Brilliant. This is a brilliant stroke of diplomacy, one that counter balances nicely with the war on Iraq. Here's hoping that Kim Jung-il will be spending his retirement somewhere in China, and be spending it soon. Because, if they can force a non-violent regime change, that will be the victory that will infuriate all of the Bush-bashers.

Force a non-violent regime change in North Korea? Is this unattainable fantasy day? I suppose you believed that non-violent regime change was possible in Iraq as well? If you're not familiar with the term "juche," perhaps you should look into it. You can count on Kim Jong Il starving every single last one of the 25 million North Koreans before he goes into voluntary retirement.

North Korea is a fanatical cult and Kim is their David Koresh. You'll see the whole compound burn before you see Kim come out with his hands up. It's a fantasy of a dream, and anyone who knows the slightest bit about North Korea would never consider that a remote possibility. The fantasy may be a victory that would infuriate Bush-bashers, but it's never going to happen. Ever.

And exactly what are you referring to as brilliant diplomacy? Drezner (and Kaplan) are reading too much into the Russian naval exercises. They do not signify a fundamental shift in the Russian position. In fact, North Korea was invited to participate in these exercises, and had actually agreed to a few weeks ago, but pulled out at the last minute. Can it really be considered a strong signal to North Korea if they were in fact invited to participate?

How do joint naval exercises and some meaningless drills near the North Korean border change the dynamics of the upcoming talks? We're still in the same boat, still have little to no support from China and South Korea, and still have no viable non-military means to force an intrusive inspections process on North Korea.

What Kaplan (and Drezner) fail to see is that North Korea cares little about Russia, because they're not a major supplier of oil or food. China is. Russia is a bit player, and it's a waste of time to claim a diplomatic victory from insignificant military exercises.

Kevin: I question whether North Korea cares little about Russia, seeing that NK has been the beneficiary of a diplomatic contest between the Soviet Union/Russia and China for years. Nevertheless, whatever NK may care about Russia, Russia cares a lot about NK simply because of China. And Russia is not planning on standing by while the future of Eastern Asia is as precarious as it is just now.

Joint Naval exersizes? I strongly suspect that the NoKos declined to join in due to the material reliability of their ships and simply do not want it demonstrated to the world. After the whole point of "joint exersizes" is to size up the other guy's capabilities.

Henry, Kaplan's main point seems to be that the Russian military maneuvers are a specific signal to NK. A signal that the old NK game of playing superpowers off against each other won't work this time.

If that is indeed the case, and Russia "stands aligned with all the other foreign powers," then why did Russia adamantly oppose (along with China) bringing the issue of North Korea's violation of the Nuclear Non-profileration Treaty to the UN Security Council?

The talks are doomed to failure if the Bush administration holds the line on demanding a "complete, verifiable, irreversible" dismantling of the North Korean nuclear program. The American demands are nowhere near what North Korea will accept, and the only reason for the United States to be a part of the talks is to see them fail, after which it should theoretically be easier to convince our allies in the region to help us exerting more pressure.

For more, see here: http://incestuousamplification.blog-city.com/read/145723.htm

Kevin:

Why do you assume that Kim will drink the Kool-Aid? Shouldn't the null-hypothesis be that he is rational, and will sell the people down the river to save his own butt?

Kevin:

In fact, North Korea was invited to participate in these exercises

Do you have a source?

Dude, here's your source: http://www.iht.com/articles/105571.html

Robert, there's no use saving his own butt if he's forced to live in exile somewhere in the Chinese desert. If you knew anything about Koreans (north and south), you'd know that their history is littered with invasions and subjugation to larger powers. They never had the military power to repel those invasions (or inflict serious damage on their invaders) until now. Kim Jong Il will go down in a suicidal flame before abandoning the ship.

There you have it the social science pas-des-deux.

On one hand the actions of men are determined by their context -- their history and "culture" -- which create the roles and script the lines that they play.

OTOH (and as HST said find me a one-handed economist), men are all children of one Adam and one Eve, endowed with the facility of reason and they will all act as rational creatures acording to mini-max critera.

Which will it be?

We need a market. I am long rational action.

Maybe not "somewhere in the Chinese desert," but I think that St. Petersburg or Odessa might seal the deal.

Kevin of IA is correct. The North Korean leaders don't care what the Russians think. Why should they? North Korea's big aid and trade partners are South Korea ($641 mil in trade in 2002 and rapidly growing and substantial aid as well) and China (big oil and food aid supplier and trading partner too).

Fred Kaplan keeps imagining diplomatic breakthrus with North Korea and the breakthrus keep on not happening. Only substantial reductions in sources of outside support have any chance of bringing the North Koreans to agree to a real and extremely well verified end of their WMD programs. The DPRK Illicit Activities Initiative is reducing some of their revenue. But without either China or South Korea cutting aid and trade it seems unlikely that all this much talked about diplomatic activity will amount to diddly squat.

Read Kevin at http://incestuousamplification.blog-city.com and Robert Koehler at http://marmot.blog-city.com/ for rather more skeptical and better informed commentary on North Korea. And, hey, when you read them and they tell you you ought to go read a post I make on North Korea, well, I can only say that they have excellent judgement. ;>

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