Obama Cabinet Watch: Will Kurt Campbell Be the New Chris Hill?

Update: Or, Chris Hill might succeed at keeping his job. BBC monitoring, quoting the Japanese Monthly Sentaku, claims that Richard Holbrooke is leaning on Hillary Clinton to keep Hill, and that the Japanese are wary about that possibility. No link, sorry. Hope! Change!

If this piece in the Washington Times has it right, it’s going to be Harvard Professor Kurt Campbell, who also advised the Pentagon on Asia-Pacific issues during the Clinton Administration and a number of other government and wonk jobs.

One not-so-great sign is that he blogs with Nick Kristof at the New York Times, but this is otherwise of little use to us. Campbell’s few postings are disappointingly bereft of substance about Korea or Asia policy; they consist of injection-molded pulp excreted from the partisan mill. The Seoul Times, linked and quoted below, actually did a far better job of drawing out Campbell’s views (also published here at the Asia Times). Here are some quotes I thought significant.

On North Korea’s nuclear intentions:

Paul Nash: Dr. Campbell, in your view does North Korea have legitimate security concerns to justify the development of nuclear weapons as a deterrent to regional threats?

Kurt Campbell: Ultimately, yes – but I think there are larger questions that are more troubling and difficult to answer. Recent revelations and other reports suggest that the North Korean regime is even more brutal than we had anticipated, with enormous gulags, vast misery. The harder question is not whether the North Korean regime is threatened, but how threatening is North Korea both to its people and the region? It is at the nub of this conundrum that U.S. policy finds itself. On the one hand, there is a strong desire to prevent North Korea from acquiring and developing nuclear weapons – that is obvious. But at the same time, there is, in some quarters, a reluctance to take the kinds of steps that could both secure and sustain the current leadership in North Korea and, in exchange, remove the potential threat of the spread of nuclear weapons. I think that in the final analysis the U.S. administration will decide that the threat of nuclear weapons is so overriding that it will consider doing business with an odious regime in North Korea. But, as we have seen over the last many months, getting to that point is much more painful than any of us would have anticipated many months ago.

[….]

The larger question is: under any circumstances is North Korea prepared to relinquish its fledgling nuclear capabilities? The answer I am coming to is, unfortunately, no. [Seoul Times, Circa 2003]

On regime change (but by what means? It’s not specified.):

I don’t think it is viable. The only viable recourse to a new regime in North Korea is for China to take a more dramatic role. China right now really wants to avoid two things. On the one hand it wants to avoid a nuclear North Korea, and on the other hand it also wants to avoid a rupturing regime change in North Korea. Choosing between two things you do not want, if you are forced to choose, is obviously the challenge of national policy-making. It is a Sophie’s Choice in a sense for the leadership in Beijing. In the end, the prospect of a regime change that is unplanned and that is messy, involving enormous numbers of refugees and other issues, is something that I think China feels it cannot take right now. [ditto]

On U.S. aid to the regime:

“There is some modest largess from the foreign assistance budget available to North Korea, but engagement with the U.S. may become a problem. The progress will be slow and tied to humanitarian targets instead of fungible projects,” predicted Mr. Campbell. [….]

“The only way U.S.-Japan-South Korea can deal effectively with North Korea is as a common front and with a clear sense of the consequences”¦ but the signs are quite compelling for engagement,” said Mr. Campbell. [Japan Society, circa 2002]

On the USFK:

I want to talk first, if I can, about the unilateral steps that the United States takes, the steps that we take on our own accord. And I think the most important commitment that the United States makes to the region is a commitment to deploy very large numbers of troops. That number now is about 100,000, and we continue to maintain that level. And we will make a further statement later this year that maintains our commitment at about 100,000 for the remainder of the century and beyond.

The U.S. public supports our efforts at maintaining deterrence in securing the peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula. Our sense is that any hope of diplomacy that Ambassador Kartman underscores rests on the reality of deterrence. And we believe that taking steps to secure that deterrence is our most important mission of the Department of Defense.

Second, in addition to our unilateral commitments to remain deployed in Asia, particularly in Japan and Korea, are our bilateral relationships; and, again, here primarily with Korea and Japan.

I will say, Mr. Chairman, on the issue of our joint readiness, I would say in the last 4 years our interaction with the South Korean military has increased almost exponentially.

We have more military training, more joint exercises with South Korea, I believe, today than with any other country in the world. I urge you in your consultations; I know your staff had an opportunity to talk with our senior military officials in South Korea–over the last 5 years, we have taken steps to increase our military capabilities across the board in accelerated programs that allow us to go after North Korean artillery, increasing our air capabilities, our attack fighter squadrons. All of these efforts underscore our ability to enhance deterrence and, if necessary, fight and win a war on the Korean Peninsula. [….]

