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American Morning
U.S. Might be Willing to Help North Korea With Energy Crisis
Aired January 13, 2003 - 09:03 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: The U.S. might be willing to help North Korea with its energy crisis, if Pyongyang is prepared to abandon its nuclear-development plans. That comes from Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly. He is in Seoul, talking with the South Koreans about the standoff with the north.
Let's check in with John King, who's standing by at the White House this morning.
Good morning, John. What is the White House view there this morning?
JOHN KING, CNN SR. WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Paula, a realistic view here at the White House. They believe they're on a path to a potential diplomatic breakthrough, but no breakthrough as yet, no conversations, no contact from the North Korean government. That is what the Bush White House says it is waiting for, for the North Korean mission at the United Nations to contact the administration, and say, yes, it is ready for talks, and yes, it agrees that first round of talks will deal only with one issue, a commitment from North Korea to dismantle it's nuclear weapons call. The North Koreans trying to encourage that call, if you will, to create the climate for North Koreans to be willing to make that call by making clear, as you noted, that it is willing to discuss other things down the road, like possible energy assistance.
That message coming today from the Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly. He's the president's point man on North Korea, as well as the entire Korean peninsula. He's in Seoul right now, some hard feelings in South Korea, because of the how way the Bush administration has handled this nuclear standoff. First and foremost, Ambassador Kelly trying to make the case to both the governments, in the south and the north, that anyone who says the United States is not willing to sit down with North Korea and talk doesn't have their facts right.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES KELLY, ASST. SECY. OF STATE: We are, of course, willing to talk to North Korea about their response to the international community, particularly with respect to elimination of nuclear weapons.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KING: Now, Mr. Kelly went on to say that he's also willing to have conversations down the road with North Korea about possible energy assistance. The Bush administration is characterizing it this way, it says it will not be blackmailed, there can not be any quid pro quo, but if North Korea goes first, and says it will dismantle its nuclear program, allow international inspectors in to verify, that that indeed is taking place, that then there could be a second round of consultations, and in a second round, the Bush administration will consider going to back to arrangements in place before this dust-up, and providing some fuel oil, perhaps some other energy assistance, and then at that point, even opening the door to conversations about other economic assistance.
But the Bush White house says it is adamant on this point: North Korea must go first, must commit to get rid of nuclear weapons program -- Paula.
ZAHN: Thanks so much, John King. Appreciate it.
James Woolsey was the director of the CIA. The last time a U.S. administration faced a standoff with North Korea, that crisis was defused by an agreement in 1994, and that deal required North Korea to stop reprocessing plutonium. Are their similarities between that crisis and the one today? Let's turn to James Woolsey himself, who joins us from Washington this morning. Welcome back, sir. Glad to have you with us.
First of all, your reaction to a little bit of what John King just reported from the White House, that the White House is not ruling out the possibility, if North Korea decides to back down from its nuclear development program, of some sort of energy deal. Is that, in essence, succumbing to nuclear blackmail, if that happens.?
JAMES WOOLSEY, FMR. CIA DIR.: I think not if North Korea first gets out of both its possibly renewed plutonium program and its uranium-enrichment program. This whole thing really got started in October when Assistant Secretary Kelly went in to confront the North Koreans with the fact they had a second nuclear program for obtaining fissional material, enriched uranium, and they admitted it.
Now the press this morning says that they're un-admitting it, so dealing with North Korea, the only reparation is probably watching Loony Tunes. But as of now, they really have to get out of not one, but two fissional material programs, and convince us, I think, and the world they've done so. At that point, we're back to square one and presumably could pick up with at resuscitation of something like the '94 agreement, if the president, and decides that that's the way to go.
ZAHN: The only preparation for this is probably watching Loony Tunes. We wanted to count on your expertise to decipher what a North Korean newspaper threatened today -- a quote -- "thousand-fold revenge if the U.S. seizes another missile shipment." The communist party said this -- quote -- "If the U.S. commits another reckless provocation despite the North Korea's warning, the Korean peoples army will counter with a decisive measure, and the U.S. will be held entirely responsible for all the ensuing consequences."
Are they threatening to use nuclear weapons? WOOLSEY: Well, they threaten things like that for a long time. They have very purple prose, "seas of fire" and so forth. I don't know exactly what that's supposed to suggest. They don't, we believe, have the kind of delivery systems that could permit them to use nuclear weapons yet, effectively, even if they have, say, a couple from the plutonium that they produced back before 1994.
