BA Thesis

Keeping Up Appearances In The Face of Uncertainty: North
Korean Nuclear Diplomacy
Alexander G. Gershon
A Thesis
In
International Relations
Presented to the Faculties of the University of Pennsylvania

Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Bachelor of Arts
2011 BA in International Relations
----------------------------------------- (Signature)
Supervisor of Thesis
Gershon 1
Table Of Contents
List of Abbreviations 2
Abstract 3
Chapter 1: Introduction
Introduction 4
Research Questions 8
Methodology 14
Research Goals 15
Organization of Thesis 16
Chapter 2: What Do We Know?
Theoretical Framework 17
Research Design 23
Literature Review 28
Chapter 3: A Glance into the Hermit Kingdom
Internal Structure 37
External Views 39
Chinese-North Korean Relations 40
South Korean-North Korean Relations 44
United States-North Korean Relations 47
Chapter 4: The Six Party Talks
A Brief Introduction into the Six Party Talks 49

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The Fifth Round of the Six Party Talks 52
The End of the Fourth Round—A Precursor to Trouble
September 19th Joint Statement/Issue of Light Water Reactors 56
The Fifth Round; Phase I 59
A Whole Lot Of Nothing 59
An Eventful Year 60
Not Your Typical 4th of July Fireworks Show 63
October Nuclear Test 66
A Volte-Face: The Changing US Policy Apropos of North Korea 70
The Fifth Round; Phase II 71
The Fifth Round; Phase III 74
Chapter 5: Conclusion
What We Have Learned 76
Importance of This Study to International Relations 78
Need for More Research 80
The Future 81
Works Cited 84
Gershon 3
Abbreviations
BDA Banco Delta Asia

DPRK Democratic People’s Republic of Korea
HEU High Enriched Uranium
HFO Heavy Fuel Oil
IAEA International Atomic Energy Agency
ICBM Intercontinental Ballistic Missile
KCNA Korea Central News Agency
KEDO Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization
KPA Korean People’s Army
LWR Light-water Reactor
MFA Ministry of Foreign Affairs
NK North Korea
NPT Treaty of Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons
SPT Six Party Talks
UN United Nations
UNSC United Nations Security Council
USSR Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
WMD Weapons of Mass D-estruction
WPK Workers’ Party of Korea 
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Abstract
The purpose of this study is an attempt to understand the utilization of Nuclear
Diplomacy by North Korea as its main foreign policy since the First Nuclear Crisis1 in
1993. This thesis argues that Nuclear Diplomacy is employed by North Korea as a means
for the Kim regime to maintain power. In this study, the term “Nuclear Diplomacy” will
not only be limited to nuclear weapons but also to other types of military weaponry that
have been utilized as a supplement to nuclear weapons by North Korea.2 Since the First
Nuclear Crisis, North Korea has utilized Brinkmanship—the concept of constantly
tittering on the line of nuclear war—in an attempt to obtain economic and political
concessions from the United States, South Korea, and various multilateral organizations
such as the Six-Party Talks. These concessions range from more palpable demands such
as economic aid and assistance in building Light-Water Reactors for energy to more
diplomatic centered requests such as high-level summit meetings with the United States.
One reason behind pursuing this study is that the impending succession of Kim Jong Un
recast North Korea’s nuclear capabilities into the global spotlight. In order to completely
understand how to view North Korea’s actions surrounding this succession it is vital to
accurately and exhaustively calculate the importance of said weapons to the North
Korean state. Also, North Korea can roughly be utilized as a de facto representation of
the contemporary threat posed by Nuclear Proliferation spreading to rogue states. This is
important in International Relations for there is an unknown entity, Kim Jong Un, rising
                                                        
1 The First Nuclear Crisis describes a brief eighty-nine day period from 1993-1994 when North Korea
withdrew from the NPT and declared its intention to nuclearize. It will be extrapolated upon later on in this
thesis.
2 This includes missile launches, naval confrontation, and threatening diplomatic overtures which will all
be encompassed by the term “Brinkmanship”.
Gershon 5
to power in a rogue state, being North Korea, which posses a nuclear arsenal thereby
dealing directly with the contemporary fears of Nuclear Proliferation.
Chapter I: The Introduction
On Tuesday, November 23, 2010, the South Korean island of Yeonpyeong, in
Northeast Korea, was heavily shelled by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea
(henceforth known as North Korea) in response to live-fire Southern military drills that
were occurring on the island.3 Two days later, the beleaguered South Korean Defense
Minister resigned amidst a storm of controversy surrounding the halfhearted South
Korean response to this attack.4 On par with prior events in the region, the United States
rehashed its promise to stand behind South Korea while China attempted to assuage the
situation so as to mitigate the international response against North Korea. The consistent
involvement of these two superpowers only escalates the anxiety on a peninsula that has
been a boiler of tension for the past half-century. The actions of North Korea, while
appearing abnormal to the casual observer, follow a calculated blueprint set forth since
the inception of North Korea’s foreign policy of Nuclear Diplomacy.
The elements present in this study are of great importance to the contemporary
International Relations zeitgeist. First is the issue of Nuclear Proliferation which has a
tectonic affect in the contemporary IR paradigm working its way into the rhetoric of
policymakers and world leaders alike. From the fear of non-state actors acquiring nuclear
weapons to the New START treaty between the United States and Russia, Nuclear
                                                        
3 “N Korea warns region on brink of war after more artillery fire heard,” Japan Now, November 26, 2010,
http://www.japantoday.com/category/world/view/artillery-fire-heard-on-yeonpyeong-island.
4 Jack Kim, “South Korea Defense Minister Quits After Attack”, Reuters, November 25, 2010,
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSL3E6MN0SQ20101125.
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Proliferation subsumes a large portion of contemporary international security. North
Korea is not only a rogue state possessing nuclear capabilities but is known to have sold
these weapons to various nefarious countries including Syria—a breeding ground of
terrorist activity.5 Additionally, the possible collapse of North Korea would lead to the
possession of their nuclear arsenal by either a rogue military figure or a non-state actor—
both of which are quite troublesome to contemporary policy makers.
Secondly, the concept of a unified Korean Peninsula, which could result if
Nuclear Diplomacy is being utilized as a last-ditch effort for the survival of the current
North Korean regime, is something that would completely change the power dynamic in
the East Asian region. If this occurred, China, realizing its worst fear, would have a
unified, pro-West Korea directly on its border—severely altering its future actions in the
region and challenging its attempts at regional hegemonic rule. The collapse of the North
Korean regime would also lead to a mass exodus of thousands upon thousands of
severely malnourished, impoverished North Koreans into both China and South Korea.
This would put a severe financial strain on both economies as they attempted to handle
this increase in population.6
Thirdly is the importance of South Korea to the United States. South Korea, on
numerous occasions, has been given the full backing of the United States’ military in any
                                                        
5 Colum Lynch, “North Korea Accused of Violating U.N. Sanctions on Nuclear weapons Trade,” Foreign
Policy, November 9, 2010,
http://turtlebay.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2010/11/09/north_korea_accused_of_violating_un_sanctions_on_n
uclear_weapons_trade.
6 Incidentally, last year Lee Myung-bak, the current Prime Minster of Korea, proposed a unification tax
just incase this scenario occurred which shows its importance in the greater context of International
Relations. (Source: Jennifer Lind, “The Once and Future Kim: Succession and Stasis in North Korea,”
Foreign Affairs, October 25, 2010, http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/66870/by-jennifer-lind/the-once-
and-future-kim?page=show.).
Gershon 7
situation that might arise on the peninsula. The involvement of the United States on the
Korean Peninsula has more than once drawn the ire of China who views the United States
as an unwelcomed visitor in their sphere of influence.7 Any conflict that would embroil
the peninsula would involve both the United States and China—burgeoning the chances
of it turning into a global conflict. This makes North Korea relevant to the United States
and China for it is the main variable that could lead to a physical confrontation between
the world’s two superpowers—something that neither of them want.
Fourthly, the impending succession of little known and untested Kim Jong Un as
the leader of the Workers’ Party of Korea8 only furthers the volatility of the situation for
there are now internal murmurs of a power struggle for control of North Korea and its
nuclear arsenal.9 In order to quell such dissent, Kim Jong Un must solidify his hold on
power through an external show of force which might explain the recent attacks on
Yeonpyeong Island.10 If this attack is a prognosticator for future actions by the North
Korean regime under Kim Jong Un’s rule then it appears as if the “Military-First” 11
policy created under Kim Jong Il will continue—adding another dimension to the North
Korean threat. This is relevant to the field of International Relations for North Korea’s
                                                        
7 “U.S. Carrier Strike Group Embarks for the Yellow Sea,” Stratfor, November 24, 2010,
http://www.stratfor.com/memberships/176615/analysis/20101124_us_carrier_strike_group_embarks_yello
w_sea.
8 The only political party in North Korea
9. Robert Carlin and Joel Wit, “ Six Mysteries of North Korea’s Succession Drama”, Foreign Policy,
September 13, 2010,
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/09/13/six_mysteries_of_north_korea_s_succession_drama?pag
e=0,0.
10 Andrew Salmon, “Theories abound on N. Korea attack,” CNN, November 24, 2010,
http://articles.cnn.com/2010-11-24/world/north.korea.attack.analysis_1_defense-minister-kim-tae-young-
pyongyang-succession-process?_s=PM:WORLD.
11 North Korea’s “Military First” policy of Songun (선군) prioritizes the Korean People's Army in the
affairs of state and allocates national resources to the army first.
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“Military First” policy is one of the main pillars behind its utilization of Nuclear
Diplomacy and buttresses their nuclear threat.
Lastly, the Cold War is still officially occurring on the Korean Peninsula because
the armistice that ended the Korean War was never officially ratified into a peace treaty.12
It is for this reason that Kim Jong Il justifies keeping the KPA (Korean People’s Army) at
constant military alertness. One minor miscommunication in such a constant state of
vigilance is the difference between relative peace on the peninsula and a full-fledged war
which would, most likely, lead to the mutual destruction of both North and South Korea
and has the possibility of creating another world war. I will be arguing that the Kim
regime utilizes Nuclear Diplomacy as a means to maintain power through stabilizing
internal dissent whilst obtaining external concessions to aid their dilapidated
infrastructure.
Research Questions
The overall research question is why has North Korea utilized Nuclear
Diplomacy as its main international diplomatic tool since 1994? The sub-questions are as
follows: are North Korean politics as military-oriented as they appear? Is North Korea
able to act rationally in the context of nuclear proliferation? What is the importance of a
nuclear arsenal to North Korea and is it more complex than for mere power gains? Why
does North Korea view multilateral organizations as an affront to their sovereignty? Why
is the United States viewed with the upmost importance to North Korea? How does Kim
                                                        
12. Glyn Ford and Soyoung Kwon, North Korea on the Brink: Struggle for Survival (London: Pluto Press,
2008), 43.
Gershon 9
Jong-Il utilize nuclear weapons to solidify his hold on power and continue his
subjugation of the North Korean people?
I argue that North Korean politics are as military-orientated as they appear. This
stems from the internal structure of North Korea being based off of Kim Jong Il’s
“Military First” policy which is utilized to maintain the concept of the ever-present
outside threat posed by the United States. If this threat is taken away, which means an
alleviation of this emphasis upon the military, then the crippling environment in which
the North Korean people live becomes overtly apparent. North Korea is able to act
rationally13 in the context of Nuclear Proliferation in the sense that they will never launch
a nuclear warhead unless fired upon first. The reason for this is that the function of the
nuclear weapon to North Korea is as a device to obtain concessions from foreign powers
as well as a means to uphold the aforementioned concept of the omnipotent outside
threat—firing a Nuclear weapon would lead to the loss of key diplomatic tool. The
United States is viewed as the main enemy of North Korea partially stemming from their
importance on the world stage and role in the Korean War; it is the job of the Kim regime
to confront them as to protect the security of the North Korean people. The United States
is also an economic superpower and has been a major contributor of aid to the North
Korean regime since the end of the Korean War. This is of importance for the Kim
regime cannot merely accept this aid for the image of the villainous American would
quickly unravel. Instead, it must utilize acts of brazen physical force against the United
                                                        
13 Before explaining North Korea’s rationality it is important to first place a disclaimer upon this
discussion for the term “rationality” is a byzantine concept with profuse amounts of literature present
extrapolating on its true definition. For this paper, the term rational will be the ability to consistently act in
one’s best interest. While this might appear too abstract, it is important that it remains in such a state to
avoid an ontological discussion of its meaning.
Gershon 10
States so it appears, at least to the people of North Korea, that America is providing
North Korea with concessions deriving from their fear of the North Korean state. Lastly,
nuclear weapons are used by the Kim regime to continue their hold on power and their
subjugation of the North Korean people. These weapons bolster the concept of the ever-
present outside threat by making it tangible through their physical presence. The regime
constructs this image of the Kim regime as the final barrier between the Capitalist West
and total domination of North Korea and, through this, upholds the falsehood of the
Korean people needing the leadership of the Kims.
These questions arise through a duality of analysis: one of the current literature on
North Korea’s use of Nuclear Diplomacy and the other an amalgamation of real world
events. With regards to contemporary literature on North Korea, the questions derive out
of applying the structural lens of “Subversive Realism”14 to the applicable literature.
Subversive Realism is an amalgamation of Classical Realism, Constructivism, and Post-
Structuralism which will be discussed, in-depth, in the proceeding chapter.15 The
Subversive Realist theory was utilized to discover issues that arose out of the literature
surveyed for this study. These issues ranged from not fully extrapolating on topics
deemed germane to the thesis or misinterpreting data by utilizing erroneous assumptions.
The real world events from which the questions arise are chronologically set from
1993 to the contemporary era. The First Nuclear Crisis (1993-1994) laid the foundation
for North Korea’s utilization of Nuclear Diplomacy as its eighty-nine day withdrawal
                                                        
14 Subversive Realism is a theory that was created by the author.
15 Note that for the remainder of this paper the terms Classical Realism and Realism will be used
interchangeably.
Gershon 11
from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty set actions in motion that would shape the
future of North Korea’s foreign policy.16 While this crisis ended peacefully through the
1994 Agreed Framework17 signed alongside the United States, North Korea’s utilization
of Nuclear Diplomacy and its subsidiary of Brinkmanship would become their modus
operandi when securing international concessions.18 Other events that follow along this
pattern that helped generate the research questions for this study include the 2002 West
Sea Incident19, the First and Second Nuclear Tests (2006, 2009), and the Six Party Talks
(2003-2009)—the majority of which will be extrapolated upon in the later chapters of this
study.20
The aforementioned questions can be answered through looking at both the
internal and external dynamic of North Korea. Internally, one must look at the dire
economic situation, the importance of the military in the sustainability of the regime, and
the personality cult21 surrounding the Kims. Externally, one must analyze the ever-
                                                        
