Why Iraq? Why not North Korea, first or instead? About two weeks
ago, the North Koreans admitted that they were developing nuclear
weapons. Just a few days ago, Dubya sent Colin Powell and
Condoleezza Rice out to say that if Saddam disarms, maybe he can
remain in power. Now Congress and the pundit community —
especially those who were already howling against using force
against Saddam — will be arguing that we can’t justify war with
Iraq unless we also take out North Korea’s nuclear weapons program.
Wrong again, boys. It’s all about time and terror.
You can try to stop the spread of nuclear weapons by signing
agreements with countries that will break them or by direct action.
The agreement method was pursued by the Clinton administration and
other fools and knaves. More effectively, in 1981, the Israeli Air
Force bombed Saddam’s Osirak nuclear weapons plant, setting back
his nuke program by about ten years. If they hadn’t done that, Iraq
could have had nuclear weapons by the 1991 Gulf War. The First Iraq
War might never have been fought because we might not have been
willing to risk a nuclear war to free Kuwait. Which is why Saddam
wants nukes and will do anything to get them.
Now both North Korea and Iraq are nearing the ability to produce
nuclear weapons. Both are a threat. But which one is more imminent,
requiring it to be dealt with first? We know Saddam plans to sell
or give chemical and biological weapons to terrorists for use
against Americans at home and abroad. Saddam’s capability and his
intent combine to create a need to remove him now, not later.
Moreover, our military is capable of taking out Saddam in very
short order. The analysis of North Korea yields opposite answers on
both issues.
North Korea is led by a very strange bad guy. Kim Jong Il is
about sixty. A playboy in his early years, he is now nearly a
recluse. He wields his complete power in strange ways, such as
ordering the kidnapping of South Korean movie directors who are
brought to his palace for a chat, and then sent home. The North
Korean economy is one of the weakest in the world, and Kim is
content to let his people starve while about one-third of North
Korea’s gross domestic product goes to its armed forces. Kim is
more interested in reuniting his country by force than anything
else, but apparently isn’t crazy enough to try it against the
American and South Korean forces arrayed across the DMZ. But North
Korea’s threat to us and others arises from its attaining, under
Kim, the status of the premier ballistic missile seller to every
bad guy with cash.
Kim’s military industry sells missiles such as the new
Daepodong-1, which has a range of about 1,250 miles. With it,
Saddam could threaten all of the Middle East. In a terrorist’s
hands mounted on a ship, it could threaten all of Europe or either
half of the U.S. But there is no report of sale of such missiles to
terrorists, or even to Saddam. If North Korea made such sales, we
would have to interdict them, and destroy the places they are made.
There is no reason to believe Kim will act in a manner different
from his Chinese neighbors. The Chinese sell advanced aircraft and
some low-tech missiles to nations such as Pakistan. Their dealings
with Iraq and other terrorist nations are troublesome, but they
don’t — yet — provide Iraq and its ilk advanced missiles or
weapons of mass destruction.
Because of the North Korean breach, Dubya canceled Lil’ Billy’s
1994 agreement. The North violated it, and there was no point in
pretending otherwise. Even Colin Powell admits that the 1994
agreement is dead. He said that while delivering the latest
confusion, saying that if Saddam were disarmed, we would let him
stay in power. This is part of a very dangerous game the President
is playing to get anything close to a useful Iraq resolution out of
the U.N., and it’s a very bad idea for a whole pile of reasons, not
the least of which is that it won’t work. But the most important
reason is that while time is not on our side in Iraq, it is in
North Korea.
The President, General Powell and Dr. Rice are trying to
convince the U.N. to pass a resolution with teeth in it,
authorizing use of force against Saddam if (okay, we know it’s
when, not if) he violates the disarmament terms. But by saying he
can stay, the President is sending precisely the wrong message to
Iraq’s military. If Saddam’s troops know he will be removed no
matter what else happens, they won’t fight. If we give them reason
to believe he can remain in power — as we have now done — they
will fight, and our troops will have to pay a much higher price in
blood when the time comes. Better to tell the U.N. to step up or be
left behind, as the President did weeks ago. And it’s time to call
the U.N.’s bluff. No one should be told that Saddam can stay if he
behaves. As for the North Koreans, time is on our side in the
absence of credible intelligence that they are selling or passing
WMD to terrorists. But they are a threat. So what can we do?
The 1994 agreement so eagerly engineered by Lil’ Billy (with
considerable help from Jimmy Carter, silver medalist in the Worst
President Ever event) provides that we would help North Korea build
two “peaceful” nuclear plants and in return, it would end its
nuclear weapons program. Japan and South Korea are now building
those plants, which is a multi-billion dollar job for their
companies. But those plants — supposedly weapon
proliferation-resistant — could be modified to further the North’s
nuclear weapons programs. Construction must be stopped immediately,
and the President should demand Japan and South Korea’s cooperation
in doing so.
The President’s announcement that the 1994 agreement is dead
will have very practical effects on North Korea. For starters, the
shipments of about 500,000 tons of American heating oil to North
Korea will be stopped. For North Koreans, who live by the kindness
of strangers (in China, who barter food to starving Koreans), this
may literally mean sitting in the cold and dark for the coming
winter. We shouldn’t miss the opportunity that creates for a covert
operation to stir up trouble for Kim.
North Korea spends over 30% of its gross domestic product on its
military, the only part of its population that eats regularly. As a
result, the North Korean military is quite capable, and too large
for us to take on in a tank-to-tank battle. If the nuclear weapons
program continues, we should consider an Osirak-like strike against
the Yongbyon plant which is the center of North Korea’s program.
It’s quite possible to do that without beginning a general war.
Other than that, we wait. Because its leader is a recluse, his
nation is as well. If they threaten us directly, or begin to sell
weapons of mass destruction to terrorists, we must act. For now,
let us watch, and wait, and stir up trouble where we can.
Saddam delendus est.
