By Andy Jackson
North Korea is not the first major foreign policy issue President Barack Obama wants to handle.
There are a lot of other places he would prefer to direct his attention; places more central to U.S interests or where he hopes he can score an early success.
He would much prefer to enjoy a victory lap in Iraq. With a continuing drop in violence in most of Iraq and the triumph of moderates in Iraq's recent local elections, it is looking increasingly likely that U.S. military involvement will end on a high note. While insurgent and terrorists attacks on the United States and Iraqi targets continue, they have diminished to a point more analogous to the Reconstruction era after the American Civil War than a major insurgency.
It appears increasingly likely that he will be able to withdraw most U.S. forces from Iraq without the insurgency re-igniting on his watch.
Obama would also prefer to concentrate on Afghanistan, where he hopes to successfully end the insurgency.
It will not be easy. Foreign insurgents are entering Afghanistan as quickly as they are fleeing Iraq, according to a recent report by the International Herald Tribune. However, succeeding in Afghanistan was a central foreign policy plank in his campaign and one he will be judged on by voters.
But North Korea? It's a diplomatic black hole where success is fleeting and frustration is endemic.
While the Obama administration has started its diplomatic work quickly in the Middle East and Afghanistan, Obama's State Department is still reviewing its North Korea policy.
Perhaps the North Koreans have decided that the review period is over and it is time for Obama's first test.
The recent escalation of tensions between North and South Korea, capped by Pyongyang's declaration that all of its military agreements with Seoul have been scrapped, was a clear enough signal that we are witnessing the ``pay attention to me" phase of what passes for North Korean diplomacy.
The reported preparations for a test launch of a North Korean Taepodong-2 long-range missile in the next two months will likely cap that phase, which will be followed by the ``now that I have your attention, let's talk" phase.
(The ``these negotiations have failed because of the imperialist Americans or their flunkies in South Korea" phase will complete the cycle a few months to a year later. Then we can enjoy the whole process all over again.)
So what should President Obama do in the face of North Korea's provocations?
The first thing he should do is nothing. Don't hit the panic button. Don't threaten air strikes. Don't start emergency negotiations. Don't prematurely announce a plan before the State Department's review of its North Korea policy is complete. He should engage North Korea on his timetable and not in reaction to provocations.
While the span of a few weeks is hardly enough time to judge Obama's views on North Korea, he has started promisingly enough.
In just his second week in office he signed orders slapping sanctions on three North Korean companies, along with companies from Iran and China, for violating U.S. trade laws against the proliferation of missiles and other armaments. While the sanctioning of three companies is hardly a major development, it is an early signal to Pyongyang that its dealings with the Obama administration will not just be an exercise in gathering carrots.
He also assured President Lee in a phone conversation last week of his commitment to the six-party process for denuclearizing North Korea.
On a more deliciously petty note, the Obama team backed the Bush administration's refusal of a request by North Korea to be allowed to send an emissary to Obama's inauguration.
The Obama administration must follow up on its good start by resisting the temptation to play good cop to Seoul's bad cop, such as by offering Pyongyang bilateral deals or even bilateral negotiations that are not within the framework of the six-party process.
So far it appears that the goals and means of Obama and Lee Myung-bak are not that different. Both are promising rewards for Pyongyang but only if it gives up its nuclear materials and programs.
Obama's North Korea team must remember that the goal is not to secure an agreement with Pyongyang on denuclearizing North Korea; it is to denuclearize North Korea. Experience has shown that the two are nowhere near the same. If they were, then we could fly Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to Pyongyang and have a denuclearization deal with the North Koreans next week.
If a genuine workable agreement with North Korea is possible at all, it will only be possible as the result of a long process in close coordination with Seoul and Tokyo. That process will require negotiations, rewards, sanctions, threats and just about every other diplomatic trick.
Above all else, it will require patience and a cool head.
To that end, the Obama administration's non-response so far to North Korea's provocations is a sign that they are on the right track.
Andy Jackson teaches American government in the Lakeland College bridge program at Ansan College, Gyeonggi Province. He can be reached at andyinrok@lycos.com