Iraq and North Korea

Quick – what’s the difference between North Korea with nuclear weapons and Iraq with nuclear weapons? Why is the President determined to rid Iraq of its potential capability, by force if necessary, but willing to continue diplomatic measures with North Korea?

One likely answer is the neighborhood in which each resides.

Quick – what’s the difference between North Korea with nuclear weapons and Iraq with nuclear weapons? Why is the President determined to rid Iraq of its potential capability, by force if necessary, but willing to continue diplomatic measures with North Korea?

One likely answer is the neighborhood in which each resides.

North Korea is a pariah in a region of states that have reasonable-to-good relations with the United States. Japan, South Korea, the Philippines and Taiwan are democratic friends and trading partners of ours. Prestige is at least partly conferred by economic growth, making relations with the U.S. and Europe crucial. By that measure, even China is in some ways closer to us than to them, and Jiang Zhemin has made it clear that China does not approve of a nuclear-armed North Korea (though what, if anything, he will do about it is unclear).

Possession of nuclear weapons will not make North Korea a regional leader. Nothing about its ideology or its economic, political or agricultural system induces respect or a desire to imitate it. North Korea is a failed state and a threat to peace and stability and, best of all, the U.S. doesn’t have to convince the neighbors to see it that way.

Iraq in the Middle East poses a different set of issues.

Unlike in Asia, where “western” is not a pejorative, Arab and Islamic attitudes toward the U.S. and the West are ambivalent at best. Economic growth has been non-existent for years and the squandering of billions in oil revenue by despots has left millions across the region poor, unemployed and radical. Political development has been nearly non-existent as well, with not a single Arab or Islamic democracy. (The people of Turkey are Muslim but not Arab, and the government is determinedly secular, so its democracy is neither Islamic nor Arab.) Education is too often a mechanism for religious indoctrination rather than a means to enhance economic and political traffic with the rest of the world, increasing Muslim isolation and resentment of the material advances of the West.

Under these circumstances, although Saddam is a threat to his neighbors and his own people, his hatred for the United States, Israel and the West resonates across a wide part of the Arab and Islamic world. Furthermore, an “Islamic bomb” has long been the active goal of some states and the wish of others. If Saddam succeeds, his stature in the Islamic world will rise commensurately. Whether out of fear of him, pride in an “Islamic” accomplishment, hatred for us, or a combination of all three, Saddam will lead and others will follow.

To protect American interests and assets in Asia, the U.S. can work with countries in the region that share our interest in security from North Korean aggression. In the Middle East, we will have few allies – mostly outside the region – to protect an area populated largely by weak and angry states unlikely ever to admit the benefit of having the menace removed.