"We know that both Iran and Syria have long cooperated with North Korea on
ballistic missile programs, and the prospect of cooperation on nuclear
matters is not far-fetched. Whether and to what extent Iran, Syria or others
might be "safe havens" for North Korea's nuclear weapons development, or may
have already participated with or benefited from it, must be made clear. "

AXIS OF EVIL
Pyongyang's Upper Hand
Thanks to feckless diplomacy, Kim Jong Il may preserve his nuclear program.

BY JOHN R. BOLTON The Wall Street Journal
Friday, August 31, 2007 12:01 a.m.
www.opinionjournal.com/forms/printThis.html?id=110010542

The Six-Party talks on North Korea's nuclear weapons program have now
descended into a miasma of "working groups," one of which, on U.S.-North
Korea bilateral issues, will meet this weekend in Geneva. It is worth paying
attention to the outcome of this gathering.

North Korea wants to be taken off the U.S. list of state sponsors of
terrorism and, as soon as possible, to enjoy full diplomatic relations with
Washington. Pyongyang may well succeed, as many in the U.S. State Department
seem more eager to grant full recognition to the Pyongyang dictatorship in
North Korea than to the democracy in Taiwan. This would be a profound
mistake on our part.

Nearly 200 days have passed since Feb. 13, when the Six-Party Talks on North
Korea's nuclear weapons program produced an "agreement" to eliminate that
program. Despite encomiums about the virtues of diplomacy, little real
progress has been made in eliminating Pyongyang's program. Negotiations in
July ended without agreement on a timetable, despite repeated State
Department assurances since February that the North would be held to strict
deadlines.

The Yongbyon reactor is shuttered, but that reactor was not frequently
operational in the recent past, and may well be at the end of, or even
beyond, its useful life. The return of International Atomic Energy Agency
inspectors to Yongbyon provides North Korea with a new patina of
respectability, despite the near certainty that significant nuclear activity
is happening anywhere but Yongbyon.

In fact, the key change is that economic assistance is once again
subsidizing and reinforcing Kim Jong Il's hold on power. Heavy fuel oil,
food and other "humanitarian" assistance from South Korea, and substantial
unpublicized aid from China are all flowing North. Cheeky Pyongyang is once
again demanding that the outside world supply it with light-water nuclear
reactors. The second North-South Summit in Pyongyang, postponed until
October--closer to South Korea's presidential elections-- will provide
renewed legitimacy to the North Korean dictatorship, and may bolster the
political chances of South Korean advocates of appeasement, in turn
providing Kim Jong Il even more breathing room.

Kim is once again besting the U.S. in accomplishing his two central
strategic objectives: staying in power and preserving his nuclear-weapons
program. The working groups currently underway do nothing to achieve the
proper ends of U.S. foreign policy. A few weeks ago in Shenyang, China, the
"denuclearization" working group met without visible progress, even on
permanently dismantling Yongbyon.

There is still simply no evidence that Pyongyang has made a decision to
abandon its long-held strategic objective to have a credible nuclear-weapons
capability. This inconvenient fact should make it impossible for the State
Department to concede on other issues, even if it were inclined to do so.
Creative minds are therefore working on ways to explain that any forthcoming
North Korean declaration of its nuclear capabilities is "full and complete,"
thus eliminating the remaining troubling obstacles to full normalization of
relations.

Consider a possible North Korean "declaration," perhaps drafted with State's
coaching, which would say something like this: "We manufactured two nuclear
devices, one of which we detonated last October. We detonated the other
earlier, but you didn't recognize it as a nuclear explosion. We currently
have no nuclear devices. Our plutonium reprocessing efforts were not very
successful, which explains why we only had two devices, neither of which
produced large yields. We ultimately disposed of our limited remaining
plutonium to others, and we have no idea where it now is. We currently have
no plutonium. On uranium enrichment, we purchased some UF6 and a small
number of centrifuges for a test cascade from A.Q. Khan, but we could not
progress due to inadequate funds. Accordingly, we long ago sold all but a
small amount of the UF6 and the centrifuges to third-parties. We will
produce what little we have at Yongbyon shortly. That's it. Are we done
now?"

Many will fall for this pretense of "full disclosure," especially those
needing a diplomatic "success" to justify long years of faith in the
Six-Party Talks. The alternative is to reject any North Korean declaration
without full and timely verification. IAEA inspections alone are not enough.
Its capacities are limited. Indeed, much of the IAEA's work is accomplished
on the basis of intelligence provided by governments.

Precisely because our knowledge of the North's nuclear program is
incomplete, we need an intrusive, indeed invasive, verification mechanism
before having any confidence that North Korea's nuclear program is in fact
being dismantled. We need smart and extensive verification activities inside
North Korea, including no-notice inspections, a full range of sensors and
sampling, unrestricted interviews and document reviews. If the North rejects
effective verification, that is yet another basis to repudiate the Feb. 13
quicksand deal.

We need to know, among other things, precisely how many nuclear weapons the
North has manufactured, how and where it manufactured them, how many it now
has, and how much reprocessed plutonium remains available for weaponization.
If any devices, fissile material or nuclear manufacturing equipment have
left North Korea, we need to learn the specifics.

We need to understand the full extent of its uranium enrichment program, and
if weapons-grade enriched uranium was produced, where it is and how much
there is of it. We also need to know specifically if North Korea possesses
any enriched uranium metal or any weapons- or missile warhead-design
information.

President Bush has stressed that we must also deal with Pyongyang's
biological, chemical and ballistic missile programs. We must address these
programs, especially the missiles, soon. Failure to make explicit the
important connection between weapons and delivery systems will certainly
come back to haunt us, and we are on the verge of allowing this point to
slip away entirely.

Finally, we need to learn the details of North Korean nuclear cooperation
with other countries. We know that both Iran and Syria have long cooperated
with North Korea on ballistic missile programs, and the prospect of
cooperation on nuclear matters is not far-fetched. Whether and to what
extent Iran, Syria or others might be "safe havens" for North Korea's
nuclear weapons development, or may have already participated with or
benefited from it, must be made clear.

For our own safety's sake, and that of allies like Japan and South Korea,
there can be no compromises on these points.
====
Mr. Bolton is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and the
author of "Surrender Is Not an Option: Defending America at the U.N. and
Abroad," forthcoming this fall from Simon & Schuster.
[IMRA: Former U.S. Ambassador to the UN]