Abstract
The United States’ decades-long engagement of North Korea yielded little beyond Pyongyang’s broken promises, frustrating artful dodges, and its relentless pursuit of nuclear weaponry. Far more than any of the other post–Cold War rogue states, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) practiced brinkmanship, broadcast saber-rattling threats, and yet scored a series of diplomatic successes against the United States. Washington and its close ally, the Republic of Korea (ROK), or South Korea, many times worked for accommodation with the DPRK. The two allies frequently offered Pyongyang inducements, which seemingly reinforced its bad behavior. Washington donated food shipments through the UN’s World Food Program, which delivered the relief packages to the North. The ROK repeatedly turned its cheek to DPRK slaps while it offered generous aid to Pyongyang. It financed an industrial zone, ran tourist excursions into the North, and donated mammoth food and humanitarian assistance—all for naught. The DPRK refused to halt its nuclear arming or to open itself entirely to international arms inspections. In fact, its belligerency intensified over the years.
The most important thing in our war preparation is to teach all our people to hate U.S. imperialism. Otherwise, we will not be able to defeat the U.S. imperialists who boast of their technological superiority.
—Kim Il Sung
When you examine the nature of the American security commitment to Korea, to Japan, to this region, it is pointless for them [North Korea] to try to develop nuclear weapons, because if they ever use them it would be the end of their country.
—William J. Clinton
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Notes
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© 2012 Thomas H. Henriksen
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Henriksen, T.H. (2012). North Korea: Blackmailing Rogue. In: America and the Rogue States. American Foreign Policy in the 21st Century. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137006400_5
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