Last week, Rex Tillerson seemed to suggest that war with North Korea was on the table if the communist nation didn’t scale back aggression on the Korean peninsula. But experts say that war is unlikely. Instead, Tillerson may have used the threat to intimidate other nations friendly with North Korea.
Why is Secretary of State Rex Tillerson making saber rattling comments about how military action would be “on the table” if North Korea further provokes the U.S.?
Do he and President Donald Trump really want war with North Korea?
No. What they really want is to convince the rest of the world that we will consider some kind of military response. And they want the world to fear that possibility so much that they’ll accept another kind of response instead. And of course that other response is tighter and more universally observed economic sanctions. In other words: If you really don’t want war, then support some tougher penalties against Pyongyang.
There are two reasons why even strict sanctions on rogue nations don’t lead to major policy changes or topple regimes. First, the dictators themselves like North Korea’s Kim Jong Un and his inner circle do not personally suffer as whatever dwindling resources and luxuries the country can still obtain are hoarded by them.
Second, there are always some major countries that end up cheating the sanctions regime openly or clandestinely and thus give the sanctioned regime a lifeline. That’s where that aforementioned “support” really comes in as the U.S. will need other nations to not only vote for new sanctions, but agree not to cheat the system too.
“To be blunt, China uses North Korea like a thug nation to do some of its dirtier jobs and act as a buffer against nations it sees as potentially hostile like South Korea and Japan.”
Sadly, the “carrot and stick” approach doesn’t work on both ends when it comes to rogue regimes like North Korea. The relaxation of sanctions against North Korea pushed by President Bill Clinton in the mid-1990s led to that nation getting billions of dollars in aid in return for halting its nuclear weapons program. But North Korea and the regime of Kim Jong Il cheated, and they went ahead with their nuclear project anyway.Tillerson’s threats of war are likely a calculated stab at getting more countries, especially Russia and the European Union nations, to get tougher for real. But one country is clearly the primary focus for Tillerson and the Trump administration: China.
It seems the Trump administration and Tillerson are taking a page from Ronald Reagan’s approach to foreign policy — talk big, take nothing off the table, and avoid war in the process.
Source: CNBC