16 Glyn Ford and Soyoung Kwon, North Korea on the Brink: A Struggle for Survival (Ann Arbor: Pluto
Press, 2008), 150.
17 This was an agreement between the United States and North Korea that was signed on October 21,
1994. The aim of this agreement was freezing and replacing North Korea's indigenous nuclear power plant
program with Light Water Reactors (which are less prone to nuclear proliferation) while normalizing
relations between the two countries. This agreement was constantly beleaguered by empty political rhetoric
and diplomatic strong handing and was never fully upheld. It eventually completely dissolved around 2003.
18 Bruce E. Bechtol, Red Rogue: The Persistent Challenge of North Korea (Dulles: Potomac Books, Inc,
2007), 14.
19 On June 28, 2002, during the closing days of the 2002 World Cup (co hosted by South Korea), two
North Korean Navy patrol boats crossed the Northern Limit Line (an arbitrary line demarcating North and
South Korean in the West Sea) and opened fire as South Korean Navy ships approached. A miniature battle
ensued in which one of the NK ships was sunk, four South Korean sailors were killed, and eighteen
wounded. (Source: “Northern Limit Line (NLL) West Sea Naval Engagements,” in Global Security,
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/war/nll.htm.)
20 Narushige Michishita, North Korea's Military-Diplomatic Campaigns, 1966-2008 (New York:
Routledge, 2010), 150.
21 This term will be extrapolated upon later on in this thesis but I will provide a brief description of it here.
A personality cult arises when an individual uses mass media and propaganda to create an idealized and
heroic public image. This is usually achieved through means such unquestioning flattery and praise.
Gershon 12
changing dynamic between North Korea, South Korea, and the United States while also
not underestimating the importance of a Chinese ally. This last point, regarding China, is
pertinent to the survival of the North Korean regime and has become a point of
contention with the recent release of classified United States documents that show how
China might be losing control over North Korea.22 While these documents have lead
certain academics to believe the Chinese-North Korean relationship is falling apart, as
will be shown later on, their relationship is as strong as ever.
Nuclear Diplomacy is due to two main factors: political power and economic
despair. This political power can be viewed as both power within the international
community and power, in a subservient sense, over the North Korean people. North
Korea (read Kim Jong Il) lusts to be a major voice in the international community and
realizes that, in order for that to happen, North Korea must have something to offer that
other countries need. The fact of the matter is that the North Korean infrastructure has
atrophied since the downfall of the Soviet Union and lacks anything to offer and therefore
has to rely on the power and fearfulness of nuclear weapons to garner international clout.
With regards to power in the context of the North Korean people, Kim Jong-Il
utilizes fear as a means of maintaining the their subservience to him and as a reason to
prolong his military first policy of Songun (선군). Unlike his father, who had the military
credentials to garner respect, Kim Jong-Il needed to prove his legitimacy as the ruler of
the North Korean people and show them that they needed the protection his rule offered.
He accomplished this through his alienation of the rest of the world (mainly the United
                                                        
22 Chris Hogg, “Wikileaks cables: China ‘frustrated’ by North Korea”, BBC, November 30, 2010,
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11871641.
Gershon 13
States and South Korea) and the constant fear that these countries could attack North
Korea at any given moment. In order to make this fear palpable, Kim Jong Il utilizes
nuclear armament to show the North Korean people that the outside threat is a serious
matter. Through this he is able to masquerade the obvious suffering of the North Korean
people and his poor internal governance under the guise of utter trepidation.
The despair arises out of the fact that North Korea lacks infrastructure and a
developed economy—heavily relying on foreign aid just to function. Many instances in
which North Korea has threatened war have been out of a not-so-subtle need for
economic aid. This includes monetary donations, the construction of infrastructure (such
as Light-Water Reactors for electricity), and copious amounts of food. The North Korean
regime cannot merely ask for international aid for then the constructed image of the
villainous outsiders unravels; it is for this reason that North Korea must utilize Nuclear
Diplomacy to obtain this aid. Through acting as if the aid is a concession, something
given up by other sovereign institutions out of a fear of the North Korean state, the Kim
regime can maintain their air of importance and the view of the wicked outsider. Also,
the sale of nuclear material to other states has proven to be an important source of income
for the North Korean state. It is their only real source of income, outside of economic aid,
that they have. The nuclear weaponry of North Korea is an important crutch that is
holding up the ailing regime. Kim Jong-Il uses the military and Nuclear Diplomacy to
solidify his role as “Dear Leader” and it currently appears that the same methodology is
being utilized to ease the transition from Kim Jong-Il to the mysterious and novice Kim
Jong Un.
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Methodology
The methodology implemented in this study will be Odell’s “Disciplined
Interpretative Case Study” with the case study being the Fifth Round of the Six Party
Talks (henceforth known as the SPT) which lasted from November 2005 to February
2007 and involved North Korea, South Korea, Japan, China, Russia, and the United
States.23 The Disciplined Interpretive Case Study “interprets or explains an event by
applying a known theory to the new terrain. The more explicit and systematic the use of
theoretical concepts, the more powerful the application.”24 It allows for the utilization of
various perspectives on the Fifth Round of the SPT to “sharpen, refine, and contrast them
while working with them.”25 This design will allow the implementation of the case-
centric theory of Subversive Realism which will be discussed in the proceeding pages of
this thesis.
The SPT, as an overly encompassing concept, consisted of a slew of gatherings
centered on security concerns regarding North Korea’s pursuit of nuclear weaponry.26
The reasoning behind choosing this event as the case study for this analysis is that it
encapsulates an amalgamation of variables that shape North Korea’s Nuclear Diplomacy.
Some of these variables include the utilization of threatening overtures within the
international community to gain concessions, occasionally using physical force to prove
                                                        
23 John S. Odell, “Case Study Methods in International Political Economy”, International Studies
Perspectives 2 (2001): 163-165.
24 Ibid.
25 Ibid.
26 Charles L. Pritchard, Failed Diplomacy: The Tragic Story of How North Korea Got the Bomb
(Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 2007), 146-162.
Gershon 15
their point, and explaining their actions as manifest from the threatening overtures of
other countries—mainly the United States.
In order to see how one event or decision in the SPT lead to an outcome, Odell’s
theory will be used alongside Van Evera’s concept of Process Tracing.27 Van Evera’s
concept of Process Tracing will give a better understanding of how events progress from
point A to point B and will allow for an analysis of all of the variables at play in the case
study and see how their interactions produce a varying array of results. This also allows
the ability to branch out in the tracing of events. Instead of being limited to the normal
linear progression of A to B, Process Tracing allows the accommodation of outliers—
things that turn the linear process into more of a web-like structure. This can
tremendously add to the dynamic value of the assessment occurring in this thesis.
Research Goals
The practical goal of this study is to provide a general framework to understand
Nuclear Diplomacy as it applies to North Korea. This requires taking the case study
utilized in the analysis and extrapolating upon it in order to produce a template that
should be applicable to any instance of Nuclear Diplomacy by North Korea.
The academic goals of this study center around understanding why North Korea
acts the way that it does within the context of the international community. Why they
constantly forgo peaceful negotiations and, instead, chose to turn the international
community into a zero-sum game. Building upon this is an inquiry as to if North Korea’s
utilization of Nuclear Diplomacy has more depth than it appears to the casual observer/is
                                                        
27 Stephen Van Evera, Guide to Methods for Students of Political Science (Ithaca: Cornell University
Press, 1997), 66.
Gershon 16
portrayed in the news. This can be understood as an inquiry into whether Nuclear
Diplomacy is the means to the end of this threatening overture that North Korea takes
with the international community or if there is more beneath the surface that is not
apparent from a cursory glance. Jutting off of this is the intellectual goal of understanding
why North Korea views multilateral organizations as an affront to their sovereignty.
Organization of the Thesis
This thesis can be broken up into four sections that center around obtaining a
better understanding of North Korean Nuclear Diplomacy and its importance to the Kim
regime. The first section will provide a basic template of the thesis which includes the
Literature Review, in which the contemporary literature on the subject will be discussed,
and the Research Design in which the case study and the methodological approach to this
paper will be laid out.
The second section will consist of an explanation of some fundamental concepts
that are key if one wants to undertake the analysis of North Korea offered in this study.
This will include a discussion of the internal structure of North Korea and its relations
with the United States, South Korea, and China.
The third section of this thesis will center around the SPT and North Korea’s
utilization of Nuclear Diplomacy during this time period. This section will provide an in-
depth analysis of the Fifth Round of Talks and will, therefore, be broken up into three
temporal categories: the events that occurred at the end of the Fourth Round (July-
September 2005) of Talks that set the stage for the Fifth Round; the Fifth Round
(November 2005-February 2007); and a brief discussion regarding the end of the Fifth
Gershon 17
Round at the affect that it would have on the eventually withdrawal from the SPT by
North Korea in 2009.
The final section of the paper will be the conclusion in which the template created
in the prior chapters will be applied to the recent actions of North Korea to generate a
better understanding of the events. These events will then be extrapolated upon in an
attempt to conjecture upon what they might tell about the future of North Korea.
Chapter 2: What Do We Know?
Theoretical Framework
The theoretical framework of this study encompasses the theories of
Constructivism28, Realism29, and Post-Structuralism30. The amalgamation of these will
help prove the argument of this thesis which is that Kim regime utilizes Nuclear
Diplomacy as a means to maintain power through stabilizing internal dissent whilst
obtaining external concessions to aid their dilapidated infrastructure. The utilization of
Constructivism is important when dealing with how North Korea views entities such as
the Six-Party Talks, states such as the United States and South Korea, and when viewing
the means by which the Kim Regime maintains its legitimacy. Unlike Kim Il-Sung, who
was a revolutionary that fought against the Japanese in Manchuria, neither Kim Jong Il
                                                        
28 Constructivist thinkers in the field of International Relations include Alexander Wendt, John Rugie, and
Kathyrn Sikkink.
29 Realist thinkers in the realm of International Relations include Hans Morgenthau, Kenneth Waltz, and
John Mearsheimer.
30 Post-Structuralist authors include Michael Foucault, Jacques Derrida, and Roland Barthes who are
viewed as the three founding members of Post-Structuralism.
Gershon 18
nor Kim Jong Un have military experience on their resume.31 From a sociological
standpoint, this presents a major hindrance on the legitimacy of their rule for they do not
have this personality of a fearless, nationalistic leader that formulated around Kim Il-
Sung. What is necessary for the ruler of an autocratic regime is the development of a cult
of personality centered around the ruler based off of what sociologist Max Weber
described as charismatic authority.32 For Kim Il-Sung, this was simple for his actions
during WWII and the Korean War were enough to solidify his cult. The problem that
North Korea faces with Kim Jong Il and Kim Jong Un is that they had to routinize this
charisma so that they are viewed in the same light as Kim Il-Sung.33The propaganda
machine in North Korea turns adoration and veneration for their leaders into a personality
cult making the leaders demigods. An example of this is how Kim Il-Sung is still
considered the “Eternal President” despite his death nearly sixteen years ago.34 In order to
completely understand how North Korea maintains this sense of a personality cult
amongst its people and the means by which it accomplishes this, which include the
demonization of the West, one must utilize the Constructivist lens. The fallacy of solely
utilizing Constructivism is that it does not account for the importance of military power,
                                                        
Press, 2008), 24.
32 Max Weber originally defined it as “"resting on devotion to the exceptional sanctity, heroism or
exemplary character of an individual person, and of the normative patterns or order revealed or ordained by
him." Since his original description of this term it has become bastardized into the sense that it is utilized
today—being charisma. (Source: Max Weber, The Theory Of Social And Economic Organization (New
York: Free Press, 1997).)
33 No one will ever be as idolized in North Korea as Kim Il-Sung currently is. It has been said that many
members of the North Korean population will begin to joyfully cry when discussing the importance of Kim
Il-Sung to North Korea.
Press, 2008), 24.
Gershon 19
zero-sum game, and security—all of which are variables that are key to fully
understanding North Korea.
Realism provides an excellent analysis of these variables; it can be utilized to
understand a majority of North Korea’s actions on the international stage as well as
helping to add some insight into the importance of nuclear weapons to North Korea. It
can also help extrapolate upon the security dynamic in the Northeast Asian region which
will shed light upon the actions of the United States, South Korea, and China in relation
to North Korea. A fallacy is solely utilizing the Realist lens is that it cannot explain how
legitimacy can be a source of military power which is pertinent to understanding North
Korea—this can be analyzed utilizing Constructivism.
Post-Structuralism will be utilized to combine the theories of Realism and
Constructivism. The problem with Post-Structuralist theory is that it is too esoteric in
nature to be able to be a main theory in this research. While Realism and Constructivism
are mainstream theories in International Relations, thereby not needing a cursory
explanation of what they entail, Post-Structuralism is not normally utilized in the
International Relations rhetoric requiring a brief explanation of the theory and what it
entails.
Post-Structuralism, instead of treating the production of knowledge as simply a
cognitive matter, treats it as a normative and political matter.35 It states that power and
knowledge are mutually supportive matters; that power shapes knowledge and knowledge
                                                        
35 Scott Burchill, Richard Devetak, Jack Donnelly, Andrew Linklater, Terry Nardin, Matthew Paterson,
Christian Reus-Smit, and Jacqui True, Theories of International Relations, Fourth ed (New York: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2009), 184.
Gershon 20
shapes power. Objectivity in knowledge does not exist for all knowledge is shaped
through the power dynamic—history is written by the victor. Post-Structuralism concerns
itself with counter-histories, “expos[ing] the process of exclusion and covering which
make possible the teleological idea of history as a unified story unfolding with a clear
beginning, middle, and end.”36 As example of this, pertinent to this study, is Roland
Bleiker’s Divided Korea : Toward a Culture of Reconciliation which utilizes this
concept of power shaping knowledge to understand the roots of the conflict on the
Korean Peninsula and to recommend policy options towards a more peaceful future in
North and South Korean relations.37 Too few authors and policy makers engage with this
sense of a counter-history when dealing with North Korea which becomes a glaring issue
when formulation policy recommendations and attempting to explain why North Korea
has acted the way that it does.
The means by which this paper will attempt to achieve this counter-history, in
regards to North Korea, is through the utilization of two of Post-Structuralism’s founding
pillars—Deconstruction and Double Reading. Deconstruction is “a general mode of
radically unsettling what are taken to be stable concepts and conceptual oppositions. Its
main point is to demonstrate the effects and costs produced by the settled concepts and
oppositions, to disclose the parasitical relationship between opposed terms and to attempt
a displacement of them.”38 Conceptual oppositions are never neutral, they are inevitably
hierarchical, and Deconstruction looks for this hierarchical structure. It is particularly
                                                        
36 Ibid., 185.
37 Roland Bleiker, Divided Korea: Toward a Culture of Reconciliation (Minneapolis : University of
Minnesota Press, 2005).
38 Ibid., 191.
Gershon 21
concerned with locating the elements of instability that ineradicably threaten any
totality.39 It’s concerned with both “the construction and deconstruction of any totality,
whether a text, theory, discourse, structure”, etc.40
Double Reading is the means by which Deconstruction is achieved; the process by
which a Double Reading occurs is through the reading of a work twice over. The first
reading is “a commentary or repetition of the dominant interpretation—this is, a reading
which demonstrates how a text, discourse or institution achieves the stability-effect.”41
The point here is to search for how the text is coherent and consistent with itself—it
attempts to elaborate on how the identity of the text is constituted. The second reading
attempts to unsettle the discoveries of the first reading by “applying pressure to those
points of instability within a text...”42 It exposes the internal tensions and how they are
incompletely covered over in the text. The text is never totally at one with itself; it always
carries within it elements of tension and crisis which render the entirety of the document
unstable.43
The task of Double Reading as a mode of Deconstruction is an attempt to
understand how “a discourse or social institution is assembled or put together, but at the
same time to show how it is always already threatened with its undoing.”44 It is not the
intention of Deconstruction/Double Reading to arrive at a single, conclusive reading—the
tension creating by this duality of readings is something that is omnipresent. The point of
                                                        
39 Ibid., 192.
40 Ibid., 192.
41 Ibid., 192.
42 Ibid., 192.
43 Ibid., 192.
44 Ibid., 192.
Gershon 22
this exercise is to “expose how any story depends on the repression of internal tensions in
order to produce a stable effect of homogeneity and continuity.”45
The importance of Double Reading and Deconstruction in the greater context of
Post-Structuralism as it applies to this thesis is that it is a means to cipher out the biases
innately placed in the literature on North Korea. Much of the literature on North Korea
will only attempt to convey a single point and, through the utilization of these pillars of
Post-Structuralism, the undercurrent that it attempts to cover up will be hashed out. In the
greater whole, Post-Structuralism allows an analysis of the importance of the North
Korean regime and its promulgation of propaganda conveyed as knowledge to its people.
It shows how the North Korea power structure controls the knowledge of the North
Korean people—thereby controlling them and being able to indoctrinate them to
whatever cause they want. This theory also allows one to look at mutual relationships.
Too often than not, scholars merely look at how North Korean policy affects the United
States and other great powers as opposed to this being a reciprocal affect; the utilization
of Post-Structuralism will allow for this mutuality to be studied.
Instead of continually having to rehash that the theory being utilized in this study
as an amalgamation of Realism, Constructivism, and Post-Structuralism, these theories
were combined into a newly dubbed theory—Subversive Realism. This theory is merely
a conglomeration of the previous three theories depicted above—the unification of the
strong points from all of these theories provides the most accurate chance at
understanding North Korea’s actions in the context of Nuclear Diplomacy. The problem
                                                        
45 Ibid., 193.
Gershon 23
with utilizing a new theory is that it has been untested and, therefore, its validity is
questionable. This can be negated for two reasons: authenticity of the variables and real-
world error. While Subversive Realism is a newly defined theory, it is a combination of
authentic International Relations variables which help justify its legitimacy. With regards
to the real-world error, all IR theories run into the issue of applicability in the real world
and, therefore, this issue can be negated for this theory is no different from any other
theory postulated by an academic scholar. With the methodology now in place, it is
possible to explain how the study of North Korean Nuclear Diplomacy will be
approached.
Research Design
this thesis will argue that the Kim regime utilizes Nuclear Diplomacy as a means
to maintain power through stabilizing internal dissent whilst obtaining external
concessions to aid their dilapidated infrastructure. As mentioned in the Introductory
Chapter of this thesis, the empirical-testing ground for my thesis will be the utilization of
a single case study, the Fifth Round of the Six Party Talks, as the event to which I will
apply Odell’s Disciplined Interpretative Case Study and Van Evera’s Process Tracing. A
case study allows the testing of theories against real world events to see which portion(s)
of the theories hold up when placed in the context of reality; it provides a means to which
the hypothesis can be accurately tested.46 Without the utilization of a case study the thesis
is merely a metaphysical gathering of abstract thoughts that do not actually prove or
disprove anything grounded in reality.

