Posted on: Sunday, December 15, 2002

EDITORIAL
Pre-emption doctrine: One size does not fit all

In 1991, on the brink of war with Iraq, the first Bush administration warned Baghdad that an attack on American troops with biological or chemical weapons would bring an overwhelming response.

It worked, evidently.

A dozen years later, the new Bush administration seized on this example — but drove it over a cliff.

Its new policy calls for pre-emptive response to weapons of mass destruction before an enemy — such as Iran, Iraq or North Korea — can use them.

What's new about this doctrine? It's overt, public and in your face. Washington in the past has wisely kept adversarial leaders guessing.

And it's inflexible in the extreme, which became glaringly evident almost immediately.

The interception of a North Korean ship carrying 15 Scud missiles at first sounded like a robust application of Bush's new policy — "effective interdiction" to keep weapons of mass destruction "and their delivery means" from falling into the wrong hands.

Yemen is the wrong hands. Al-Qaida operates openly there, a U.S. destroyer was bombed there and the missiles aimed at an Israeli jetliner in Kenya last month were stolen from there. Yet the shipment was allowed to proceed because it's "legal."

The administration believes Yemen is an ally in the war against terrorism. So is Pakistan, which has been receiving nuclear-capable ballistic missile technology from North Korea without U.S. interference.

Yemen and Pakistan are glaring exceptions to the pre-emption policy before the ink has dried.

North Korea is the scariest case. By taking everything it hears from Washington literally, Pyongyang argues — almost plausibly — that it's merely defending its legitimate interests.

When Bush called North Korea part of an "axis of evil," that nation began enriching uranium to build nuclear weapons — to defend itself against Bush's explicit threat, no doubt. In response, Bush halted delivery of fuel oil.

Without the fuel oil to run conventional generators, Pyongyang said, it must restart its Soviet-built nuclear power plant.

Washington originally promised the fuel oil shipments in exchange for the shutdown of the power plant. North Korea says it faithfully carried out its end of the bargain until Bush reneged and began making threats.

The plutonium that's a by-product of that plant can be much more quickly weaponized than uranium. That's totally unacceptable. But pre-emption in North Korea is almost unthinkable as an option for Bush, no matter what his policy says.

The pre-emption policy may deter Baghdad, but Yemen and Pakistan have already marched through its gaping loopholes. Worse, its uncompromising rhetoric will make it all the harder for diplomats to extricate Pyongyang from the dangerous corner it's backed into.