Ship's sinking was irrational, even for North Korea

The 400-page South Korean government report on the sinking of its naval vessel makes a compelling case that North Korea is guilty of an act of war. However, if the allegations are true, as they seem to be, the act itself raises the question: Why would it be in North Korea's interest to manufacture a major crisis that could at worst lead to war, and at best lead to its further isolation?

This totalitarian society with its nuclear weapons and its mercurial leader has preoccupied our leaders for decades. We have difficulty deciding how to react to North Korean provocations because we have a limited understanding of the mentality of its leaders. Very few people outside North Korea have been privy to the strange mix of paranoia, clever manipulation and largely unchecked authority possessed by the supreme leader, Kim Jong-Il. Casual observers consider it irrational, but students of this dictator's behavior see something quite different.

One such student, Matthew Henry here at the Humphrey Institute, has spent many hours researching U.S.-North Korean decision-making for his master's thesis. His review reveals a pattern of behavior that may explain why North Korea would risk all-out war to gain the world's attention.

Having engaged the North Koreans in negotiations to address our concerns about their nuclear program, the U.S. government in both the Clinton and Bush administrations was able to make some progress -- but not enough to stop North Korea from producing enough fissile material to make several nuclear warheads. Estimates are that the North has about eight warheads and is developing a launch capacity that would put regional nations -- South Korea, China and Japan -- at risk.

Henry's research uncovered the insights of Andrei Lankov, a Soviet-born scholar, educated at Leningrad State University and Pyongyang's Kim Il-Sung University. In a recent article, Lankov used his extensive experience in North Korea to describe three common stages of the North's negotiating approach.

The first stage, according to Lankov, is to raise tensions, mostly with belligerent rhetoric. The second is to act out in seemingly irrational ways to drive the point home with provocative acts such as launching missiles or conducting nuclear tests. Lastly, he suggests, the North Koreans use the heightened tensions to engage in negotiations, where they make the concession of stopping the behavior they themselves initiated. This abrupt shift toward reasonableness is then used to leverage the international community to be more accommodating.

Scott Snyder, the director of the U.S.-Korea Policy Center, shares this interpretation. He believes that this conduct reflects the mindset of a people shaped by history, geography and anti-Western sentiment that dates back to real and imagined abuses of the 1800s, the age of imperialism. It represents an "us against the world" mindset.

Still, the sinking of a ship and the deaths of 46 South Korean sailors is provocation enough to start a war. Why such an extreme act? Was it a mistake by a naval captain? This isn't likely in a state with strict command and control straight to the top. Perhaps Kim Jong-Il is trying to restart negotiations with the United States, following the pattern described by Lankov: Exercise bad behavior in the extreme, employ a gesture (perhaps an apology?) that brings relief, and then use it for leverage.

China, fearful of a destabilized North Korea, wants to put the lid back on. It sent a delegation to Pyongyang to calm the waters. In turn, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited Seoul in an effort to reassure the South Korean government. The U.S. government has apparently agreed to help train and reinforce the South Korean Navy. The U.N. Security Council will soon take up a sanctions resolution; the question is whether China will use its veto power to stop it.

Supreme Leader Kim has serious internal problems. His country recently has suffered hyper- inflation (the adviser whom Kim blamed for it was executed!). South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak may have contributed to the North's economic crisis by reversing more liberal trade and family-reunification policies initiated by his predecessor. Was the economic crisis placing at risk Kim's plan to name his son as his successor?

As usual in the case of North Korea, we have more questions than answers. It is likely that an international crisis, and a divided response, is what Kim Jung-Il wanted. In his paranoid world, instigating a crisis was a way to get his peoples' minds off troubles that he and his closed, totalitarian system created.

Perhaps in his world, it's rational.

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J. Brian Atwood, dean of the University of Minnesota's Humphrey Institute, was a career Foreign Service officer from 1966 to 1972, serving in the Ivory Coast and Spain. He was assistant secretary of state in the Carter administration and undersecretary of state and administrator of USAID in the Clinton administration.

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