Posted on: Saturday, April 19, 2003

EDITORIAL
Bush must not duck talks with North Korea

What's up with these fickle North Koreans? First they insist they will discuss their nuclear ambitions with no one but the Americans. Then last week they won't insist on "any particular dialogue format."

The interpretation reported from Washington: The North Koreans got their pants scared off by the American drubbing of Iraq. Suddenly they're willing to talk on our terms.

Then we learn diplomats from Washington and Pyongyang will meet Wednesday in Beijing. Then yesterday comes the announcement that Pyongyang has begun reprocessing spent plutonium fuel rods. That means, says a "high-ranking American official," the Beijing talks are off.

Later in the day comes news of a garbled translation. The North is simply ready to begin reprocessing, as it's already said, not that it actually has begun.

Who's responsible for all these fits and starts? We'd suggest it's an administration bitterly divided over how to handle the North Korean crisis. Snippets of North Korean statements are being taken badly out of context and incorporated into high-level leaks. (For a fuller discussion, see Richard Halloran's "Rising East" column in tomorrow's Focus Section.)

The Iraq war didn't scare Pyongyang into talks; they were secretly set up weeks ago.

As a nation, it's time to get our act together in the face of the following likelihood:

North Korea firmly believes that, as a member of the "axis of evil," it faces attack by the United States, and that its only hope is to "go nuclear," either as a deterrent or a powerful negotiating lever.

Thus Washington's choices are (1) persuade the North Koreans through talks to abandon their nuclear programs because they don't face attack; (2) accept North Korea as a nuclear power, and watch a regional nuclear arms race begin; (3) attack North Korea, risking a million-casualty conflagration.

If (2) and (3) are unacceptable, and they should be, then the only thing the Bush administration risks by undertaking urgent talks with Pyongyang is face.