Post-cold War Era Of The Evolution Of U.s. Policy Toward The Dprk

During the Cold War period, the United States contained the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) by force for more than 40 years based on the strategy of counter-communism and socialism. At the conclusion of the bipolar system, the "modest initiative" policy toward North Korea was carried out during the second term of the Reagan Administration in adapting to the new international situation. The George H. Bush's Administration partially adjusted and maintained the policy. Therefore, the bilateral relations between the U.S. and North Korea were basically peaceful. But the nuclear deadlock finally achieved its boiling point and erupted at the beginning of the Clinton Administration, because North Korea withdrew from the "Non-proliferation Treaty". If North Korea had the nuclear capability, it would have challenged the non-proliferation policy considered by the Clinton Administration as its first agenda. But several years' practice indicated that constantly putting the pressure on North Korea to abandon their nuclear weapons had been proven a failure, so the Clinton Administration knew that they could not continuously pressure North Korea, but to soften its coercive policy. Over a year of back and forth bargaining, both sides reached an "Agreed Framework" in October of 1994 which symbolized the beginning of a new relationship and the end of confrontation between the two nations. As a result, this "Agreed Framework" contained the guidelines for overall relations: political, diplomatic, military, and economic. Since the conclusion of the "Agreed Framework", the U.S.-North Korea relations have witnessed steady progress.Around the time of the signing of the "Agreed Framework", North Korea was overwhelmed with its own unprecedented, unpredictable political transition and aggravated economic crisis. So some political leaders including academia predicted that North Korea would soon collapse. The U.S. was happy, but at same time worried. They were happy because they thought North Korea would vanish without costing them anything. But they were also worried because the U.S. had not fully prepared for the inestimable economic confusion and security turmoil that would be caused by the sudden collapse of the totally dilapidated country of North Korea. Based on this consideration, the Clinton Administration promoted a "soft landing" policy for the purpose of slowing down the collapsing of North Korea and cooling down the adverse effect which may have been created by this collapse. Therefore, the U.S. felt relieved of the burden of the "Agreed Framework" and did not pay close attention on the importance of the implementation of the agreement, except by paying lip-service to it.Four years passed by, North Korea had not obtained any true advantages from the U.S.. Undoubtedly, this enabled the domestic hardliner in North Korea to gradually take the position of advantage. In 1998, both the so-called Kumchang-ri nuclear suspicion and the test-firing of a Daepo-Dong long-range missile had once again awaken the U.S.. Under this kind of atmosphere, former U.S. Defense Secretary William Perry conducted a congressionally mandated "full and complete interagency review of United States policy toward North Korea." In the fall of 1999, Perry released his report which suggested that the U.S. government must adopt a comprehensive and integrated approach to resolving North Korean issues.However, there were still some negative factors that restricted the development of U.S.-DPRK relations. One of the most important factors was that the U.S. Congress, which was dominated by the Republican Party diverted from the Clinton Administration's engagement policy. This resulted in the blocking of normalizing the relations between the two countries once again. In the 2000 election, George W. Bush won. The Republican controlled Congress was a propelling factor that guided the White House policy toward the North. The U.S.-DPRK relations did not go forward but instead continued worsening for four years. A series of crucial issues between the two countries such as nuclear proliferation, missile issues, conventional forces reduction, human rights, relaxing of economic sanctions, deletion from the terrorism-supported-country list and so on, had been discussed but no progress was made. Due to Bush Administration's so-called "tailored containment" policy, North Korea not only declared that it already had nuclear weapons, but they continued with weapons trade, drug trafficking, money laundering and counterfeiting. The goal of that policy was to change the regime of North Korea and this undoubtedly limited the improvement of U.S.-DPRK relations.From the point of view of the Game Theory, although it is difficult to forecast when the game will be finished between the U.S. and North Korea, we can anticipate that so long as the two countries observe the game rules and recognize each others common interests, then compromise and cooperation will finally be achieved. This being so, a peaceful and stable Korean Peninsula can be realized in the near future.