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The Korean crisis
 Last autumn, as the Bush administration geared up for a
showdown with Iraq, a full-blown diplomatic and military crisis was developing
on the Korean peninsula, once again raising the spectre of war and nuclear
conflict. LYNN WALSH analyses this new and disturbing feature of world
relations.
IN OCTOBER 2002 US imperialism provoked a confrontation with
the isolated and floundering Stalinist regime of North Korea. Revealing publicly
the news (known to the US administration for some time) that Kim Jong-il’s
regime had resumed its nuclear weapons programme in violation of the 1994
‘agreed framework’, the Bush administration ignored the fact that the US had
consistently reneged on its own 1994 promises.
Leaning on South Korea and Japan, the US cut off the oil
supplies being delivered to North Korea under the 1994 agreement. There would be
no talks or further economic assistance, proclaimed the US, until North Korea
unconditionally abandoned its nuclear weapons programme. The White House hawks
were evidently sure that Kim Jong-il would back down – but that was a serious
miscalculation. North Korea defiantly announced that it would continue its
nuclear programme until the US entered serious talks to normalise relations
between North Korea, South Korea, and the US. Moreover, the North would
retaliate in the event of any military attack by the US – which appeared to be
threatened in Bush’s ‘axis of evil’ speech and recent US actions.
Despite its commitment to pre-emptive military action
against any state developing weapons of mass destruction, US imperialism was
forced to retreat. While continuing hard-line threats against North Korea, the
US began to reassure the world that it would seek a ‘diplomatic solution’ to the
crisis. Colin Powell and other US representatives began to speak, in somewhat
coded language, about new talks and economic concessions. In reality, the hawk
administration had been forced to confront the limits of US military power. "In
private", reported the New York Times, "some of the president’s aides… said that
North Korea’s existing nuclear capacity, and its ability to wreak enormous
damage on Seoul with its conventional weapons, had led them to conclude that the
US had no viable military options in dealing with the North, at least without
risking the rekindling of the Korean war". (2 January)
Moreover, despite Rumsfeld’s public claims that it was
perfectly possible for the US to conduct two regional wars simultaneously, the
US strategists were forced to recognise that, in reality, two wars would put
massive strains on the US’s strategic capabilities. The diplomatic and political
overheads of preparing for a second war would seriously distract from US efforts
to mobilise support for an attack on Iraq.
Powell and others worked hard to play down the consequences
of the US’s confrontational policy. There is no ‘crisis’, said Powell, only a
‘serious situation’. There would be no ‘negotiations’ but there would be
‘talks’. The glaring contradiction, however, between the US policy on Iraq, on
the one side, and North Korea, on the other, destroys the legitimacy claimed for
an attack on Iraq. This devastating exposure of US hypocrisy is a serious blow
to the superpower’s prestige.
Anatomy of a crisis
AS IN 1993-94, North Korea is using the threat of nuclear
weapons (whether actual or potential) and its formidable conventional arsenal to
force the US superpower into negotiations. Kim Jong-il’s regime needs economic
concessions to avoid collapse, and just as crucially needs an end to the
strategic siege imposed by the US since the end of the Korean war (1950-53).
Pyongyang’s nuclear brinkmanship, though potentially dangerous, is driven by
fear rather than by militaristic ambition. The rotten Stalinist dictatorship
faces the prospect of an implosion. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union,
which deprived North Korea of vital economic support, the regime has
consistently attempted to secure from the US a non-aggression pact, recognition
of its sovereignty, and economic assistance. The US’s equally consistent refusal
to enter into direct negotiations with North Korea, effectively ruling out a
peace treaty to formally close the 1950-53 Korean war, has encouraged the regime
to resort to nuclear blackmail.
The 1994 ‘agreed framework’ provided an opportunity for
defusing the Korean conflict. The US, however, never fulfilled its promises,
leading North Korea to secretly renew its nuclear weapons policies. The
aggressive, reckless policy of the Bush administration has been the primary
cause of a renewed confrontation, once again raising the spectre of war and
nuclear conflict.
