hankyoreh

US President Joe Biden speaks from the Treaty Room in the White House on April 14. (AP/Yonhap News)

A hundred days after coming to office, US President Joe Biden has unveiled the outline of his policy toward North Korea. Biden said he will take a pragmatic approach aimed at the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, avoiding both the “strategic patience” of the Obama administration and the “all or nothing” attitude of the Trump administration.

North Korea promptly released a pair of statements criticizing the US government. The two sides have begun to move at last.

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki told reporters Friday that the Biden administration has completed its review of North Korea policy.

“Our goal remains the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,” Psaki said.

“With a clear understanding that the efforts of the past four administrations have not achieved this objective, our policy will not focus on achieving a grand bargain, nor will it rely on strategic patience. Our policy calls for a calibrated, practical approach that is open to and will explore diplomacy with the DPRK,” Psaki said, using an acronym for North Korea’s official name.

“We have and will continue to consult with the Republic of Korea, Japan, and other allies and partners at every step along the way,” she added.

Biden was briefed on the North Korea policy review results last week by Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley, the Washington Post reported.

A source in Washington said that the Biden administration would soon be announcing its North Korea policy in more detail.

The features of the US’s updated policy toward North Korea that Psaki described suggest that Biden means to find a “third way” that’s distinct from the two previous presidents, Barack Obama and Donald Trump.

Critics say that Obama’s policy of “strategic patience,” which amounted to ignoring North Korea, only allowed it to expand its nuclear capacity. Meanwhile, Trump sought to strike a “grand bargain” under which the US would sweep away all sanctions on the North in exchange for its complete denuclearization.

“If the Trump administration was everything for everything, Obama was nothing for nothing. This is something in the middle,” a senior official in the Biden administration told the Washington Post.

“What we’ve settled on is what we think is a calibrated, practical approach to diplomacy with the North with the goal of eliminating the threat to the United States.”

Such remarks are significant since they suggest that the Biden administration means to adopt the step-by-step approach of exchanging partial sanctions relief for progress on denuclearization while maintaining the goal of complete denuclearization. The official described a “careful, modulated diplomatic approach, prepared to offer [sanctions] relief for particular steps.” The idea is to move toward denuclearization through a series of small deals.

The US has also reportedly agreed to endorse the statement signed by Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in Singapore in June 2018.

“Our approach will build on the Singapore agreement and other previous agreements,” said another senior official in the Biden administration.

On April 1, a senior US official told reporters that the US appreciates the importance of the Singapore agreement.

The Singapore agreement consists of four main points: resetting North Korea-US relations, building a sustainable and stable peace regime on the Korean Peninsula, completely denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula, and repatriating the remains of soldiers who died in the Korean War.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in has steadily pushed the US to uphold the Singapore agreement and take a gradual and step-by-step approach to denuclearization to kickstart dialogue with North Korea. Most recently, Moon voiced those requests in an interview with the New York Times on April 16.

While Biden was very reluctant to endorse the Singapore agreement, which Trump had orchestrated, he was reportedly won over by South Korean persistence. Moon and Biden are likely to discuss ways to carry out the US’s North Korea policy during a summit at the White House on May 21.

Joseph Yun, the US’s former special representative for North Korea policy, drew attention to the fact that the Biden administration hasn’t used the unrealistic term CVID (which stands for “complete, verifiable, irreversible denuclearization”) and that it has signaled its respect for a step-by-step approach and the Singapore agreement.

“That’s a very reasonable and balanced approach,” Yun said in a telephone interview with the Hankyoreh. “This can be taken to mean that the door to North Korea-US dialogue is now ajar. It’s at this point that skilled diplomacy is important.”

The key is how North Korea responds. In two statements Sunday, North Korea criticized a statement by the US State Department spokesperson that called attention to the human rights situation in North Korea and Biden’s emphasis on “diplomacy as well as stern deterrence” in a recent address to a joint session of Congress, while promising to take corresponding action.

It won’t matter what North Korea policy the US adopts if the North refuses to play ball.

“A ‘calibrated’ approach to North Korea is not a ‘new path,’” said Frank Aum, the senior expert on North Korea at the US Institute of Peace, in a tweet Saturday. Aum noted that a calibrated approach had been previously tried in the Six Party Talks and other occasions.

“It can work if NK will come to table, [but the] question is how,” Aum said, contrasting the cycle of pressure and provocations with signaling “a comprehensive strategic effort at building new, peaceful US-DPRK relations.”

Also important is the role of China, which is competing with the US in a range of areas, including trade, technology and military affairs. Given China’s leverage over the North in the form of economic aid, China’s willingness to help set the mood for dialogue between the US and North Korea is a major variable.

The Biden administration has begun building a domestic and international consensus by explaining the outcome of its North Korea policy review to the US Congress and allies, including South Korea and Japan.

By Hwang Joon-bum, Washington correspondent

Please direct comments or questions to [english@hani.co.kr]