Gore or Bush: Engagement Process With the North Is Likely to Continue

Despite speculation that U.S. policy toward North Korea is likely to be affected if George W. Bush wins the presidential election Tuesday, analysts in Seoul suggest that Washington is likely to continue with engagement.

Han Sung-joo, a former South Korean foreign minister who is now a professor of political science at Korea University in Seoul, told the JoongAng Ilbo English Edition that the main reason the Republicans would not overhaul the engagement policy of the Clinton administration is because they have "no other alternative."

"It's not as if they can bomb the country," Professor Han said. "One way is to completely isolate the North, but that will be risky and going against the trend, and will not be supported by the international community."

Analysts agreed that the Clinton policy will probably undergo some changes － even if Al Gore wins. Although he serves as Bill Clinton's vice president, he is expected to be much tougher toward the North than the White House has been.

Speculation has been widespread in South Korea that Mr. Bush is likely to take a tough stance against the North since he is surrounded by such hardline aides as Condoleezza Rice, his senior national security adviser, and Paul Wolfowitz, a former senior official at the State and Defense Departments. These members of Mr. Bush's close circle have stressed that U.S. policy toward North Korea must be firmer.

While Ms. Rice is a Russia expert, Mr. Wolfowitz, as a former ambassador to Indonesia, brings some Asia expertise to the Bush team. The two are considered likely to play a decisive role in determining Mr. Bush's foreign policy because the Republican candidate's experience in foreign affairs is minimal.

Mr. Han's remarks were echoed by another North Korea watcher who said that the Clinton administration's engagement policy － often dubbed the "Perry Process" after a former defense secretary, William Perry － largely reflects Republican ideas.

"The Republicans also want the North to abandon its missile program," said Koh Yu-hwan, a professor at the Department of North Korean Studies at Dongguk University.

"The current process is going well and in the long term, the North will have no choice but to give up. They wouldn't want to take a risk at this moment."

He added that major changes in the U.S. stance toward the North would be strongly opposed by Seoul.

Although analysts and officials said the Republicans would use more "sticks" than "carrots," they felt that the main thrust of policy toward the North would not change.

"The Republicans would take a firm position if the North did not abide by its agreements, such as the Geneva Agreement, but that is unlikely to happen," Mr. Koh said.

Lee Joung-binn, the South Korean foreign minister, said, "The speculation that a Republican president will be hostile toward North Korea is not well founded."

That does not mean no changes will occur.

Although the framework will stay, details will change, the analysts felt. For example, the Bush campaign repeatedly criticized the Clinton administration for the 1994 Geneva Agreement, in which the United States promised the North two light-water reactors and 500,000 tons of heavy oil in exchange for a freezing of its nuclear weapons program.

"The Republican administration is likely to focus on helping the North on a humanitarian level so that its aid would not be used for military purposes," Mr. Han said, indicating that the amount of the aid would not increase. However, he said that the U.S.-North agreement would be maintained.

The North Korea watchers here went on to say that it is not only the Bush administration that will be "stricter" with the North. Although the public assumes that Vice President Gore will inherit the policy of President Clinton, analysts said this is not necessarily the case.

No foreign policy expert is closer to Mr. Gore than Leon Fuerth, who is widely expected to become Mr. Gore's national security adviser if the Democrat wins. Mr. Fuerth, a former Foreign Service officer, was on the staff of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence when then-Representative Gore became a member in 1980 and joined his staff when the Democratic candidate won his Senate seat a few years later.

The two agree on the necessity for arms control negotiations and they share an interventionist impulse to use U.S. millitary forces to defend American values as well as American interests abroad.

Another person close to Mr. Gore and a leading candidate for secretary of state is Richard Holbrooke, currently U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

Kim Sung-han, a professor at the Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security, called these people much "firmer" than some officials close to Mr. Clinton.

"Richard Holbrooke is really not much different from a Republican," Mr. Kim said in a phone interview.

Mr. Han added: "These people close to Gore are much more professional than Clinton's people. Therefore there is a possibility that a Gore administration is going to be much tougher with the North than Clinton since Albright and Wendy Sherman were amateurs." He was referring to Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and the State Department official in charge of talks with North Korea.

According to Mr. Han, who flew to Washington in 1993 with what he called a "stick and carrot" approach to persuade Pyongyang not to withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, the United States is likely to slow its pace in approaching the North. Furthermore, inter-Korean detente is also expected to slow, he felt.

"The pace of inter-Korean rapprochment will slow down as the North has already taken all it wants from the South," Mr. Han said.

In the last six months, North Korea has been pushing contacts with the outside world in gestures aimed at easing concerns over the isolated Communist state and facilitating outside economic aid. Relations with the United States have improved significantly in tandem with warming inter-Korean relations.

This would make it difficult for a Bush administration to pursue the U.S. national missile defense system proposed by the Clinton administration, analysts also felt.

The defense system is designed to protect against attack from rogue states. Whether to go ahead with the system will be one of the first big decisions for whoever takes office.

"Just because they say it during the campaign does not necessarily mean they will go ahead with it," Mr. Han said. He added that if public opinion goes against the missile shield, the Bush administration may decline to approve it.

by Lee Soo-jeong