Chris Hill Resignation Watch: Nuke Disclosure Starts a Category 3 Sh*tstorm

[Update: Watch the CIA’s video on the al-Kibar reactor:

I’d love to know how they got those photographs of the reactor’s interior, and I can only guess that some trusted person who is now in a much safer place took them.]

How stupid and how evil does Kim Jong Il have to be to get the attention of Congress in an election year?  This stupid and this evil:

The United States on Thursday released an intelligence document with photographs of what it said was a Syrian nuclear reactor built with North Korean help.  [Reuters; interesting fact sheet at that link, btw]

“The belief is that the reactor was nearing completion,” said one official familiar with the content of the briefings. “It would have been able to produce plutonium.”  [Washington Times, Joshua Mitnick]

The evidence is, to say the least, hard to dismiss:

The officials said the video of the remote site, code-named Al Kibar by the Syrians, shows North Koreans inside. It played a pivotal role in Israel’s decision to bomb the facility late at night last Sept. 6, a move that was publicly denounced by Damascus but not by Washington.

Sources familiar with the video say it also shows that the Syrian reactor core’s design is the same as that of the North Korean reactor at Yongbyon, including a virtually identical configuration and number of holes for fuel rods. It shows “remarkable resemblances inside and out to Yongbyon,” a U.S. intelligence official said. A nuclear weapons specialist called the video “very, very damning.”  [WaPo, Robin Wright]

There’s no reasonable defense to the charge that North Korea has crossed the Red Line in a very big way.  No wonder the State Department stonewalled Congress for so many months.  No wonder Chris Hill has feared this day like Kennedys fear  sobriety checkpoints. 

If there is one explanation for why Agreed Framework 2.0 got as far as it did, it’s the fact that the  media and Congress haven’t been paying attention.   They are now.  People are  about to have  what will be, for many of them, a first opportunity to kick the tires of the  Edsel Chris Hill was trying to sell us.  And nobody — Republican or Democrat — is defending Bush now.  Let’s begin with the reaction that will matter most:

The Arizona senator, a former prisoner of war in Vietnam who has touted his experience in security issues as a strength in his campaign, said the North Korean nuclear disclosures were “troubling but not surprising.”

“North Korea has not acted in good faith for more than a decade,” he said. “The goal of our diplomacy must be an agreement that advances America’s national interests in the full denuclearization of North Korea and the cessation and full accounting of North Korea’s proliferation activities.”

He said any agreement must be completely verifiable and take into account the interests of allies South Korea and Japan.  “In addition, it would be a serious mistake to exclude from the negotiations our legitimate concerns regarding North Korea‘s egregious human rights abuses,” McCain said.  [Reuters]

And with that, Bush is orphaned and  exposed as a hypocrite on human rights.  Good for McCain, though it’s a  bit of a stretch  to turn  this into an attack on Obama.  Granted:  in a blind taste test, I’d  pick Obama as the  most likely proponent of a policy this naive, but  you can’t hold Obama responsible for this one  (or much of anything else; he came to Washington, stopped for a cup of coffee, and decided to run for President). 

Republicans in Congress were also  critical:

After receiving a classified briefing for Congress members, Michigan Republican Pete Hoekstra on Thursday called it “is a serious proliferation issue, both for the Middle East and the countries that may be involved in Asia.”  [Rep. Peter Hoekstra, via AP]

Hoekstra is one of those who has been demanding answers since last fall, along with Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, but  other reactions, such as that of Democratic Intelligence Committee Chairman Silvestre Reyes, are somewhat more surprising.  As was this:

“Reports that North Korea – over a period of several years – helped Syria build a nuclear reactor make clear that any deal to eliminate North Korea’s nuclear programs must also stop its proliferation activities and include vigorous verification.         
 
“Unless we are able to confirm that North Korea is no longer in the nuclear proliferation business, the United States should not lift sanctions on the North.  Our goals are, and must remain, both shutting down North Korea’s nuclear programs and ensuring that North Korea does not transfer dangerous technology to other irresponsible states.   [Sen. Joe Biden, Press release]

Biden then calls for the United States not to cut off the six-party talks, which these senators aren’t calling for,  and for that matter, I’m not calling for,  either.   Talks have cosmetic value and do little harm, as long as you keep your expectations realistic and apply enough pressure.  So score one for Senator Biden  over  Senator Strawman.   

