North Korea's cruel and churlish reaction to the downing of a U.S. helicopter that strayed over its territory Dec. 17 could materially increase the Clinton administration's difficulties in selling its nuclear accord with the Pyongyang regime to the Republican-controlled Congress and the American people. As this is written, Communist authorities have not yet agreed to release Chief Warrant Officer Bobby Hall, the pilot of the chopper, by Christmas. And they delayed the return of his dead crew-mate, CWO David Hilemon, until Thursday.
Rep. Bill Richardson, D-N.M., who was in North Korea when the helicopter went down and sought the pilots' release, says his dealings were so heated they almost broke down. He detected tension between hard-line North Korean military officers and foreign ministry officials who had no trouble understanding his warning that this incident could "cloud the atmospherics" between Washington and Pyongyang. The country's reclusive new leader, Kim Jong Il, failed to appear at a meeting yesterday honoring him as supreme commander of the armed forces. He has not been seen in public since Nov. 2, thus fueling speculation about a power struggle.
Even before this tragic incident, there had been rumblings of discontent from conservative circles about the pact signed Oct. 21 in which the U.S. agreed to improve relations with Pyongyang and help supply it with fuel oil and safer nuclear reactors if it would freeze and eventually dismantle its suspected nuclear weapons program. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., a senior member of the Armed Services Committee, has attached the "appeasement" label to the accord. Incoming Senate majority leader Bob Dole has made it clear he believes the administration made excessive concessions.
The White House is seeking a procedure that will not require congressional approval of the pact, at least until appropriations are required to finance the fuel-oil shipments or the U.S. part in a planned South Korean-Japanese consortium to pay for the $4 billion light-water reactors. This, however, will not prevent Republicans from conducting hearings on troubling aspects of the accord.
While North Korea has now said it would honor open-inspection pledges it supposedly undertook when it signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty, it can actually delay some of these requirements for five years or more while its new reactors are being built. No nuclear components will be supplied, nevertheless, until its present weapons-potential facilities have been shut down and its past stockpiling of plutonium verified.
The U.S.-North Korean pact is one of the most sensitive issues on the international agenda, in that it draws a fine line between rewarding a pariah state while stopping its breakout into the nuclear club. The helicopter incident is bound to increase misgivings and debate about what has been negotiated and how the U.S. should proceed.