                                                        
Press, 1997), 66.
Gershon 24
The reasoning behind the selection of the Fifth Round of the Six Party Talks as
the case study in this analysis arises from its temporal location, the involvement of a
multitude of countries—all of which poses a different means in confronting the North
Korea problem, and the fact that this portion of the Six Party Talks has the most precise
instances of Nuclear Diplomacy and Brinkmanship which will be of great assistance to
this study. On top of this, there is an abundance of literature from a wide-range of
academic sources on the Fifth Round of the SPT because of the importance of the events
that occurred during its span. The case study being the Fifth Round of Talks will allow an
analyzation of Nuclear Diplomacy in the context of the July 5th missile launches, the first
North Korean nuclear test, and various other forms of Brinkmanship that spanned this
round of Talks.47 The Six Party Talks, as a whole, are important for the way that they
ended, with North Korea storming off, refusing any future multilateral talks, and
performing their Second Nuclear Weapons Test, which set the tone for the future
international rhetoric of North Korea.48
The Disciplined Interpretative Case Study, alongside Process Tracing, will work
alongside the implementation of Subversive Realism in an attempt to cipher out answers
to the research questions posed in the Introduction. What will be occurring with the
Disciplined Interpretive Case Study is an attempt to understand the use of Nuclear
Diplomacy through the SPT by applying Subversive Realism—a theory that has never be
applied to any study of North Korea’s Nuclear Diplomacy.
                                                        
48 Mark Landler, “North Korea Says It Will Halt Talks and Restart Its Nuclear Program”, New York Times,
April 14, 2009, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/15/world/asia/15korea.html?_r=1.
Gershon 25
However, two issues arise from the utilization of the Disciplined Interpretative
Case Study: selective reconstruction and the fallacies of Subversive Realism. The later of
the two was hashed out in the previous chapter so it is a non-issue. Selective
reconstruction is the problem of subliminally reconstructing an event so that it melds with
the study being conducted and the theories being applied to it so that one arrives at a
certain answer.49 The way that this will be avoided is through a cognizant analysis of all
events utilizing Post-Structuralism’s Double Reading which will force an avid study of
every aspect of the literature so as to not negate anything of importance to the research.
Process Tracing allows the backwards tracing of the “causal process that produces
the case outcome, at each stage inferring from the context what caused each cause.”50 The
cause and effect link that connects both the independent variable and outcome is divided
into smaller steps and then each step is analyzed for observable evidence.51 This
methodology helps break down the SPT into individualized segments and see how some
variables lead to one outcome in the SPT while other variables lead to other outcomes.
The research methods will be utilizing primary and secondary sources to gather
information. Primary resources encapsulate American/South Korean newspapers,
speeches by foreign diplomats, journal articles from established organizations such as
Foreign Policy, World Affairs, etc., and official documents from the United States’
Government, the UN, and the SPT. The secondary sources will come from books, journal
articles, and interviews from experts on North Korea and the Northeast Asian region.
                                                        
49 John S. Odell, “Case Study Methods in International Political Economy”, International Studies
Perspectives 2 (2001): 164.
Press, 1997), 66.
51 Ibid., 64.
Gershon 26
This amalgamation of sources allows for a broad range of information to be processed
thereby lowering the chance of missing an important point that could end up skewing the
study.
Literature Review
The books analyzed in this study can be divided into four separate categories:
Regional North Korean Policy, United States’ North Korean Policy, the internal structure
of North Korea, and the growth and utilization of North Korea’s Nuclear Diplomacy.
The first set of books deal with the regional policies of North Korea with an
emphasis on South Korea, Japan, and China. All of these books were published after
1993 so each has the threat of Nuclear Diplomacy intertwined into its foreign diplomatic
analysis for 1993 introduced the world to North Korea’s utilization of Nuclear Diplomacy
and Brinkmanship through the First Nuclear Crisis.52 These books seek to analyze
various concepts surrounding North Korea such as North Korean policy coordination in
the context of great power relations in Northeast Asia; how the handling of North Korea
by the great powers in Northeast Asia influences the power dynamic of the region; and
the growing economic gap between North Korea and South Korea and its affect on inter-
Korean relations.
The importance of South Korea in the North Korean dynamic is multifaceted and
revolves around its historical narrative apropos of North Korea as well as its importance
on the international stage. South Korean safety is constantly utilized as a bargaining tool
for North Korea because Seoul would be the main target of any North Korean military
                                                        
Gershon 27
attack stemming from of its relative closeness to the North and its global economic
importance. Despite this, as authors such as Myers point out, South Korea’s strong sense
of ethno-nationalism, plus many South Korean newspapers’ leftist views regarding North
Korea, constantly taper Seoul’s response to any North Korean provocation.53 This creates
an interesting dynamic amongst scholars whose works contribute to this paper for there
are certain theorists (i.e. Son and Kim) who believe South Korea should reestablish the
economic engagement with North Korea that began with the regime of Kim Dae-jung
under the nomenclature of the Sunshine Policy.54 This is juxtaposed with views of other
academics (i.e. Pritchard and Ford/Kwon) who point out that economic engagement is
merely utilized by North Korea as leverage in their pursuit of nuclear weapons.55 They
believe that South Korea must stop treating North Korean provocations so lightly for
these actions are interpreted by the North as an intrinsic weakness in South Korea which
can be exploited.
These authors view South Korean/North Korean relations through a Realist or a
Constructivist lens—acting as if these two theories are mutually exclusive. For example,
Myers utilizes a Constructivist lens in his arguement that North Korea has an upper hand
on South Korea for the collective identity56 of the South Korean people is one that
                                                        
53 B.R Myers, “North Korea Will Never Play Nice,” The New York Times, November 24, 2010,
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/25/opinion/25myers.html.
54 Key-young Son, South Korean Engagement Policies and North Korea (London: Routledge, 2003).
(Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 2007); Glyn Ford and Soyoung Kwon. North Korea on the
Brink: A Struggle for Survival (Ann Arbor: Pluto Press, 2008).
56 A collective identity refers to individuals' sense of belonging to a group. The collective identity forms a
part of the personal identity of the person over time. When this sense of a collective identity becomes
strong enough it can triumph over portions of one’s personal identity thereby taking away a sense of
individualism. (Source: B.R. Myers, The Cleanest Race: How North Koreans See Themselves—And Why It
Matters (Brooklyn: Melville House, 2010).)
Gershon 28
encompasses the North Koreans too and therefore handicaps them when it is time to
pressure or punish the North Korean regime for its aggressive actions.57 He fails to
combine this collective identity with the paranoia of the Kim regime in its struggle for
regional power and security from the threat of the pro-Western forces. This is a consistent
issue arising from this set of literature that justifies the need for a new analyzation
through the innovative theory of Subversive Realism.
These books present some incorrect assumptions that justify the need for this
research paper. A major assumption in this literature is that South Korea lacks the
physical ability to standup to North Korea. Economically, where it is vastly superior to
North Korea, its attempts to impose sanctions have been negated through the constant
funneling of funds through North Korea’s northern neighbor, China. The authors assume
that because of South Korea’s sense of ethno-nationalism and the constant threat of an
attack by North Korea that South Korea’s response to nearly any provocation by North
Korea will be subdued. While this has been the case in past provocations, recent events
(i.e. Cheonan sinking and Yeonpyeong Island shelling) present a strong possibility of
changing this dynamic. The Yeonpyeong Island attack was the first attack since the end
of the Korean War58 that not only occurred on South Korean land but also involved the
loss of civilian life.59 This inserts a variable that has never truly been in-play before in
this dynamic being a direct attack on South Korean soil which resulted in the loss of non-
                                                        
58 The Korean War is technically not over for the 1953 Armistice was never fully ratified into a peace
treaty but most academics merely state that it is over for the dearth of military confrontation since this time
period.
Gershon 29
military life. Also, these books fail to completely analyze the importance of South Korea
being a democratic institution and the affect this has on its relations with a nuclearized
North Korea. An example of this is that during the span of the SPT, South Korea
underwent three presidential changes (Kim Dae-jung, Roh Moo-hyun, and Lee Myung-
bak) each of whom brought a new North Korean policy to into office with them.60 The
lack of a consistent North Korean policy, which is a general fallacy of democratic
institutions, makes it so certain reforms put in place are not given the necessary time to
develop and mature in an effective manner.
The literature on China and North Korea in the age of Nuclear Diplomacy
presents a more unified view amongst academics in that many of them (i.e. Kwak/Joo,
Cooper, and Pritchard) view China as a major player in the North Korean paradigm and
one in which there is an immeasurable influence on the external actions of North Korea.61
China’s position in the SPT was constantly grounded in pro-North Korean rhetoric; this
can also be said for China’s role on the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) in
which its veto power leads to any sanctions against North Korea being categorically
watered down. What makes this literature important is what was discovered when various
confidential United States documents leaked to the public in November 2010. These
documents present a China that is not as in control of North Korea as analysts have
believed and one that has become fed up with the constant actions of an irrational regime
                                                        
60 Uk Heo and Terence Roehrig, South Korea Since 1980 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010).
61 Tae-Hwan Kwak and Seung-Ho Joo, eds., Peace Regime Building on the Korean Peninsula and
Northeast Asian Security Cooperation (Surrey: Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2010); Helene Cooper,
“Asking China to Act Like the U.S”, The New York Times, November 27, 2010,
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/28/weekinreview/28cooper.html; Charles L Pritchard, Failed Diplomacy:
The Tragic Story of How North Korea Got the Bomb (Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press,
2007).
Gershon 30
that acts like a “spoiled child”.62 It is important to re-engage with these texts for this will
show the fallacies in these documents.
The main theory utilized in this set of literature derives from the Realist school of
thought. The authors portray China’s support of North Korea as a manifestation of its
anti-Western rhetoric for a collapse of North Korea presents the strong possibility of a
pro-Western unified Korea bordering China which would acutely hinder its desire for
hegemonic rule in the region.63 North Korea needs China to bolster its importance upon
the international stage and as a means to confront the pro-Western forces that have major
qualms with North Korea’s actions. The issue arising in this text is that the hegemonic
structure of the China-North Korean friendship is one that presents the perfect
opportunity to utilize Post-Structuralist theory. The authors see this friendship as
mutually beneficial but see China as the main actor with North Korea following when
one must look at how certain actions of North Korea force the hand of China.
The major assumption amongst these authors is that China is, by far, the most
informed country regarding North Korea’s actions and that North Korea does not act on
the international stage without either having China’s permission or without viewing their
actions in the context of how it might affect their friendship with China. Recently
published documents, as noted above, lay out a different structure in which North Korea
is not as observant to Chinese hegemony as previously thought and the Chinese are
                                                        
62 Chris Hogg, “Wikileaks cables: China ‘frustrated’ by North Korea”, BBC, November 30, 2010.,
63 Seung-Ho Joo and Tae-Hwan Kwan, eds. North Korea’s Second Nuclear Crisis and Northeast Asian
Security (Hampshire: Ashgate, 2007).
Gershon 31
beginning to become aggravated with North Korea’s actions.64 When one places this new
paradigm in the context of the SPT the zeitgeist of the SPT changes dramatically and
must be scrutinized more so than occurs in this literature.
The second set of books deal with the United States relations with a nuclearized
North Korea. These books focus on North Korean Nuclear Diplomacy through the lens of
the United States as opposed to an East Asian lens that is viewing United States/North
Korean relations. This is important for it infuses a Western view into a mostly Eastern
literature set. The authors in this category can be divided into two sections with one
tending to focus on US/North Korea relations in the context of the SPT (i.e. Pritchard) 65
while other authors tend to focus on post-SPT and the ramifications this has on the
contemporary power dynamic on the Korean Peninsula.66 The difference is that this later
set of books are more concerned with what the possible collapse of North Korea could
mean regarding Nuclear Proliferation and Korean Unification and how the United States
fits into this situation.
What is very important about these books is that they show the United States’
governmental view of North Korea. This offers a better understanding of the actions
taken by the United States since 1993 regarding its North Korean policy. The United
States is, arguably, the most important player in dealings with North Korea for many of
                                                        
64 Chris Hogg, “Wikileaks cables: China ‘frustrated’ by North Korea,” BBC, November 30, 2010,
65 Charles L Pritchard, Failed Diplomacy: The Tragic Story of How North Korea Got the Bomb
(Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 2007).
66 Donald A. L. Macintyre, Gi-Wook Shin, and Daniel C. Sneider, eds., First Drafts of Korea: The U.S.
Media and Perceptions of the Last Cold War Frontier (Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press,
2009); Leon V. Sigal, Disarming Strangers: Nuclear Diplomacy with North Korea (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1997).
Gershon 32
North Korea’s demands deal with bringing the United States to the negotiating table.
North Korea views the United States as the main power broker in the multilateral
organizations and therefore believes that it must circumvent the roadblocks posed by
these organizations and directly deal with the United States if it wants to obtain its
foreign policy goals.
The major assumption in this literature which provides a reason for this research
is that this literature views North Korean-United States relations solely through a Realist
lens. The blame for this does not completely fall upon the academics for, as Carles L.
Pritchard the ambassador and special envoy for negotiations with Norht Korea (2001-
2003), so aptly described it the United States, during George W. Bush’s tenure, viewed
North Korea only as a bellicose actor. This is shown by the quote, attributed to then Vice-
President Dick Cheney, stating, “I have been charged by the president with making sure
that none of the tyrannies in the world are negotiated with. We don’t negotiate with evil
we defeat it.”67 The Bush administrations inability to view North Korea as anything
besides this “Axis of Evil” severely limited their political leverage regarding the Hermit
Kingdom. These actions and viewpoints set the United States-North Korean relations
back years and negated any progress made during the Clinton Administration.
The dealings between North Korea and the United States must include both a
Constructivist and Post-Structuralist viewpoint to have any validity. Constructivism helps
one understand how the North Korean regime must indoctrinate its people with the
collective identity of America as a serious threat so that the personality cult surrounding
                                                        