Let me just conclude by saying I think that we have had many years of alliance, military and security alliance, that is the bedrock of our relationship with South Korea. I think that if you consult your South Korean counterparts, you will find that our security relationship is as strong as it has ever been. [House International Relations Committee, circa 1998]

On planning for regime collapse:

The other challenge that we face more recently, shall we say, are the kinds of security challenges that flow from unpredictable situations in North Korea. And those, of course, are the security implications associated with instability or humanitarian concerns. The Department of Defense has been working closely with our Korean counterparts to develop plans for how we would respond in the face of humanitarian situations which sent millions of refugees searching for food or that led to internal instability in North Korea. [ditto]

On China and North Korea:

Last, in addition to our bilateral steps with South Korea, or our regional steps, we are working often behind the scenes with China, who has been at times helpful at the Four-Party Talks. Immediately after the missile tests, Mr. Chairman, Secretary Cohen asked us to go to China for consultations about the situation in North Korea. We urged them to take steps to put whatever pressure they could on North Korea to refrain from such dangerous and provocative steps as this missile launch. [ditto]

On the Agreed Framework:

Our security objectives in Korea have been greatly aided by diplomatic breakthroughs during the past several years. In particular, the engagement process begun by the U.S.-DPRK Agreed Framework, which froze the North’s nuclear program and its destabilizing potential, has defused the most immediate source of tension and deflected what could have been a military confrontation with North Korea. With the agreement and our underlying security commitment, we have preserved stability on the Peninsula and created an opening to pursue other issues of concern, the most important of which, North-South dialogue, is the foundation for a stable, long-term peace on the Peninsula. Other bilateral issues that we have pursued include missile proliferation and the recovery of Korean War remains. The Agreed Framework has also provided greater access to North Korea and some North-South contacts. [House International Relations Committee, Subcommittee on Asia, circa 1997]

On North-South relations:

Permanent peace on the Peninsula will be accomplished only through diplomatic/political means, and the Agreed Framework begins that process by laying a groundwork for uncoerced reconciliation between South and North Korea. We must recognize, however, that this agreement is an initial step in a long and difficult course. Our desire for a long-term, stable peace on the Peninsula will not be realized overnight, but that reality does not diminish the value of current initiatives toward North Korea. The alternative could very well be direct conflict with the North, which would take a devastating toll in lives and resources. For this reason, it is important for the U.S. to back the Agreed Framework, and the international consortium that implements its provisions, with the resources that will permit it to succeed. [ditto]

On China and Taiwan:

There has also been, according to Dr. Campbell, recognition by the Bush Administration that China can play a significant role in maintaining a stable Asian security structure. This is especially true regarding its neighbors and allies such as Pakistan and North Korea.

Dr. Campbell explained that interpersonal ties, especially those within the business community, are the ballast that holds the bilateral relationship steady. In the past, after disruptive incidents such as the Chinese fighter jet’s collision with an American EP-3 reconnaissance aircraft, it was the US business community among others who kept US-China relations on track. Presently, the Chinese leadership is focused on domestic issues and sees a preoccupied US and strong trade and industry ties as a good thing for both the Chinese economy and a stable bilateral relationship.

Dr. Campbell then argued that when the US looks back decades from now it would see that the last two years and the present represent the most dramatic strategic change in Asia’s recent history. Chinese political, economic, and military concerns have begun to dominate agendas and decisions in Asia. How to deal with China’s growing power has become the top priority of countries throughout Northeast and Southeast Asia.

Dr. Campbell contends that compared to Japanese and American diplomacy in the 1990s, China’s foreign policy has grown more mature and sophisticated along with its influence. For example, on the issue of North Korea, the US turned to China for help because it failed to achieve its objectives. In response, China offered to host a meeting between the United States and North Korea rather than participate in the meeting themselves; a clever diplomatic sidestep. [….]

Dr. Campbell concluded by offering a wait and see approach, claiming that in five to ten years the US and China will have to face the results of military build up along the Taiwan Strait. Thus, the primary question is whether or not the good relations of today will translate into understanding tomorrow. [Nixon Center]

What do I take from this? That at one point, Campbell more-or-less simultaneously believed that North Korea was a brutal regime with a legitimate security interest in having nuclear weapons, that it would never give those weapons up, and that there was still a strong case for “engagement” with them, giving them aid, helping China to stabilize the regime, and sticking with our obligations in Agreed Framework v1.0 … though Campbell had concluded at least as early as 2003 that North Korea would never denuclearize. I doubt whether Campbell would reveal whether he privately believed that even earlier — say, during the last days of the Clinton Administration, though he could not have been ignorant of the evidence. In what sense was that evidence of North Korea’s disinterest in disarming significant to Campbell’s policy prescriptions?

Of course, plenty has changed since Campbell expressed some of those views, and his reticence to talk specifics, at least recently, leaves us to infer plenty. Chiefly, I infer that Campbell is wired to default to the path of least resistance and a progression of the status quo. Like so many in our diplomatic class, he believes that “talks” and “engagement” are objects in themselves, and that he sees a proportional relationship between our capacity to influence Korea and the number of warm American bodies within Nodong range (as opposed to those of us who see that relationship as inversely proportional in more ways). But in the continuum of history, from the baby riots to the beef riots, neither Korea can fairly be described as rational or predictable.

If Stephen Hadley is right (he is) North Korea will be an early challenge for Obama, which means we’ll soon find out whether Campbell has learned anything from the collapse of two agreed frameworks, the Sunshine Policy, and multiple “red lines” that tough-sounding politicians had frequently warned North Korea not to cross (a fine and recent example of such hollow posturing can be found here). Where, for example, does Campbell think Chris Hill went wrong, or does he think Hill went wrong at all? Are there any red lines or tangible limits to his patience, or would he simply say what so many “experts” in the field tend to say — that at some (perpetually vanishing) horizon, North Korea’s cheating, lying, proliferation, and mass murder will draw some (always unspecified) consequence?

I hope I’m wrong, and it’s possible that I am, but my vote is for the that whole perpetually vanishing horizon scenario. Which means that Campbell would not just be a successor to Chris Hill; he’d be a plug-and-play replacement, drawn from a deep field of fungible men who are all nuance and no judgment, toughness, or common sense.