A renunciation by North Korea on its nuclear program at present is illusory. Nevertheless, the foreign countries will not come to the dialogue with the country, says North Korea expert Eric ball Bach in the interview -.
Deutsche Welle: North Korea has again fired a ballistic missile, for the third Time since the beginning of the month, all the warnings from the international community. What is the calculus of pages of North Korea behind this?
Eric J. ball’s Creek: Behind North Korea’s nuclear arms is something of a double logic. This is the familiar logic of deterrence: The Regime feels, in particular of the US militarily threatened, so that the nuclear weapon is, so to speak, the highest guarantor of state sovereignty in this context.
This logic only works if the foreign also believes that the North Koreans developed their nuclear infrastructure up to a certain stage. This has nothing to do with irrationality, but rather quite the opposite: It is inherent in the logic of deterrence, that you test the weapons systems on a regular basis and also prove what you have.
In the case of North Korea to be added, especially in the last few months, that one is apparently seeking, the two major technologies, nuclear weapons and missile technology, to bring together. This step is considered to be technologically highly complicated, and for that, regular Tests are necessary.
Ball Bach: For North Korea’s nuclear program is currently non-negotiable
To the extent that the conventional logic of deterrence. What is it with the “second logic” of the North Korean nuclear program?
The second logic explains why North Korea is escalating steps, as these missile tests, although these are not very conducive to their own security interests (see the recent debate about a possible preemptive strike against North Korea – ed.) Here it is, in fact, questions of identity and legitimacy.
While the logic of deterrence, before all foreign policy considerations, the purpose of this logic of escalation, primary inside. The Regime requires an all-encompassing and existential threat discourse to accomplish their goals. Because it is quite conceivable that even a totalitarian country like North Korea, such a resource – and cost-intensive project, such as the nuclear program without such an external threat is not maintained in could be.
That is to say: the Regime sends to these regular Tests, a sign of military strength and the Signal that these decisions not be made in Washington but in Pyongyang
South Korea’s new Chairman Moon Jae-In could bring things in motion
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Actually, the circumstances for an approach seem to be favorable: South Korea’s new Chairman Moon Jae-In has said that he would, under certain circumstances even prepared to have a Meeting. Also from the USA, there were signals that the discussions are not, at least, excluded. Exactly, it is actually what it wants to North Korea. Why, then, these repeated provocations?
The question of missile tests, OR the Dialog does not contradict itself from a North Korean perspective. Pyongyang knows that the International community is faced with a Problem: Namely, the Problem of the lack of Alternatives. Sanctions alone have not achieved the desired goal of military actions are really realistic, not politically and not militarily, because a majority of the nuclear infrastructure in North Korea is underground, and we don’t know for a large part, even, where it is located exactly. That is, a military strike would not make much sense.
At the end of the do-nothing, what we have seen under Barack Obama, which has also led to the goal remains the same: to sell and Waiting for the collapse as a strategy.
The result, ultimately, there is no way the dialogue is over, and the North Koreans know that, too. This is not to say, for a new missile test or nuclear test, a Dialog is opposed diametrically. And we have experienced in the past. After the first nuclear test in 2006, it has not lasted even a month, until the then-Six-party-talks resumed. That is to say, provocations in the past as a kind of diplomatic catalyst, has also brought back the diplomatic initiatives.
For North Korea, but still: Under the current conditions of one’s own nuclear program is not negotiable.
What would have to happen in order to bring the opportunities for a new dialogue in reach?
It is a great political will on the part of the international community would be necessary in order to, by means of dialogue on the issue of North Korea’s nuclear program. Because the basic conditions have changed in the past ten years solid. North Korea sees itself as a nuclear power and will not give up this Status so easy, unless the political price is high enough. This would, for example, Non – aggression or security guarantees, and are currently with a President Donald Trump in the White house is simply not conceivable.
However, I see a Chance of the presidency of the Moon Jai In. As a co-founder of the sunshine policy, he knows that in the medium term, a dialogue with North Korea can only be a success, if not all, of the dimensions of the intra-to be determined-Korean relations to the nuclear issue. That is, if it succeeds, the debate on the nuclear issue of socio-decouple cultural, or economic cooperation, could step-by-step, trust is built, what is the absolute basis for a successful dialogue with North Korea.
It is certainly exciting that the dynamics from three conservative governments in the United States, is broken in South Korea and Japan now. With a liberal South Korean President, who has always expressed the importance of the dialogue with North Korea, there is a Chance that channels of Dialogue be re-opened, for several years, broke.
Eric J. ball Bach is head of the research group “North Korea and International security” at the Institute for Korean studies, FU Berlin