rohrabacher. A couple of thoughts. I am sorry I would
disagree with my colleague and the witness as well. You both
seem to be underestimating the antagonism of the Korean people
to the Japanese.
And I am sorry, it's not a good thing. I don't like it. But
it better be a factor in how we create a more peaceful
situation in that part of the world.
The Koreans have never forgiven the Japanese for the Second
World War, and but that does not mean we should not--we should
not be moving forward with a plan that would increase Japan's
at least capacity in that region but not necessarily having
military maneuvers aimed at something going on in Korea. I
think that would be counterproductive.
With that said, let me also note when I said that this
whole thing is a, you know, deja vu all over again. Let us note
that of my colleagues who are saying we didn't accomplish
anything and my witnesses suggest it wasn't accomplished, that
Reagan, when he was negotiating, when he went to Reykjavik and
elsewhere, this was predicated how we ended up turning what was
a slamming of the door--Reykjavik--to another situation was
Ronald Reagan proposed the zero option, and he was--by the way,
most people forget that.
And, again, castigated by the liberal Democrat opponents of
Ronald Reagan as being a fraud and you're never going to get
them to agree to that.
We want the nuclear freeze, which would have frozen the
Soviets into a--into a superior position with nuclear weapons
and Reagan said no, we are going to go for the zero option and
he was called--they said he's being disingenuous. The
Democratic attacks on Trump are almost exactly the same, and
the fact is that in the end the Soviets agreed to the zero
option, and in the end we eliminated a whole schedule of
nuclear weapons in Europe because yes, the President did not
demand immediately to have something to show for every meeting
that he was in and had a long strategy that worked.
I believe that's what's going on right now, and our
President has opened the door. He's opened the door, and I
agree with Mr. Kinzinger, I should say--not Kissinger--who
pointed out military--maintaining a strong military possibility
and that's why I was talking about Japan and helping them build
forces there, was an important component about bringing
together the end of the Cold War and would be important to hear
as well.
In the Cold War, while Ronald Reagan had his hand out, he
also was supporting mujahadeen guerillas in Afghanistan, the
contras in Nicaragua, various elements in eastern Europe who we
were supporting under cover like Walesa and others. And so my
colleague is exactly right, it needs to be a two-fisted thing.
But I have no reason--I do not believe there is any reason
for us to suspect that this President--we keep treating him as
if he doesn't know what he's doing. He understands the basics,
and there's a fellow who wrote a book in my district called
``No Profit Without Risk.'' His name is Bob Mayer. Bob Mayer is
a very successful businessman.
Our President is very successful businessman. He realizes
there will be not progress without some risk, and what you--and
what--but you should not castigate this President and undermine
his position as being taking--as possibly having a rational
approach rather than just dismissing him as oh, this is just so
risky--we shouldn't be doing this.
I think he's putting us in a position, like Reagan did when
he said the zero option, not nuclear freeze, to actually put us
in a position to end the conflict on the Korean Peninsula.
And the goal isn't just taking nuclear weapons out of the
hands of North Korea. The goal is to unify Korea in the end
under a somewhat democratic country.
And one last note, and I want your comments on this--sorry
I am taking up all this time--but the fact is that this Kim is
different than his father and his father's father.
And when you say that, as my colleague just said, but he
went to Singapore, maybe he saw the potential of the West--this
man, this young leader Kim, he was educated in Switzerland at
an elite and prestigious school.
He knows so much more than what his father and his father's
father knew that perhaps these things that we are talking about
make sense that you're dealing with a rational person rather
than a rabid Marxist dog like his dad and his grandfather.
So I am sorry. I've used up my time. Could they have a
minute to comment on--feel free to disagree.
Mr. Yoho. Real briefly, if you can comment.
Mr. Klingner. I think in many ways Kim Jong-un is different
from his predecessors but in many ways he is similar. It
perhaps is a more effective implementation of a three
generation game plan by the North Koreans.
North Korea has had a two-page play book of alternating
threats, attacks with charm offensives, although with North
Korea it tends to be more offensive than charming.
With Kim Jong-un, he, for 6 years, only did the first page
of his father's play book and he did it on steroids with an
accelerated test schedule.
And since January he switched to the second page and also
done that sort of on steroids, where he's now had the revolving
door of summits.
So the whiplash effect is strong in going from one extreme
to the other. But I think it's still trying to implement the
objectives of his father and his grandfather of being accepted
as a nuclear state, of reducing the pressure and isolation on
North Korea, getting economic benefits but on North Korean
terms.
