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We believe the principal risk to international security posed by development of nuclear weapons by the Democratic People's Republic of Korea ("North Korea") is proliferation of such weapons to other entities, including terrorists.
North Korea has a history of using weapons technology as its primary export 1 When a state or organization is considered so radical that the United States, Europe, Russia and China are unwilling to provide materiel, North Korea becomes the provider of last resort2 North Korea has provided missile technology to Iran, Syria, Libya and Iraq3, all of which are or have been considered by the United States Department of State to be "state sponsors of terrorism." 4
In addition to ballistic missile technology, one of its most frequent exports, North Korea is believed to have exported WMD technology to Iran, Syria and Libya.5 6 It may be collaborating with other entities in its nuclear weapons program. 7
Given North Korea's desperate need for hard currency8 and its history of weapon proliferation to every conceivable entity (including, historically, terrorist organizations8), it is unreasonable to suppose that it would not sell nuclear weapons technology, if offered a sufficiently attractive price.
Unfortunately, several terrorist organizations including Hezbollah and Al Qaeda are quite well funded.
If North Korea cannot be trusted not to sell nuclear weapons to anyone who can meet its price - and evidence suggests it cannot - then the only way to prevent nuclear terrorism is to deny North Korea access to nuclear weapons and facilities that can produce the fissionable materials to power such weapons. Such a denial requires an immediate and complete decommissioning of any nuclear programs North Korea currently possesses.
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This proposal sets forth a number of incentives to encourage North Korea's disarmament by peaceful means,10 specifically, when North Korea has verifiably eliminated its entire nuclear enrichment and weapons programs, the United States will:
Immediately sign a treaty of non-aggression with North Korea; Immediately enter bilateral talks with North Korea; Pay in full for all removal, remediation and transfer activities; Construct at the cost of the United States a state-of-the-art, non-nuclear power generation facility of capacity equal to the full capacity of the facility decommissioned; Supply fuel for such facility for a period of 5 years; Assist to the fullest extent of the United States' ability to provide gainful alternative employment for North Korea's nuclear scientists; Provide food aid with a fair market value of $1 billion annually for a period of 5 years.
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It is important to emphasize the essential aspect of first achieving verifiable complete elimination of North Korea's entire nuclear enrichement and weapons program. As noted repeatedly by informed experts, such as the United States Ambassador to the United Nations (2006), John Bolton, who was also part of the State Department's delegation to six-party toalk on the North Koreans nuclear program (2003), many of the on-going talks and negotiations with North Korea have still not uncovered the extent of North Korea's nuclear program, let alone dismantled it.11
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If peaceful decommissioning of North Korea's nuclear program proves impossible, as one senior level North Korean defector believes it will, military action may be required 12. The proposal therefore states that, if North Korea does not within the period of one year fully decommission and dismantle all nuclear activities to the satisfaction of the United States, that failure will per se constitute an act of aggression.
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1 By some estimates, "North Korea's only basis of foreign exchange involves weapon production." News Batch, North Korea (www.newsbatch.com/korea.htm). Other estimates are more conservative, e.g. "North Korean defectors believe that such [missile] sales - including the sale of more conventional weaponry - make up as much as 40 per cent of North Korea's total exports." B. Linter, "North Korea's Missile Trade Helps Fund Its Nuclear Program,", YaleGlobal (yaleglobal.yale.edu/display.article?id=1546).
2 "As the former Soviet republics and China have scaled back on sales of nonconventional weapons to the [Middle East] region in the face of international pressure, North Korea has become the leading proliferator of ballistic missiles, weapons of mass destruction (WMDs), and related technology. This poses a serious threat to regional and global security." J.S. Bermudez, Proliferation for Profit: North Korea in the Middle East (The Washington Institute for Near East Policy) Executive Summary. (www.washingtoninstitute.org/pubs/exec/bermexec.htm).
Also, "Because of embargoes or laws against exporting such weapons to these extremist regimes, the items North Korea supplied have been unavailable from any other state..." B. Rubin, North Korea's Threat to the Middle East and the Middle East's Threat to Asia (Middle East Review of International Affairs, 1997) ((meria.idc.ac.il/books/brkorea.html).
3 B. Rubin, North Korea's Threat to the Middle East and the Middle East's Threat to Asia. (meria.idc.ac.il/books/brkorea.html).
4 U.S. Department of State, Overview of State-Sponsored Terrorism, Patterns of Global Terrorism (www.state.gov/s/ct/rls/pgtrpt/2000/index.cfm?docid=2241&CFNoCache=TRUE$printfriendly=true). Note that the U.S. Department of State also considers North Korea itself to be a state sponsor of terrorism, principally based on direct sales of weapons to terrorist organizations.
