Ex-US nuke negotiator says normalizing relations with NK should come before denuclearization talks
Robert Gallucci, the chief negotiator during the 1994 North Korean nuclear crisis, said normalizing relations with North Korea should come before discussing denuclearization.
As denuclearization is increasingly seen as an unlikely outcome amid stalled diplomacy and North Korea’s continued provocative threats, the United States should push toward forging normal ties as an effort to engage Pyongyang, according to Gallucci.
“The only way we’re going to get at the nuclear issue, in my view, is to change the nature of the political and diplomatic relationship between the U.S. and the DPRK and that is going to require improvement of relations, diminishing the threat at all times,” Gallucci said during an interview with The Korea Times at Yonsei University, Tuesday. The DPRK stands for North Korea’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
Gallucci, a distinguished professor in the Practice of Diplomacy at Georgetown University’s Walsh School of Foreign Service, explained that the threat from North Korea has evolved 슬롯 to the point that the U.S. ballistic missile defense may not be particularly effective against the North’s sophisticated attack. In January, he wrote in National Interest that “we should at least entertain the thought that nuclear war could break out in Northeast Asia in 2024.”
“Now we are starting to get into a much more dangerous situation in terms of nuclear weapons. An increased level of threat from North Korea is largely due to two things — their capability to do damage and their declaratory posture,” he said.
“We are now dealing with a nuclear weapons state that has somewhere between 50 and 100 nuclear weapons. They’ve gotten better in accuracy, reliability and perhaps even in sophistication.”
Asked if North Korea’s failed satellite launch has any implications, he said, “I would say that’s not significant. If you look at the American or the Russian development of ballistic missiles — particularly the very long range ones like ICBMs — there are lots of failures in developing.”