They want to get the economic benefits but they don't want
to open their country to what they see as the contagion of
outside influence.
Mr. Yoho. Okay. Thank you.
We are going to go on, just out of respect for the other
members.
Mr. Connolly from Virginia.
Mr. Connolly. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and let me thank you
for putting together an intellectually honest panel. I've gone
to way too many committee hearings on this committee over the
years where we have a skewed panel. Even the title of the
hearing predetermines the outcome of the hearing.
Mr. Yoho. We try to be fair and balanced.
Mr. Connolly. Well, you have been more than that.
No, seriously, I really thank you because I think we are
having an intellectually honest conversation about something
that's terribly important.
My friend from California I think does not accurately
recall history, even though he worked for Ronald Reagan. My
recollection of the Reykjavik summit was that when Ronald
Reagan said, why don't we just get rid of all nuclear weapons,
it was the neocons in his own administration who were shocked
and distressed, not liberal Democrats.
And secondly, I must remind my friend from California, I
sat here for 8 long years and I don't remember my friends on
the other side of the aisle giving the very kind of
consideration he now asks of this President to President Obama.
And what's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.
So we Democrats reserve our right, the right you exercised
for 8 years, to criticise this President and we are going to do
it carefully but with some zeal.
Let me--let me summarize, if I may, what I've heard from
all three of our witnesses. We have a history of violations by
the North. Don't get too excited about anything they sign on
to.
Added to the fact that this joint statement after the so-
called summit actually lacked specificity. I think it was you,
Mr. Klingner, who said--or maybe you, Dr. Green--it actually is
less meat on the table in this statement than some of the
previous ones.
We still have a huge human rights problem. Again, I was
listening to my friend from California. You would never guess--
you know, he had his uncle executed in a horrifying way. You'd
never guess he still presides over gulags of tens of thousands
of North Koreans. You'd never guess that he had his step-
brother assassinated--killed at a modern airport in Asia, but
okay.
You have the effect--I think, Dr. Green, you talked about
the de facto lessening of sanctions with China. This kind of
gives a little bit of a green light to China, maybe not others
about certainly China, and that's not a good thing, given the
fact that most of their trade is with China.
We have the recognition of their nuclear status de facto by
having the summit by the United States. WE elevate his stature,
which they've been seeking, as you pointed out, Dr. Green, for
the previous three or four administrations. This is the first
one to give it to him.
And in return, we've gotten no commitment on
denuclearization, no commitment on inspections, no commitment
on metrics, and as I said in my statement, the problem
President Trump has is by ripping up Iran, which was working
and that had very specific metrics, one has to presume, since
he decided that was inadequate, that with respect to North
Korea or any nuclear threshold state, we are going to have
higher metrics--we are going to have a higher standard they
have to meet. And I don't know how you do that, frankly, with
North Korea. I think Iran complicates the problem.
But I also think just this so-called summit--I don't want
to take anything away from shaking hand and having a photo op,
but I think there's danger in terms of the expectations that
have been raised, in the concessions de facto that have been
granted.
I now welcome you to comment on that.
Doctor--Mr. Klingner.
Mr. Klingner. I've been working on North Korea for 25 years
so I tend to be skeptical and cynical. But perhaps you are even
more skeptical than I.
No, I agree. I would say the summit as--it's a first step.
We can discuss, debate how successful it was, how good a first
step it is.
But as you know, my colleagues and I have tried to identify
the things that we need to do to put the meat on the bones
and----
Mr. Connolly. Yes, but I am not trying to be skeptical. I
am trying to raise--I am trying to be realistic, and what I
listed was actually feeding back what I heard from your
testimony, which I thought was very helpful.
You know, yes, be hopeful but let's be realistic. Not like
we don't have a history here.
Mr. Klingner. Right. No, exactly, and just to boil it down
I would say is we need very detailed texts and then very good
verification.
You know, not only do they have a different definition of
denuclearization, but when they define the Korean Peninsula,
it's anything that influences the peninsula, including our
bombers in Guam and our submarines and our aircraft carriers.
So we need to get the terms straight and we need to look at
sort of the arms control treaties we had to be very, very
specific--a very detailed contract with someone who has cheated
us many times in the past.
Mr. Connolly. If the chair would allow the other two
witnesses to answer and then I yield back my time.
