April 2, 2012
Bikram Vohra

With North Korea still pretty closed out to nuclear inspections and the world only in a position to second-guess exactly how far the nuke programme has advanced there is now a new and palpable concern that the work on the delivery systems has not stopped. In fact, it must come as quite a rude shock to the White House that the North has announced the launch of a new satellite in the course of this month.

This not only brings to a brutal halt the already fragile rapprochement between Washington and Pyongyang in which slim glimmers of hope had lit the path to some sort of understanding that the North would hold back on its nuclear proliferation plans. Those have now been clearly blackened out ironically while Earth hour was being globally acknowledged.

The fear in South Korea is not about 60 minutes of token darkness but a fearful step closer to the abyss of obliteration. Despite the UN Resolutions 1718 and 1874 calling for a suspension of all ballistic related missiles, which includes any rocket capable of carrying a weapons load or even a satellite, this violation cannot sit well with President Barack Obama or the other eight nations who have delivery system capabilities. Not that anyone particularly wants to promise a measure but if North Korea is planning to buck the pressure and continue to push its programme the question that then rises is how ‘long’ is long range ballistic technology and what parts of each hemisphere would under the cosh. There is little solace in the labeling of this launch as it being part of an earth observation satellite, seeing as how the technology for an ICBM system and a satellite are very similar.

The US was quick to grab the straw when it was offered to them by Pyongyang in February that the state would suspend all long range tests and launches in return for food aid, which amounted to about 240,000 tonnes. They hoped that would ease tensions and let South Korea breathe a little more comfortably. But it has been short-lived.

Now what? Either Obama canters into the last months of his first-term in office with the prickly burr under a saddle in that the North isn’t going to be intimidated and intends to be the tenth state on the planet. In the eyes of the West, a totally rogue state in that context. Not one of the good guys. So, if Obama does not blink and accommodate the North in what could be a huge problem down the line for him or his successor because you cannot do much with a fait accompli except be an accomplice, wittingly or otherwise he has to move now and move definitively.

The problem here is that he has very little room to maneuver. The food option seems to have gone down the tube. There is no goodwill to barter with. Paradoxically, even as North Korea battles with its inner political crises and its people face a harsh food shortage, over $850 million have gone into the scheduled launch.

For the world it is cold comfort that the launch coincides with the 100th birth anniversary of the nation’s founder, Kim Il Sung. Would it be facetious to say that the event could be celebrated with fireworks but the North’s concept of the pyrotechnic is evidently a lot more sophisticated?

From the White House one hears the rattling of the verbal sabre and the president warns of stricter economic sanctions and a call for a global snub, neither of which are likely to concern the leaders very much. They have heard it all before and it is much of the same rhetoric.

That leaves Obama with only one option which is confrontation and it is not even on the cards yet what with no certainty that the rest of the world will conscript themselves as partners in the venture to keep the world safe. Very clearly, Pyongyang’s leaders, themselves a slightly blurry bunch in that no one quite knows who is pulling the strings under Kim Jong-un, won’t fall apart and the odds favour the launch going on schedule April 14 — unless President Obama can pull a rabbit out of the hat. One more victory for Armageddon!

Bikram Vohra is Editorial Advisor at Khaleej Times. Write to him at bikram@khaleejtimes.com
Source: Khaleej Times