The Peninsula

Trump at the UN: A Plea for Help on North Korea

By Mark Tokola

Within minutes of President Trump’s September 19 speech to the United Nations General Assembly, headline writers were irresistibly drawn to the President’s threat to “totally destroy” North Korea and his description of “Rocket Man” (aka Kim Jong-un) as being on a “suicide mission.”  But, the context of the tough talk was President Trump’s call on the United Nations membership collectively to pressure North Korea into abandoning its nuclear program – a call which must be premised on the idea that North Korea can still be stopped without military action.  It is premised on faith in the United Nations.  Trump thanked China and Russia for joining the recent, unanimous Security Council vote to impose tough sanctions on North Korea.  He called on all nations to stop enabling North Korea through trade and financial services.  Trump also reminded the General Assembly of North Korea’s appalling human rights abuses.

Some will interpret President Trump’s remarks on North Korea as moving the United States closer towards exercising a “military option,” and that may be partially true.  The threat to “totally destroy” a country is a step beyond the usual, “will respond to threats appropriately” diplomatic language.  But, no interpretation is necessary to hear what the President unambiguously stated, that North Korea poses a threat to international peace and security, and it is the responsibility of the United Nations and its member states to take steps to preserve peace and security.  North Korea does represent a unique threat.  It is the only nation to conduct nuclear tests in this century.  It is the only nation that gleefully produces videos of nuclear attacks on foreign countries (Washington D.C. and New York being recent subjects).  Kim Jong-un has threatened to turn South Korea into a sea of fire and “sink” Japan.  If that, combined with North Korea’s ICBM and nuclear testing and its international weapons proliferation, doesn’t represent a threat to international peace and security, it is hard to think what would.

President Trump’s United Nations speech seems, above all, to be a plea for help from the international community in dealing with North Korea.  He said, in essence, that the United States is capable of dealing with North Korea militarily, but the preference of the United States is a peaceful solution.  The means to achieve a peaceful solution requires international cooperation.  Trump essentially admitted that the United States alone, or acting in concert with its close allies including South Korea, cannot apply enough economic or diplomatic pressure to thwart North Korea’s nuclear ambitions.  The cooperation of all countries, including China and Russia, will be necessary to preserve the peace which North Korea threatens.  That is a realistic, non-unilateral, internationalist approach – tough rhetoric aside.

Mark Tokola is the Vice President of the Korea Economic Institute of America. The views expressed here are his own.

Photo from John Gillespie’s photostream on flickr Creative Commons.