How eager should we be to reopen dialogue with North Korea?

How important is it to do whatever we can to get talks going again with North Korea?

I ask because Kim Yo-jong, the influential sister of Kim Jong-un, said something vaguely nice last week and a lot of people seem to be feeling warm and fuzzy and a wee bit excited about it.

The prioritizing of dialogue is a profound question because it goes to the heart of what divides the political left and right in democratic South Korea. Strip away the labels, park the pet issues and put aside whatever image you have of a particular politician, and this is the hinge upon which our democratic politics swings.

If you believe dialogue is essential and that we should bend almost any which way to facilitate it, you are on the left. If you believe dialogue can wait until we are likely to get something tangible out of it, you are on the right.

It doesn’t matter what your economic prescription is, or what you think about same-sex marriage or climate change. In this country, on this question, it really is that simple.

Like most people, I’m a confused soul. I have flip-flopped on this dialogue thing over the years. I used to quote Winston Churchill in arguments with right wingers who favored the big stick approach and say, “to jaw-jaw is better than to war-war.”

After Kim Jong-il reneged on his promise to come to a summit in Seoul, I changed my mind. Of course, I realized that Kim, the "Guiding Star of the 21st Century" couldn’t come here. The myth of the workers’ paradise would have popped like a mouthful of bubblegum.

I still favored jaw to jaw, but more as a cynical tactic to keep them tied up and expecting cash under the table, something we have to watch out with our politicians.

But given the total lack of progress in 80 years, you have to wonder: What exactly is the upside in being so eager?

This week’s comments from Kim Yo-jong have revived that familiar dilemma. She was responding to Unification Minister Chung Dong-young’s expression of “deep regret” over drone incursions into the North — apparently by civilians on our side. His statement was “quite sensible behavior” and “fortunate,” she said.

Then she wagged her finger, like a school principal dressing down a naughty boy, and warned that any recurrence would “provoke a terrible response.”

Some commentators see her remarks as a positive signal, a small opening in a relationship frozen by the North’s rejection of reunification. The administration of President Lee Jae Myung is clearly trying to create conditions conducive to dialogue.

But here is where the core question returns: How far should we go in manufacturing those conditions?

I ask because in this country, reunification is a sacred national task. It is held so dear that we risk forgetting our principles. The issue of the North has been used to justify some bad stuff. It was the pretext authoritarians on the right once used to withhold democratic rights and crush dissent. It has also served at times as an excuse for those on the left to sidestep democratic principles and ignore individual rights.

Two administrations ago, for example, two North Korean fishermen accused of murder were rapidly deported back to the North against their will and without even a trial here to establish guilt. Why? To curry favor and reopen dialogue with you-know-who.

You will recall that those drone operators violating North Korea airspace were apparently civilians. The government’s expression of “deep regret” over their “reckless” behavior felt pathetic to many people. Minister Chung missed a chance to make the simple democratic point to his thuggish counterparts that while our government safeguards individual rights, those rights exist within the framework of the law, and violations are handled through due process.

Why adopt a posture that appears fawning? Is it simply the perennial temptation to restart talks, even if they ultimately lead nowhere?

Don’t get me wrong, I am in favor of dialogue — especially if it can, over time, force open the North’s window.

It’s just that I don’t think we should be quite so eager. I suppose that means that, this week at least, I find myself on the right.

Michael Breen (mike.breen@insightcomms.com) is the author of "The New Koreans.” The views expressed here are his own.