Mr. Yoho. Go ahead.
Mr. Connolly. I thank the chair.
Mr. Green. So, Representative Connolly, I think you have
accurately captured the core points we are all trying to make
and that, I think, points to the important oversight role
Congress should have in this and in any negotiation the
negotiators help by a good cop-bad cop, and there's a role that
could be a bipartisan role for this committee and for the
Congress, in my view.
If I could very briefly pick up on Mr. Rohrabacher's point
about Ronald Reagan. You know, it was Richard Nixon, a
conservative Republican, who changed relations with China.
There is an argument that we should not dismiss, that any
conservative Republican President can do this because of the
curious politics of it all.
However, I think there are two lessons from Reagan that
would be important to remember.
You know Ronald Reagan went to Reykjavik, having presented
an absolutely unwavering commitment to human rights and
democratic values, and a clear and unchanged, unrivalled,
frankly, commitment to our allies.
When the Soviets deployed SS-20s in Europe and NATO, he
went right back, toe to toe, with tactical nuclear weapons. If
we look for the opportunity for a Republican President to do
something like this with North Korea, it is absolutely
essential for President Trump to remember what Ronald Reagan
did.
And what we've heard so far has not been a Reagan-like
commitment to democratic values, to human rights, and to our
allies, which is an essential backstop precisely because North
Korea is targeting the U.S.-Korea alliance as the center of
gravity they don't want to break and China is targeting our
alliances as a whole, and that's an important--the Reagan
parallel could work. But I think those two caveats are
absolutely essential to remember.
Mr. Yoho. Mr. Denmark, real quick.
Mr. Denmark. Yes, sir. I agree that you summarized the
points that we've been making a great deal, and I think--I
agree that there's a tremendous role that the Congress has in
terms of oversight.
The one point I would like to add and it feeds into some of
the discussion that was had earlier but I didn't have time to
in my opening statement, one of the key aspects of any
negotiation is to know what the other guy on the other side of
the table wants--what they're trying to get out of this
negotiation.
And if you look at everything that Kim Jong-un has done--
you said earlier that Kim Jong-un may be different from his
father or his grandfather--since taking power, Kim Jong-un
accelerated nuclear testing, accelerated ballistic missile
testing.
If you look at his New Year's statement from January of
this year, his version of the State of the Union Address, he
embraced nuclear weapons, declared the whole program a success
and said that he wanted to turn toward economic development,
but as a nuclear power.
I have yet to see any indication that Kim Jong-un is
looking at disarmament or denuclearization. My sense is that he
believes he wants to be entering into arms controls
negotiations the way that we were doing in Reykjavik, not
denuclearization negotiations, and if you have a good sense of
right, I strongly recommend that you would read the New Year's
address.
The translation is in English. It's very clear. He's
looking to engage the world as a nuclear power, and until we
have a good understanding of what he's actually trying to get
out of it, these negotiations are going to be difficult to even
move a bit forward because we have different objections in
mind.
Mr. Yoho. Thank you.
Next we'll go to Ambassador and Congresswoman Ann Wagner
from Missouri.
Mrs. Wagner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The U.S. faces two threats in Northeast Asia--North Korea
and China. My father served in the Korean War and the stalemate
in the region persists to this day.
America's intervention in Korea in 1950 was a strategic
success in preventing an important buffer region from becoming
a zone of communist influence and strengthening the United
States' hand in the broader Cold War. Cold War is over, but
today the North still serves as a buffer state for China.
Rapprochement between the U.S. and North Korea could
possibly threaten China's influence over the Kim regime.
Dr. Green, North Korea is useful to China because it
distracts and challenges the U.S. and our South Korean
alliance.
At the same time, the Kim regime is vulnerable because of
its strategic and economic dependency on China. China is North
Korea's real long-term threat, not the United States.
Do you believe China has an interest, Dr. Green, in our
negotiations failing?
Mr. Green. You know, I think we don't get to read about the
Chinese debate because they don't have an open vibrant
political system like we do.
But I think in Beijing they are as confounded by North
Korea as we are, in many respects. I think you accurately
captured their strategic view but there are huge debates within
the leadership compound in Zhongnanhai, I am sure.
I think from China's perspective, the operative approach is
not today--don't let North Korea collapse today--don't have
unification today--kick this can down the road.
In 10 years, in 20 years, in 30 years China will be more
powerful. It will have more control over North and South Korea.
