North Korea has little to lose, much to gain from rocket launch

By Kim Hyun
SEOUL, April 5 (Yonhap) -- North Korea displayed its long-range missile
capability with its rocket launch on Sunday, a strategy to boost internal unity
and increase pressure on Washington and possibly a sales pitch to possible
buyers.
The launch is a win-win for North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, who allegedly fell
ill last year and is now looking to reassure onlookers that his grip on power
remains strong and to remind the United States of his presence, analysts say.
The U.S. may initially take on a tough response, but will eventually reach out to
Pyongyang for negotiations, while there is little South Korea and Japan can do
amid already frosty ties with the North, they say.
"A bit of tough talk and the resumption of negotiations," predicts Andrei Lankov,
a North Korea specialist at Kookmin University in Seoul. "It seems that North
Korean diplomats believe that a missile launch will make Americans softer at
those negotiations, and they might be right."
North Korea has warned that any attempt to impose U.N. sanctions against its
launch will rupture multilateral disarmament talks on its nuclear weapons
program, a possible indication it may resort to a second nuclear test should
Washington try to punish it.
The Barack Obama administration, unlike its predecessor, won't let North Korea
attempt the repeat of its nuclear test in 2006, Lankov said.
"Due to the domestic considerations, the U.S. administration will have to appear
tough and act tough... However, I do not think this tough line will last for
long," he said.
South Korea and Japan, along with the U.S., have sought to punish North Korea for
the rocket launch, but apart from those threats, they have little economic
leverage on the North as they don't trade with Pyongyang.
North Korea is believed to have spent nearly US$500 million to send the
"communications satellite Kwangmyongsong-2" into orbit, according to the
Institute for National Security Strategy, a state-run think tank for Seoul's
National Intelligence Service. The hefty price tag may not yeild immediate
profits for the North's ailing economy, but its political benefits are evident,
said Hong Ihk-pyo, a North Korea analyst with the state-run Korea Institute for
International Economic Policy in Seoul.
Intense promotional efforts will follow at home, with the North's newly-elected
parliament set to meet on Thursday to reappoint Kim as chairman of the National
Defence Commission, the highest decision-making body that governs the country's
1.19-million military. Seoul officials compare Kim's reappointment to the
inauguration of a new government in other countries.
The newly appointed Kim will have only four years to complete his campaign to
rebuild the country's economy by 2012, timed to coincide with the 100th
anniversary of his father and state founder Kim Il-sung's birth. The sense of
urgency has risen as Kim, 67, is believed to have suffered a stroke last August,
Hong said.
"As rumors of his health spread last year, he must have clearly seen how
vulnerable his regime can appear to the eyes of foreign 'hostile forces' when no
successor is present," Hong said.
Sources say Kim, apparently driven by his health condition, named his third and
youngest son, Jong-un, as his successor in January. Intelligence officials in
Seoul refuse to confirm the reports but acknowledge that another hereditary
succession in the North could be possible. Kim took over after his father died in
1994 in the first father-to-son power transfer in a communist country.
Instant economic returns are not likely as there is no tangible market in the
aerospace industry yet, but the North may be eyeing long-term income through its
sale of rocket technology to the Middle East or other developing countries, Hong
said.
Pyongyang has often claimed it has developed satellite technology since the
1980s, though outside observers believe the impoverished North has underlying
motives, including the development of its long-range missile technology to gain
bigger payments from the U.S. North Korea first launched what it called
"Kwangmyongsong-1" satellite in 1998, which international monitors say never made
into orbit.
"This (sale to the Middle East) is plausible. North Korea has to earn money from
somewhere, but it can't sell a product that doesn't appear to work," Richard
Bush, a senior fellow with the Brookings Institute, a non-governmental U.S. think
tank, said. "But the main reason for testing will be to try to make credible its
deterrent vis-a-vis the actors in Northeast Asia."
Bush disagreed with other experts on Obama's response, saying the new U.S.
administration will not easily bow to North Korea's intentions.
"After the test, the Obama administration will work to build consensus within the
U.N. Security Council to secure a firm reaction," he said. "The test will likely
make the administration more cautious about engaging North Korea bilaterally,
because it will not wish to give the impression of submitting to intimidation.
Watchers in Seoul are over-analyzing the administration's position on a
shoot-down."
"Aside from the losses that stem from any sanctions that are imposed, North Korea
will reaffirm its image as an irresponsible actor," he said.
hkim@yna.co.kr
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