5 B. Rubin, North Korea's Threat to the Middle East and the Middle East's Threat to Asia.. (meria.idc.ac.il/books/brkorea.html).
6 U. Mahnaimi and S. Baxter, "Israelis Seized Nuclear Material in Syrian Raid," The Sunday Times, September 23, 2007. As written in the article, "Israeli commandos seized nuclear material of North Korean origin during a daring raid on a secret military site in Syria before Israel bombed it this month, according to informed sources in Washington and Jerusalem. The attack was launched with American approval on September 6 after Washington was shown evidence the material was nuclear related, the well-placed sources say. They confirmed that samples taken from Syria for testing had been identified as North Korean. This raised fears that Syria might have joined North Korea and Iran in seeking to acquire nuclear weapons... Diplomats in North Korea and China believe a number of North Koreans were killed in the strike... Syrian officials flew to Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, last week, reinforcing the view that the two nations were coordinated their response."
7 "There are credible reports that in the late 1980s North Korea had contacts with Iran, Libya, and Syria discussing ways to develop nuclear arms." B. Rubin, North Korea's Threat to the Middle East and the Middle East's Threat to Asia. (meria.idc.ac.il/books/brkorea.html).
8 "But the main purpose shifted to ensuring the regime's own survival. Now the badly faltering North Korean regime badly needs the money obtained by such sales. This mercenary factor is Pyongyang's primary motive. Remarkably, North Korea has become the world's fifth-largest arms exporter and in 1993 alone signed $300 million of arms transfer agreements, virtually all to the Middle East." B. Rubin,North Korea's Threat to the Middle East and the Middle East's Threat to Asia., (meria.idc.ac.il/books/brkorea.html).
9 "In the late 1950s North Korea began providing political, financial, and minor military assistance to a number of terrorist and revolutionary groups in the Middle East. Its frequent use of radical regimes as conduits and surrogates for supporting terrorism and revolutionary movements throughout the world has frustrated U.S. efforts to combat international terrorism." J.S. Bermudez Proliferation for Profit: North Korea in the Middle East, (The Washington Institute for Near East Policy) Executive Summary. (www.washingtoninstitute.org/pubs/exec/bermexec.htm). Also, "In Lebanon during the 1970s and in Libya and Syria from the 1980s down to the present, North Korean soldiers have also trained terrorists from many groups including the Basque Spanish ETA, Palestinian Abu Nidal organization, Irish Republican Army, Italian Red Brigades, Japanese Red Army, Moro National Liberation Front in the Philippines, Turkish radicals, and others. While many of these links have lapsed, in the 1990s, North Korea added Hezbollah and the anti-Turkish PKK group to its roster of clients." B. Rubin, North Korea's Threat to the Middle East and the Middle East's Threat to Asia.
10 This proposal is substantially similar to a U.S. proposal made in June 2004 but addresses certain concerns expressed by North Korea. Discussion of the U.S. proposal and the North Korean response can be found at P. Kerr, "U.S. Unveils Offer at North Korea Talks," Arms Control Today (July/August 2004). (http://www.armscontrol.org/act/2004_07-08/NKtalks.asp).
11 See, for example, J. Bolton, "Pyongyang's Upper Hand: Thanks to feckless diplomacy, Kim Jong Il may preserve his nuclear program," Wall Street Journal, August 23, 2007; J. Bolton, "Salvaging Our North Korea Policy," Wall Street Journal, March 17, 2008; J. Bolton, "The North Korea Climbdown: Politicized intelligence? This time it's for real," Wall Street Journal, March 5, 2007.
12 "Although North Korea signed the U.S.-North Korea nuclear pact 1994, Kim Duk Hong, one of the regime's most senior defectors, says that North Korea resumed the development of its nuclear weapon program as soon as the treaty was signed. Hong also stated that North Korea gained much of its expertise from Pakistan, and that only the death of Kim Jong Il and the destruction of his regime will stop North Korea's nuclear weapons program." Wikipedia, North Korea and weapons of mass destruction (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Korea_nuclear_weapons_program). Also, "Such sober observers as former secretary of defense William Perry have warned that once North Korea has completed reprocessing the fuel rods it withdrew from international control in 2002, war will become close to inevitable. The negotiations must not permit Pyongyang to turn it into a delaying action to enable North Korea to complete this process. Policy must begin with a time limit -- at least an internal one -- or with North Korea's agreement to freeze its program under strict international control while negotiations are taking place." Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, "The Six-Power Route to Resolution, The Washington Post , 18 August, 2003. (http://www.cfr.org/pub6229/henry_a_kissinger/the_sixpower_route_to_resolution.php)
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