During 1993-94 the CIA discovered that, despite signing the
Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1985, North Korea was developing a nuclear weapons
programme based on its plutonium-producing reactor at Yongbyon. Whether they
actually produced weapons (or now possess usable weapons) is not certain, though
North Korea has not carried out the kind of nuclear tests considered essential
to producing a viable weapon. Nevertheless, Clinton has recently admitted that
"we actually drew up plans to attack North Korea and to destroy their reactors,
and we told them we would attack unless they ended their nuclear programme". US
imperialism’s own military assessment, however, concluded that the cost of an
offensive against North Korea would be too high. Full-scale war on the peninsula
would claim up to one million dead, including up to 100,000 Americans. The
immediate cost to the US would exceed $100bn, while the cost of destruction and
economic dislocation would be over $1 trillion. This was apart from the
horrendous consequences of a nuclear conflict.
Instead, the US (through mediation by former president
Carter) negotiated the agreed framework. In return for North Korea suspending
its nuclear weapons programme, the US would provide economic assistance in the
form of oil, food and the construction of two (non-plutonium-producing) ‘light
water’ reactors for electricity generation. Just as important for the North,
however, was the US promise to move towards "full normalisation of political and
economic relations".
Apart from providing oil, however, the US did not proceed to
fulfil its promises. Construction of the two nuclear power stations was
repeatedly postponed, and there were no serious talks on the normalisation of
relations. Clinton was undoubtedly under pressure from the Republican-dominated
Congress not to end economic sanctions or honour US promises. At the same time,
Clinton’s administration believed that the North was on the verge of collapse:
they calculated that economic problems would force the regime into unilateral
military concessions, even if the US did not deliver.
In 1998, North Korea resumed missile testing, firing some
missiles over Japan. This was partly to promote its missile sales (estimated to
be $50-100m a year to states such as Pakistan, Syria, Iran, Iraq, and Yemen) and
partly to put pressure on the US to resume negotiations.
In June 2000 there was a summit meeting between Kim Jong-il
and the South Korean president, Kim Dae-jung. A big section of the capitalist
class in the South is strongly in favour of reaching agreement with the North,
to prevent a collapse and avoid the devastating consequences of a mass exodus.
Japanese capitalism also wants a rapprochement with North Korea, though
negotiations were delayed by the shocked reaction in Japan to North Korea’s
admission that the regime had abducted over a dozen Japanese citizens during the
1970s and 1980s. This confession and apology was apparently intended to placate
Japan but had the opposite effect (despite Kim also renouncing North Korea’s
demand for wartime reparations).
The takeover in Washington by Bush and his foreign policy
hawks, however, cut across the process of détente developing among the
North-East Asian states. Bush broke off talks with North Korea and adopted a
confrontational approach. In his State of the Union Speech (January 2002) Bush
declared North Korea to be part of an ‘axis of evil’, in language that was
tantamount to a declaration of war. Later, the US National Security Statement
authorised a policy of pre-emptive military strikes against any state acquiring
weapons of mass destruction.
In June 2002 the CIA produced a secret intelligence report
that since 1998 North Korea had restarted its nuclear weapons programme, this
time on the basis of the uranium-enrichment process (as an alternative to
reactor-produced plutonium). An assistant secretary of state, James Kelly, was
sent to Pyongyang to deliver an ultimatum to Kim Jong-il – drop your nuclear
programme or face the consequences. Bush and his hawks evidently believed that
Kim would back down. Instead, the regime admitted they had restarted their
nuclear programme, and threatened to accelerate the development of nuclear
weapons unless the US fulfilled its framework agreement promises and entered
into serious negotiations to normalise relations.
After Kelly’s visit the US publicly announced the existence
of North Korea’s new nuclear programme, clearly with the intention of gearing up
another confrontation with North Korea. Very little publicity, however, was
given to a key element of the CIA’s report – evidence that the technology for
uranium enrichment had been supplied to North Korea by Pakistan’s Musharraf
regime. Pakistan has a nuclear arsenal but needs the missiles necessary to
deploy them operationally. Facing acute economic crisis in 1997, the Pakistan
regime supplied North Korea with uranium-processing equipment in exchange for
their latest ballistic missiles. Another glaring contradiction. The US’s key
ally in the war against the Taliban regime in Afghanistan was actively
collaborating in a nuclear weapons programme with a ‘rogue’ state, part of
Bush’s ‘axis of evil’.
