Reaching Out To Pyongyang.(World Affairs)

Despite its achievements, Washington is divided on how to deal with North Korea long term.

A battle rages in Washington, uniting forces of left and right against a divided Bush administration over whether to compel North Korea to tell the detailed truth about its nuclear-weapons capabilities and its Syrian connection, or to allow the country to collapse as a pariah state. But our recent trip to the North Korean capital suggests that the current controversy conceals more fundamental issues in U.S. relations with North Korea: unlike the United States, Pyongyang has both a short- and long-term policy toward its antagonist. It is willing to bargain away its nuclear-weapons programs piece by piece starting now, but only in return for a new, nonhostile relationship with Washington and more help for its economy. Washington, by contrast, has focused solely on the issue of denuclearization (and even on that Washington remains divided) and has no broader approach to North Korea. It falls to the next administration, one hopes, to devise a strategy toward Pyongyang that addresses both the nuclear program and the long-term question of how to deal with the weak but dangerous nation.

This is not to deny the recent achievements, only to put them in context. After six years of ideological posturing, the Bush administration followed the Clinton administration in trading goodies to halt North Korea's illicit weapons programs. Under a multistage agreement reached in February 2007 in the Six-Party Talks, North Korea has stopped producing plutonium at Yongbyon and the facility is finally being disabled. Once the process is completed later this year, North Korea will no longer be able to quickly regain its plutonium-production capability.

North Korea has also recently provided the West an inventory of its nuclear programs that, while not publicly divulged, is believed to include information on its plutonium stockpiles and maybe its weapons as well. U.S. and North Korean negotiators have also reportedly agreed on formulas--causing all the controversy--for handling North Korea's alleged nuclear dealings with Syria and its alleged uranium-enrichment program. In exchange, the Bush administration has promised to remove North Korea from its list of terrorist sponsors and to end some trade sanctions. If the current phase can be completed, the next phase of negotiations is expected to cover the dismantling of the reactor and the verification of Pyongyang's plutonium holdings. The recent flap in Washington over the extent of North Korea's aid to Syria should not obstruct the critical task: capping Pyongyang's production of plutonium and getting North Korea to give up its stockpile of plutonium and weapons.

Ensuring that North Korea does not continue to produce plutonium is critical. But it will ...