China will be in a position to affect unification of a
peninsula with no American alliance.
So China has every incentive to lower tensions but also to
just kick this can down the road, and that's our problem, and
part of the solution is our alliances, because China assumes it
will be more powerful and have more influence over South Korea
as time passes.
But if we are faithful to our allies, if we are strong on
trilateral defense cooperation with Japan and Korea, if we
don't say we want to get out of Korea, if we do all of those
things, we signal to China that North Korea is making our
alliances stronger--thank you very much, Beijing--so if you are
worried about that, you need to put more pressure on your
friends in Pyongyang--the game of alliances and U.S. and China
is an essential part of how we get purchase on the----
Mrs. Wagner. How can the U.S. best manage China's interests
as it negotiates with Kim? Because, frankly, kicking the can
down the road is a negotiation failure at this point in time.
Mr. Green. Yes, in the sense that we won't get a result.
It's a success for China and interests converge in North Korea
because it just sort of prevents the U.S. from taking action.
Look, we had the Six-Party Talks. They failed to get North
Korea to denuclearize. I was involved in that at the time. One
useful thing about it was it got China, Russia, Japan, Korea
all around the table. They all have equities. Only China, North
Korea, U.S., and South Korea would be in a peace negotiation to
replace armistice.
We will need a broader diplomatic framework that gets----
Mrs. Wagner. I am running out of time.
Mr. Klingner, is it possible to check the growth of Chinese
power through our negotiations with Kim? Namely, what could we
do to turn the North into a buffer zone for our own interests?
Mr. Klingner. Well, I think the North Korean-Chinese
relationship is strained. It's more strained now than under the
previous leaders in North Korea.
You know, 5,000 years of history and 1,000 invasions or so
have caused North Korea to have a very suspicious view of its
neighbors. They see it as a shrimp amongst whales.
Each of the leaders in North Korea has warned that China is
a bigger threat to North Korea than the U.S. because of its
intent to influence North Korea.
So the North Korean nuclear program was a response to
feeling that both the Soviet Union and China were not going to
protect North Korea to the degree that they needed.
So I think North Korea is playing all these countries, all
these neighbors, off against each other. The thing with the
alliances is that they are multi-purpose tool, so that they are
not only deterring and defending against the North Korean
threat but they're also serving to protect not only U.S. and
allied interests----
Mrs. Wagner. Thank you. I hate to interrupt.
But Mr. Denmark, we know Kim has been talking with Xi
Jinping throughout this process. China has lost influence in
North Korea's top circles of power. But what role is Xi playing
in our negotiations? Do you think China has the ability to
influence Kim as he enters negotiations with the U.S., and how?
Mr. Denmark. I do believe that Xi Jinping has a multiplying
effect. I think his primary message from all these meetings
that he's been having with Kim Jong-un is to show that China
has a critical role to play and China will not be bypassed.
The most important role that China will have in these
negotiations will be in maintaining economic pressure. As the
Trump administration has said, they want to make sure that
North Korea remains under significant economic pressure until
it makes significant steps toward denuclearization.
The challenge, of course, is that the vast majority of
international trade for North Korea goes through China, and
China has, in the past, proven inconsistent, you can say, in
its willingness to engage those sanctions and to enforce those
sanctions.
One of the challenges that we are going to have, going
forward, is that many in China, as Dr. Green mentioned, many in
China increasingly see dynamics on the Korean Peninsula through
the lens of geopolitical competition with the United States.
And if China sees progress in some area as being--sees
increased sanctions, for example, as being an American
interest, that may be one reason why China may be less willing
to enforce some of those sanctions, because they see it
potentially as helping the United States.
Mrs. Wagner. Thank you.
My time has expired. I appreciate the chair's indulgence. I
yield back.
Mr. Yoho. Thank you.
Next we'll go to Ms. Tulsi Gabbard from Hawaii.
Ms. Gabbard. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the gentlemen
for being here and sharing your insights.
I think there's been a lot of focus on the geopolitical
considerations and impacts of these negotiations. But very
little focus on the seriousness of the North Korea nuclear
threat on the United States.
As the chairman mentioned, I represent Hawaii. Being in the
middle of the Pacific this is something that is an ever present
concern for our residents and people who live in our State.
The false missile alert that we had in January of this year
brought things into light that many others really didn't
consider.
So the seriousness of these talks and this diplomatic path
failing, very high stakes, and why, I believe it's important
that these talks happened. Important first step, as everyone
has said, clearly lacking in critical details, lacking in
written plan of execution on exactly how this will be done.