The US put pressure on South Korea and Japan to halt the oil
supplies to the North. In retaliation, North Korea restarted its Yongbyon
reactor, removed UN monitoring equipment and ordered International Atomic Energy
Agency inspectors to leave the country. On 10 January this year, North Korea
formally withdrew from the Non-Proliferation Treaty.
The unanticipated consequences of Bush’ provocative policy
towards North Korea have again revealed the deep split within the Bush
administration between hawks, who want to pursue confrontation, and the doves,
who advocate ‘engagement’ and negotiations. " I have never seen a more divided
group in my 30 years of involvement in foreign policy", commented a veteran of
the Republican foreign policy establishment (New York Times, 13 January). They
appear to be lurching between wielding the big stick and dangling fresh carrots.
Bush is insisting on referring North Korea to the UN Security Council for breach
of the Non Proliferation Treaty, a step towards new sanctions. At the same time,
Powell and others are raising the possibility of further economic assistance.
Both Russia and South Korea have opened talks to try to reach a negotiated
settlement of the conflict. For the time being, the diplomatic approach prevails
in Washington, mainly because Iraq takes priority. There is little doubt,
however, that the hawks see North Korea as the next target, once they have dealt
with Iraq.
The North Korean regime
UNDER PRESSURE OF a deep internal crisis, the Kim Sung-il
regime has, since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the other Stalinist
states after 1990, desperately sought to break out of its extreme isolation.
Using its capacity to develop nuclear weapons as a bargaining counter, North
Korea has attempted to open up economic relations with its neighbours and the
rest of the world and at the same time negotiate a ‘non-aggression pact’ with
the US. While the country’s economic crisis is profound, with even the
possibility of a collapse, the North Korean regime is not willing to bargain
away its potential nuclear capacity solely in return for economic assistance –
survival of the regime, Kim’s primary aim, depends on a strategic détente with
US imperialism.
In 1994, under the framework agreement, North Korea agreed
to suspend its nuclear weapons development, but fearing that the Clinton
administration was reneging on its promises, the regime secretly renewed its
nuclear programme. Rather than preparing for war, however, which would
undoubtedly result in the total destruction of Korea, the regime’s main aim is
to use the threat of nuclear weapons to pressure the US into ‘talks’
(negotiations) on a non-aggression ‘agreement’ (effectively, a tripartite North
Korea-South Korea-US treaty) formally concluding the 1950-53 Korean war and
recognising North Korea’s right to exist. North Korea’s real motive is
recognised by former US president Carter, who said recently "they are using
these fiery and public statements [about preparing for war] in order to
accomplish their long-standing goal of negotiating a permanent and positive
relationship with the US". (New York Times, 17 January)
North Korea is a fossilised form of Stalinism, a grotesque
distortion of the idea of socialism, modelled on the bureaucratically planned
economies of the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. Hardened by the Korean
war and the prolonged US military threat during the cold war, North Korea has
been far more isolated, monolithic and rigid than other variants of Stalinism.
Kim Jong-il is a hereditary dictator, taking over from his father, Kim Il-sung,
in 1994. He has continued the cult of personality around the ‘Great Leader’, and
the ideology of ‘Juche’ (self-sufficiency), linked to a xenophobic attitude to
all foreigners. Kim Jong-il, however, has reportedly strengthened the role of
the tops of the army and security apparatus in the regime, trying to counter the
weight of the ‘old guard’ leadership of the ruling Korean Workers’ Party, who
oppose his move towards economic reform and détente with imperialism.
The regime is ideologically monolithic and rules by
totalitarian methods. There are thought to be over 200,000 political prisoners,
mostly in labour camps. The military apparatus dominates the state. There are
around a million troops, most of them stationed just north of the demilitarised
zone (DMZ) and only about 30 miles north of Seoul. North Korea has a massive
array of conventional weaponry: tanks, heavy artillery, missiles, military
aircraft and warships, though most is now technologically outmoded. This is a
massive burden on the economy.
The regime’s apparent paranoia – or permanent siege
mentality – is not without historical causes. After a long and bitter guerrilla
struggle against the occupation of the Korean peninsula by Japanese imperialism,
the leadership of the Korean Communist Party then faced an intervention by US
imperialism to prevent the reunification of Korea after the second world war.
