By JOHN NORTH

While North Korea thinks having nuclear weapons serves as a deterrent from being attacked by the United States, “in reality,” possessing nuclear weapons is the biggest deterrent to receiving full-scale humanitarian aid from America and its allies, a retired career U.S. foreign-service officer told an Asheville audience last Monday night.

By far, the people of North Korea have suffered the most from the policies of Kim Jong Il, who leads a one-man dictatorship, having succeeded his father in 1984, Mark Mohr said.

“To be the last Stalinist dictator” in the world — “it’s a good life,” Mohr noted wryly. “Unfortunately, he’s willing to give up millions of his own people for nuclear weapons.” Specifically, Mohr said, North Koreans are starving and their economy is wrecked as a result of their dictator’s investment in a nuclear weapons program under the guise of security.

Mohr  termed relations between North Korea and South Korea as “the worst it’s been in 10 years. Probably, it’ll blow over.”

He noted that “there’s going to be a really significant meeting” on Tuesday and “it’ll either be a breakthrough or the same old, same old.”

Indeed, according to a report in the International Herald Tribune, “North Korea and the United States made significant progress Tuesday toward ending an impasse in talks aimed at revealing the full scale of the North’s nuclear weapons programs and dismantling them, top negotiators from both countries said.

“‘Depending on what we hear back from capitals by tomorrow, I think there will be some further announcements very soon,’ the U.S. assistant secretary of state, Christopher Hill, told reporters after his meeting with his North Korean counterpart in Singapore.”

Mohr spoke for an hour on “Problems and Prospects in the Korean Peninsula: A New South Korean Administration and an Unresolved North Korean Nuclear Stand-Off” at the Owen Conference Center at UNC Asheville.

About 70 people attended his talk, the third annual Barbara Chisolm Memorial Lecture, sponsored by the World Affairs Council of Western North Carolina. A 30-minute question-and-answer period followed.

Mohr, who worked for the State Department from 1969 to 1997, is now a program associate for the Asia Program at the Wilson Center in Washington, D.C.

In his career, he has worked in the field of North Korean nuclear nonproliferation, he said.

Mohr began his lecture by tracing the recent history of the Korean Peninsula, noting that the U.S. sided with South Korea in the early 1950s and eventually shared nuclear technology with its ally against communist expansion.

Gen. Douglas MacArthur even threatened to use nuclear weapons on North Korrea.

In response, North Korea repeatedly requested the sharing of nuclear technology with its ally, the Soviet Union, but was rebuffed because of fears that North Korea would start a nuclear war.

However, in 1956, an agreement was reached in which North Korean scientists were allowed to study nuclear technology with Societ scientists.

The U.S. soon gave South Korea a research reactor — a move matched by the Soviets with North Korea.

The U.S. has kept 20,000 to 30,000 trips along the demilitarized zone between the two Koreas since the end of the Korean War, a move Mohr termed cleverly calculated. U.S. officials, he said, uses the troops as a “tripwire, so if North Korea invaded and wiped out the 20,000 or 30,000 U.S. troops, the president would have no problem declaring war” and receiving the support of Americans.

Ultimately, Mohr said of  the plan to use the presence of U.S. troops at the DMZ, “It worked.”

In 1980, North Korea had developed enough “nuclear know-how” that it was able to build its own nuclear reactor and produced enough uranium to produce on nuclear bomb per year.

In 1985, Moscow agreed to supply North Korea with four reactors, with the stipulation that its ally sign on to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty through the International Energy Agency.

However, the IAE in the early 1990s reported to the United Nations Security Council that “the North Koreans were lying” about their nuclear weapons capabilities.

Then-president Bill Clinton threatened a worldwide trade embargo on North Korea, with the latter threatening to turn the Korean Peninsula into a firestorm.

“A point could be made that the Clinton administration overreacted,” Mohr said. In summer 1994, ex-president Jimmy Carter, escorted by a Cable News Network crew, persuaded North Korea to sign the only nuclear pact it ever signed.

“Yes, it’s true that Jimmy Carter prevented a (probable) war on the Korean Peninsula, in which 10 million to 20 million people would have died, including 10,000 to 20,000 Americans, Mohr said.

At that point, North Korea let the U.S. send in experts to “can” 8,000 fuel rods, enough for eight nuclear bombs,” produced over eight years.

