NK back on US terror state list?

Were the torpedoing of the Cheonan and the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island last year acts of terrorism?

By Michael Breen

Were the torpedoing of the Cheonan and the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island last year acts of terrorism?

Several American congressmen say yes. They are supporting a bill by the chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen that would require the State Department to put North Korea on the list of state sponsors of terrorism.

Given the lack of leverage over North Korea, this might be useful. Like the others on the list _ Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria _ North Korea will have economic incentives to behave well and get taken off: U.S. economic assistance, World Bank loans and other good things.

But utility alone will not do. For the list to make sense, and not simply to be a group of those who offend America, its members must actually sponsor terrorism.

Does North Korea qualify? The tricky part here is the definition of terrorism. Although a familiar term, it is a tough one to get agreement on. In fact, there is no international consensus. Depending on the cause and the intention, it seems, one man’s terrorist is another’s government spokesman admitting collateral damage.

That is because terrorism is a strategic approach to warfare and, sad to admit, we live in a world where warfare itself is considered legitimate. Even civilized states reserve the right to use violence in the defense, if not pursuit, of some of their interests.

They may outlaw certain tactics, such as landmines, or barbarity such as abuse of prisoners, and promise not to use the biological and other horrendous weapons they have developed. But they can’t expect weaker parties to agree to their rules.

That said, we kind of know what terrorism is. The terrorist is one whose best weapon is his enemy’s fear. He seeks to generate it and harness it to his purpose. This may take the form of a regime terrorizing its people in the name of real or delusionary war against internal enemies.

But, in our context here is used to refer to non-state actors such as Al Qaeda who adopt unorthodox tactics because they lack soldiers, tanks and territory, and see non-combatants as legitimate targets by virtue of their race, nationality, religion or opinions.

Those tactics thus far range from targeted assassination, hostage-taking, and hijacking to random terrorizing of civilian populations and ritualized murder, the more publicized by enemy media the better. A terrorized people, the terrorist calculates, may savage their own leaders, lose morale, go soft, or otherwise throw open their gates.

The approach can be successful. Terrorists have founded countries. Those with broader ambitions, on the other hand, seem to founder on their own vagueness. Al-Qaida types, for example, may have hijacked Islam and silenced the free world’s journalists, most of whom will not cover that religion honestly today for fear of getting a brick through their window. But to what end? And for how long?

Terrorists fighting for social issues often seem to be their own worst enemies. Violent anti-abortionists have succeeded in the wrecking the non-violent argument of fellow opponents of abortion that life begins at conception.

So where does North Korea figure in this? It was originally on the U.S. list because it sold weapons to terrorist groups and gave asylum to hijackers from Japan’s Red Army Faction. (Also factored in were some of its own military actions which employed terrorist-type tactics, notably the 1983 assassination attempt in Myanmar on then-South Korean President Chun Doo-hwan, which killed several of his cabinet, and the 1987 bombing of Korean Air Flight 858, intended to provide a security pretext for its communist allies to boycott the 1988 Seoul Olympics).

It got taken off for good behavior a couple of years ago. To get put back on, Pyongyang would have to have supported terrorists or been a terrorist itself.

Do last year’s attacks on the Cheonan and Yeonpyeong Island qualify? The Cheonan sinking, it could be argued, appeared like a terror attack. It was murderous and surprised and scared people. But, it wasn’t terrorism. North Korea is a sovereign state at war with South Korea. For the most part that war is silent, but it flares occasionally. When it does, it is many things, but not terrorism.

American politicians, then, are best advised to drop this one in the interests of consistency. By all means, find additional leverage for negotiators dealing with North Korea. Create a new list, if that’s what it takes.

But don’t put North Korea on it for the wrong reasons. This may seem a pedantic point but it is important to get things right. The last time we accused a state we thought had nukes of terrorist connections, we ended up invading it. Let’s not do that again.

Michael Breen is an author, former foreign correspondent and the chairman of Insight Communications, a public relations consulting company. He can be reached at mike.breen@insightcomms.com.