Military

DATE=2/19/02

TYPE=INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT

TITLE=TOM CROSBY

NUMBER=3-57

DATELINE=WASHINGTON

INTERNET=

VOA INTERVIEW WITH KEN LIEBERTHAL

BY VOA'S TOM CROSBY - FEBRUARY 18, 2002

HOST: The next stop for President Bush in his Asia trip is South Korea...and there...according to Kenneth Lieberthal...he is likely to encounter some very difficult discussions because of his recent comments about an "axis of evil" which supports terrorism. Mister Lieberthal was a special assistant to President Clinton for Asia and was for a time (1998-2000) the Senior Director for Asia in the National Security Council. He tells VOA News Now's Tom Crosby, Mister Bush's inclusion of North Korea along with Iran and Iraq in that "axis of evil" makes South Korean leaders a little nervous.

MR. LIEBERTHAL: I think the President's inclusion of North Korea in his "axis of evil" presents very severe diplomatic problems for U.S. relations with South Korea. The administration has said repeatedly that, on the one hand, they support Kim Dae-jung's sunshine policy but, on the other hand, they want to call it like it is with regard to North Korea and are articulating a very tough stance. The reality is that this misrepresents Kim Dae-jung's sunshine policy. That policy is not simply a policy of concessions and bridge building to North Korea; it is a wide-ranging effort to instill in the North Koreans a sense of confidence that others do not wish them ill and that there is a way to move forward together. Kim combines that with tough defense measures to cover his downside.

President Bush's approach directly shoots at the heart of this thrust of the sunshine policy, to build confidence, to convey to the North Koreans that others do not either disparage them or seek them ill. And so I think that he is in for a very tough set of private discussions in South Korea on this issue.

MR. CROSBY: There is also the matter of U.S. aid toward North Korea, North Korea having had some problems with crops and the like. Does that get undermined by any of this?

MR. LIEBERTHAL: I certainly hope not. We have based our aid toward North Korea on a set of humanitarian considerations in response to calls by the World Food Program and others to provide necessary relief, given acute food shortages in North Korea. My impression is the administration does not plan to turn back on America's longstanding commitment to try to prevent or at least reduce starvation in the North.

MR. CROSBY: Should South Korea, though, be terribly nervous about all this? Is North Korea really that well armed at this particular point that it might present, say, a military threat to South Korea, or does it have other problems to be concerned with?

MR. LIEBERTHAL: I think one of the real potentially significant changes in the administration's policy and the one that I think would worry the South Koreans the most is that for the last three or four years there has been essential agreement among all the major players in the region -- South Korea, the United States, Japan, China, and Russia -- that we all want North Korea to continue in existence and to evolve in a favorable direction over time. Because we have all seen a North Korean collapse as producing calamitous consequences for others -- refugee flows, requirements potentially for peacekeeping and stabilization measures, huge financial demands that would have to be met by others in the region and by the world community.

Now it is not clear whether this administration seeks to sustain that policy of wanting to see North Korea continue in existence but encourage reform or whether it really prefers to see a collapse of North Korea. If so, it stands alone in the region on that issue.

MR. CROSBY: It is likely then that President Bush is going to have to clarify that very much, if indeed you are correct, when he visits Beijing.

MR. LIEBERTHAL: I think that the Japanese, the South Koreans and the Chinese are all very concerned to get a more accurate understanding of what the President had in mind with his recent set of remarks. All of them want to see tension reduction on the Peninsula. All of them want to see South Korea thrive. All of them want to see North Korea change. But all of them also have been in agreement for some time now -- with the United States I might add -- that the best set of policies to achieve that are ones that seek to build bridges to the North, not publicly to confront the North and humiliate the North.

MR. CROSBY: Given what you have just said, you invoked Japan, do you think on his just completed visit to Japan and talks with Junichiro Koizumi, the Japanese Prime Minister, that he may have put Mr. Koizumi's mind somewhat at ease?

MR. LIEBERTHAL: On this issue, I'm not sure. As I understand the Bush administration's policy and as I understand Japan's own views, I don't think that they are in agreement on this issue. Having said that, the Japanese, of the various governments concerned -- the U.S., Japan, South Korea, China, and Russia -- the Japanese were the least anxious to move forward rapidly with North Korea. That is in part because Japanese normalization of relations with North Korea will bring a high price tag on what is effectively war reparations. And they don't see a major advantage to them of moving forward rapidly. They also haven't gotten satisfaction on key issues, especially the alleged kidnapping of Japanese citizens over the past 15 years by the North Koreans.

But, having said that, the Japanese, like the rest, do not want to see the North Korean Government collapse. What they want to see is an evolution in the right direction. Hopefully that is where the Bush administration is headed, too, but recent rhetoric has made that unclear.

HOST: University of Michigan political scientist Kenneth Lieberthal, a former special assistant to the President for Asia and former Senior Director for Asia in the National Security Council during the Clinton administration. He spoke to VOA News Now's Tom Crosby.