ed Ruinous miscalculation

Missile bluff can fool none but North’s residents

According to photos taken recently by U.S. intelligence satellites, North Korea seems to be preparing to launch another long-range rocket. If proved true, that will be a pitiful and unfortunate turn of events for none other than North Koreans themselves.

Barely a week has passed since reelected U.S. President Barack Obama extended an olive branch to Pyongyang, urging the latter to change its attitudes and accept Washington’s help.

The North’s leadership might be calculating that the bigger its nuclear arsenal grows and the longer its missiles can fly, the higher the U.S.’s price will be for buying them. Yet the experiences of the past four years have shown such strategic gambling to be totally wrong while Obama is in the White House. And the U.S. leader’s precondition of denuclearization hasn’t changed a bit as he embarks on his second term.

South Korea is worried the presumed test of a long-range missile is aimed at influencing the Dec. 19 presidential election. If Pyongyang intends to affect the poll here, however, it will use other means, as it will take at least another month or so to actually launch a rocket given the current state of its preparations. So the purpose of the launch, if realized, will be to test the two new administrations in Washington and Seoul.

Pyongyang points to the South’s launch of its space rocket Thursday and the recent Korea-U.S. accord to nearly triple the range of South Korean missiles to justify its efforts to put a ``working satellite” into orbit. But Seoul has long abandoned its nuclear programs, and the fact that the North cites the South’s missile range conversely reveals that its satellite tests are actually those for ballistic missiles. The international community can distinguish satellites from missiles by the track records of the two Koreas.

The North’s Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) made a very funny ― for its preposterousness ― report in this regard last week.

It quoted North Korea’s U.N. delegate as saying Pyongyang would continue to launch satellites for the country’s ``economic development,” i.e., to monitor weather conditions over the blighted country and broadcast celestial songs in praise of its three-generational leaders. The governmental mouthpiece also said North Korea’s push to advance in science and technology is directly linked to a promise by its young leader, Kim Jong-un, to ``improve the livelihood of the people.” For most foreigners, and even some North Koreans, this is a sick joke.

Aside from actual costs of millions of dollars per such test, an additional missile launch or nuclear test will make the already hard lives of North Koreans even more unendurable by pushing away desperately-needed foreign aid, most notably that from the United States and its closest ally, South Korea.

The North’s logic may be to maximize its negotiating leverage through beefing up nuclear stockpiles and making more sophisticated carriers for them until Washington agrees to turn the shaky truce into peace treaty. It may not be so bad as a strategy except that all of Pyongyang’s counterparts have seen through it and won’t play by the North’s rules.

All the while, the promise of a strong and prosperous country is overshadowed by the reality of starving, poverty-stricken people.