Opinions

Be vigilant, but keep talking with North Koreans

With all of the hoopla and hysteria over North Korea (some of it justified), I feel compelled to put pen to paper and submit this piece. Trump's "fire and fury" inflammatory rhetoric is not only unhelpful and counterproductive but potentially dangerous. He's almost certainly as clueless about North Korea as he is about health care and Charlottesville, and, quite frankly, worries me more than Kim Jong Un.

We should be talking and negotiating with North Korea — without preconditions. This does not mean we support or condone their government, leaders or policies/actions. It does, however, acknowledge that there may be some things we cannot change without paying an unacceptably high price.

[North Korea conducts its most powerful nuclear test, escalating tensions]

I can walk my talk here. I've had multiple discussions with North Korean government officials/diplomats since I first engaged them some 20 years ago. Drank single-malt Scotch with them, laughed with them, even had a snowball fight with them at the base of an Alaska glacier (I made sure it was a tie). They're not from Mars, and their English is fluent and flawless.

In 1998, I crashed the North Korean embassy in Laos on the back of a motorcycle driven by a Lao friend — barreled through the open gate, across the wide courtyard and right up to the main entrance. I was curious about North Korea because I'd been raised on Cold War anti-Soviet propaganda, but had been in Alaska at the melting of the Ice Curtain and enjoyed travel to the Russian Far East and friendships with many Russians. I wondered about North Korea, which seemed a last vestige of Stalin's Dark Kingdom.

So my friend and I paid them an impromptu call. We were escorted inside and had a productive and friendly conversation. Since then, I've had discussions with North Korean officials inside their U.N. mission in New York about the possibility of them joining the Northern Forum, an organization of regional and provincial groups that includes South Korea. Once, a jovial fellow interrupted us, introduced himself and told me how he'd like to visit Alaska. It was U.N. Ambassador Li Gun.

In Anchorage in 1998, I hosted North Korean diplomat Kim Myong Gil, who not only gave a public talk at the Alaska World Affairs Council but also answered questions from the public! And he gave me an annotated copy of his speech before he delivered it. With his permission, I shared a copy with President Bill Clinton, and later shared it with former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, then the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. In recent days, Richardson has been speaking out in favor of negotiation.

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I took Kim to a meeting at UAA with former Govs. Steve Cowper and Wally Hickel. Mead Treadwell was also in attendance. They had a lively conversation about potential trade and economic opportunities between North Korea and Alaska should sanctions be lifted in the future. I brought Kim to a friendly visit with Archbishop Francis Hurley as well as a private talk at a downtown coffee shop with a leader of Anchorage's Korean community. Yes, there was much discussion.

According to Stephen Colbert (insert smiley face here — gotta keep a sense of humor in all this), all 15 nations on the U.N. Security Council voted to sanction North Korea for their recent missile tests, yet they are only threatening America. Not nuclear-armed France or Britain, just us. Why do they dislike us so intensely, or profess to dislike us? What do they want? The answers to these two questions should inform our policy toward North Korea.

Also, sanctions will disproportionately hurt those already suffering and are unlikely to change the regime's behavior, although blocking seafood exports to China might divert more needed protein to North Korea's malnourished masses. And a non-nuclear war with North Korea would literally demolish Seoul. Are we considering our allies and friends in South Korea? In Japan?  Here's hoping Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and the Joint Chiefs of Staff will be the grown-ups in the room.

In December 2008, I found myself back in New York City and placed a call to the North Korean mission. Kim Myong Gil was now the minister for USA affairs. He and his colleague Pak Song Il walked several blocks through bitter cold and blowing snow to meet me at the UN Millennium Hotel. We shared tea and talked for half an hour. One of the first people he asked me about was former Gov. Tony Knowles.

We need to talk and talk with North Korea. Keep our powder dry, yes. And be prepared to talk some more. Vigorous diplomacy.

Dr. William Cox is a physician who practiced for many years in Alaska. He now lives in Anchorage.

The views expressed here are the writer's and are not necessarily endorsed by Alaska Dispatch News, which welcomes a broad range of viewpoints. To submit a piece for consideration, email commentary@alaskadispatch.com. Send submissions shorter than 200 words to letters@alaskadispatch.com. 

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