North Korea is still a threat that is posed to us. But we all
hope for success and want to be supportive in that.
I have a few questions. I am, first of all wondering what
your thoughts are on should a nuclear agreement come out of
these talks, what role approval by the House and Senate has,
whether this should require ratification by the Senate or take
a similar route as the previous Iran nuclear deal in allowing
for congressional disapproval?
If we are talking about permanent denuclearization being
most successful, what role do you see Congress playing in that?
Mr. Klingner. I believe that achieving many issues with
North Korea, not only denuclearization but a potential peace
treaty and normalization relations, are of such critical
importance to the United States that it should be a matter for
more than just the executive branch.
I think the legislative branch should be involved. So
whether that's a formal treaty or interaction with the
executive branch, I think it is of such importance,
particularly a peace treaty and denuclearization.
Ms. Gabbard. So you don't see any major difference between
ratification of the treaty by the Senate versus some other
mechanism of approval or disapproval?
Mr. Klingner. I don't know enough about the mechanics of
it--a Senate ratification versus other means.
Mr. Green. The President had waiver authority in the 18 or
so pieces of legislation that Trading With the Enemy Act and so
forth--terrorism--these sanctions give the President a
Presidential waiver. So legally he can lift sanctions in the
process of rewarding North Korea for steps toward
denuclearization. But the President has talked about a peace
regime--a peace declaration--a peace treaty that would have to
be ratified by the Senate.
If the United States negotiates a normalization that has to
be ratified, and if there is to be aid for North Korea, it
would come through the Asia Development Bank, the World Bank,
maybe China's Belt and Road. But Congress would have
authorities and control of the budget.
So bottom line is if this does move forward there's going
to be a major congressional role even if the President has
national security waiver authority on sanctions, and one way to
construct this would be, like, the Helsinki process in the Cold
War with the Soviet Union to have a broad framework where there
are baskets, such as economic development, human rights,
conventional weapons, and confidence building nuclear weapons
and with the aim of ultimately moving toward peace treaty
ratification denuclearization and begin building that process
with Congress through hearings and so forth to anticipate what
Congress would expect.
I think maybe not in the next month or 2 but early on in
the process that framework should be set up.
Ms. Gabbard. Dr. Green, you mentioned earlier, I think,
about how CVID is an ongoing process. It's not something that
really has a hard finish.
A lot has been--I think you all talked about the different
types of verification measures that would be needed. Can you
talk about the irreversible part of that acronym and how that
can be executed, especially given your history in this?
Mr. Green. Well, we never got irreversible, ever, not in
the Six-Party Talks.
Ms. Gabbard. Is it possible?
Mr. Green. If the North Koreans turn over fissile material,
nuclear weapons, that's irreversible in the sense that they
can't use those anymore.
But that doesn't stop them from continuing to spin
centrifuges to make more uranium-based weapons if we don't know
where all the facilities are.
So the only way to get irreversible really, aside from bits
and pieces, is full inspections, and the North Koreans have not
even let us look in the keyhole in the negotiations to date.
The first step will be a declaration.
Ms. Gabbard. How do you deal with the nuclear scientists
that they have?
Mr. Green. Well, you know, Senators Nunn and Lugar have
legislation to do this with the Soviets that was--appears to
have been pretty effective and I saw they both spoke recently
and met with the President, I understand.
So that might be a model--the Nunn-Lugar legislation to
employ scientists and engineers, and it's also one we suggested
to the North Koreans in the Six-Party Talks as a way to help
compensate them, basically, by hiring scientists and engineers
for other projects.
Ms. Gabbard. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Yoho. Thank you.
Next we'll go to Ms. Dina Titus from Nevada.
Ms. Titus. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I thank all
of you for testimony. It's been most interesting.
I share in your skepticism about this so-called agreement
and some of the vagueness of the terms--what's the time and
what's the possible verification--what does denuclearization
really mean.
Also, President Trump has been getting a lot of credit for
putting us in a better position with Korea--than we've been in
for a while.
But let us not forget that it was some of his saber
rattling and his belligerent rhetoric that got us to the kind
of a crisis situation--the fire and fury, as you recall. So I
don't think we should give the arsonist too much credit for
putting out the fire.
You were talking earlier about, you know, some of the
tactics of diplomacy and I think language is a very big part of
that and the language that you use.
