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| Chairs: | The Honorable Morton I. Abramowitz, Senior Fellow, The Century Foundation James T. Laney |
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| Director: | Michael J. Green |
| Publisher: | Council on Foreign Relations Press |
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Release Date: June 1998
67 pages
ISBN 0876092334
$5.00
Task Force Report No. 17
The Korean peninsula remains one of the most heavily armed and dangerous places in the world. Despite its deteriorating economy, North Korea retains a standing army of over one million men and an enormous arsenal of artillery and missiles, most of them as close to Seoul, the South Korean capital, as Dulles Airport is to downtown Washington, DC. In 1994, the United States and North Korea almost went to war over the North’s nuclear program. Since then, Washington and Seoul have attempted to cap North Korea’s nuclear ambitions through the Agreed Framework, but the threat from the North remains.
According to Managing Change on the Korean Peninsula, U.S. policy has not moved far enough to reduce the underlying threat from the North and to encourage North-South reconciliation. Noting that the new Republic of Korea (ROK) government has taken steps to open North Korea to broader contacts with the outside world while asserting that it will brook no military aggression from the North, this Task Force recommends a parallel and supportive approach for U.S. policy. It should be premised on robust deterrence, close U.S.-ROK cooperation, and an acknowledgement that the United States does not seek a takeover of the North by the South or the North’s destruction.
At the same time, the Task Force recommends that the policy should expand contact with the North, join with Seoul in offering a larger package of reciprocal moves that might induce the North to make significant changes in its policies, and deny any assistance to the North if Pyongyang rejects the opportunity for threat reduction and reconciliation. The Task Force argues that, despite the difficulties in dealing with North Korea, this approach can, at a minimum, enhance stability on the peninsula and establish the groundwork for positive change.
Morton I. Abramowitz is senior fellow of the Council on Foreign Relations. He was president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and served as assistant secretary of state for intelligence and research.
Richard V. Allen, former national security adviser, is senior fellow at the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace, Stanford University; member of the advisory council of the Center for Strategic and International Studies; and chairman of the advisory council of the Asian Studies Center of the Heritage Foundation.
Richard L. Armitage is president of Armitage Associates, L.C. He served as assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs and deputy assistant secretary of defense for East Asian and Pacific affairs.
Edward J. Baker is associate director of the Harvard-Yenching Institute, a foundation associated with Harvard University that brings East Asian scholars to the United States for research and studies.
Daniel E. Bob is special assistant for Asian and Pacific affairs to Senator William V. Roth Jr. (R-Del.), chairman of the Senate Finance Committee. He worked previously as assistant director for studies and policy programs at the Japan Society of New York and as a Fulbright Scholar in Fiji.
Peter T. R. Brookes is the senior adviser for East Asia with the Foreign Affairs Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives.
Jerome A. Cohen is C. V. Starr senior fellow for Asia studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. He practices law at the international law firm of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton and Garrison and teaches at New York University Law School.
James Delaney is a consultant to the Institute for Defense Analyses. He served as an intelligence officer in Asia for more than 20 years.
William M. Drennan is a U.S. Air Force colonel and senior military fellow at the Institute for National Strategic Studies, National Defense University. He served as a professor at the National War College and chief of strategy and policy, J-5, U.S. Forces Korea.
L. Gordon Flake is associate director of the Program on Conflict Resolution at the Atlantic Council of the United States.
George J. Flynn is a U.S. Marine Corps colonel and a military fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Robert L. Gallucci is dean of the Edmond A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University.
Michael J. Green is Olin fellow for Asia security studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. He is also a professorial lecturer at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and a consultant to the Office of Secretary of Defense.
Donald P. Gregg is chairman of the Korea Society. He served as U.S. ambassador to the Republic of Korea (1989-93).
Morton H. Halperin is senior vice president of the Century Foundation/Twentieth Century Fund. He is also a senior fellow of the Council on Foreign Relations and a former official of the National Security Council and the Department of Defense.
Frank S. Jannuzi is a member of the minority staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He served for eight years as the East Asia regional political-military analyst in the Bureau of Intelligence and Research, U.S. Department of State.
Arnold Kanter is senior fellow at the Forum for International Policy. He served as undersecretary of state for political affairs (1991-93) and as special assistant to the president for defense policy and arms control (1989-91).
Richard Kessler is democratic professional staff on the Asia-Pacific Subcommittee of the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee.
James T. Laney is president emeritus of Emory University. He served as U.S. ambassador to the Republic of Korea (1993-97).
Winston Lord is currently a member of several nongovernmental organizations and serves as vice chairman of the International Rescue Committee. He previously served as assistant secretary of state, ambassador to China, and president of the Council on Foreign Relations.
Robert A. Manning is senior fellow and director of Asia studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. He was a State Department adviser for policy (1989-93).
Marcus Noland is senior fellow of the Institute for International Economics. He has served as the senior economist for international economics at the Council of Economic Advisers.
Sam Nunn is a partner in the Atlanta-based law firm of King and Spaulding. He served as a U.S. Senator from Georgia for four terms.
Donald Oberdorfer is distinguished journalist in residence at the Foreign Policy Institute of the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. He served as Tokyo correspondent and diplomatic correspondent for the Washington Post.
Kongdan Oh is a research staff member at the Institute for Defense Analyses. She is also a non-resident senior fellow of the Brookings Institution and a lecturer at George Mason University's graduate program on international transactions.
Douglas H. Paal is president of the Asia-Pacific Policy Center (AAPC). Prior to forming the AAPC, he was special assistant to President George H.W. Bush and President Reagan for national security affairs and senior director for Asian affairs on the National Security Council.
James Przystup is director of the Asian Studies Center at the Heritage Foundation. He served as director of planning for Asia-Pacific security strategy at the Department of Defense (1991-94) and on the State Department's policy planning staff (1987-91).
C. Kenneth Quinones is Korean representative at the Asia Foundation. He served as a Foreign Service officer at the State Department and was a guest scholar at the U.S. Institute of Peace.
Jason T. Shaplen is a policy adviser at the Korean Energy Development Organization (KEDO), where his primary responsibility is to prepare and negotiate agreements between KEDO and North Korea in connection with the light-water-reactor nuclear project.
Scott Snyder is the recipient of an Abe Fellowship from the Social Sciences Research Council and during 1998-99 is conducting independent research on aspects of U.S.-Japan-ROK policy coordination on security issues in northeast Asia. He is completing a monograph analyzing patterns in North Korea's negotiating style.
Stephen J. Solarz is president of Solarz Associates. He served for eighteen years in the U.S. House of Representatives and for twelve of those years as chairman of the Subcommittee on Asian and Pacific Affairs. He now heads an international business consultancy.
Richard H. Solomon has dealt with matters of Korea policy since 1971 as a member of the National Security Council staff. He served as assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs (1989-92).
Helmut Sonnenfeldt is guest scholar for foreign policy studies at the Brookings Institution. He served as counselor at the State Department and as a senior staff member at the National Security Council.
Nancy Bernkopf Tucker is professor of history at Georgetown University and the Georgetown School of Foreign Service. She served in the State Department Office of Chinese Affairs and the U.S. Embassy, Beijing (1986-87).
William Watts is president of the Potomac Associates. He served as a Foreign Service officer in Korea, Germany, and the Soviet Union, and as staff secretary at the National Security Council.
Paul Wolfowitz is dean and professor of international relations at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. He has served as U.S. ambassador to the Republic of Indonesia and undersecretary of defense for policy.
Donald S. Zagoria is professor of political science at Hunter College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. His specialty is the international relations of East Asia.
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