67 Charles L Pritchard, Failed Diplomacy: The Tragic Story of How North Korea Got the Bomb
(Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 2007), 103.
Gershon 33
its leaders remains. Post-Structuralism is important for many of these works, just like the
previously discussed works on China, negate looking at the duality of the relationship
between North Korea and the United States. They would rather view the United States as
reacting to North Korea’s actions as opposed to these two things not being mutually
exclusive. This relation is much too complex to merely be viewed through a theoretical
concept whose main focus is power relations and a zero-sum game. In order to truly
understand this relationship a study must encapsulate the Realist perspective with
Constructivism while utilizing Post-Structuralism as an underpinning.
The third set of works revolves around the internal structure of North Korea.
While the previous two sets of literature have looked at how North Korea’s Nuclear
Diplomacy shaped relations between North Korea and various states, this set of literature
offers a glance inside the Hermit Kingdom which can offer a better insight into the
importance of nuclear weapons to North Korea. Certain works, such as Ford and Kwon,
discuss the history of North Korea from the post-Korean War era until contemporary
times.68 The importance of this set of literature is that it provides the background from
which the growth of North Korea’s Nuclear Diplomacy can be scrutinized. Allowing one
to see what internal events were occurring in the country during certain key external
events (i.e. the Nuclear Tests, the 1993 withdrawal from the NPT, etc.) allows for a more
extensive view as to why these external events occurred and can lead to the discovery of
pertinent information that was not discussed in the literature available. Also, when
dealing with a topic as sensitive and controversial as North Korea the more facts that one
                                                        
Press, 2008).
Gershon 34
is able to collect the better for it provides a broader view of events thereby assuaging any
biases that are innately present in the literature.
These works’ casual arguments can be divided into two distinct sections: those
that utilize the Constructivist viewpoint when viewing North Korea’s internal structure
and those that utilize a Realist viewpoint. Those utilizing the Constructivist viewpoint
include Ford/Kwok, Foster, and Martin who view internal change in North Korea in the
context of how it might alter the collective identity of the North Korean people and the
personality cult that surrounds the Kim family.69 This contributes to this thesis for it
shows how Nuclear Diplomacy is being utilized to maintain this aura of a collective
identity in the sense of how the North Korean’s view their leader and how they view the
outside world both of which are vital to the maintenance of the regime.
Those utilizing the Realist viewpoint include Michishita, Myers, Jong-Yil, and
Salmon who view changes in the internal structure of North Korea in the context of how
it threatens the viability of the Kim regime and how it alters their views of the Korean
Peninsula as a zero-sum game.70 In this context, Nuclear Diplomacy can be seen as the
means by which North Korea can flaunt its power and prove that it has major influence
                                                        
Press, 2008); Aidan-Carter Foster, “For the Kims, the Weakest Link is Family”, Asia Times, October 22,
2010, http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/LJ22Dg01.html; Bradley K. Martin, “North Korea: Pity the
Son of Kim Jong Il”, GlobalPost, September 27, 2010, http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/north-
korea/100927/kim-jong-il-un-succession.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/25/opinion/25myers.html; Narushige Michishita,. North Korea's
Military-Diplomatic Campaigns, 1966-2008 (New York: Routledge, 2010); Andrew Salmon, “Theories
abound on N. Korea attack”, CNN, November 24, 2010, http://articles.cnn.com/2010-11-
24/world/north.korea.attack.analysis_1_defense-minister-kim-tae-young-pyongyang-succession-
process?_s=PM:WORLD; Ra Jong-Yil, “North Korea’s ‘Military First’ Politics are Behind Recent
Attacks”, Christian Science Monitor, November 26, 2010,
http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Opinion/2010/1123/North-Korea-s-military-first-politics-are-
behind-recent-attacks.
Gershon 35
on the international stage. Internally, it is struggling but, as this literature suggests, that
will not matter as long as the “threat” of outside forces is great enough to distract the
North Koreans from their obvious suffering.
A major assumption in this literature that furthers the need for a re-analyzation of
the facts presented is that these authors assume that North Korea can be viewed through
either a Realist or Constructivist lens—much like many of the previously authors. The
problem with this is that North Korea is such a complex entity that viewing it merely
though either the Realist or Constructivist lens only covers a minute amount of the causal
variables present and, if a fully-detailed analysis of North Korea’s Nuclear Diplomacy is
to be generated, one must look at all of the variables present. Also, with the exception of
Ford/Kwon, the authors do not mention the effect of the collapse of the USSR on the
contemporary North Korean structure. The downfall of the USSR beget an economic
downturn in North Korea for the USSR provided North Korea with weapons, aid (both
monetary and physically), and backing in the international community. This spurred a
period of economic decline that continues to this day and is only assuaged with the help
of China. The situation created by the downfall of the USSR is something that cannot be
neglected in the context of North Korea’s Nuclear Diplomacy for it was only four years
after its downfall that the First Nuclear Crisis occurred setting a new path in North
Korean foreign diplomacy.

Gershon 36
The forth set of literature deals with the growth of North Korea’s nuclear prowess
and its ever-growing use of Nuclear Diplomacy.71 These set of books analyze the growth
of North Korea’s Nuclear Diplomacy and the meaning of nuclear weapons to North
Korea. This is very important because in order to comprehend the larger picture (i.e.
Nuclear Diplomacy) it is important to understand all the little parts that make up the
whole (i.e. the meaning of nuclear weapons to North Korea, the utilization of military
threats as opposed to various other means of diplomatic interactions, etc.).
The major assumption in this set of literature is that North Korea utilizes Nuclear
Diplomacy for mere power gains. Power, as it is discussed in these works, deals with
having a presence on the international stage. While it is true that North Korea does not
posses the economic means to help it evolve into a major player on the global stage there
is much more to this than is discussed in the aforementioned literature. To truly
understand the importance of Nuclear Proliferation to North Korea it is vital to look at the
historical narrative of the Korean Peninsula, the influence of power politics in the region,
and intra-North Korean politics amongst an amalgamation of other issues. This study will
                                                        
71 Bruce E. Bechtol, Red Rogue: The Persistent Challenge of North Korea (Dulles: Potomac Books, Inc,
2007); Charles L. Pritchard, Failed Diplomacy: The Tragic Story of How North Korea Got the Bomb
(Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 2007); Glyn Ford and Soyoung Kwon, North Korea on the
Brink: A Struggle for Survival (Ann Arbor: Pluto Press, 2008); Narushige Michishita, North Korea's
Military-Diplomatic Campaigns, 1966-2008 (New York: Routledge, 2010).
Gershon 37
attempt to delve into all of these to provide a more scrupulous view of the North Korean
nuclear program and North Korea’s use of Nuclear Diplomacy. It is with this laid out that
this thesis can now progress into a discussion of the internal structure of the Hermit
Kingdom.
Chapter 3: A Glance into the Hermit Kingdom
Internal Structure
One of the major overarching fallacies in any North Korean analysis is a
misinterpretation of its internal structure ranging from the social structure to the
etymological nomenclature prescribed to the form of government present in Pyongyang.
In order to produce a viable analysis of North Korea’s employment of Nuclear
Diplomacy it is pertinent to produce a clear and concise definition of certain terms, such
as the governmental structure or North Korea and the personality cult around Kim Jong
Il, so that for the duration of this study their significance is not misconstrued. The hope of
this section is to present a cursory glance of these variables so that the common fallacies
are pointed out. This section will not aim to provide a detailed analysis of these
definitions for that would shift the emphasis of the paper away from its original purpose
being that the Kim regime utilizes Nuclear Diplomacy as a means to maintain power
through stabilizing internal dissent whilst obtaining external concessions to aid their
dilapidated infrastructure.
The governmental structure of the regime in Pyongyang is Authoritarian with the
legitimacy of rule not stemming from some divine being but from the concept of a
personality cult. The term that can be used to describe this structure is a “Communist
Gershon 38
Monarchy” but, always bearing in mind, that the term Communist is not synonymous
with Soviet Russia. The type of rule in North Korea is vastly different to that of its father
state, the USSR.72 Without providing tangential information, the differences between
North Korea and the USSR range from the way in which the leaders are praised to the
way that the people view themselves as citizens of the state. A personality cult manifest
itself when a “one-man dictatorship presents itself as a democracy” and the goal of this
personality cult is to “convey impression that due to the ruler’s unique qualifications and
unanimity of the people’s love from him, his rule constitutes the perfect fulfillment of
democratic ideals.”73 The utterance of “Democracy” should not be interpreted as the
yearning for the Kim regime to present itself as a bona fide form of rule produced from
some metaphysical lining of democratic norms present in North Korea—quite the
opposite is true. The term Democracy in this sense speaks more to fact that natural forces
endowed the Kim lineage with the perfect embodiment of ethnic virtues making them the
just rulers for the Korean people. In order to do this, the North Korean propaganda
machine must convey the sense that whatever Kim is in charge is the most “naïve,
spontaneous, loving, and pure Korean—most Korean, Korean—ever.”74 This shows a
difference between Pyongyang and the USSR for “[p]raising a leader as the perfect
embodiment of ethnic virtues is less extravagant than praising him, as Stalin was praised,
as the highest authority in every science.”75 By truncating the level of extravagant praise
placed upon the ruler to more tangible, more humanesque, it presents the North Korean
                                                        
72 Aidan-Carter Foster, “For the Kims, the Weakest Link is Family,” Asia Times, October 22, 2010,
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/LJ22Dg01.html.
73 Ibid., 98.
74 Ibid., 98.
75 Ibid., 165.
Gershon 39
people with a concept that is much easier to believe than claiming that their leader is as a
demigod of academia.
The importance of understanding the internal structure of North Korea to this
thesis revolves around the utilization of Nuclear Diplomacy by the Kim regime as a
means to maintain power over the North Korean people. In order to fully comprehend
how this is accomplished it is vital to understand how the country is internally structured.
Not only this but understanding the internal structure of North Korea will help in
understanding a variety of their actions during the Fifth Round of the Six Party Talks.
External Views
The brief overview of the internal structure of the North Korean government
creates the grounds from which a discussion of their external views can be constructed.
Discussing the external views of the Hermit Kingdom alone could be the subject of an
entirely separate thesis and for this reason this discussion will be limited to their views
regarding the three most important actors in the Fifth Round of the Six-Party Talks:
China, South Korea, and the United States. The reasoning behind attributing these three
states (and North Korea) as the most important actors in the Six-Party Talks will become
more apparent the more this paper delves into the topic. But, as a cursory explanation,
Japan’s main concern during the entirety of the SPT was on reparations from the North
Korean kidnapping of Japanese citizens earlier in the century and Russia was only
brought into the SPT at the behest of North Korea to balance out the South Korean-
Japan-United States alliance. China is North Korea’s main ally and functions as their
Gershon 40
proxy on the United Nation Security Council. South Korea and the United States, on the
other hand, function as the scapegoat for the North Korean propaganda machine.
Chinese-North Korean Relations
Chinese-Korean relations were forged on the battlefield during the Korean War
when Chinese troops crossed the border to aid their Korean comrades in the fight against
the “Imperialist” Americans.76 The Chinese-North Korean relationship can be quite
intricate depending on the context in which it is analyzed. From the Chinese point of
view, North Korea is a strategic asset apropos of its relations with America.77 North
Korea presents a geopolitical buffer between China’s Asiatic hegemonic aspirations and
the largest threat to this dream—pro-American South Korea. It is for this reason, and the
fact that the collapse of the North Korean regime would lead to a mass influx of
malnourished and impoverished Koreans into China’s northeast region, that China is the
largest economic donor to the Kim regime. Because of the fear of this flood of North
Korean immigrants, a preview of which occurred during the widespread famines in the
mid-1990s78, China will never take severe, de-habilitating actions against North Korea.79
China’s two billion dollars worth of annual trade with Pyongyang accounts for more than
                                                        
76 Ra Jong-Yil, “North Korea’s ‘Military First’ Politics are Behind Recent Attacks,” Christian Science
Monitor, November 26, 2010, http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Global-
Viewpoint/2010/1126/North-Korea-s-military-first-politics-are-behind-recent-attacks.
77 Ibid.
78 Estimates are that a million people—roughly 5% of the North Korean population—died from hunger
related causes during the worst period of the famine (1995-1997) with ten of thousands fleeing to China.
(Source: B.R Myers, The Cleanest Race: How North Koreans See Themselves—And Why It Matters
(Brooklyn: Melville House, 2010), 53).
79 Ibid., 28.
Gershon 41
forty percent of North Korea’s external trade.80 Also, “by some estimates, China provides
eighty percent of North Korea's consumer goods and forty-five percent of its food.”81  
The discussion of the Chinese views of North Korea is important for it will help
convey how complex the North Korean views and treatment of China are by comparison.
North Korea has become quite dependent on Chinese assistance since the downfall of the
Soviet Union—a fact that they are not willing to readily admit for that would question the
strength of the Kim regime and everything that they have told their people. The most
accurate way to describe the North Korean stance on China is anecdotally through the
First Nuclear Crisis (2006) which will be discussed in-depth later on in this paper.82
North Korea is well aware that China is their only true ally and possesses an "emerging
role as a global actor with increasing international responsibilities and prestige and a
commitment to North Korea as an ally with whom China shares longstanding historical
and ideological ties."83 This came into their calculation when they attempted their First
Nuclear Test for, despite the fact that China signed UN Security Council Resolution
171884 following the test, North Korea is well aware of their mutually beneficial
relationship with China. It is for this reason that they do not fear a volte-face by China
and can, thereby; assert their importance on the international stage through acts such as
this without the fear of ruthless Chinese retribution.
                                                        
Northeast Asian Security Cooperation. Surrey (Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2010), 28.
81 Jayshree Bajoria, “The China-North Korea Relationship,” Council on Foreign Relations, October 7,
2010, http://www.cfr.org/publication/11097/chinanorth_korea_relationship.html#p3.
82 Ibid.
83 Ibid.
84 This resolution imposed sanctions upon North Korea; its full description can be accessed here:
http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N06/572/07/PDF/N0657207.pdf?OpenElement
Gershon 42
These actions can also be explained by looking at the aid that North Korea
receives from China. If North Korea merely received goods from China, without these
types of physically threatening actions, it could be seen as “aid” despite whatever the
local propaganda might purport. The inability of the local propaganda to fully sway the
North Korean people is a contemporary problem facing the Hermit Kingdom due to the
deterioration of the information cordon85. Because of this, North Korea must substantiate,
in the eyes of its people, that it has the upper hand in the Chinese-North Korean
relationship. The relationship must come off as a hierarchical one in which “subservient”
China is more-or-less paying tribute86 to the Kim regime through their economic
offerings. This anaylzation of the hierarchical structure of the North Korean-Chinese
relationship is a perfect instance to implement the utilization of Post-Structuralism. In
reality, China is far superior to North Korea in arguably every measurable aspect but
through the Kim regimes control over the means of knowledge dispersion (e.g. the news,
the educational system, etc.), the Kim regime can make the North Korean people believe
that North Korea is the superior country.
What can be gleaned from the prior two paragraphs is that China needs North
Korea as a physical landmass to separate it from South Korea while North Korea direly
needs the Chinese economic aid and political clout but cannot openly admit this and must
                                                        
85 In the late 1990s, when North Korean’s were fleeing over the border into China during the famine, many
of them would not live in China and, instead, opt to bring goods back to their starving families. Included in
these goods were smuggled TVs which are utilized, to this day, to illegally watch Chinese/South Korean
news. This newly discovered access to information is dubbed “the deterioration of the information cordon”
for the North Korean people now have other ways to get their news besides government-sanctioned
newscasts which makes it much harder on the North Korean regime to bend the truth.
86 What is interesting in this is that it is an attempt to completely reserve the historical narrative forged
between the two countries. Up until around the time of the Opium Wars (mid-19th century), the Korean
Peninsula was a tributary of the Chinese Empire.
Gershon 43
convey the view that they are the more powerful state in this two-state dynamic. These
brief descriptions should be enough to provide a strong critique of the recent articles,
stemming from the accidental release of classified State Department documents, that
China has become “fed up” with North Korea and would not render the unification of the
Korean Peninsula under control of South Korea out of the question.87 Currently, the only
government who wants Korean Unification, whether their objection is for economic or
geo-political reasons, is North Korea—as long as they are the ones doing the reunifying.
Any bona fide scenario concerning a Southern-lead reunification of Korea must involve
the demise of the DPRK—the outcome of which could be disastrous.
This discussion relates to the argument posed in this thesis in that it encapsulates
both the political power and the despair variables in the logic behind North Korea’s
utilization of Nuclear Diplomacy. China manifests itself, to North Korea, as an entity to
help North Korea circumvent the occlusion between them and a presence on the world
stage. On top of this, China, as mentioned above, is a major supplier of aid to North
Korea which helps keep the regime running. North Korea cannot be seen as a lesser state
than China, which it would appear so if it just accepted the aid given out by the Chinese,
so it must act with threatening overtures on the world stage—though, it is important to
remember, never acting in such a manner directly towards China. This way, North Korea
receives the aid they so desperately need while maintaining their aura of near infallibility
amongst the North Korean people.
                                                        
