CONNOR HOFFMAN
Staff Writer
With all the noise of the Iran deals, we seem to have overlooked a much worse problem that we have.
That problem is the fact that North Korea, one of the most rogue countries in the world, now has restarted its nuclear facilities and is again threatening the United States.
According to CNN on Sept. 15, the director of the North Korea Atomic Energy Institute said, “If the U.S. and other hostile forces persistently seek their reckless hostile policy towards the DPRK [Democratic People’s Republic of Korea] is fully ready to cope with them with nuclear weapons [at] any time.”
North Korea said that it is planning more satellite launches, although that is prohibited by United Nations Security Council resolutions. These kinds of launches are usually seen as a way of testing ballistic missile technology.
When countries develop ballistic missile technology, it can be used as a way to develop a space program. But most of the time this missile technology is used to develop nuclear weapons capable of attacking countries continents away.
I don’t know when the United States will learn that we can’t negotiate with these tyrants unless it’s from a position of strength. Iran isn’t the first time this country tried to negotiate with a country that is extremely anti-American. In the 1990s, the United States tried to conduct a nuclear deal with North Korea similar to what we are doing with Iran today.
North Korea, aka the Hermit Kingdom, was essentially the Iran of the 1990s; it, too, decided that they wanted to develop their own nuclear weapons, despite almost the entire international community disagreeing. President Bill Clinton took the initiative to persuade North Korea to stop its program, but as history has shown, we can’t negotiate with these dictators and expect them to comply.
The United States and North Korea reached an agreement in 1994. According to the Nuclear Threat Initiative, North Korea was to freeze and dismantle their nuclear reactors, allowing the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to monitor this process and meet IAEA safeguards. In return, the United States was expected to help North Korea build a nuclear reactor to use for energy, give them 150,000 tons of oil and reduce trade barriers.
Sounds eerily similar to the Iran deal, doesn’t it? That’s because it is. These kinds of deals look good on paper, but in reality is it very difficult to get these rogue nations to follow through.
By 2002, this terrible deal completely collapsed. The CIA discovered that North Korea was secretly enriching uranium for further weapons production. Also, North Korea did not get rid of the nuclear material that they had prior to the deal.
It would only take North Korea four more years to have their first nuclear test, according to the Washington Post. 2006 was a long time ago and we are in a much less secure world than we used to be.
According to David Albright, a former UN weapons inspector who is now the head of the Institute for Science and International Security, North Korea may already have 10 to 15 weapons. He went on to say that by 2020, North Korea could have anywhere from 20 to 100 nuclear weapons.
This kind of reckless behavior must not be tolerated, and North Korea must be dealt with. We must not tell them that adhering to the agreement will grant a reward, as they already deserve punishment for breaking Clinton’s agreement years ago. It is through strength that we will show North Korea their actions will not be tolerated. Once they learn this, they will return back to the negotiating table, this time serious about change.
This is not just the United State’s problem; the entire international community should join in an effort to condemn North Korea. First, the U.S. must impose stricter sanctions on North Korea. To truly get North Korea to comply, we must get Russia and China to impose tougher economic sanctions on North Korea as well. This kind of behavior simply cannot and will not be tolerated by the world.