During the Korean war (1950-53) the US military commander, General McArthur,
advocated dropping 20 or 30 nuclear bombs on the North – this was only five
years after Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The conventional bombardment of the North,
previously the most industrialised region of Korea, caused enormous casualties
and massive destruction of the country’s infrastructure. After the war (never
formally ended with a peace treaty), the US backed an extremely repressive
dictatorship in the South and maintained a nuclear arsenal in South Korea from
1957 until 1991. Hiding behind the fiction that the US was not directly a party
to the hostilities, merely a participant in a UN force, Washington has
consistently refused to negotiate a peace treaty with North Korea. In the light
of this history, it is hardly surprising that the North Korean regime feels
itself to be under threat from US imperialism.
North Korea is predominantly an urbanised, industrialised
country, not like China, Vietnam, etc, which still have a predominant peasantry.
Most of the industrial plant, however, is obsolete, and the bureaucratic
planning apparatus is suffering from the kind of organic sclerosis that
undermined the former Soviet Union. Output has undoubtedly been steadily falling
(though it is impossible to confirm some Western claims of a 50% fall over
recent years). Debts to European and Japanese banks total around $3.2bn, and the
default on many of the debts is a barrier to potential investment from abroad.
The economy was hit very hard by the collapse of the Soviet Union after 1990,
which deprived North Korea of cheap imports of oil, fertilisers, and machinery.
Serious flooding in 1995-96, which particularly affected the ‘bread basket’
areas of the south, led to a serious famine and has left a legacy of
malnourishment amongst children. There are estimates that between one and two
million died of starvation, and many thousands of refugees fled to North-East
China (with a predominantly ethnic Korean population).
The famine forced the Kim Jong-il leadership to tolerate the
growth of private farmers’ markets, charging higher prices for food products.
Early in 2001 the regime began to implement limited Chinese-style reforms,
raising agricultural prices and some consumer prices. However, this will not
automatically have the same effect as in China in the 1980s, where higher prices
for farmers stimulated the rapid growth of rural industries. North Korea has a
very different social structure from China, Vietnam, etc, where rural-sector
growth had a much bigger impact on the economy than it could in North Korea.
In the summer of 2002, the regime announced the development
of two SEZs, special economic zones (Kaesong just north of the DMZ and Sinuiju,
near the border with China). There is no shortage of capitalists throughout East
Asia eager to exploit North Korea’s cheap labour. South Korean capitalists in
particular, view investments in the North as a way of opening up the economy,
avoiding a precipitous collapse of the North, and achieving a ‘soft landing’ for
the disintegrating Stalinist regime. The economic development of the North,
however, will not automatically follow from overseas investment. In any case,
growth throughout East Asia is likely to be undermined by the developing world
downturn. A ‘soft landing’ for the North, moreover, depends on a peaceful
resolution of the peninsula’s cold-war era divisions, which is far from being
guaranteed.
North Korea is a grotesque regime. But its development has
been heavily conditioned by the unrelenting military-strategic threat from US
imperialism. Neither US diplomacy nor military aggression (which would in fact
be catastrophic) can resolve the Korean crisis. Only the working class, applying
socialist solutions, can find an exit route from the dangerous dead-end created
by Stalinism and imperialism.
South Korea and the US
"‘IN SOME WAYS, the problem in South Korea has become harder
to handle than that of North Korea’, said a Korea specialist with ties to many
members of Bush’s foreign policy team". (New York Times, 2 January) South Korea
is now as much a problem for the US as the North. Roh Moo-hyun, candidate of the
Millennium Democratic Party (MDP), won the presidential elections (19 December)
on a wave of anti-American feeling. Viewed by the Bush regime as a dangerous
populist and nationalist, Roh supports the continuation of the ‘sunshine’ policy
– as does a big section of the South Korean ruling class – and is strongly
opposed to the US policy of aggressive confrontation with the North Korean
regime. Although Roh, now a liberal bourgeois politician, has toned down his
anti-American rhetoric, political changes in the South will unavoidably pose a
challenge to the continued presence of US imperialism in South Korea, one of its
main bases in East Asia.