Although Democrats are probably more supportive of Bush’s new policy than Republicans, your base of support is never strong when most of it is in the other party: 

Rep. Gary Ackerman, D-N.Y., chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Middle East subcommittee, accused the Bush administration of selectively leaking the classified information, which he called “bizarre behavior.”

While reporters without security clearances were selectively given information “most of us got no information whatsoever,” Ackerman said as he opened a separate hearing on U.S. policy toward Syria.  [AP]

And in the end, no one will really care much what the policy’s few remaining defenders say.  If the Democrats become strong in their opposition, Bush’s left-of-center defenders will fall silent.  Their support is on consignment.

“The United States and Israel have not identified any Syrian plutonium separation facilities or nuclear weaponization facilities,” he said. “The lack of any such facilities gives little confidence that the reactor is part of an active nuclear weapons program. The apparent lack of fuel, either imported or indigenously produced, also is curious and lowers confidence that Syria has a nuclear weapons program.”   [David Albright, via the WaPo]

If we caught a North Korea freighter carrying nuclear bombs to Bandar Abbas, Albright would no doubt point out that they were not yet loaded onto bombers.  Ironic, as Richardson notes.  But dig this:

U.S. intelligence officials will also tell the lawmakers that Syria is not rebuilding a reactor at the Al Kibar site. “The successful engagement of North Korea in the six-party talks means that it was unlikely to have supplied Syria with such facilities or nuclear materials after the reactor site was destroyed,” Albright said. “Indeed, there is little, if any, evidence that cooperation between Syria and North Korea extended beyond the date of the destruction of the reactor.”

And also, there’s no conclusive evidence whatsoever that Bill Clinton has received so much as one extramarital hummer or lied about it under oath since 1996.   The point being?   And in any event, I wouldn’t be so sure about that:

Asked yesterday whether the North has assisted Syria’s nuclear program since the Sept. 6 bombing, officials said, “Not at that site.” They declined to elaborate.  [Washington Times]

There will be (forgive me) fallout from the briefing and Congress’s reaction.  For one thing, it’s hard to believe that Chris Hill feels that his job is secure these days:

Mr. Hill was put in charge of the talks more than three years ago in the hope of finding a new way to deal with the North Koreans. But support for him has wavered, and President Bush has repeatedly warned aides not to agree to anything that “makes me look weak,” according to former officials who sat in on meetings with him on North Korea.

Mr. Cheney’s office and other conservatives have argued that Mr. Hill’s proposed deal would amount to a huge concession. In return for a minimal declaration from North Korea — an accounting of how much plutonium it has produced — it would be removed from the terrorism list and would no longer be subject to economic sanctions under the Trading With the Enemy Act. [….]

It is not clear what has changed, apart from the politics of the moment. Mr. Hill’s boss, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, has not voiced strong support for Mr. Hill’s effort to coax the North Koreans along, granting them rewards for steps along the way to compliance with a deal that calls, ultimately, for the country to give up its weapons.

Ms. Rice has been a strong critic of the 1994 agreement between North Korea and the Clinton administration, complaining that it was “front loaded” with rewards for the North.  [….]

“He’s feeling pretty abandoned by Rice and Bush,” one of his colleagues said Wednesday. Mr. Hill did not respond to messages.  [NY Times]

There are in fact rumors that he will resign, although I’m in no position at all to substantiate them.  Stay or go, Hill’s precarious situation probably means that the Singapore Surrender is a non-starter, one that would go into the same legislative dustbin as Dubai Ports World, Harriet Miers, Comprehensive Immigration Reform … and the FTA with Korea.

Kathleen Stephens’s nomination seems less certain now.  There’s a Senate hold on her nomination, and  her close association with Hill may harm her chances that State will push hard to have it lifted. 

The doves may have finally overplayed their hand this time.