The Need for Trilateral Cooperation

Posted July 12, 2008

The top political leaders in Tokyo, Seoul and Washington have each seen better days in their administrations when it comes to popularity and political influence, but it is quite rare for all three to suffer simultaneously a mere 25% (or lower) domestic approval rating. Such a chorus of political weakness is never welcome among allies, but it comes at a particularly inopportune time as the region launches another round of six-party talks aimed at implementing North Korean denuclearization agreements. Trilateral policy coordination has always been important to blunting North Korean wedge strategies in the negotiations, but the three countries need each other more than ever if they are to achieve their distinct yet still interconnected objectives.

When North Korea ran afoul of the International Atomic Energy Agency in early 1993, the United States, Japan and South Korea began intensifying their coordination of policy toward the North through a series of ad hoc bilateral and trilateral meetings. A trilateral approach was attractive to the three countries, as each had been involved in bilateral discussions with North Korea before 1993, and it was apparent to all that their negotiations with the North were inextricably linked. Like a gang of prisoners chained at the ankle, the group could only make progress toward their goal in small, coordinated steps.

Each country wanted to terminate North Korea’s nuclear programs, of course, but Japan also placed an emphasis on Pyongyang’s medium-range missile program, and there were persistent reports of a North Korean connection to a series of missing person cases in Japan (the so-called abduction issue that later emerged as the major obstacle to Japan-North Korea normalization). Japan lacked the diplomatic and military clout of the United States, however, so it needed U.S. help to press these issues in the context of U.S.-North Korea talks on America’s priorities (namely plutonium production and long-range missiles). In return, Tokyo offered financial backing to U.S.-brokered agreements and dangled large-scale aid and investment in front of Pyongyang if progress could be made on their normalization negotiations. Meanwhile, Seoul benefited from U.S. policy that was not too tough or too easy on the North, as it encouraged Pyongyang to take seriously Seoul’s reunification agenda (without crawling into its shell for fear of attack). 

When trilateral coordination weakened during the early 2000s, North Korea exploited the situation to further its nuclear and missile programs while still compensating for its large recurring shortfall in food production. Japan had a weak negotiating hand during the final days of the Clinton administration, for example, as U.S.-North Korea relations were peaking. When U.S. food aid was later scaled back in line with a tougher stance by the new Bush administration, Pyongyang warmed to Tokyo yielding summit meetings in 2002 and 2004, along with thousands of tons of free rice and medicine from Japan. When Japan demanded more on the abduction issue than North Korea was willing to give, Pyongyang found more rice, fertilizer, and economic assistance from South Korea’s new liberal government, which was eager to expand engagement opportunities. Now we’ve come full circle, as a more conciliatory U.S. approach sent 38,000 tons of American wheat to North Korea last week (with another 460,000 thousand on the way), enabling Pyongyang to snub a similar offer of corn from the South and allowing it to send a clear message of disapproval with the conservative government in Seoul. These are classic wedge tactics.

Today, the need for trilateral cooperation vis-à-vis North Korea has become more intense. One can see this in the context of: 1) Japan-North Korea relations and the abduction issue (Japanese politicians are upset that Washington lifted certain sanctions on North Korea before significant progress on the abductees); 2) the expansion of economic and political contact between North and South Korea since the “Sunshine Policy” (2008 North-South trade is still up 30% over the same period last year, despite cold politics); and 3) China’s rise as both a formidable partner and potential rival in the region (not only on the North Korean nuclear issue as the six-party chair, but also in terms of regional economic and security relationships that could serve either to strengthen or weaken U.S. alliance relationships with South Korea and Japan). 

Although the heads of the six-party delegations from the three countries have recently revived the practice of meeting together to consult and coordinate policies and announcements, much more is necessary to compensate for their weak political underpinnings at this critical time. China’s role remains important, of course, but close U.S.-Japan-Korea trilateral cooperation has been most effective at generating sustained progress in the negotiations. Until all of North Korea’s plutonium and nuclear weapons are removed from the country, there should be very little daylight between their policies.

Food aid can continue, for example, but it should be a coordinated policy that prevents Pyongyang from playing favorites. U.S. normalization with North Korea can proceed a bit faster than the Japan-Pyongyang dialogue at first, but it should be clear that ultimately one will not normalize without the other. Economic engagement with, and investment in, North Korea can go forward, but not in a way that undermines another ally’s core objective. There is a difference between making North Korea satisfy everyone before it receives anything, and allowing Pyongyang to receive everything before it satisfies everyone. The best route is the latter, even though it makes for a slower, more complicated process. These alliances are worth the effort.

Mr. James Schoff, associate director of Asia-Pacific Studies at the Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis in Cambridge, Mass. is co-author of “Nuclear Matters in North Korea: Building a Multilateral Response for Future Stability in Northeast Asia” (Potomac Books, 2008).