Shortly before the elections mass demonstrations and
candlelit vigils were triggered by the announcement that a US military
court-martial had acquitted two US soldiers on charges of negligent homicide
after their armoured vehicle had crushed two 14-year-old schoolgirls in June.
Demonstrations continued for weeks, particularly involving young people but also
drawing in broader layers of workers, white-collar workers, housewives, and
shopkeepers. The movement reflected deep resentment at the continued presence of
37,000 US troops in the country (which costs South Korea $3bn to $4bn a year).
For several decades after the Korean war (1950-53), the US supported a viciously
repressive dictatorship in the South, which was only cleared out by the massive
movement of the working class in the late 1980s. Moreover, there is growing
support for the idea of reunification of the Korean peninsula and opposition to
US policies which many fear could lead to another devastating war. There is an
overwhelming feeling that South Korea should be treated as an equal by the US,
not merely as a convenient military base. Even the presidential candidate of the
ultra-conservative Grand National Party (GNP), Lee Hoi-chang, opportunistically
joined the candlelit vigil outside the US embassy in Seoul. Ironically, it was
Roh Moo-hyun, trying to establish ‘moderate’ credentials with Washington, who
urged the protesters to tone down their demands.
The rising tide of opposition to the role of US imperialism
in Korea was the key factor in Roh’s narrow victory (48.9% against 46.6% for Lee
Hoi-chang). Support for Roh’s MDP has been undermined over the last few years,
because of president Kim Dae-jung’s economic policies, especially industrial
restructuring and the imposition of new labour laws ending lifetime job
security. These are seen as US-dictated IMF policies, the economic facet of US
domination. There have been massive job losses (about a quarter of 15 to
29-year-olds are estimated to be unemployed). Two years ago president Kim
Dae-jung deployed the riot police against Daewoo workers protesting against
redundancies. Disillusionment with the MDP government, which harvested the
political gains of the mass workers’ movement that forced through the
democratisation of South Korea in the late 1980s, led to a 10% fall in the
turnout compared to the 1997 election (down to 70.2%). Disillusionment with the
MDP was also reflected in the increased vote for the Democratic Labour Party
candidate, Kwon Young-ghil, leader of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU),
who won nearly 4% of the vote, up from 1.2% in 1997.
The ominous standoff between the US and the North did not
strengthen the conservative Lee, a former supreme court judge, previously linked
to the US-backed dictatorship. This indicates a big change from the cold war
political alignments. At the time of Bush’s axis of evil speech (January 2002),
even a section of the GNP’s parliamentary representatives joined with the MDP in
condemning Bush’s provocative policy towards the North Korean regime. This
indicates supports for the sunshine policy within the South Korean ruling class.
They fear that a US policy of isolating the North Korean regime, and threatening
a military strike, could lead to a catastrophic nuclear war. But they also fear
an implosion of Kim Sung-il’s regime, whether from internal weakness or
intensified economic pressure in the form of US-enforced sanctions.
A sudden collapse could lead to a massive migration from the
North to the South, which would have a devastating impact on the already
strained South Korean economy. The majority of South Korean capitalists want the
reunification of the country, but they want it over a period of 20 to 30 years,
beginning with some kind of loose federation and moving gradually towards
integration on the basis of capitalism. A rapid unification on the lines of
Germany in 1990-91 would, in their view, destroy the South Korean economic
‘miracle’.
One estimate (Financial Times, 8 November 2002) puts the
cost of rapid unification at $3,200bn, a phenomenal sum for South Korea. The
high cost arises from the enormous disparity in wealth between the two
countries: the South with a population of 50 million has a GDP of nearly $500bn,
while the North, with a population of about 23 million, has a GDP estimated at
only around $15bn. This disparity is about five times greater than the economic
difference between West Germany and the East in 1990-91.
