Billede øverst: Steve Tharp og Samuel i samtale med udsigt ind over Nordkoreas bjerge.
In the car on the way to the demilitarized zone that separates North and South Korea, on a recent trip to South Korea, I had the opportunity to ask military expert Steve Tharp a number of questions.
Steve Tharp is a retired US Army colonel with a long military career as an officer stationed in South Korea, where he patrolled the Demilitarized Zone and was part of the team that negotiated with North Korea for six years. He was introduced to me by one of the Danish European Mission's partners who help persecuted North Korean Christians.
What are real threats, And what are North Korea's negotiating tactics?
When I was a negotiator, we worked with an eight-step model in the US military that described North Korea's negotiating tactics. The steps are: 1) Create a crisis atmosphere, 2) Blame South Korea and the US for the tense situation, 3) Then quickly announce that you want détente 'in principle', 4) Create artificial deadlines and pressure the other side, 5) Politicize, drag out negotiations and set demanding preconditions for a solution (which are often the real goals), 6) Accuse South Korea and the US for the failed talks and demand compensation or concessions to go back to the negotiating table, 8) Go back to step 1.
The problem with this kind of diplomacy is that you have to constantly raise the rhetoric in steps 1 and 2 to get an appropriate response from the other side. In his first five years as leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-un has escalated the rhetoric to higher and higher levels, but he can't seem to get past stage 2 as South Korea and the US are not lured into making concessions as they did in the past. Conversely, South Korea and the US respond with provocative statements, which Trump, with an unusual use of Twitter for a president, also contributes to. At the same time, South Korea and the US are in close dialog with China and Japan about their approach to North Korea.
The current crisis created by North Korea has led some to speculate that the situation is more tense now than at any time since the end of the Korean War. When the rhetoric becomes extreme, as it is at the moment, the media often becomes interested, especially the foreign media due to their lack of experience with Korea. This media focus can in turn cause the parties to escalate the rhetoric further, increasing the risk of war.
The media are thus partly responsible for the escalation of the rhetoric, and it is as if they throw themselves into North Korea's conflict with the outside world during periods when they have nothing else to write about. I remember, for example, that in 2013 we had completed a military exercise with South Korea. Kim Jong-un started making threats, as he often does, but without doing anything. At that time, the White House allowed journalists to report live on TV from the demilitarized zone, and I drove a CNN reporter up there, among others. The intense media coverage of North Korea stopped abruptly with the terrorist attack on the marathon in Boston in April 2013 - then the media had other things to write about.
Why does North Korea want nuclear weapons?
North Korea is fighting for its survival. The party elite in North Korea is afraid that the lower classes in North Korea will revolt against the extreme repression - and such a revolt could be triggered if the US attacks North Korea. Therefore, North Korea is working hard to get a nuclear bomb, as it would make it much more difficult for the US to attack the country.
Look at Gadaffi in Libya - unlike North Korea, he gave up the desire to get nuclear weapons and the West attacked him and now he is dead. If North Korea gets launch pads and can mount nuclear weapons on intercontinental missiles, it could threaten the US.
However, the likelihood of the US attacking North Korea is small, as China has committed to defending North Korea if it is attacked. At the same time, China has publicly stated that it will not defend North Korea if it attacks others.
Is Kim Jong-a Better or worse than its predecessors?
Kim Jong-un is different from his predecessors. He doesn't seem to be someone you can make deals with, he tries to bully his way through politics and neither China nor Russia can make deals with him.
Will China lose patience with Kim Jong-un?
Image: China's powerful Xi Jinping is the first Chinese president yet to meet Kim Jong-un, with whom China is losing patience.
Secondly, there is the risk of North Korea's bombs exploding in the mountains and underground tunnels where they are hidden - causing damage to China due to earthquakes on the Sino-Korean border. To prevent these scenarios, China must act and tighten its stance towards North Korea.
In the end - will it end in war?
No, neither the US, South Korea, North Korea or China want war.
So much for Steve Tharp's interesting observations on the likelihood of war on the Korean peninsula. As Christians, we have a weapon that does no harm, only good. It is prayer, and we can pray for Kim Jong-un. What if God's Spirit was allowed to soften his heart so that he came to faith in Jesus and wanted to improve conditions for the country's inhabitants and create good relations with the outside world? Let's stand with the persecuted North Korean Christians and pray for Kim Jong-un and North Korea.
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