President Kim Dae-Jung, of the Republic of Korea, launched a major diplomatic initiative which he called the "Sunshine" policy. It was aimed at bringing about some serious improvement in the relations between the two Koreas, North and South. For a while, it seemed more successful than one might have expected. But now it seems to have been undone by the U.S. elections, during which neither candidate ever mentioned the Korean peninsula.

During the Cold War, four countries were divided between the two camps, by the creation of separate state structures. They were Germany, Vietnam, China, and Korea. In all four countries, nationalist sentiment for reunification has remained extremely strong throughout. In all four countries, the ideological gulf has been very wide. Each country has its particular history and its particular geography. Two of them have achieved reunification - Germany and Vietnam - in more or less opposite ways. In Germany, the Communist half was dissolved and absorbed by the non-Communist half. In Vietnam, the opposite occurred.

All four countries have been on the front lines in terms of military action. But in the cases of Germany and China, the military action was extremely constrained, whereas both Korea and Vietnam suffered major, highly destructive wars. Essentially, the United States, which has been a central figure in all four situations, lost the Vietnam war. The Korean war, in which the Chinese took direct part, ended in a tie. No one won. The frontiers are more or less the same today as before the war. The two sides are separated, still today 48 years after the truce was signed, by a highly-armed no-man's land, known as the DMZ (demilitarized zone).

Up until two years ago, there was no contact - economic, diplomatic, or even telephonic - between North and South Korea. Indeed, individual contact across the border was considered a treasonous act. It was this situation that Kim Dae-jung hoped to end by his "Sunshine" policy. To understand what has been going on, we have to see what are the priorities of the four principal political actors in the conflict: North Korea, South Korea, China, and the United States.

North Korea is today the last unreconstructed old-style Communist state: a single-party system with no public arena; an industrialized state with no space for private endeavors and a very low level of interstate economic exchanges; a strong military establishment; an ideological commitment, loudly proclaimed, to their version of Leninism. They have been, as everyone knows, in great economic difficulties in the last decade, the collapse of the Soviet Union having enormously exacerbated prior economic problems.

The priority of the regime seems to be to survive in more or less unchanged form. While they are probably favorable in principle to Korean reunification, they would at present only favor it on their own terms, which is totally unlikely. They actively fear a renewal of the Korean war, and believe that the U.S. intends to destroy the regime. They believe that the only thing that prevents this from happening is their military strength. In the evolving state of military technology, the North Koreans are convinced that this means they should develop nuclear capacity and long-range missiles, which they have been doing for a long time now.

South Korea's priorities are rather different. South Korea has had a remarkable economic rise in the last quarter century, and priority number one is probably to maintain their newly-acquired economic strength and enjoy it. South Korea is also seeking nationalist fulfillment via a larger role for the country in Asian geopolitics. They thus want some renewal of ties with North Korea. This is partly for sentimental reasons (both national and individual - the problem of divided families), partly for economic reasons, and partly for geopolitical reasons.

Having observed the economic consequences of the reunification of Germany for the West Germans, they are not anxious to have a real reunification at this time, neither by agreement of the two sides nor via the collapse of the North Korean regime. But they think, or at least the current government thinks (supported by the majority but not the totality of public opinion), that North Korea's current severe economic difficulties make that regime open to the kind of closer ties that the South Koreans hope to have. South Korea thinks that China is sympathetic to its proposals in this regard, and counts on the Chinese, North Korea's last diplomatic friend, to encourage the North Koreans to pursue such negotiations.

China has in fact done this. China is probably not interested in a real Korean reunification, since this would make Korea too strong an actor in the East Asian scene. But China believes that the North Korean regime cannot survive without bending somewhat in its economic policies, and the South Korean proposals would move North Korea in this direction. China also fears any renewal of hostilities, since that would undoubtedly harden the attitudes of the U.S. in regard to China, and might be the occasion of augmented military reinforcement of the Taiwan regime. Furthermore, China withdrew all its troops from the Korean peninsula in 1953, and has no desire to see any of them return there.

So, this brings us to the United States. During the Clinton years, the U.S. was brought somewhat reluctantly to a position of endorsing the South Korean proposals. The U.S. has interests quite different from those of the others. The U.S. has a worldwide military priority of limiting the military strength of all other countries, except insofar as these forces are entirely subordinated to U.S. control. They act this way even towards western Europe. So of course they act this way towards North Korea. What the U.S. fears most in the world-system today is what it calls "proliferation" - a word which means that other countries are trying to have the kinds of weapons the U.S. already has.

In its campaign against proliferation, North Korea is the number 1 demon. It has a regime totally hostile to U.S. interests. It has a technology that puts it closer to achieving nuclear weaponry than any other country not presently possessing it. It shows every intention of seeking actively to improve its weaponry. So what the U.S. wants is for North Korea to forego these efforts. This is not easy for the U.S. to achieve. It can try threats, but it is unsure that it would carry through on threats, and the North Koreans know this. It can try diplomacy, but then it has to concede something. Or it can dither. In some sense, Clinton's initial impulse was to dither. It was Kim Dae-jung's achievement that he convinced the Clinton government that diplomacy would do better than dithering.

So the U.S., North Korea, and South Korea have been negotiating for several years now, and it seemed last December that they had almost reached an arrangement, in which North Korea would limit its military technology in various ways in return for some serious economic assistance. We are told that Clinton was ready to fly to P'yongyang in December to clinch the deal, when two things stopped him: first, the Florida debacle, and then, when the election of Bush was certain, word from the Bush people that they would not fulfil any agreement. So he didn't go.

Since the inauguration of Bush, the U.S. has made very clear that it would not only not come to such an agreement, but that it would not even renew discussions with North Korea. Why not? There seem two obvious reasons. One, the Bush people are mired in a rightwing version of cold war mentality - you can't trust Communists; they only understand a tough line. But even more important is their own intentions in terms of military technology. The Bush government is moving full speed ahead with the so-called National Missile Defense (NMD) program, steamrollering apposition from allies and foes. It is doing this partly because it believes that the U.S. should put forward a supermacho position in geopolitics, and partly because this is a very profitable economic proposition for some people.

But pushing NMD as a policy is not all that easy. There is a lot of opposition, including within the U.S. The major rhetorical argument that the Bush people are using to advance the need for NMD is the evil intentions of the North Korean regime. One can hardly expect them to undercut their own major argument by pursuing a deal with North Korea.

So poor Kim Dae-jung, poor South Korea - caught between a rock and a hard place. It looks like the skies may be gray for a long while to come.

Immanuel Wallerstein

[Copyright by Immanuel Wallerstein. All rights reserved. Permission is granted to download, forward electronically or e-mail to others and to post this text on non-commercial community Internet sites, provided the essay remains intact and the copyright note is displayed. To translate this text, publish it in printed and/or other forms, including commercial Internet sites and excerpts, contact the author at iwaller@binghamton.edu; fax: 1-607-777-4315.

These commentaries, published twice monthly, are intended to be reflections on the contemporary world scene, as seen from the perspective not of the immediate headlines but of the long term.]

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