Carter also persuaded South Korea and Japan to pay for $4 billion to cover the project’s costs.

According to the agreement with North Korea, once it was signed, relations would be normalized with the other countries of the world.

However, Mohr criticized the Clinton administration for being “asleep” at the helm and failing “to get anything done” on normalization with North Korea. Clinton worked hard on the project during his final two months in office, but he didn’t get anything done.”

Predictably, North Korea was furious, he noted, as President George Bush and his administration took office expressing hostility to the agreement.

As more cheating by North Korea came to light, the Bush administration said it was suspending oil shipments until it begins telling the truth.

North Korea then ordered out Americans and, on October 2002, exploded its first nuclear device.

Mohr lamented that “the rods were canned” and threatening North Korea” at that point “was one of the stupidest things ever done” by an American president. As as result, “they now can explode (nuclear) bombs and sell technology” to terrorist groups.

Next, after some prodding by the U.S. and its allies, China set up what is termed the six-party talks between North Korea and South Korea, Japan, Russia, China and the U.S.

In September 2005, after two years of no progress, an agreement was reached for North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons in exchange for food aid.

However, despite the agreement, in 2006, North Korea exploded a nuclear bomb.

In response to the perceived provocation, the Bush administration decided to increase the pressure on North Korea by banning the trade of luxury items.

Last October, North Korea agreed to close all nuclear facilities “in return for more goodies” from the U.S., Mohr said.

The deadline for North Korea to submit a complete and accurate declaration regarding its nuclear capabilities was Dec. 31 in order to be removed from America’s trading with the enemy ban and terrorism list.

Contrary to the assertions of the U.S. and its allies, North Korea contended that it had submitted a complete and accurate declaration. That squabble, Mohr said, has continued to this day.

“Getting back their plutonium is the key for us,” he added. “Therefore, it’s quite possible, there will be an agreement along the lines I just told you, or it could be just more of the same.”

Overall, “there has been negative progress in North Korea’s history” since the Korean War, Mohr said.

Meanwhile, in neighboring South Korea, a military dictatorship, “which has been pretty bad,” has held power since the Korean War.

“Democracy didn’t come to South Korea until 1988, when the military gave up power and civilians took over.”

However, the ruling party held power until 1997, when the opposition party finally took power and “democracy really came into its own in South Korea,” Mohr said.

In 2002, South Korea’s economy “tanked,” he said, as the country’s top leadership lacked economic training. He added that “people despised” the government’s “socialist leveling policy.”

Following elections, a new administration took power last December and it decided to be more critical of North Korea for human rights violations.

As a result, Mohr said, “The atmosphere became like dry kindling in the wind — all it needed was a spark to set it off.”

That spark was provided by a South Koran legislator, who harshly criticized North Korea and its militancy and said he country “would take any means necessary”  to deal with any North Korean threats.

Infuriated, North Korea’s response, according to Mohr’s paraphrasing, was: “Oh yeah? We will turn your country into ashes” with its nuclear bombs.

South Korea, which Mohr now terms a “vibrant democracy,” responded in by “being very responsible,” with its leaders saying, “We’re just going to let this situation calm down.

Mohr added, “It’s certainly not as dangerous as 1984, when we almost went to war.”

“North Korea wants to have — or make people think they have — a nuclear capability, so people won’t attack them.”

However, he added, unless one thinks North Korea’s dictator “is suicidal,” he would never launch a nuclear attack.

A decision, such as deciding to sell plutonium to Bin Laden or to other terrorists would result in the incineration of North Korea by the U.S., Mohr noted.

He added, “The Korean Peninsula is very small. If they (North Korea) dropped a bomb on Seoul, if the wind blew the wrong way, they’d wipe themselves out,” too.

Mohr admitted that the U.S. and its allies have “been jerked around” by North Korea, but “when you’re in the State Department, we’re paid to be jerked around.”

“If no agreement is reached, the North Koreans will suffer. They need our grain.”

He praised the U.S. for its current humanitarian efforts to supply food to North Koreans. “We continue to feed our enemies,” Mohr said. “Show me some other nation” in history that has been as magnaminous.

Concluding, Mohr said, “Maybe with a new (U.S.) administration, they (North Korea) will give it a try and sign the agreement.”