Our President is not a master of the English language, much
less any other one, and he doesn't stick to the script or read
the teleprompter or take notes or believe in preparing.
One of the uses of language I thought that might hinder
this diplomatic effort is when he used the same language as
North Korea and China used about the joint military exercises
and called them provocative. That's what they have been saying
they are.
We have had other reasons for why those exercises took
place but now just kind of on the spur of the moment he
canceled them because they are provocative.
I wonder if, moving forward in these diplomatic relations,
we aren't making a mistake using the same language that our
adversaries use as opposed to making our own case.
Mr. Denmark, would you comment on that?
Mr. Denmark. As I said earlier, ma'am, my sense is that
these exercises are not provocative. They're defensive. They're
stabilizing. They're legal, which is why I've always opposed
the so-called freeze for freeze proposal that the Chinese made,
and I am trying to equate some degree of equality between these
two.
But I think, if you take a step back, referring to these
exercises as provocative really has broader implications than
just on the Korean Peninsula. It suggests that these exercises
are done to provoke not just North Korea but potentially the
exercises that we have all around the world can now be pointed
to by our adversaries as provocative.
And so I think it has global implications in that way. But
at the same time, my sense is that it raises the bar for if the
President decides he wants to reinstate these exercises, wants
to do any of these major exercises again in Korea, then it
allows North Korea, it allows China to say, you said that these
are provocative--you're only doing these to provoke us--it's
not about readiness--it's not about deterrence--you said it's
about provocation and this is exactly what you're trying to do.
So I think by using that language, I agree that languages
is absolutely important in diplomacy. My concern is that by
using this language it helps feed into the arguments that China
and North Korea have been making for a long time.
Ms. Titus. I agree.
You know, we've heard a lot about China and North Korea and
Japan. There are other players in the area that are going to be
affected by this that I think we need to take into account,
too. You saw Mongolia wanted to host the summit, Singapore, you
know, India. We need to look at other allies there as we move
forward on this.
Also, I would ask you, I am inclined to think that North
Korea is not going to give up their nuclear weapons because
that's what got them to the table. That's what got the U.S.
there, and now they want to play on that stage.
At what point in these negotiations, going forward, do we
shift our focus from denuclearization to nuclear control or
arms control?
Mr. Klingner. Well, going along with the theme of words
matter, North Korea defines denuclearization as global arms
control, and as my colleagues have said it is as a self-
professed member of the nuclear club, North Korea will say,
we'll go to zero when you go to zero.
So we need to move away from defining or allowing North
Korea to define the denuclearization, which is a U.N.
requirement, in North Korean terms of arms control.
So we need to keep focusing on what is required under
numerous U.N. resolutions.
Mr. Green. I would not bet a lot of money that this is
going to lead to CVID. If it goes well, then maybe in a year or
2 this committee will be debating the deal we have, and the
deal we have is probably going to be if it's--best case
scenario, in my view, North Korea freezes the Yongbyon
plutonium facility or North Korea agrees to turn over certain
facilities.
It's a piece of the program, and then the debate will be
how much do we lift sanctions--do we normalize relations--do we
give them economic aid.
And people can have a reasonable debate about that if we
are lucky enough to get that far. My own bias would be reward
them incrementally with humanitarian aid and other things but
do not normalize or do other things that undermine the
credibility of our commitment to allies.
WE should be always remembering, as I said, that there are
two chess games going on. One is with North Korea but the other
one is with China, and our critical advantage in both, but
especially the one with China, is our alliances.
So let's not jeopardize our alliances for a partial deal.
Let's pay something if we have to, but make sure that our
alliances and our military readiness and deterrence are intact
and, in fact, are getting stronger.
Mr. Denmark. I believe that the United States should not
drop its commitment to denuclearization. That said, I do think
that positive progress is positive progress, and if we are able
to make a partial deal that improves stability, that reduces
the risk of war, that would be work to some degree of
concessions, although I agree with Dr. Green that it is not
worth giving everything for a partial deal.
My sense, as I've said before, is that North Korea thinks
they're in the mode of arms control negotiations, not
denuclearization negotiations.
And my fear for accepting a partial goal would that be the
North Koreans would say okay, we got what we wanted--we are
going to stop here.
So I think it's always important to maintain--keep things
back that they need--that they want in order to continue to
have pressure to move forward on negotiations. But, again,
positive progress is positive progress.