87 Simon Tisdall, “Wikileaks cables reveal China 'ready to abandon North Korea',” Guardian, November
29, 2010, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/nov/29/wikileaks-cables-china-reunified-korea.
Gershon 44
South Korean-North Korean Relations
Relations between South Korea and North Korea are even more complex than
they are between North Korea and China for the historical narrative and collective
identity amongst the two bordering nations begets an odd, albeit ever changing, dynamic.
The North Korean regime views South Korea as a colony of the “Yankees” (i.e. America)
and it is North Korea’s job to free their enchained brethren.88 While, because of the
deterioration of the information cordon, the North has had to admit the higher quality of
life in the South, this is negated, in the eyes of the Northern propaganda machine, by the
national and moral inferiority of their Southern brethren through their interactions with
America.89 What North Korean propaganda purports is that “ no amount of wealth…can
still the southern brethren’s yearning for freedom and purification.”90 So, while their
Southern brethren may be better off monetarily, they are encapsulated by the American
nightmare and it is the job of their powerful Northern brothers to free them. North Korean
propaganda has also permeated the idea that South Koreans revere Kim Jong Il even
more than their elected leaders—who are, according to North Korea, chosen by the
United States in rigged elections.
What has anchored the South Korean people to their Northern brethren is their
infallible sense of ethno-nationalism91 that has withstood various North Korean attacks92
                                                        
88 B.R Myers, The Cleanest Race: How North Koreans See Themselves—And Why It Matters (Brooklyn:
Melville House, 2010), 151.
89 Ibid., 152.
90 Ibid., 155.
91 This ethno-nationalism has begun to waver with the recent attacks previously mentioned in this paper.
There is not enough anecdotal evidence during the writing of this paper to clearly state that the South
Korean sense of ethno-nationalism has all but dissipated. It is for this reason that we will assume that it
remains strong.
Gershon 45
throughout the years.93 Though what has beleaguered a consistent South Korean policy
towards the North is the variance in elected officials views towards North Korea. For
instance, up until the election of Kim Dae Jung, all South Korean Presidents94 held strict
anti-engagement views towards North Korea.95 This would change under Kim Dae Jung
with the implementation of the Sunshine Policy96 which would last until the election of
Lee Myung-Bak in 2008 who reverted to a much stronger anti-North Korean stance. The
lack of a consistent approach to North Korea is something that makes negotiations much
more difficult for Pyongyang is cognizant of the fact that the South Korea’s policy one
year might be the antithesis of the policy the next year.97 Also, occluding a
straightforward relationship with North Korea are South Korea’s relationships with the
United States and with China.
The United States has, for the most part, maintained a vehemently anti-Kim
regime standpoint in dealing with North Korea. This presents a problem to South Korea
                                                        
92 For a summary of all the North Korean attacks on South Korea visit this website:
http://www.google.com/fusiontables/DataSource?dsrcid=317611.
93 B.R. Myers, “North Korea Will Never Play Nice,” The New York Times, November 24, 2010,
94 Technically speaking, Kim Young Sam was the first democratically elected civilian President in 1993.
Before that, there were a slew of military dictatorships.
96 This policy was named “after the Aesop fable in which the Sun is able to persuade a man to take off his
coat after the North Wind fails to do so.” The policy had three components: 1) Seoul would never tolerate
armed provocation of any kind from North Korea 2) Seoul has no intention to undermine or absorb North
Korea and 3) Seoul will actively push reconciliation and cooperation between the two Koreas beginning
with those areas that can be most easily agreed upon. This opened up economic and social interactions
amongst the two countries including the reunification of families who were separated during the Korean
War. It is argued, by many scholars, to have produced the closest relations amongst the Koreas since the
Korean War. (Source: Gordon G. Chang, Nuclear Showdown: North Korea Takes on the World (New
York: Random House, 2006), 101-102.)
97 The reference to the lack of a consistent approach does not take into account any provocations by North
Korea. It is merely stating that, even if North Korea did not change its policies or force any provocations
between regimes, the policies between South Korean Presidents’ would still change. As will be shown
during this paper, this is a major fallacy in dealing with democratic nations during long-drawn out
negotiations such as the Six Party Talks.
Gershon 46
for the United States provides South Korea with a nuclear umbrella98, a means of
protection against North Korea99, and with military personal and equipment.100 It is for
this reason, and a slew of others101, that South Korea must always take into careful
consideration the opinion of America when dealing with North Korea—further
convoluting their North Korean policy.
Chinese opinion, regarding South Korea’s North Korean policy, cannot be
ignored for the importance of China to South Korea. Not only has South Korea benefited
the most economically amongst its Asian neighbors from the rise of China (it is the
second largest exporter to China) but diplomatically China is a force that South Korea
cannot ignore if it wants to reach its full potential on the world stage.102 Adding this
variable into the equation produces a result in which South Korean foreign strategic
policy regarding North Korea fluctuates between domestic opinion (which is constantly
changing), United States opinion (constantly anti-North Korean), and Chinese opinion
(constantly pro- North Korean), which, obviously, produces quite the byzantine policy.
This relates to the argument presented in the thesis for it draws upon the political
power argument and helps further explain the utilization of Nuclear Diplomacy by North
Korea. One of the main objectives of the North Korean state is to have a voice on the
                                                        
98 A “nuclear umbrella” refers to a promise by a nuclear state to defend a non-nuclear state if it is attacked.
99 What is interesting is that neither Russia nor China provides North Korea with a nuclear umbrella which
adds to North Korea’s list of reasons for why it needs nuclear capabilities. (Source: Tae-Hwan Kwak and
Seung-Ho Joo, eds., Peace Regime Building on the Korean Peninsula and Northeast Asian Security
Cooperation (Surrey: Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2010), 87.)
Northeast Asian Security Cooperation (Surrey: Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2010), 87.
101 Some of the other reasons include: the economic importance of the United States to South Korea, their
historical friendship, and the importance of the United States on the world stage.
102 Francoise Nicolas, Korea and the Dual Chinese Challenge (Seoul: Korea Institute for International
Economic Policy, 2005), 14.
Gershon 47
international stage and one way to accomplish this is through diplomatic channels.
Because of the byzantine and tenuous policies of South Korea accredited to, amongst
other things, their Democratic political structure, North Korea cannot rely purely on these
diplomatic channels without the threat of nuclear weapons. The reason for this is that the
nuclear weapons provide a constant threat to the South Korean regime so that they must
always be consistent in at least one category when dealing with North Korea.
While South Korea is one of the most important actors vis-à-vis North Korean
Nuclear Diplomacy, this thesis will not actively engage with the state. The reason for this
is that North Korean actions are intrinsically laced with policy agendas regarding South
Korea. This section provides pertinent information that should be carried throughout the
thesis even if it is not expunged upon.
United States-North Korean Relations
As has been hashed out above, the United States perception of North Korea and
the Kim regime has been quite consistent throughout the years—North Korea is the
“remnants” of the former USSR molded into something slightly different yet just as evil.
What is salient for a comprehensive understanding of the Six Party Talks is the ability to
fully comprehend how North Korea views the United States. What must be understood is
that in order for the personality cult, and the concept of the “protective mother”103, to
withstand the variables present in North Korea (i.e. a dwindling economy, knowledge of
the socio-economic affluence of their southern neighbors, etc.) and still be viewed as
                                                        
103 This term “protective mother” refers to the way in which the North Korean people view Kim Jong-Il.
Unlike in the USSR, where the leader was viewed as the educating father, North Korea has their people
view their leader as a loving mother whose job it is to protect her young and let them grow though making
errors while maintaining their aura of naivety. (Source: B.R Myers, The Cleanest Race: How North
Koreans See Themselves—And Why It Matters (Brooklyn: Melville House, 2010).)
Gershon 48
infallible there needs to be an external threat from which the people are protected; this
threat manifests itself in the form of the United States.
What is interesting is that the United States operates under the conviction that the
North Korean regime believes the opposite of what it tells its people. United States
diplomats have been quoted saying, “Kim Jong Il doesn’t believe the stuff [i.e. the
personality cult and all of its externalities] himself. He told Madeleine Albright it’s all
fake.”104 It is their belief that the North Korean leadership can be bargained with and are
capable of being convinced of nuclear disarmament. This statement is erroneous for
working alongside the United States would question the mere existence of the DPRK; the
DPRK functions on convincing its citizens that it is the better Korea, the one in the right.
Working alongside the United States would, indirectly, acknowledge Seoul’s right to rule
the peninsula. The dissolution of one of the founding pillars of the DPRK could lead to
innumerable issues for the Hermit Kingdom including the usurpation of the Kim regime
and, it is for this reason, that North Korea can never work alongside the United States.
North Korea must always either have the upper hand or be able to convince its citizens
that it has the upper hand. In the following chapters it is imperative that one always keeps
this in mind. With this in mind, the discussion can now continue on into the Six Party
Talks.
                                                        
Gershon 49
Chapter 4: The Six Party Talks
A Brief Introduction into the Six Party Talks
Before launching into the case study of this thesis it is paramount to provide a
brief introduction to the Six Party Talks so that the intricacies of the Talks can be
analyzed later on without having to interrupt the analysis to delve into the basics. On
October 3, 2002 in Pyongyang there was a bilateral meeting held between the United
States and North Korea in which the United States alerted North Korea that it had
information on the construction of a “secret uranium enrichment plant” in North Korea
which was against the 1994 Agreed Framework.105 Kim Jong Il’s right hand man, Kang
Sok Ju, the First Vice Minster rebutted, “[w]hat is wrong with us having our own
Uranium Enrichment Program? We are entitled to posses our own HEU [Highly Enriched
Uranium], and we are bound to produce more powerful weapons than that.”106
Statements, such as this one, that are delivered with a threatening nuance without plainly
threatening the opposing party, is a staple of North Korean Nuclear Diplomacy and its
subsidiary of Brinkmanship. They usually, as will be shown in the later portions of this
chapter, deliver these statements in such a manner that places the blame upon the United
States for the continual development of North Korea’s nuclear arsenal; if it was not for
                                                        
105 The 1994 Agreed Framework signed between the United States and North Korea in Geneva halted the
construction of nuclear reactors by North Korea. In this document, the two governments agreed to replace
North Korea’s graphite-moderated reactors and related facilities with light-water reactor power plants (less
prone to nuclear proliferation) by 2003. They also agreed to “reduce barriers to trade and investment, to
open a liaison office in each other’s capital, and to upgrade bilateral relations to ambassadorial level.” The
full details of the framework can be found here: http://www.kedo.org/pdfs/AgreedFramework.pdf. (Source:
Chae-Jin Lee, A Troubled Peace: U.S. Policy and The Two Koreas (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins
University Press, 2006), 177-178.
106 Yoichi Funabashi, The Peninsula Question: A Chronicle of the Second Nuclear Crisis (Washington,
D.C.: Brooking Institution Press, 2007), 94.
Gershon 50
the threatening overtones of the United States then North Korea would have no need to
develop these weapons.
After the declaration of their Uranium Enrichment Program, North Korea then
declared the 1994 Agreed Framework nullified but it would not be until January 10, 2003
that they would kick out IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) inspectors and
withdrawal from the NPT107.108 Their reasoning behind the nullification of the framework
is multifaceted but is rooted in the harsh rhetoric of the United States apropos of North
Korea. It was also due to the lack of any substantial progress towards the creation of
LWRs despite the fact that the Agreed Framework clearly stated that the rough deadline
for construction would be 2003.
Tensions continued to escalate as shown by the April 2003 pronouncement by
North Korea that only a physically deterrent force (read: nuclear weapons) could avert a
war and protect the North Korea people from the hostility of America.109 With tensions
rising, China stepped in and organized a set of trilateral meetings between themselves,
North Korea, and the United States from the twenty-third to the twenty-fifth of April in
Beijing.110 The Chinese reasoning behind this can be viewed as merely self-beneficial.
China needs North Korea to act as a buffer between its northern border and South Korea
and also does not want the North Korean regime to collapse for that would lead to a mass
                                                        
107 The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear weapons (NPT) is, in its most basic form, a treaty to
limit the proliferation of nuclear weapons (Source: Gordon G. Chang, Nuclear Showdown: North Korea
Takes on the World (New York: Random House, 2006), 198.)
110 Hazel Smith, Reconstituting Korean Security: A Policy Primer (Tokyo: United Nations University
Press, 2007), 152.
Gershon 51
exodus of North Korean people into China—an event for which China is not currently
prepared. With regards to the United States, the United States is a major Chinese trading
partner so it is important for China to maintain a certain level of rapport when dealing
with the United States.
During these meetings there was a very fine line of discourse that needed to be
followed. The United States refused to engage in bilateral negotiations with North Korea,
a hallmark of the Bush Presidency, so if the meeting appeared to be headed in that
direction the United States would walk out.111 On the other hand, North Korean
provocations over the recent months were, in part, due to their yearning for bilateral
negotiations with the United States112, so it was important to them that these talks appear
somewhat bilateral in nature. Meanwhile, China could not take sides otherwise it would
lose its favorable place within these talks.
While these talks opened the dialogue regarding North Korea’s nuclear armament
it was obvious that it would be a long road to a mutual agreement amongst the parties
involved. The question then presented itself as to if it would be better to maintain the
trilateral format or if it would be more fitting to open the talks to other interested parties,
mainly South Korea and Japan—both of whom have a legitimate role and interest in the
denuclearization of North Korea.113 Pyongyang did not mind the addition of these
countries under two conditions: it would be allowed to meet with the United States
                                                        
111 Ibid., 152.
112 This is a prime example of North Korean Brinkmanship. Their threat of nuclear armament and
withdrawal from the NPT was, in part, due to their desire to bring the United States to the negotiating table.
They could not merely ask the United States to talks for that would make North Korea appear weak and, to
maintain the grip over the North Korean people, this could not happen. It is for this reason that they had to
utilize this brinkmanship to obtain, albeit partially, their objective.
113 Ibid., 153.
Gershon 52
bilaterally on the sidelines during these meetings and that Russia would also be added to
balance out the states present.114 Following this, there were a slew of diplomatic
backchannel talks amongst China and various other states which manifested itself,
eventually, in the birth of the Six Party Talks. The ability to bring together these six very
different nations to discuss the denuclearization of North Korea was quite an
accomplishment and it must be acknowledged that this gathering was due to Chinese
diplomatic capabilities.115 With the outline of the Six Party Talks laid out, the thesis can
now work its way into a discussion of the late-Fourth Round/early Fifth Round of Talks.
The Fifth Round of the Six Party Talks
The End of the Fourth Round—A Precursor To Trouble
“Two Asian men accused of smuggling weapons and counterfeit bills into the United
States laundered $1.15 million in Macau bank accounts”116
-United Press International
The Fifth Round of the Six Party Talks is of paramount importance in the study of
North Korea’s utilization of Nuclear Diplomacy because of the events that occurred, not
only during it, but leading up to it. On August 25, 2005, in between the First and Second
Phase of the Fourth Round of Talks, the above dispatch began circulating throughout
Washington—the reverberations of which would shape the future of the Six Party Talks.
These men, who were part of a larger crime syndicate, “reportedly received $1.15 million
                                                        