Behind the ‘sunshine policy’ put forward by the previous
president, Kim Dae-jung, and supported by Roh, is the strategy of step by step
opening up of the North to southern-based capitalism. South Korea, now a member
of the OECD, is no longer a cheap labour country, and has recently come under
intensive pressure from China, with its huge reserves of extremely cheap labour
and raw materials. Korean big business is relocating sections of its production
(for instance in electronics and automobiles) in China, while a section is
attempting to open up the North to exploit its cheap labour. For instance, one
big South Korean capitalist, Kim Yoon-kyu, is beginning to build a $9bn, 49sq
kilometre (19sq mile) industrial park and new town at Gaeseong just north of the
demilitarised zone, only about 70 kilometres north of Seoul. When completed in
2010, this special economic zone will have 3,000 factories, 100,000 housing
units, and over 1,000 hotel rooms. South Korean capitalists are also planning to
open up rail and road links through North Korea to give the South access to
energy, raw materials and markets in Siberia and China. Step by step economic
colonisation of the North is therefore an attractive prospect for the South
Korean capitalists, whereas rapid reunification of the peninsula would be a
disaster.
After his election, Roh (who takes up the presidency in
February) attempted to play down his radical ‘populist’ reputation and reassure
the Bush administration. He described George W as ‘cool’, and disavowed his
alleged anti-Americanism (in the 1980s Roh called for the removal of US forces
from South Korea).
Roh, however, will be forced to take account of the profound
mood in favour of reunification and an end to US domination. "I don’t have any
anti-American sentiment", said Roh, "but I won’t kowtow to the Americans,
either". The mass protests over the killing of the two South Korean schoolgirls
by a US military vehicle will ensure, at the very least, that the issue of
revision of the ‘Status of Forces Agreement’, which effectively grants US
personnel immunity from South Korean law, will be on the agenda.
Roh stresses the need for a "mature relationship with the
United States", clearly meaning that his incoming government, not the US, should
take the lead in dealing with North Korea. There is strong resentment in the
country, including among the ruling elite, that US policy towards the North
(including Clinton’s manoeuvres in 1994, which nearly came to armed conflict),
were conducted over the head of the South Korean government. While attempting to
appease the White House, Roh has spelled out his opposition to the Bush regime’s
provocative and irresponsible policy.
"The US may benefit from a get-tough policy, but we will
not", says Roh. "We must have dialogue with the North and with the US", said Roh
on his election victory. "In this way, we must make sure that the North-US
dispute does not escalate into a war. Now the Republic of Korea must take a
central role. We cannot have a war".
Clearly in any war, the South would be the first target,
likely to be obliterated. Later, Roh said that he had been horrified to learn
about US plans for a strike against North Korea’s nuclear facilities. "At the
time of the elections", said Roh, "some US officials, who held considerable
responsibility in the administration, talked about the possibility of attacking
North Korea. I then felt that no matter what differences I might face with the
US, I would oppose an attack on North Korea".
Roh Moo-hyun, who comes from a poor farming family, made his
reputation as a human rights lawyer in the 1980s. The capitalist press has
portrayed him as a populist who "mistrusts big business and favours
redistribution of wealth". (Financial Times, 20 December) In reality, there is
no indication that Roh has an anti-capitalist policy that will defend the
interests of the working class. In fact, on the issue of labour ‘flexibility’
(with big business leaders complaining that their ability to sack workers is
still restricted, despite changes in the labour laws made by Kim Dae-jung) Roh
said: "I think there remains some rigid factors in the labour market. I will try
to remove any unreasonable hurdles". The Korean Chamber of Commerce and Industry
has already made it clear that they regard the new president’s top priority to
be ‘strengthening industrial competitiveness and [the] economic rebound’.
Despite the partial recovery from the 1997 crisis, however, South Korea,
together with the rest of Asia, faces a period of economic turmoil and political
upheavals. The working class that brought down the dictatorship in the 1980s
will again move into mass action to defend working-class interest and struggle
to chance society on socialist lines.
The US-North Korea crisis may, in the coming weeks, be
diffused through diplomacy. But the effects will be far-reaching. Mass pressure
for the withdrawal of the US military presence from South Korea and Japan will
intensify. The cold-war framework will rapidly disintegrate, with intensified
rivalry between Japan, China and other regional powers. North Korea’s use of its
nuclear deterrent (actual or potential) to force the US to retreat will almost
certainly lead to further ‘nuclear proliferation’, with Japan and other states
drawing the conclusion that they can wield influence internationally only if
they possess nuclear weapons. A new and more dangerous period of world relations
has opened.
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