Ms. Titus. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Yoho. Next, if you guys can tolerate it, we'll go back.
Not that it's bad, but a second round of questions and I am
going to let the ranking member start because he's got to get
to another meeting.
Mr. Sherman. First, as to--and I will pick up on the
gentlelady from Hawaii's point--from a North Korean
perspective, for them to settle for an agreement that is just
with the executive branch would show that they're not paying
attention.
Gaddafi gave up his incipient nuclear program in return for
an agreement with the executive branch. We all know that Kim
Jong-un does not want to follow the Libya model. And Iran
reached an agreement with only the executive branch and then
the next head of the executive branch abrogated it.
That may not be as important to Iran because they want a
relationship with Europe more than they want a relationship
with the United States. But in North Korea's circumstance, it
would deprive them of very much of what they're negotiating
for.
I would also point out that if we release half the
sanctions and we get half of what we need in terms of arms
limitations rollbacks, that's a much worse deal for us because
if you give up half the sanctions that's like you did have your
foot on his neck and now you lift it most of the way.
Well, that's bad for his people, because they won't enjoy
prosperity. But it gives him enough economic clout to survive
and to make sure that the finest in European luxuries are
bestowed upon the top 3,000 or 4,000 families in the countries.
So he doesn't need all these sanctions released. He only
needs half of them released to assure everything he cares
about.
I want to ask--and I don't know which of you is in addition
to being a foreign policy expert a strategic arms expert--but
let's talk first about testing--what do they need to test.
Have they reached the point where they've tested a
thermonuclear hydrogen bomb or do they need to do more testing
to feel that they are capable of creating that?
Who has an answer? Mr. Denmark.
Mr. Denmark. So I can give my sense. I think Bruce has some
thoughts as well.
We've seen them conduct tests. We don't get perfect sense
of what it is. What we saw is a large device.
Mr. Sherman. Right.
Mr. Denmark. When it comes to testing I think the key
thought is that we should not apply our standards of testing to
North Korea. We have very high standards of testing for the
reliability of our missiles, of everything.
For North Korea, they just need to have the plausible
capability. They don't need to test it----
Mr. Sherman. So have they reached that plausible capability
with regard to thermonuclear weapons, even if they agree not to
test nuclear weapons in the future?
Mr. Denmark. My judgment is that they're probably confident
enough in order to be able to do it.
Mr. Sherman. Does any--do either of our other panellists
disagree?
Mr. Green. I agree the one technical hurdle they appear not
to have crossed is the ability for their weapon to reenter the
atmosphere without burning up.
Mr. Sherman. Yes. That's the delivery system.
Mr. Green. But I think they----
Mr. Sherman. Now, on delivery systems, keep in mind they
can have a submarine in a small boat deliver one--not to
Chicago but to Los Angeles or Honolulu. I guess Las Vegas is
safe from that.
Mr. Green. So they've achieved an acceptable level of ICBM
capability.
Mr. Sherman. So they clearly have proven missile capacity
with regard to Tokyo and Seoul but they'd need a reentry
vehicle to hit an inland city in the United States and they
haven't proven that.
Could they--if they were allowed to have a peaceful space
program, would that give them all of the excuse necessary to do
the testing to develop intercontinental ballistic missiles and
reentry systems?
Mr. Klingner. Yes. In agreement. They have tested a
thermonuclear device, that the size of the seismic event was
such that it could only have been through a thermonuclear.
Most assessments are that they have--the missile delivery
systems for nuclear weapons against South Korea and Japan. They
have demonstrated the ICBM that can reach all the way down to
Florida and beyond.
The question is since they haven't demonstrated but that
doesn't mean they don't have a reentry vehicle that would----
Mr. Sherman. And they haven't tested to be sure that they
have the reentry vehicle, but you can smuggle a nuclear weapon.
Now, they're producing a certain number of new nuclear
weapons, atomic and thermonuclear, every year.
At what point will they feel they have the minimum they
need to defend themselves and will they feel free to sell a
nuclear weapon to anybody who's got a billion or two?
Mr. Green. Dr. Green.
Mr. Green. In March 2003, I was in negotiations in Beijing
with the North Koreans where they told us that if we didn't end
our hostile policy and give them what they wanted, they would
transfer their nuclear capability.
And then you will recall----
Mr. Sherman. Well, they did transfer the capability to
Syria or Syria/Iran that Israel destroyed in 2007.
Mr. Green. That's right. They followed up on that threat.
