[Column] N. Korea’s economic strategy is a reason to hope for peace and denuclearization

An image of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un ascending Mt. Baektu on horseback with Pak Jong-chon, chief of the General Staff of the Korean People’s Army, and other military leaders published by the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on Dec. 4. (Yonhap News)

US’ Indo-Pacific Strategy requires some tension on Korean Peninsula

An image of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un ascending Mt. Baektu on horseback with Pak Jong-chon, chief of the General Staff of the Korean People’s Army, and other military leaders published by the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on Dec. 4. (Yonhap News)

North Korea made some decisive changes last year, halting its “two-track” line of simultaneous nuclear and economic growth and reorienting its state strategy around economic development. This new path can be seen as a qualitative change, built on decades of quantitative changes. North Korea hoped that this change would have a major impact on resolving the nuclear issue.

But since negotiations with the US broke down in the Hanoi summit, their dispute appears to be moving in reverse to the way it looked in 2017. Pyongyang has said that, if the US doesn’t come up with a new approach by the end of the year, it will have no choice but to go down a “new path.” The new path that Kim mentioned in his New Year’s speech sounds less like bluster and more like reality. But what exactly would that new path entail?

During their Hanoi summit, North Korea and the US confirmed the huge gap between them. While some said that confirming that gap was itself a form of progress, it may have sapped the momentum for dialogue on both sides. If such momentum has been lost, we can conclude that the devil was not in the details, but in the overarching strategy. North Korea argues that the US is still clinging to sanctions in order to achieve its ambition of first disarming the North and then overthrowing its regime. But the US didn’t create and hasn’t maintained the sanctions regime either to resolve the North Korean nuclear issue or to overthrow the North Korean regime. Like some kind of black hole, the sanctions regime has already sucked in not only North Korea, but also China, Russia, South Korea, and Japan, helping the US maintain control over Northeast Asia.

North Korea says that the denuclearization talks won’t resume until the US completely and irreversibly ends its “hostile policy” toward the North, which is the source of the North Korean nuclear issue. So how did North Korea become a mortal enemy to the US, motivating it to hold tenaciously to that hostile policy? The answer lies in North Korea’s geopolitical position. The US’ strategy in East Asia requires a hostile relationship with North Korea. China has become the US’ number one strategic rival, with US fear and hostility toward China higher than most would imagine. The Indo-Pacific Strategy, which is designed to contain and suppress China, requires some degree of tension on the Korean Peninsula. The US also wants South Korea, its ally occupying half of the Korean Peninsula, to particulate directly in that strategy. North Korea says that the US doesn’t have the political will to improve their relations, and the biggest reason for that should be found in the US’ East Asia strategy. That’s also likely the root cause for the US not normalizing relations with North Korea when South Korea did so with China and Russia after the close of the Cold War.

If the “new path” currently being sought by North Korea represents a reversion to conflict with the US, that ironically might be exactly what the US wants, in terms of the big picture. With US President Donald Trump seeking reelection, North Korea might assume that its nuclear and missiles programs could have a major impact on that election. However, that could be a double-edged sword, and the assumption itself might be incorrect.

What exactly would N. Korea’s new path entail?

Circumstances since the Hanoi summit and the working-level talks in Stockholm show that the “top-down” method isn’t guaranteed to work with a government like the US’. North Korea had put a lot of stock in Trump, since his behavior differed from previous presidents, but even Trump is trapped in the net of American strategy. And since Trump is disturbing the status quo around the world, what chance is there that he’ll be a peacemaker and paragon of justice on the Korean Peninsula?

North Korea has already notched an arrow on its bowstring, promising to embark on its new path by the end of the year. The target of that arrow will apparently be announced during the upcoming 5th Plenum of the 7th Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea. What happens if the US disregards North Korea’s ultimatum, pushing the North to target the US at its weakest point by ending its moratorium on long-range missile launches or by announcing a satellite launch? That wouldn’t be a new path, of course, and the answer will likely be found in 2017.

Could North Korea give up its exclusive focus on the US, which it has held for decades, and seek a new path to denuclearization? As long as the North doesn’t deviate from the economic development strategy line it adopted last year, we can hold on to hope.

By Jin Jingyi, professor at Peking University

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