How North Korea Got the Bomb

How easily we forget. In this case we have forgotten how the current impasse with North Korea came to be. We have forgotten that the sainted Bill Clinton, through his emissary, the sainted Jimmy Carter negotiated a nuclear deal with North Korea in 1994. As part of the deal North Korea promised to stop developing nuclear weapons.

It was a very bad deal. Thanks to the ineptitude of Clinton and Carter the world is currently facing a rogue nation with nuclear weapons that is developing intercontinental missiles that can deliver them anywhere—even to America.

Jim Stinson reports on the history of the Clinton North Korea deal in Lifezette. Astonishingly, the media has shown precious little interest in why this all happened. Apparently, the continuing idolization of the Clintons prevents them from saying an ill word about Hillary's husband.

Stinson explains:

On Oct. 18, 1994, Clinton approved a plan to arrange more than $4 billion in energy aid to North Korea over the course of a decade in return for a commitment from the country’s Communist leadership to freeze and gradually dismantle its nuclear weapons development program, according to the New York Times.

The “complex” deal was to de-escalate the situation on the Korea peninsula, where the two Korean nations don’t even have a peace treaty after the Korean War ended in 1953.

“This agreement is good for the United States, good for our allies, and good for the safety of the entire world,” said Clinton in 1994. “It’s a crucial step toward drawing North Korea into the global community.”

Stinson quotes Prof. Robert Kaufman, an expert on arms control deals:

“The North Korean deal of 1994 is the prototype for why open societies should not negotiate arms control agreements with rogue regimes,” said Robert Kaufman, professor of public policy at Pepperdine University. “The North Koreans duped Jimmy Carter — an emissary of Clinton — and the Clinton administration, to subsidize the North Korean nuclear program in exchange for the counterfeit promise that North Korea would limit itself to civilian nuclear power.”

Kaufman said the agreement tranquilized the West while the North Koreans proceeded to cross the nuclear threshold, which they announced in 2002 after pocketing billions from the West.

He continues:

But nuclear weapons are far less a threat without the capability to deliver them to another continent. That North Korea could have an ICBM means they can now, or could soon, threaten most nations on the planet. It would force a higher level of negotiation from nations reluctant to negotiate with the tyrannical regime.

And it could mean a greater degree of “blackmail.” North Korea is a cash-poor nation that often takes money from its enemies. An ICBM could allow the nation to begin arranging all kinds of new agreements meant to extort South Korea, Japan, the United States and others for cash.

Kaufman notes that the Obama administration took the North Korea deal as its role model in negotiating its own nuclear deal with Iran. One notes that a chief negotiator for the first, one Wendy Sherman, was also directly involved in negotiating the second:

Kaufman says the 1994 deal shows the folly of nuclear talks with rogue states. The 1994 deal appears to be the same mistake former President Barack Obama made with Iran before his tenure expired.

"[President] Obama's feckless nuclear deal [with Iran] is the sequel," said Kaufman. "We have lifted sanctions on Iran, infusing that tottering economy with much needed cash, in exchange for an agreement that enables Iran to cross the nuclear threshold even in the unlikely event the Iranians abide by it. Worse, we can neither verify Iranian compliance reliably. Nor can we enforce the agreement even if we detect unambiguous violation because enforcement depends on the UN Security Council."

Kaufman said the United States should have never bet on North Korea and Iran disarming.

As of now, President Donald Trump is trying to undo some of the damage done by Clinton and Carter's North Korea deal. He will later address the damage done by Obama with the Iran deal. 

Interestingly, and to the surprise of many, Trump developed a constructive and positive relationship with Chinese president Xi Jinping last week. As of now, in exchange for better trade relations, the Chinese president has sent back North Korean coal exports… a vital part of the nation’s economy… and abstained from the United Nations resolution on Syria.

Curiously, many serious commentators thought that Trump would be easily manipulated by the savvy Xi. It is fair to say that neither party was manipulated by the other and that now they seem to be getting along, thus, working together to achieve a common goal.