114 Ibid., 153.
115 While there intentions may have been more self-centered (i.e. improving their diplomatic clout on the
international stage and hoping that multilateral talks would produce a watered down agreement as is par
with treaties produced via multilateral talks) one still must acknowledge the impressive feat that China
accomplished.
D.C.: Brooking Institution Press, 2007), 410-411.
Gershon 53
from undercover law enforcement agents in exchange for $3.35 million in high-quality
counterfeit dollars” while also receiving a deposit towards a million dollar shipment of
arms including “seventy-five anti-tank missiles, fifty rocket-propelled grenade
launchers…” amongst a slew of other weapons.117 While this appears to lack any
correlation to North Korea, as more details become known it was discovered that one of
the banks at the forefront of the investigation was the Banco Delta Asia (BDA)
headquartered in Macau—forty percent of whose business directly relates to North
Korea.118 The BDA was long suspected as being a primary bank in North Korean money
laundering schemes; all these arrests did was provide tangible evidence to corroborate
this claim. While the counterfeiting of United States’ currency was quite disconcerting, it
was not until the conclusion of the Forth Round of Talks that the United States formally
accused North Korea of illegally manufacturing money119 and issued a warning to U.S.
banks about doing business with the BDA.120 The timing of this action was highly
calculated to the have the largest impact upon the Six Party Talks. By waiting to make a
formal accusation following the Fourth Round of Talks, the United States allowed plenty
of time for backchannel discussions leading up to this Fifth Round of Talks. Not only
this but the United States believed that these actions would hamper North Korea enough
that they would concede some of their demands at the start of the Fifth Round of Talks.
This was poor diplomatic leveraging by the United States for North Korea is not a
                                                        
117 Ibid., 411.
118 Ibid., 412.
119 The actual accusation was surrounding high-quality counterfeit $100 “supernotes” (Source: Charles L.
Pritchard, Failed Diplomacy: The Tragic Story of How North Korea Got the Bomb (Washington, D.C.:
Brookings Institution Press, 2007).)
(Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 2007), 129.
Gershon 54
country that concedes to others and, when it feels its being backed into a corner, will fire
back with a show of physical force.
Adding to the list of punitive measures vis-à-vis North Korea’s money laundering
scheme was the October 2005121 announcement that “under Executive Order 13382”, all
assets of proliferators of WMDs and their delivery vehicles were to be frozen alongside
the Treasury Department prohibiting all transactions between “eight North Korean
companies and any U.S. person and froze any assets that the companies had under U.S.
jurisdiction.”122 In layman’s terms, the United States successfully froze many North
Korean assets in this bank and issued a warning to United States’ companies to stay away
from any investment, linked even in the most indirect of ways, to North Korea. Dually,
this threat was utilized as a means to convince others to follow suit in the freezing of
North Korean assets which occurred when the Macanese froze certain North Korean
accounts in BDA that were valued at $24 million.123 These punitive measures were part
of a new policy the United States was attempted to implement leading into the Fifth
Round of Talks.
The United States “was taking these more aggressive tactics in the hope of
enhancing its bargaining power” apropos of North Korea without taking into
consideration that they were utilizing tactics against the country who mastered the
                                                        
121 One month before the Fifth Round was scheduled to start.
122 “Treasury Targets N. Korean Entities for Supporting WMD Proliferation,” US Fed News, October 12,
2005, https://ustreas.gov/press/releases/js2984.htm.
(Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press), 156.
Gershon 55
utilization of the exact same tactics.124 The United States was attempting to put pressure
upon North Korea to concede some of their demands heading into the Fifth Round of
discussions through these harsh economic sanctions. Utilizing these actions against North
Korea only did one thing though which was make North Korea even more upset and
prone to physically intimidating the United States through a variety of measures
including, as will be discussed later, various missile launches and a nuclear test. When it
comes to obtaining concessions from North Korea the route to pursue is not one steeped
in economic sanctions and thinly veiled threats. This only gives North Korea more
ammunition in the theatrical play where they are the poor, innocent country who is
merely utilizing nuclear empowerment as a deterrent against a larger, much more
threatening, enemy (read: the United States). As previously mentioned, one of the
mainstays of North Korean Nuclear Diplomacy is the concept, purported by the North
Korean propaganda machine, that the United States and its aggressive rhetoric are what is
the driving force behind North Korea’s attempts to gain a nuclear arsenal.
What this event would eventually show is the different ways of thinking between
the United States and North Korea. It was the understanding of the North Korean
delegation that this issue of the frozen accounts would be discussed and resolved at the
next round of Talks (i.e. the Fifth Round) while the United States delegation viewed this
issue as completely detached from the Six Party Talks.125 This lack of communication
would occlude any serious discussion from occurring during the First Phase of the Fifth
                                                        
125 Ibid., 156.
Gershon 56
Round of Talks and be one of the main reasons why North Korea left the Talks and ended
up testing their first Nuclear Weapon. As is one of the main points of this thesis, North
Korea utilizes Nuclear Diplomacy to gain clout upon the international stage. If North
Korea does not think that its voice is being heard or that it is not being taken seriously,
then it counteracts this by some outward display of a physical force. Furthering this lack
of a tangible discussion during the Fifth Round of Talks, which furthered the reasoning
behind the nuclear weapons test, was the issue of the Light Water Reactors stemming
from the September 19th agreement.
September 19th Joint Statement/Issue of Light Water Reactors
At the end of the Second Phase of the Fourth Round126 of Talks, the six nations
involved signed a joint agreement of principles (known as the September 19th Joint
Statement) outlining a detailed roadmap for achieving denuclearization of the Korean
Peninsula.127 This statement reaffirmed that “the goal of the Six-Party Talks is the
verifiable denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula in a peaceful manner,” and provided
that “[t]he DPRK [was] committed to abandoning all nuclear weapons and existing
nuclear programs and returning, at an early date, to the Treaty of the Non-Proliferation of
nuclear weapons and to IAEA safeguards.”128 Many scholars point to the importance of
this document for it was a formal recording of North Korea’s intent to denuclearize in a
peaceful and verifiable manner. The true importance of this is the fact that, if analyzed
from the Subversive Realist perspective, it is obvious that this statement was doomed
                                                        
126 Held in Beijing from September 13-19, 2005.
Security (Hampshire: Ashgate, 2007), 17.
Gershon 57
from the onset which only furthered North Korea’s drive towards complete
nuclearization.
One of the most important parts of this document, the reason that it was doomed
to fail, that is rarely viewed as such, is the North Korean demand for Light Water Rectors
to be built to help out their energy-deprived country. Without the assurance that members
of the Six Party Talks, mainly the United States, would construct these, North Korea was
not going to budge on the nuclear issue.129 This issue of the LWR was a continuation of
North Korea’s frustration stemming from the clause in the 1994 Agreed Framework that
North Korea would shut down their infant nuclear program if KEDO (Korean Peninsula
Energy Development Organization) 130 constructed a LWR in place of the Nuclear Plant.
This construction never manifested itself through diplomatic tight roping by the United
States. During this discussion, the United States claimed that a single LWR would cost
around two to three billion dollars to build and take up to a decade to construct—with this
kind of commitment the United States refused to even begin the official stages of
discussions on the issue until North Korea was completely denuclearized.131 This would
not work alongside North Korean Nuclear Diplomacy for one of the reasons for the
utilization of said diplomatic tool is to obtain concessions, such as the LWRs, to buttress
North Korea’s ailing economy and atrophying infrastructure. Making North Korea
                                                        
Security (Hampshire: Ashgate, 2007), 18.
130 KEDO was founded on March 15, 1995 by a conglomeration of the United States, South Korea, and
Japan. Its purpose was the implementation of the 1994 U.S.-North Korea Agreed Framework which froze
North Korea's indigenous nuclear power plant in Yongbyon in exchange for the construction of a light
water reactor nuclear power plant. The originally target date of completion of this LWR was 2003 but it
kept getting pushed back through diplomatic leveraging by the United States.
131 Ibid., 18.
Gershon 58
basically give up this diplomatic option without, first, giving them concessions goes
against the entire principle that is Nuclear Diplomacy.
The only reason that this statement was agreed on with such an occlusion, being
the United States refusal to act until North Korea was verifiably denuclearized, was that
the United States skirted this issue to the side saying it would be willing to leave aside the
issue of civilian usage of nuclear technology for now so that this agreement would
pass.132 This agreement was merely another case of empty rhetoric utilized amongst the
six nations present in the Six Party Talks all of whom had their own policy goals in
mind.133 The problem with this, especially in relation to the United States, South Korea,
and Japan is that in dealing with North Korea’s Nuclear Diplomacy, one must, at least
act, as if they are placing North Korea’s political agenda first. Otherwise, North Korea
will counteract this with a physical display of force which would eventually occur after
the First Phase of the Fifth Round of Talks. It was with this agreement being signed that
signaled the end of the Forth Round of Talks and would be on the forefront of the agenda
at the start of the Fifth Round. Before continuing on into a discussion of the Fifth Round
of Talks, it is important to reiterate the argument of this thesis which is that that the Kim
regime utilizes Nuclear Diplomacy as a means to maintain power through stabilizing
internal dissent whilst obtaining external concessions to aid their dilapidated
infrastructure.
                                                        
132 Ibid., 18.
133
For instance, Japan wanted reparations for the kidnapping of their citizens by North Korea and China
wanted to maintain its favorable position in these discussions and on the international stage.
Gershon 59
The Fifth Round; Phase 1 (9 Nov – 11 Nov 2005)
A Whole Lot of Nothing
On January 15th, 2006, in an interview with Dan Rather for 60 Minutes, the North
Korean Vice Minister Kim Gye-gwan stated that “[w]e have the opportunity to secure a
system for stopping the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. I think this kind of
opportunity will not come again. Under current conditions, where there is no trust, how
can we give up our weapons first?”134 This quotation is a good indicator of the
atmosphere of contempt surrounding the First Phase of the Fifth Round of Talks; North
Korea wanted the air of gravity surrounding the Talks to be fully understood while
rationalizing their stance on nuclear weaponry. This was also an attempt to force the
United States into a corner utilizing Brinkmanship. North Korea was setting the stage so
that when they did not denuclearize it would be viewed as a failure on the part of the
United States. North Korea is ascribing their inability to denuclearize to the United
States’ threatening overtones whilst trying to maneuver in such a way that they obtain the
LWRs they so desperately need. Neither the United States nor North Korea were willing
to budge on the issues of the LWRs during the First Phase of Talks. The United States
wanted verifiable denuclearization before any investment in LWRs would be made and
North Korea would not denuclearize until they received the LWRs.
A consistent issue that plagued the Six Party Talks was this inability to agree on
the semantics of the Talks—on what was to be included in them, what was not, and also
                                                        
134 Ibid., 132.

Gershon 60
the process by which anything would be implemented. For instance, North Korea wanted
the September 19th Joint Statement to be implemented in phases and refused to make any
attempts at denuclearization until the financial sanctions placed upon them, via Banco
Delta Asia, were lifted.135 This was in line with their utilization of Nuclear Diplomacy
and would be their modus operandi throughout the entirety of the Six Party Talks. The
two days that encompassed the First Phase of the Fifth Round of Talks were un-
substantive for the deadlock regarding the issues discussed above.
An Eventful Year
Following the conclusion of the First Phase of the Fifth Round of Talks, there was
an air of uncertainty as to when the next phase would take place and the events that
occurred after this First Phase would put into question if the Talks would ever resume.
Directly following the conclusion of the First Phase, the U.S. Agency for International
Development publically stated its cessation of food aid to North Korea and KEDO began
preliminary discussions regarding the dissolution of the LWR project.136 On top of this,
the United States was a co-sponsor on a resolution presented before the United Nations
General Assembly that openly condemned North Korea’s poor human rights record.137
These two things, alongside the continuation of the freeze of the North Korean accounts
in the BDA, greatly piqued the North Koreans.
The United States attempted to assuage this tension by offering to send its main
negotiator to the SPT, Christopher Hill, into a briefing session with North Korea
                                                        
135 “Kim Kye Gwan Interviewed in Beijing”, KCNA, November 12, 2005,
http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/library/news/dprk/2005/dprk-051114-kcna06.htm.
137 Ibid., 170.
Gershon 61
regarding the economic sanctions. Things did not go as planned and, in December 2005,
the North Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) openly denounced the actions of the
United States and drew a direct correlation between the resumption of the Six Party Talks
to the United States’ attitude.138 Once again, North Korea placed the blame on the United
States in an attempt to back them into a corner and, hopefully, force their hand so to save
face amongst the international community.
Furthering the dissolution of the tenuous relationship between North Korea and
the United States was the January 2006 withdrawal, by KEDO, of all workers from the
LWR site in North Korea.139 This was, in part, diplomatic leveraging by the United States
to force North Korea to stop forging United States currency but all that it accomplished
was to continue the downward spiral of relations between the two countries. In March,
there was a meeting in New York between the two countries in which North Korea
reemphasized that lifting economic sanctions against it would be a prerequisite for the
North’s return to the Six Party Talks.140 In a typical show of Brinkmanship, North Korea
emphasized the importance of bringing them back to the SPT by launching two anti-ship
missiles into the Sea of Japan.141 The United States responded by having the U.S.
Department of the Treasury add a Swiss company to the list of “designees supporting the
                                                        
138 “FM Spokesman Blasts Virulent Outcries of U.S. Ambassador to S. Korea,” KCNA, December 10,
2005, http://www.kcna.co.jp/item/2005/200512/news12/12.htm.
140 Ibid., 171.
141 Ibid., 171.
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proliferation of WMD for their involvement with North Korea.”142 Needless to say, this
was not the response that North Korea expected; they responded accordingly and
escalated tensions further.
In May, there were reports of sightings of preliminary preparations for a missile
test in North Korea. This was, unfortunately, followed by KEDO’s announcement that it
would officially be terminating the LWR project indefinitely.143 In response to this
action, the MFA announced that the escalation of hostility by the United States would
only be met with an increase in military buildup by North Korea. However, they did
extend an invitation to Christopher Hill to visit Pyongyang144 which, in return, was
rejected by the United States government.145 The abject refusal to engage with North
Korea and the continual reciprocated elevation of threats manifested itself in a display of
military brazen by the North on July 5th (or the afternoon of July 4th in America). Though,
before analyzing the details behind this event, it is important to break down the above
information and show how it supports the argument laid out in the thesis. The argument
stipulates that North Korea utilizes Nuclear Diplomacy to gain clout upon the
international stage, to maintain the subservience of the North Korean people, and to gain
concessions to bolster its struggling economy.
                                                        
142 “Swiss Company, Individual Designated by Treasury for Supporting North Korean WMD
Proliferation,” U.S. Department of the Treasury, March 30, 2006,
http://ustreas.gov/press/releases/js4144.htm.
144
This is inline with Nuclear Diplomacy for North Korea wants to maintain their air of
superiority/threatening nature but still needs to be somewhat diplomatic so states will still bargain with it
and not totally refuse diplomatic engagement (e.g. Non-state actors).
145 “DPRK Foreign Ministry; DPRK’s Stand on Six-Party Talks Reclarified,” KCNA, July 1, 2006,
http://www.kcna.co.jp/item/2006/200606/news06/02.htm.
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The variable that will be utilized as a explanation regarding how these actions by
the United States only bolster North Korea’s utilization of Nuclear Diplomacy is the
withdrawal of food aid. The concept that the American cessation of food aid would
somehow convince the ruling party of North Korea to lighten its demands is absolutely
ludicrous. Actually, this action helps add validity to the concept of Nuclear Diplomacy
and furthers the Kim’s hold on power. The withdrawal of food aid from North Korea by
the United States was utilized by the North Korean propaganda machine to purport the
concept of the evil American forces—further justifying their need for Nuclear Diplomacy
to protect the North Korean people. One would not take food away from a starving dog
for that would merely antagonize the animal and the same can be applied to North Korea.
North Korea utilizes Nuclear Diplomacy, in part, to obtain food aid from the United
States so, by taking this away, the United States is merely giving North Korea a reason to
utilize this form of diplomacy. Not only this but North Korea views this cessation of food
aid as an affront to their position on their international stage—if they allow the United
States to dictate their intake of aid then it questions how much clout they truly posses on
the world stage and can bring into question the validity of the ruling party. It is with this
in mind that the discussion regarding the July 4th missile launch can occur.
Not Your Typical 4th of July Fireworks Show
From 3 a.m. until 5:20 p.m. on July 5th (North Korean time), North Korea
launched seven “Scud, No Dong, and Taepo Dong 2” missiles146 in the Sea of Japan
                                                        
