The motives for this behavior by North Korea’s inscrutable regime are subject to debate. One simple explanation is that it is genuinely seeking nuclear capability. This reflects a coherent strategic logic. Pyongyang lost its primary great power protector when the Soviet Union collapsed, has very hostile relations with the United States, is a charter member of US President George Bush’s “axis of evil,” and is on the list of potential targets of Bush’s doctrine of preventive war. It is easy to see how North Korea might calculate that only nuclear weapons would give it enough deterrent power to avoid the fate of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. An alternative interpretation, however, suggests that for Pyongyang, the nuclear weapons program constitutes a valuable bargaining chip; indeed, almost the only significant bargaining chip that the regime is capable of mustering. By this logic, Pyongyang, deeply impoverished and in desperate need of outside assistance, is actually eager to trade away its nuclear program (as often and as expensively as possible, it is sometimes said) to obtain the food, fuel, and other help that would bolster the regime’s defenses against collapse.

North Korea’s motives may not be obvious, but the consequences of a nuclear-armed Pyongyang are all too clear. This would be a very dangerous development for a number of reasons. North Korea has one of the worst non-proliferation records in the world. In the past, it has been willing to sell weapons to just about anybody who could pay. It is, unfortunately, completely plausible that Pyongyang would be willing to sell nuclear weapons to other rogue states or terrorists once it has them stockpiled. If North Korea were to collapse, its nuclear weapons could fall into the hands of terrorists or a rogue military establishment. Once Pyongyang possesses nuclear weapons, a regime that already takes many risks and is crisis prone may become even more reckless and inclined to miscalculation. Moreover, if North Korea becomes a nuclear power, other states in Northeast Asia, including Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, may feel the need to rethink their own nuclear status and could decide that nuclear weapons had become necessary. Provoking such a nuclear chain reaction in Asia could seriously undermine the current NPT regime, and if North Korea is successful in violating and flouting its international obligations, it will also damage future non-proliferation efforts.

North Korea’s incipient nuclear program is deeply undesirable, and arguably intolerable. But what can be done to stop it? Washington’s options are few and unattractive, especially if Pyongyang is now resolved to acquire nuclear weapons. If North Korea is engaged in a bargaining gambit, some sort of negotiated settlement might be arranged that would offer a package of inducements in return for an abandonment of the nuclear program. The Bush administration has so far rejected this option, maintaining that it will not succumb to nuclear blackmail and reward nuclear misbehavior. Alternatively, the Bush administration could consider the use of force, as did the Clinton administration in 1994. So far, however, the Bush administration has refused to entertain this option either, perhaps because the dangers of escalation on the Korean peninsula are great, or perhaps because it wishes to focus on the situation in Iraq. The reasons for rejecting these options are serious and legitimate, but a policy of “neither carrot nor stick” offers limited prospects for success. The Bush administration has voiced the hope that multilateral diplomacy, perhaps spearheaded by Beijing and facilitated by the United Nations, may bring Pyongyang to its nuclear senses. But Beijing shows little willingness to take on this challenge and the United Nations is not acceptable to Pyongyang as an alternative negotiating partner. In lieu of more palatable alternatives, the current trajectory of US policy seems to be to live with North Korea’s nuclear program, seek to minimize its adverse consequences, and hope that the collapse of the regime eventually resolves the problem.

Such a policy, however, seems completely incompatible with President Bush’s National Security Strategy, which states unambiguously that the United States will not tolerate the acquisition of weapons of mass destruction by hostile parties and is prepared to use force to prevent it. Hence, it is hard to avoid the suspicion that after Iraq, North Korea will be on the hot seat and force will again be in the picture. Analyst Joshua Muravchic draws the logical conclusion about the North Korean crisis: “The world is likely to be safe with North Korea, as with Iraq, only through the demise of its current government.” In short, regime change may again be on the agenda. Another war, anyone?