As if it didn't have its hands full with the occupation of Haiti, the Clinton administration now finds itself trying to dodge another, potentially more dangerous foreign-policy bullet. Negotiations between the United States and North Korea over Pyongyang's suspected nuclear weapons program, which threatened to provoke a military showdown in June, hit another snag last week. The result could be a protracted round of brinkmanship at a time when Washington is preoccupied with Haiti.
Two months ago, it looked as though the two sides might have had a deal. U.S. negotiators met their North Korean counterparts in Geneva and offered incentives to abandon construction of two new graphite nuclear reactors that could produce about 350 pounds of weapons-grade plutonium each year.
But then North Korea lived up to its advance billing as the world's most unpredictable nation. Pyongyang suddenly began backtracking, piling on new, sometimes bizarre conditions and reopening issues that were already settled. "They basically want a blank check," says a senior U.S. official.
North Korea wants Washington to finance a $4 billion light- water reactor from the purveyor of its choice to replace its old reactors, $2 billion in compensation for past investments, interim electricity supplies and diplomatic relations. "If they don't budge," warns a senior U.S. official, "it will lead to a rupture." Negotiators are to meet again this week to try to salvage the talks.
Missteps. As is often the case with North Korea, observers were left guessing why Pyongyang was suddenly upping the ante. What is clear, however, is that the U.S. side did not help itself. Earlier this month, the U.S. Pacific Fleet commander, Adm. Ronald Zlatoper, said that routine naval maneuvers by a carrier battle group in the Sea of Japan were meant to send "a very strong message" to Pyongyang. He also described Haiti as an example of how military force can influence diplomacy. In response, the North Korean military threatened to break off the Geneva talks and accused the United States of seeking a military showdown. "The admiral was strictly off on a frolic of his own," says a senior Pentagon official. Another possible explanation is that Pyongyang's leaders sensed that the Clinton administration could ill afford another confrontation at a time when U.S. soldiers were patrolling Haiti's mean streets.
Last summer, the United States and North Korea also seemed headed for a showdown. North Korea had destroyed evidence of its reactor's history, despite stern warnings from the United States and the International Atomic Energy Agency. Washington then threatened economic sanctions, which North Korea said it would deem an act of war. It was then that former President Jimmy Carter traveled to Pyongyang at the invitation of North Korean leader Kim Il Sung in an attempt to defuse the crisis. Carter brokered a deal that called upon North Korea to freeze its nuclear program and resume negotiations, and he arranged for the first-ever summit between the leaders of North and South Korea.
Fresh from another deal, this time with Haiti's military leaders, Carter is now contemplating a return trip to North Korea. Following Kim Il Sung's death in July, his son Kim Jong Il, the North's reclusive new leader, invited Carter to help restart the stalled dialogue between North and South Korea. Envoys from the two sides flew to Plains, Ga., last month to meet with Carter, and aides say that the former president was "encouraged" when Robert Gallucci, the chief U.S. negotiator, suggested that his mediation would be welcome.
Whose agenda? But some U.S. officials worry that Carter could pursue his own agenda, much as he did in Haiti, or that North Korea's leaders will talk him into a deal that Washington cannot live with. "It's clear he's determined not to be an employee of the U.S. government," says an official. "We're not looking at this point for anyone to step in and play a mediating role."
The bottom line for now is that as long as the North Korean nuclear program remains suspended, the U.S. side is willing to talk. But if North Korea tries to reprocess spent fuel rods or restart their reactor, all bets are off -- and the Clinton administration could once again face a crisis it dearly wants to avoid. And as with Haiti, the administration could well find itself at the mercy of a former president's unpredictable diplomatic skills.
