President Obama has just completed an important ritual of an American presidency: on this third visit to South Korea as president he has visited the demarcation line between North and South Korea, peering into the windswept, desolate north from behind bulletproof glass.
What some in the press hailed as a unique triumph of Obaman diplomacy—actually, yet another “food for nukes” deal in which North Korea makes modifications in its nuclear program and the US and friends make modifications in their sanctions and aid restrictions—is on the verge of the usual meltdown as North Korea makes noise about a satellite launch.
But non-proliferation, one of the few foreign policy issues that engaged Senator Obama directly during his time in the Congress, remains one of the issues that President Obama wants to push forward. Given that background, the President’s message to the North was tough: “They need to understand that bad behavior will not be rewarded,” he said at a press conference with South Korea’s president Lee Myung-bak.
It was not quite a “Mr. Kim, tear down that wall!” moment, but the message to both North Korea and China was unmistakeable. President Obama doesn’t like the usual “you pretend to disarm and we pretend to believe you” approach to North Korean nukes and won’t spend political capital in an election year to pamper the North.
But the DPRK, dipspeak for North Korea, was only one of the subjects the President was in Seoul to talk about. The meeting of 50 heads of state and international agencies on nuclear proliferation may not bring the abolition of nuclear weapons into view, but it offered President Obama the chance to push forward on some of the issues that most engage his administration.
Besides the North Korea file, there is Iran. At its core, this is a balance of power issue which, for political reasons and perhaps also reflecting the President’s personal priorities and beliefs, is being treated as a non-proliferation issue by the US and its close allies. Anything that strengthens the legitimacy of non-proliferation as an international issue strengthens the coalition against Iran, encouraging some countries to join, others to stiffen their resolve, and making it easier to push for sanctions and other consequences while Iran fails to cooperate with the non-proliferation police.
For Obama, this is a welcome chance to bring his inner hawk and dove into concord. Committing the US to reductions in the nuclear stockpile and pledging to outgoing Russian President Medvedev to be more flexible after the elections on missile defense issues advances his long term disarmament and peace goals—while in the short run stepping up the pressure on Iran. Tough words on North Korea further push the proliferation agenda, while making the President look hawkish to the voters back home, hopefully neutralizing any impression that he is being too forthcoming to the Russians on missile issues—and putting GOP opponents of any nuclear stockpile reductions on the back foot.
This is the kind of diplomacy that administration supporters call “smart,” and critics call “too clever by half;” we shall see where it goes.
But if nuclear non-proliferation is one of the major themes of this administration’s foreign policy, bringing its North Korea and Iran policies under a common umbrella and, potentially, engaging it in a shooting war in the Persian Gulf, the new Asia policy it rolled out last fall is the other, and a visit to Seoul and the DMZ are inescapably part of that policy as well.
By including the trip to the DMZ, meeting with South Korean soldiers, calling out China for supporting North Korea and using direct language about the North in his press conference with Lee, President Obama is following through on the carefully coordinated series of steps the administration took last fall to raise the US profile in Asia and reassure China’s neighbors about the US commitment to the region. The kind words to Medvedev and the evident search for a way to reset the reset button in US-Russian relations will also ring the alarm bells in Beijing; bad US-Russia relations help keep China’s fear of encirclement within bounds. Any US-Russia thaw makes Beijing feel more at risk.
China’s cooperation remains essential in managing the North Korea issue. It’s not clear how China, still hurting from its setbacks last fall, and off-balance now that the leadership transition has turned into such a high profile political struggle, will or even can respond at the moment. Burma’s moves away from Beijing and toward Washington and its friends have left North Korea as China’s only close ally in its neighborhood; how hard is China going to kick the only friend it has left?
This highlights a broader problem for America’s Asia policy. It is one thing to demonstrate to China and the neighborhood that the US, in association with others, will do what it takes to prevent China from throwing too much weight around the region; but pushing China too hard would be counterproductive. For its Asia program to work, the Obama administration has to find a way to shift from rebuilding ties with China’s neighbors to offering China a deeper relationship with the US. The US goal is not to isolate and throttle China, but to engage with China in the promotion of an Asia-Pacific zone of peaceful commerce and reduced security competition. The US has rarely enjoyed such a position of political strength in the region (and China has rarely felt less sure of itself), but the US must resist the temptation to overplay its hand.
While electoral politics back in the US might push the President toward a continuation of tough rhetoric and showboating, in reality this is a time when he needs to look beyond politics toward the national interest. China has seen the iron fist; even as the US continues to press its advantages and push on matters like intellectual property rights and the DPRK, it is time for some velvet glove.
And finally, the Seoul get-together offers the chance for a chat with Turkey’s Prime Minister Erdogan to prep for the next careful, mincing step around the Syrian quagmire and to work to coordinate Iran policy with the Turks. A busy few days, but this is one of those world gatherings that a US President can’t afford to miss.