146 The first, fourth, and sixth missiles were classified, respectively, as Scud D, Scud C, and Scud ER
missiles while the second, fifth, and seventh as No Dong and the third being classified as a Taepo Dong 2
missile. The Scud and No Dong missiles were successfully launched in the northeast direction between the
Russian Far East and Hokkaido Island (Northern Japan) but the Taepo Dong 2 launch failed miserable with
Gershon 64
despite strong international warnings against such actions. The next day, the MFA issued
a statement in which they noted that “the missile launches had been part of routine
military exercises to increase defense capacity”, that the Korean People’s Army (KPA)
would continue with missile launch exercises in the near future, and that the DPRK
would take sterner physical actions if they faced increasing pressure from the
international community.147 These actions were taken out of frustration over the inability
to make in progress in the context of the Six Party Talks so, as is commonplace with
Nuclear Diplomacy, when things do not appear to be going North Korea’s way, they use
a display of brazen physical force to show the gravity of the situation.
A little over a week later, on July 15, the UNSC adopted Resolution 1695 which
required member states to prevent the transfer and procurement “of missiles and missile-
related items, materials, goods and technology to and from North Korea, as well as the
transfer of any financial resources in relation to North Korea’s missile or WMD
programs.”148 While this appeared to be a very important resolution, especially because
it meant that China was agreeing with the United States since they are both on the UNSC
and have the power to veto any resolution, the resolution did not permit the use of force
so there was no means of implementing the resolution. Without having the ability to
forceful check North Korean cargo ships for WMD material, the member state of the UN
would have to ask the permission of the crew to board the ship which they obviously
                                                        
the missile disintegrating mere tens of seconds after its launch. (Source: Adam Ward, ed., “North Korea’s
5 July Missile Tests, Strategic Comments, vol 12, issue 6 (London: Taylor & Francis Ltd, July 2006)).
147 “DPRK Foreign Ministry Spokesman on Its Missile Launches,” KCNA, July 6, 2006,
Routledge, 2010), 171-172.
Gershon 65
would not be granted. It is for this reason that this Resolution can be seen as empty
rhetoric and a diplomatic masterpiece by China. China was able to maintain its face in the
international community by placing punitive measures upon North Korea but did not
cripple the North Korean regime through the absence of this use of force measure.
The North Korean response to this action was arguing that the United States was
attempting to “describe the issue between the DPRK and the U.S. as an issue between the
DPRK and the UN and form an international alliance against the DPRK.”149 They went
on to state that the DPRK would “bolster its war deterrent for self-defense in every way
by all means and methods” sending a clear message to the United States.150 Once again,
North Korea is justifying their utilization of Nuclear Diplomacy as stemming from the
harsh rhetoric of the United States in an attempt to place the blame for North Korea’s
actions on the United States in hopes that this would force the United States to change
their North Korea policy. The opposite occurred and the United States responded by
stating that the Bank of China had also recently frozen some North Korean assets in its
Macau Bank which was a verbal slap-in-the-face by the United States for they were
publically acknowledging that China, North Korea’s most important ally, had sided with
the United States on this issue.151 While these actions by China should be viewed more as
China saving face amongst the international community as opposed to turning on North
Korea, the United States used these actions as diplomatic leveraging and skewed them as
China turning on North Korea. For some reason, the United States believed that going
                                                        
149 “DPRK Foreign Ministry Refutes ‘Resolution of UN Security Council,” KCNA, July 16, 2006,
150 Ibid.
Gershon 66
toe-to-toe with North Korea would lead to North Korea backing down and toning down
its demands but, as can be expected by now, the opposite happened manifesting itself in
the October 2006 Nuclear Test.
The October Nuclear Test
The refusal of the United States to unfreeze its financial sanctions and the
continual inability for either North Korea or the United States to make any progress
towards finding common ground on a slew of issues became a point of frustration for
North Korea. The failure of the July 4th/5th missile launches to gain any concessions from
the United States truly put North Korea in an awkward situation—their modus operandi,
the utilization of Nuclear Diplomacy to gain concessions and to move the dialogue in a
more favorable position for themselves—was failing. Not only this but China, North
Korea’s largest ally, not only let a UNSC Resolution pass against North Korea without
vetoing it but the Central Bank of China followed the United States is freezing North
Korean assets in the BDA. While the aura in the international environment was slowly
turning against North Korea, North Korea did have one major advantage in having the
SPT stalled—it allowed them time to further develop their nuclear arsenal.
In mid-August 2006, memos were circulating throughout Washington that there
was surmounting evidence of a nuclear test in the makings in North Korea; around a
suspected test site there was suspicious vehicle movement alongside “wire bundles used
to monitor an underground test.”152 Following this discovery, on September 21st,
Christopher Hill publically revealed that he proposed a “bilateral working group
                                                        
152 Ibid., 172.
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[alongside North Korea] to discuss financial sanctions on the condition that the North
Koreans came back to the Six-Party Talks.”153 While it is disputed how much the
discovery of the nuclear test site had on this announcement it should be noted the time
period and the location in which this announcement was made.
This announcement came about a month after the discover of the nuclear test site
and was delivered at the United Nations—ensuring that North Korea, and the rest of the
world, would hear it. This can be viewed as an attempt by the United States to show the
world that they were actively attempting to engage in discussions with North Korea
thereby attempting to circumvent the stalemate that was occluding the Six Party Talks. A
major downside to this delivery, and the reason why it can be viewed as empty political
rhetoric aimed at the United States saving face amongst the international community, is
that the United States stipulated that North Korea must return to the SPT in order for a
discussion regarding the financial sanctions to even be broached. It should be becoming
quite apparent that making North Korea act first, without giving them any concessions is
doomed to fail. This is especially true when the topic at hand is one of the pillars of their
Nuclear Diplomacy—economic incentives.
The failure to reach a common ground with North Korea, once again, began to
negatively manifest itself on October 3 when the MFA released a three-point statement
which explained that: 1) North Korea was going to conduct a nuclear test, 2) North Korea
would never use the nuclear weapon first and would strictly prohibit the threat of a
nuclear weapon transfer, and 3) the North Korean government would work its hardest to
                                                        
153 Christopher Hill, On-the-Record Briefing – 61st UN General Assembly, New York, September 21,
2006.
Gershon 68
“realize the denuclearization of the peninsula and give momentum to worldwide nuclear
disarmament and ultimate denuclearization.”154 What is interesting is the innate
contradiction between the first and third points—North Korea was going to test a nuclear
weapon but was fully committed to denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula. Despite this
contradiction, this statement is completely in line with North Korea’s Nuclear
Diplomacy. In order for North Korea’s threats to be taken seriously, and to continue the
rapport it has constructed within the international community, North Korea needs to
continue the growth of its Nuclear Program. This way, the threatening overtures that they
take vis-à-vis the international community are seen as bona fide which increases the
chance of them manifesting themselves in the form of concessions—either physical or
monetarily. The mentioning of the commitment to the denuclearization of the Korean
Peninsula was a mere political perfunctory move to elucidate the feeling that North
Korea’s Nuclear Program was for defensive purposes thereby directing the blame for the
development of the program onto the United States. It was from this statement that the
motions were put in place for the actual nuclear test on October 9th.
On October 9th, 2006, around eleven a.m. Korean time, North Korea conducted its
first official nuclear test in the Northeast region of the country. Following this was a two-
day period in which North Korea let the world revel in its actions before having the MFA
issue an October 11th statement in which it reiterated its stance that it conducted the
nuclear test because of threatening overtures from the United States but was still
                                                        
154 “DPRK Foreign Ministry Clarifies Stand on New Measure to Bolters War Deterrent,” KCNA, October
3, 2006, http://www.kcna.co.jp/item/2006/200610/news10/04.htm.
Gershon 69
dedicated to the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.155 The statement continued by
saying that the nuclear test “does not contradict the September 19th Joint Statement under
which it committed itself to dismantle nuclear weapons and abandon the existing Nuclear
Program” citing that the nuclear weapons test constituted a positive measure for the
implementation of the September 19th Joint Statement.156 This statement concluded with
the omnipotent warning that if the United States increased the pressure upon the Hermit
Kingdom that North Korea would view this as a declaration of war and take the
appropriate physical countermeasures.157 This was a merely reiteration of the October 3rd
statement with the only variance being that North Korea produced tangible proof of their
nuclear capabilities which emphasized the importance of time in relations to moving past
the stalemate.
As is commonplace with most North Korean provocations, the response to these
actions was the October 14th unanimous adoption of a UNSC Resolution—this time being
Resolution 1718. This required the member states of the United Nations to take the
necessary measures to make it difficult for North Korea to acquire “a) major conventional
weapon systems, b) all items, materials, equipment, goods, and technology which could
contribute to nuclear-related ballistic missile-related, or other WMD related programs,
and c) luxury goods.”158 Like previous resolutions, Resolution 1718 mentioned Chapter
VII and Article 41 of the UN Charter, which “allowed for such measures as interruption
of economic relations and the severance of diplomatic relations”, but, once again, did not
                                                        
155 “DPRK Foreign Ministry Spokesman on U.S. Moves Concerning Its Nuclear Test,” KCNA, October
11, 2006, http://www.kcna.co.jp/item/2006/200610/news10/12.htm.
156 Ibid.
157 Ibid.
158 United Nations Security Council, Resolution 1718 (2006), S/RES/1718, October 14, 2006.
Gershon 70
mention Article 42 which allowed the use of military force to enforce said regulations.
Once again, this was more empty rhetoric by the United Nations—attempting to punish
the North Korean regime without providing the means by which to uphold this
punishment.
An Volte-Face: The Changing US Policy Apropos Of North Korea
The United States, instead of abiding by their normal praxis of merely utilizing
the UN to punish North Korea, changed their paradigm apropos of North Korea and
opted for direct engagement. On October 31st, a mere twenty-two days after the First
Nuclear Weapons Test, bilateral discussions between the United States and North Korea
were held in Beijing. During these talks, Hill reiterated the United States willingness to
resolve the BDA issue separately from the SPT and it was under this backdrop that North
Korea announced it would return to the SPT.159
Towards the end of November, additional US-DPRK bilateral meetings were held
in Beijing in which the “Early Harvest” proposal was presented to North Korea.160 This
proposal set forth a reciprocal arrangement between the United States and North Korea in
which, if North Korea stopped its nuclear activities at Nyongbyon161, allowed IAEA
inspectors back into the country, presented a list of its nuclear related programs and
facilities, and shut down its nuclear test sites by 2008 then the United States would send
food and energy aid, discuss ways in which to best end the BDA sanctions, normalize
                                                        
159 Mike Chinoy, Meltdown: The Inside Story of the North Korea Nuclear Crisis (New York: St. Martin’s
Press, 2008), 306-307.
161 The Yongbyon Nuclear Scientific Research Center, a major component of the North Korean Nuclear
Program, is located here
Gershon 71
diplomatic relations, and establish a peace regime on the Korean Peninsula.162 Once
again, attempting to have North Korea make the first move was a political nightmare and
the North Korean regime was opposed to these terms and would only consider them if the
BDA issue was first addressed. Despite this, one must analyze the importance of the
October Nuclear Test in relations to Nuclear Diplomacy and bringing the United States to
the negotiating table.
The United States decision to begin bilateral negotiations with North Korea,
something that was antipodal to their strategy utilized up until this point, was partially a
result of North Korea’s successful utilization of Nuclear Diplomacy. North Korea was
not pleased that their list of demands were not being treated as seriously as they should
and viewed this as a direct affront to their position amongst the world community. It was
under this pretext that the Second Phase of the Fifth Round of Talks began on December
18th, 2006.
The Fifth Round; Phase II (December 18th-22nd, 2006)
This phase of the Talks started off with Kim Kye Gwan, the North Korean
representative to the SPT and the First Vice Minister of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
stating that the September 19th Joint Statement would not be implemented until the BDA
sanctions were lifted.163 The issue of the BDA sanctions were being hashed out outside
the contexts of the SPT between the United States and North Korea and culminated, at
the end of the Fifth Round of Talks, with North Korea criticizing the United States for
                                                        
162 Ibid., 173.
Press, 2008), 315.
Gershon 72
failing to lift the sanctions which occurred concurrently as the United States discovered
renewed nuclear actives in North Korea.164 This inability to come to terms with, not only
the terms with which the BDA issue would be met, but the inability to figure out the
structure of the discussions constantly plagued this round of the Six-Party Talks. It was
events like this one that occluded a serious discourse during this round of Talks and beget
events like the July 4th Missile Launch at the October 9th Nuclear Weapons Test. These
actions, then, can be seen as an attempt to jumpstart this stalemate, via Nuclear
Diplomacy, and have the United States make some concessions to North Korea in this
department.
Much like the First Phase of the Fifth Round of Talks, the Second Phase did not
make any progress towards dealing with North Korea’s Nuclear Weapons Program
because of certain roadblocks such as this stalemate over the BDA issue. All that was
formulated during this phase was the reaffirmation that each side was committed to
implementing the September 19th Joint Statement which had come into being over a year
ago and yet there was still no tangible evidence of the six nations moving any closer to
the ratification and implementation of said statement. It would not be until the end of the
Third Phase of the Fifth Round of Talks, in February 2007 that an action plan would be
adopted on how to implement the 2005 Joint Statement.
The slow pace at which the SPT operated also had a negative affect upon dealing
with North Korea and played directly into their utilization of Nuclear Diplomacy. In
dealing with a country that is a growing nuclear threat time is one of the most important
                                                        
164 Ibid., 316.
Gershon 73
factors for it is a necessity to find a common ground with said country before their
nuclear arsenal is fully functional and begins to outwardly expand. Part of North Korea’s
Nuclear Diplomacy centered around utilizing it, at certain key times, to remind the world
of the importance of haste in dealing with their demands. By not actively engaging with
North Korea and, instead, allowing time to pass the United States and the other nations of
the Six-Party Talks played into North Korea’s hand. They allowed North Korea to gain a
nuclear arsenal whilst allowing them to hide behind the veil of innocence purported by
the temporal longevity between meetings.
One would expect that, since no progress was made during this phase of the
Talks, North Korea would act out on the international stage ala what occurred following
the First Phase of Talks. The reason that this did not happen, thereby holding up the
assumptions set forth in this paper, is that the United States was concurrently engaging in
bilateral talks with North Korea during, and following, the Second Phase of Talks. In
fact, in January 2007, there was an agreement reached between the United States and
North Korea dubbed the “Berlin Agreements”165 in which North Korea promised to shut
down their nuclear facilities in Nyongbyon within a sixty day timeframe and, in
exchange, would receive heavy fuel oil (HFO)166—the details of said agreement were set
to be formalized at the next session of the Six-Party Talks.167 Once again, a meeting
                                                        
165 It was named this because the talks were held in Berlin. What is interesting is that these talks did not
occur in Beijing which had become commonplace between North Korea and the United States. North
Korea allowing this meeting to be held in a Western country, and outside their comfort zone, is quite
unusual for the Hermit Kingdom.
166 The exact amount of HFO was 500,000 tons per year. (Source: Mike Chinoy, Meltdown: The Inside
Story of the North Korea Nuclear Crisis (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2008)).
Press, 2008), 320.
Gershon 74
occurred between these two powers where they reached a conclusion but refused to fully
implement it until a later date. Also, later in January, North Korean and American
officials met again to discuss the financial sanctions the United States still had against
North Korea but there was not any progress made between the two. It was with this in
mind that the Third, and final, Phase of the Fifth Round of Talks began.
The Fifth Round; Phase III (February 8th- 13th, 2007)
The main emphasis heading into this phase of Talks was finally adopting the 2005
Joint Statement which meant intense politicking so that all involved parties would find
the terms agreeable. On the final day of the Talks, February 13th, this came into fruition
with a plan of action to adopt the Joint Statement finally being agreed upon. This plan
would be implemented in two phases with the first being a sixty-day initial phase in
which North Korea would “shut down and seal for the purpose of eventual abandonment
the Nyongbyon Nuclear Facility, including the reprocessing facility, and invite back
IAEA personnel” with the other countries providing “emergency energy assistance
equivalent to 50,000 tons of HFO.”168 Once this was completed, the second phase would
be implemented in which North Korea would provide a complete declaration of all their
nuclear programs and all existing nuclear facilities would be disabled and in return the
other countries would provide North Korea with “economic, energy, and humanitarian
assistance up to the equivalent of one million tons of HFO, including the initial shipment
                                                        
