The failure of the ongoing negotiations, while North Korea is willing to suspend its nuclear and missile program, will definitely Washington make, in the face of international criticism, disrupting the talks and not having an honest approach to addressing the crisis.
After a stormy period of the nuclear reciprocity threat and the North Korean and American leaders’ strife towards each other, which pushed the world to the brink of a devastating war, now the situation has changed in general and there are constructive and positive constructive messages of the desire for dialogue and Tensions are released daily by Trump and Kim Jong-un. The most recent developments in recent days have revealed the controversial travel of Mike Pompeo, the former head of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to Pyongyang, the establishment of a direct contact between the two Koreas, as well as North Korea’s surprise announcement in suspending its nuclear and missile program. Which have contributed to a ghostly security vision of the peninsula at once to make a clear horizon for peace. Accordingly, the question now is whether we should look forward to a historic bargain so that almost the last bastion of the communist system (based on the collective economic system) is also conquered by the leader of global capitalism, thus witnessing a new chapter in the relationship between the United States and North Korea.
A record of North Korea’s willingness to negotiate and resolve conflicts with the United States and the West can be found several times in the past.
In October 1994, the United States and North Korea launched a deal called “An Agreed Framework” in which Pyongyang committed to stop its nuclear program under the protection of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s safeguards (IAEA) Slowly By contrast, it was promised to build two nuclear reactors for civilian use and 500,000 tons of heavy fuel oil per year and other aid, including food aid.
But ultimately, this agreement was followed by the failure to build the promised reactors because of the continuation of Western sanctions against Pyongyang and the failure to implement food assistance programs due to disputes, and Pyongyang secretly continued its nuclear research program.
On February 29, 2012, the United States and North Korea announced a new agreement, called “Mutual Day Agreement.” Under this plan, North Korea has pledged to suspend its uranium enrichment program and its missile tests, and continue to prevent international monitoring of its nuclear program. Instead, the United States also announced it will send Pyongyang food aid to 240,000 tons.
But the agreement, like the “agreed framework”, did not last long, and months later, the United States stopped supplying its food aid on the pretext of continuing North Korea’s missile program in the form of satellite launch.
The Korean leader, quoting the media, has said he does not want to experience what happened to Gaddafi in Libya and Saddam in Iraq, who were attacked by a Western military strike. But the fact is North Korea’s addiction to nuclear weapons is far beyond the recent US intervention in Iraq and Libya.
Kim Il Sung, the grandfather of the current Korean leader, even considered a nuclear weapon even before the communist regime in Pyongyang on September 9, 1948. At the end of World War II, thousands of Korean workers were fired from Japan and settled in the northeastern part of the Korean Peninsula occupied by the Soviet Union. Many of them were engaged in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which were attacked by the United States in August 1945. They returned to their country with stories of “Resurrection” weapons, which brought enmity to the United States with fear of being completely destroyed.
This fear became more and more pessimistic among not only North Korean leaders, but even the people of the country, which the United States intended to launch nuclear attacks against the North. On December 9, 1950, US commander General Douglas MacArthur even said that he had provided a list of 26 atomic bombs to prevent the development of the North Korean army and its Chinese allies.
Also, in September 1956, the United States decided to deploy nuclear weapons on South Korean territory, in breach of clause 13 (d) of the cease-fire agreement. The decision was made at various stages in 1957 and 1958. The efforts of the Soviet Union and its allies in the United Nations to prevent the decision of the United States did not get anywhere.
On the other hand, North Korea began to build ground-based underground conventional weapons near the obstacle area, with South Korean and American troops capturing these weapons. In 1963, North Korea helped the Soviet Union to acquire nuclear technology and weapons, but this request was not accepted. Nonetheless, the Soviets agreed to help North Korea’s peaceful nuclear program, including training its experts. Later, China opposed North Korea’s similar request.
North Korea has since demanded that nuclear weapons be used to counteract and prevent a possible US strike, thereby guaranteeing its survival. In 1965, a nuclear research reactor at Yongbyon in northern Pyongyang opens and launches North Korea’s nuclear program. The Yong-byon Center was established with the assistance of the Soviet Union. In the 1960s and 1970s, more than 300 North Korean nuclear scientists were trained at the Moscow Engineering Physics Institute, the Bowman Technical School, and the Moscow Energy Institute. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russian and German scientists continued to assist in the development of the country’s nuclear program in Korea.
Eventually, on October 3, 2006, the North Korean Foreign Ministry announced in response to US threats that it was planning to test a nuclear bomb and that this happened historically for Korea three days later.
Another issue that makes it impossible to look at the results of possible talks between the leaders of the United States and North Korea optimistically is the reality of the indirect involvement of China and Russia and other regional actors in the issue. Of course, the North Korean nuclear crisis is not just a two-way issue between the United States and Pyongyang, and other major powers, including China and Russia, are involved.
From one perspective, while Trump considers the Security Council’s sweeping sanctions as a factor in turning North Korean leaders to the negotiating table, with a closer look at the matter, the main reason for Pyongyang’s willingness to negotiate under current conditions is to push China on Korea. North and Beijing has been accompanied by international sanctions against the country.
After four costly nuclear tests, 2012 has been closely linked to Beijing with international economic development sanctions. Also, according to the UN report in July 2017, rainfall in North Korea dropped dramatically, affecting food shortages. Under these circumstances, Beijing’s policy to reduce the import of textile and fuel products from North Korea is a major contributor to Pyongyang’s engagement with Trump.
But why has China, which has always used North Korea’s support as a leverage to pressure the United States and its allies in the region and prevent the Alliance’s two rivers, now has a policy of protecting Korea’s non-stagnation? The answer to this question should be America’s mainstream strategy in the Far East to confront the uprising of China, which has come to power since the Obama era, and has now been intensified in the Trump era. Under the pretext of Korea’s nuclear program, the United States deployed its own nuclear weapons bombers in South Korea, under the pretext of Korea’s nuclear program and the need to support its allies, and during the Trump period, intensified its military presence in East Asia, and the establishment of the Advanced Thad developed Missile Defense System (THAAD) in South Korea and Japan accelerated. The system, with a range of about 1,000 km of radar, is capable of monitoring the depths of China’s soil and parts of Russia’s soil, which will be a major contributor to the strategic advantage of the United States against these rivals. The sensitivity of this issue is better understood when it comes to the fact that Washington, in three important documents, determines its foreign policy and national security strategy during the Trump era of China and Russia as the most important threats to national security and US hegemony and the necessity he has cited them.
On the other hand, North Korea’s past record has shown that Pyongyang has in the past also welcomed the negotiation process for resolving disputes and ending hostilities.
Therefore, it can be admitted that the Pyongyang tendency to negotiate cannot be considered as a surrender to the will of America. But what it seems certain is that with this move, North Korea, China and Russia have thrown the ball on the American soil. The United States looks at the continuation of military presence and the strengthening of these forces near the borders of China and Russia from a strategic imperative to maintain its own interests and prevent China from gaining power. This need is similarly raised by other US allies in the region, such as Japan. Therefore, it can be expected that the failure of the negotiations ahead with North Korea refusing to suspend its nuclear and missile program will surely put Washington in a position of international criticism to disrupt talks and lack honest approach to resolve the crisis. . Indeed, the United States is now facing North Korea’s willingness to negotiate with the demands of China and Russia to reduce its military presence in the region in order to bring about talks. An issue that White House policymakers are not willing to accept.