Mr. Sherman. And they could go forward and--when will they
have enough weapons so that they feel that they can transfer
fissile material?
Mr. Green. They have enough weapons probably so that they
can afford to transfer weapons or fissile material without
significantly reducing their own military capability.
The question is will they be deterred. I think the answer
is yes. It's an excellent question because I think the North
Koreans will put more pressure on us by threatening transfer,
and we need to have very clear red lines and interdiction
capabilities, which is one more reason why sanctions have to be
vigorously enforced.
Mr. Sherman. So far the Chinese have not agreed that they
would prohibit nonstop flights between Tehran and Pyongyang. If
those flights stopped in Beijing for fuel, then they would only
carry the materials that China agreed to allow.
But if they go nonstop they'll have whatever they have on
them. I believe I've gone into overtime. I will yield back.
Mr. Yoho. Thank you. I appreciate the second round.
Let me ask you, in your opinion how much cooperation do you
feel China has earnestly afforded to this process as far as
sanction compliance?
Any thoughts?
Mr. Klingner. I think it has been better than in the past
but it's not as much as the U.S. would like. A lot of it,
especially from the outside of government, it's hard to get
information on how strictly they have implemented sanctions.
I think, since the January 2016 nuclear test, China has
allowed better U.N. resolutions than in the past. I think they
have stepped up their sanctions enforcement, as they
periodically did in the past.
It seems that this sanctions enforcement is, I think,
stronger and longer than previous ones. But we also, at the
same time, get conflicting reports about economic activity
going on near the North Korean border as we even get reports
about economic activity being restricted. So I----
Mr. Yoho. Does anybody else have a different opinion?
Mr. Green. Just a bit more detail. I understand from
international relief organizations that when they try to
transfer medicines or other things across the Chinese-North
Korean border they're being stopped if there's any metal of any
kind.
So the Chinese were implementing pretty strictly up until
recently. But since the summit was announced, we have Japanese
photographs of Chinese ships helping transfer oil and so on and
so forth, and the pattern for China has been they will put
economic pressure on North Korea to get North Korea to the
table, and as soon as there's a process the Chinese back way
off and we can see that coming with a Xi-Kim dialogue going on
right now. That's what we have to watch out for.
Mr. Yoho. Well, and that was one of my questions I wanted
to ask you. Do you have any factual information that China
relaxed the sanctions after the Kim-Xi meetings?
Mr. Denmark, you were going to say something too?
Mr. Denmark. There's indications that they have dialled it
back. I would add to what Dr. Green said, that North Korea--
excuse me, China does reduce economic sanctions enforcement
after a meeting.
They also put pressure on North Korea when they feel it
helps keep the United States on the diplomatic path. So I
actually think the Trump administration deserves a great deal
of credit for getting the Chinese to enforce sanctions more
than they had done before.
That said, China--my sense is that China is already
starting to soften its enforcement. My expectation is that
they'll continue to soften and my concern, of course, is that
the era of maximum pressure is over and we are in different
period now than we were before.
Mr. Yoho. Yes, and I have nightmares of snap back with the
JCPOA--immediate snap back, which we knew was never going to
happen.
But I think this will be different. The thing that--I guess
I am concerned about is North Korean vessels--since the summit
we are seeing North Korean vessels transport coal and other
minerals have been spotted at Chinese harbors.
Chinese officials have stated that China will continue
enforcing sanctions but have also suggested lifting U.N.
sanctions on North Korea following the summit.
I think this is a huge mistake. This is something that we
are going to express our concerns here from this committee and
the full committee.
This is something that has brought us to the table to start
the negotiations and we cannot back off and I think the
President and Secretary Pompeo have articulated that very well
and we want to make sure those tools stay in the arsenal as we
talked about before this hearing.
There is the saying--it's Korean--that says a job begun is
a job half done. The summit happened. We can't go further if we
didn't start.
So let's just hope we have wise leaders, that we have the
backbone, I think, or the political willingness to hold people
accountable, because this is a historic moment--that if we can
bring peace to that peninsula, finally, after the end of the
Korean conflict, it'll be a historic moment that the world will
be better off for that.
And so let's just hope with the recommendations that you
all have afforded us and we appreciate that, that we move in
that direction.
With that, this hearing is concluded, and I appreciate your
patience and everybody in the audience being here.
Thank you.
[Whereupon, at 3:39 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]
A P P E N D I X
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