Gershon 75
equivalent to 50, 000 tons.”169 Alongside this was the promise that the United States and
North Korea would continue the discussions regarding the BDA sanctions within thirty
days of the conclusion of the Fifth Round of Talks.170
In March, directly following this round of Talks, the United States Department of
the Treasury unfroze roughly twenty-five million dollars that were frozen in BDA—
effectively lifting the pre-Fifth Round Sanctions.171 This would be followed, a few
months later, with North Korea shutting down and sealing their nuclear reactors thereby
fulfilling their end of the agreement.
This raises the issue of why did North Korea follow through with what they
promised seeing that closing the nuclear reactors would, arguably, end their utilization of
Nuclear Diplomacy for they could no longer threat the usage of nuclear weapons to gain
concessions from other powers. This issue can be skirted aside for two reasons: the first
being that North Korea has to, occasionally, concede to some demands so that they
appear rational enough to bargain with in the context of the international community. If
North Korea only threatened other world powers without ever showing their willingness
to work alongside said powers then no one would be willing to cooperate with them or
attempt to reach a common ground—much like how countries refuse to engage with
certain non-state actors such as Al-Qaeda. The key term in Nuclear Diplomacy is
diplomacy—the art of dealing with other countries in an effective manner. It would be
                                                        
169 “ Initial Actions for the Implementation of the Joint Statement,” Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the
People’s Republic of China, February 13, 2007, http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/eng/zxxx/t297463.htm.
Press, 2008), 326.
171 U.S. Department of the Treasury, “Statement by the DAD Glaser on the Disposition of DPRK-Related
Funds Frozen at Banco Delta Asia.” HP-322, March 19, 2007.
Gershon 76
very ineffective to only demand concessions from other countries without ever willing to
shown one’s willingness to give back.
The second reason why this issue is not as serious as it appears is that it is almost
commonplace knowledge that North Korea has more clandestine nuclear reactors. The
stipulations of the Joint Statement laid out that North Korea had to disclose all of their
nuclear facilities, allow IAEA inspectors back into their country, and close off said
reactors in order to receive the aid promised by the other countries. There is no tangible
evidence, apart from conjecture, that North Korea posses these hidden nuclear sites so
there is no reason for North Korea to declare that they exist because no one can prove
otherwise. This agreement plays quite well into North Korea’s hand—they can declare
that they are nuclear free, receive the concessions that they dearly need, and yet secretly
maintain their nuclear weapons. This way if things are not going their way or if other
countries are beginning to backtrack on their promises (read: the United States and the
1994 Agreed Framework) North Korea can, once again, declare themselves a nuclearized
state and resume their utilization of Nuclear Diplomacy.
Chapter Five: Conclusion
What We Have Learned
The argument laid out in this thesis is that North Korea utilizes Nuclear
Diplomacy to accomplish three main goals: maintaining power over its people, have a
voice within the international community, and to help buttress its ailing infrastructure.
The way Nuclear Diplomacy is utilized to maintain the subservience of the North Korean
people is through the constant, internally constructed, outside threat that justifies the
Gershon 77
utilization of Kim Jong Il’s “Military First” policy. By keeping the military on constant
high alert and increasing North Korea’s nuclear arsenal, Kim Jong Il makes the concept
of a villainous and threatening America a tangible notion. It is through this tangible
manifestation that Kim Jong Il and the North Korean propaganda machine can impress
upon the North Korean people their need for Kim Jong Il as their protector.
This utilization of Nuclear Diplomacy forms a collective identity, utilizing the
Constructivist lens, amongst the North Korean people that Kim Jong Il is the last line of
resistance between the innocent North Korean people and the villainous West thereby
justifying his rule. If it were not for this constant threat posed by the outside world, the
North Korean people would begin to see how dire their situation is and Kim Jong Il’s
hold on power would halter for there would no longer be need for him, and his “Military
First” policy, to protect the people.
Nuclear Diplomacy is utilized to gain clout on the international stage for it
provides something that the rest of the world must take into account when formulating
their foreign political agenda. North Korea, apart from their nuclear arsenal, has nothing
of importance to offer on the world stage. Their infrastructure has atrophied since the
downfall of the USSR and there are no natural resources present there—the only thing
they have to offer on the world stage that makes them of importance is their volatile
threats of a nuclear holocaust. It is because of said arsenal that countries must always
account for the North Korean variable when formulating East Asian policy options.
Nuclear Diplomacy guarantees that North Korea’s voice will always be audible on the
world stage and is one of the reasons why North Korea will never denuclearize. No
matter what incentives are presented to North Korea, denuclearization means that North
Gershon 78
Korea looses their largest bargaining tool on the world stage and the variable that helps
maintain the view of the villainous outsider.
The threat of the North Korean nuclear arsenal presents the perfect means by
which to gain concessions from the outside world and buttress their ailing economy.
North Korea is constantly in dire need of aid, both physical and monetary, to continue to
function but it cannot merely ask for said aid for that would deconstruct the image set
forth by the North Korean propaganda machine that North Korea is the greatest country
in the world. Not only this, but receiving unconditional aid from the United States would
go against decades of propaganda which help formulate the collective identity of the
United States as this evil outside force set on the destruction of the North. If this image
were deconstructed then Kim Jong Il would lose one of the key pillars justifying his rule
which could set in motion a stream of events leading to the eventual downfall of the Dear
Leader. It is for this reason that any aid that North Korea receives must be viewed as a
concession from the other party out of said party’s fear of North Korea’s nuclear arsenal.
In layman’s terms: North Korea must always been seen as having the upper hand in any
situation so as to maintain the air of superiority amongst its people.
The Importance Of This Study To International Relations
The importance of this study in the greater context of International Relations is
that is provides tangible proof of what occurs when a rogue state obtains nuclear
weapons. Nuclear Proliferation has become a hot-button issue in the International
Relations paradigm regarding global security with one of the major areas of concern
being when rogue states or non-state actors obtain nuclear weapons. North Korea cannot
be utilized to conjecture what will occur when non-state actors obtain nuclear weapons
Gershon 79
for, as a sovereign nation, they operate differently than a non-state actor would. However,
they are a rogue state and their situation can thereby be broadened to obtain an outline for
what occurs when rogue states obtain the bomb.
What can also be gleaned from this study is the importance of North Korea’s
Nuclear Diplomacy in shaping the future of the Korean Peninsula and, in a greater
context, the future of East Asia. Currently, the Korean Peninsula is the story of polar
opposites—a free South Korea with a booming economy and an oppressive North Korean
regime with a desolate economy. For decades, pundits have falsely declared the looming
end of the North Korean regime and the possibility of a unified Korean Peninsula. While
these claims have yet to come true, one must weigh the importance of the North Korean
arsenal should the North Korean regime topple or begin to topple. If the North Korean
regime begins to collapse, one must account for the fact that North Korea does have
nuclear weapons and would be more inclined to use them if it became blatantly obvious it
was the end of the North Korean state. If this did occur, there is a real possibility that
these weapons would be directed at Seoul and, should they successfully make contact in
Seoul, would send Seoul, and the rest of South Korea, back into third world status while
creating unimaginable damage. Even if this did not occur, a North Korean collapse means
the possession of nuclear weapons by rogue military generals or non-state actors. To this
point, the world has yet to cope with such a scenario but, should it occur, it would
generate enormous tension within the context of the international community.
With regards to the greater context of East Asia, North Korea presents a
geopolitical buffer between China and pro-America South Korea and between potential
Chinese Asiatic hegemony and a stronger American influence in the region. Should
Gershon 80
North Korea collapse, the most likely scenario would be a unified, pro-United States,
Korea which would be a serious affront to Chinese hegemony in the region. This would
further increase the tensions between the two powers, especially considering that one of
the two states (South Korea or China) would garner possession of the North Korean
nuclear arsenal. While China is a nuclearized state, South Korea has relied on the nuclear
umbrella of the United States for protection and their garnering of North Korea’s Nuclear
Program would have serious implications on the future of East Asian security and
political discourse.
The Need For More Research
While this thesis has answered the questions generated in the First Chapter, it has
also discovered certain questions that generate the need for more research to be
conducted. For instance, this research did not touch on the importance of Japan and
Russia apropos of North Korean Nuclear Diplomacy. While, this thesis negated Japan’s
role for their refusal to engage in the Six-Party Talks outside of the context of receiving
reparations for the North Korean kidnapping of Japanese citizens, this refusal to engage
past this point must have some effect on the way in which North Korea operates.
Concurrently, this thesis did not even attempt to cover the Russian influence on North
Korean Nuclear Diplomacy because of the parameters set forth regarding the length of
the thesis and the need to fully engage with what I believe were the most important
countries to North Korea—the United States, China, and South Korea. If North Korea
wanted Russia to join the SPT to counteract the additions of South Korea and Japan then
they must have had a reason for this and this reason should be fully extrapolated upon.
Not just this but even amongst the most important countries to the SPT, South Korea was
Gershon 81
not engaged with to the fullest extent. One could write a thesis solely on the South
Korean-North Korean relations vis-à-vis the SPT and North Korean Nuclear Diplomacy.
More abstractly, it would be very interesting to see how applicable the study of
North Korean’s Nuclear Diplomacy would be to other rogue states and their attempts to
garner nuclear weapons. While it was briefly mentioned at the start of this chapter, there
is much more research to be conducted on this topic which would be extremely valuable
in the formulation of foreign policy. Especially now, with the air of revolution brewing in
many of these rogue states, how the concept of Nuclear Proliferation shapes these
countries should be of the upmost importance. Not only this, but the concept of Nuclear
Proliferation is a relatively new concept and is in dire need of some new research to help
develop the data on it further.
The Future
It is extremely difficult to predict the future in International Relations, especially
when dealing with a country as volatile as North Korea, but this section will attempt to
extrapolate on current events in North Korea and what they might say about the future of
the Hermit Kingdom.
The two events that will be analyzed are the sinking of the ROKS Cheonan in
March 2010 and the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island in November 2010. These two events
will be analyzed simultaneously because their causual variables are the same—the
impending succession of Kim Jong Un. In September 2010, in-between these two events,
the WPK met for the first time in thirty years and Kim Jong Un was anointed the
impending leader of the DPRK. The importance of these two events is that they were
utilized to solidify the Kim’s hold on power and ease the transition from Kim Jong-Il to
Gershon 82
Kim Jong Un. These events were risky for they were direct military attacks, one of which
were the first attack on South Korean soil since the Korean War and accrued civilian
deaths, but this riskiness showed the military’s dedication to the Kim Regime. This is
quite important in the power transition for North Korea operates on a “Military First”
policy so an outward display of military support for the Kim Regime internally helped
quell any dissent that might have arisen in the KWP over the succession of the relatively
unknown and unproven Kim Jong Un.
Currently, North Korea has stated their intent to test a third nuclear weapon
sometime in 2011.172 Utilizing the analysis presented in this thesis to conjecture the
meaning behind this action, it appears to be in part due to Kim Jong Un asserting his
presence on the world stage173 and in part an attempt by the Kim regime to bring America
back to the negotiating table.174 North Korea was relatively quiet following the
Yeonpyeong Island shelling and this weapon test will allow it to, once again, reassert its
presence on the world stage. Not only this but it will be a way to make sure that North
Korean has not fallen off of the United States’ agenda. In summation, one can expect the
                                                        
172 Sunny Lee, “North Korea Set On Third Nuclear Test,” Asia Times, January 22, 2011,
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/MA22Dg01.html.
173 While Kim Jong Il is technically in power until his death, his failing heath and the need to indoctrinate
Kim Jong Un as soon as possible in the position of ruler of North Korea can lead to the assumption that the
majority of North Korea’s action from here on out will be the doing of Kim Jong Un.
174 On April 5, 2009, North Korea attempted to launch a satellite into space, despite international pressure
not to do so. The main reason for the international pressure was a fear that the satellite was actually a
Taepodong-2 ICBM (Intercontinental Ballistic Missile). This test was a failure and the satellite fell into the
Pacific Ocean briefly after launch. On April 13, 2009, the UNSC, the United States, and South Korea
imposed heavy sanctions upon the Hermit Kingdom for the launch and North Korea responded, on April
14, 2009, with a statement that it was officially leaving the Six Party Talks, would never again participate
in such a gathering, and informed the IAEA that it would resume its Nuclear weapons Program. Then, on
May 25, 2009, North Korea successful detonated its second Nuclear Weapon. Ever since this time, North
Korean-United States relations have been very tenuous with a lack of dialogue between the two being the
paradigm.
Gershon 83
same harsh rhetoric and brazen attacks by the Hermit Kingdom as have become
commonplace over the past years for as long as the Kim Regime remains in power—
which it appears it will be doing for a long time.

Gershon 84
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BA Thesis

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Keeping Up Appearances In The Face of Uncertainty: North

Korean Nuclear Diplomacy

Presented to the Faculties of the University of Pennsylvania

Chapter 2: What Do We Know?

Chapter 3: A Glance into the Hermit Kingdom

Chinese-North Korean Relations 40

South Korean-North Korean Relations 44

United States-North Korean Relations 47

Chapter 4: The Six Party Talks

A Brief Introduction into the Six Party Talks 49

The Fifth Round of the Six Party Talks 52

The End of the Fourth Round—A Precursor to Trouble

September 19th Joint Statement/Issue of Light Water Reactors 56

The Fifth Round; Phase I 59

A Whole Lot Of Nothing 59

Not Your Typical 4th of July Fireworks Show 63

October Nuclear Test 66

A Volte-Face: The Changing US Policy Apropos of North Korea 70

The Fifth Round; Phase II 71

The Fifth Round; Phase III 74

What We Have Learned 76

Importance of This Study to International Relations 78

Need for More Research 80

BDA Banco Delta Asia

Nuclear Crisis, North Korea has utilized Brinkmanship—the concept of constantly

dealing directly with the contemporary fears of Nuclear Proliferation.

Chapter I: The Introduction

On Tuesday, November 23, 2010, the South Korean island of Yeonpyeong, in

Minister resigned amidst a storm of controversy surrounding the halfhearted South

the inception of North Korea’s foreign policy of Nuclear Diplomacy.

Proliferation subsumes a large portion of contemporary international security. North

these weapons to various nefarious countries including Syria—a breeding ground of

both of which are quite troublesome to contemporary policy makers.

Secondly, the concept of a unified Korean Peninsula, which could result if

this increase in population.6

the world’s two superpowers—something that neither of them want.

Diplomacy and buttresses their nuclear threat.

constant military alertness. One minor miscommunication in such a constant state of

regime utilizes Nuclear Diplomacy as a means to maintain power through stabilizing

internal dissent whilst obtaining external concessions to aid their dilapidated

subjugation of the North Korean people?

as well as a means to uphold the aforementioned concept of the omnipotent outside

Korean people needing the leadership of the Kims.

of applying the structural lens of “Subversive Realism”14 to the applicable literature.

Subversive Realism is an amalgamation of Classical Realism, Constructivism, and Post-

Structuralism which will be discussed, in-depth, in the proceeding chapter.15 The

deemed germane to the thesis or misinterpreting data by utilizing erroneous assumptions.

The aforementioned questions can be answered through looking at both the

certain academics to believe the Chinese-North Korean relationship is falling apart, as

will be shown later on, their relationship is as strong as ever.

developed economy—heavily relying on foreign aid just to function. Many instances in

The methodology implemented in this study will be Odell’s “Disciplined

States.23 The Disciplined Interpretive Case Study “interprets or explains an event by

The SPT, as an overly encompassing concept, consisted of a slew of gatherings

centered on security concerns regarding North Korea’s pursuit of nuclear weaponry.26

encapsulates an amalgamation of variables that shape North Korea’s Nuclear Diplomacy.

international community to gain concessions, occasionally using physical force to prove

other countries—mainly the United States.

linear progression of A to B, Process Tracing allows the accommodation of outliers—

The practical goal of this study is to provide a general framework to understand

should be applicable to any instance of Nuclear Diplomacy by North Korea.

why North Korea views multilateral organizations as an affront to their sovereignty.

Organization of the Thesis