Also, if they were going to put nuclear weapons on ballistic missiles, they really need some technology that is not all that simple in terms of getting them to detonate and the like, but clearly, they are threatening something disastrous, and presumably, they hope that having the fissional material alone will make them sufficiently credible to be able to blackmail us, and they're working very hard at that.
You more than anybody can help us make a reference from 1994 to now. We wanted to put up on the screen something that former national security adviser under the first George Bush, Brent Scowcroft, wrote, calling for preemptive action. That was way back in 1994. He said the time for more decisive action, specifically the United States must make clear whether Pyongyang remains in or withdraws from the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty, the United States will not permit North Korea to process its spent fuel. We will remove its capacity to reprocess.
Now, let's jump ahead to what we saw in the paper yesterday, that Mr. Scowcroft wrote, and he said, while many of the circumstance are different today, the nature of the threat and the consequences of action or inaction have not changed. What does the Bush administration need to do?
WOOLSEY: I think Brent wrote that in '94 before the agreed framework deal, and at the time, people were thinking that that was the only North Korean fissionable material program. It probably was, but they probably started this uranium enrichment program a few months thereafter. So the situation we're in now is that unless they stop both programs, and the plutonium one is the more urgent, but nonetheless, both could produce the material needed for nuclear weapons, unless they stop both, we have to, I think, Brent's right, keep open the possibility of using force.
Now, that's very difficult thing to do on the Korean peninsula, because Seoul is within artillery range of North Korea. They don't need missiles to get to Seoul. It's only 30-some miles from the DMZ. So, it's a very difficult situation but we can't force absolutely off the table. I think he's right about that.
ZAHN: Former CIA director James Woolsey, always good to have your perspective. Thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Crisis>
Aired January 13, 2003 - 09:03 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: The U.S. might be willing to help North Korea with its energy crisis, if Pyongyang is prepared to abandon its nuclear-development plans. That comes from Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly. He is in Seoul, talking with the South Koreans about the standoff with the north.
Let's check in with John King, who's standing by at the White House this morning.
Good morning, John. What is the White House view there this morning?
JOHN KING, CNN SR. WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Paula, a realistic view here at the White House. They believe they're on a path to a potential diplomatic breakthrough, but no breakthrough as yet, no conversations, no contact from the North Korean government. That is what the Bush White House says it is waiting for, for the North Korean mission at the United Nations to contact the administration, and say, yes, it is ready for talks, and yes, it agrees that first round of talks will deal only with one issue, a commitment from North Korea to dismantle it's nuclear weapons call. The North Koreans trying to encourage that call, if you will, to create the climate for North Koreans to be willing to make that call by making clear, as you noted, that it is willing to discuss other things down the road, like possible energy assistance.
That message coming today from the Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly. He's the president's point man on North Korea, as well as the entire Korean peninsula. He's in Seoul right now, some hard feelings in South Korea, because of the how way the Bush administration has handled this nuclear standoff. First and foremost, Ambassador Kelly trying to make the case to both the governments, in the south and the north, that anyone who says the United States is not willing to sit down with North Korea and talk doesn't have their facts right.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES KELLY, ASST. SECY. OF STATE: We are, of course, willing to talk to North Korea about their response to the international community, particularly with respect to elimination of nuclear weapons.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KING: Now, Mr. Kelly went on to say that he's also willing to have conversations down the road with North Korea about possible energy assistance. The Bush administration is characterizing it this way, it says it will not be blackmailed, there can not be any quid pro quo, but if North Korea goes first, and says it will dismantle its nuclear program, allow international inspectors in to verify, that that indeed is taking place, that then there could be a second round of consultations, and in a second round, the Bush administration will consider going to back to arrangements in place before this dust-up, and providing some fuel oil, perhaps some other energy assistance, and then at that point, even opening the door to conversations about other economic assistance.
But the Bush White house says it is adamant on this point: North Korea must go first, must commit to get rid of nuclear weapons program -- Paula.
ZAHN: Thanks so much, John King. Appreciate it.
James Woolsey was the director of the CIA. The last time a U.S. administration faced a standoff with North Korea, that crisis was defused by an agreement in 1994, and that deal required North Korea to stop reprocessing plutonium. Are their similarities between that crisis and the one today? Let's turn to James Woolsey himself, who joins us from Washington this morning. Welcome back, sir. Glad to have you with us.
First of all, your reaction to a little bit of what John King just reported from the White House, that the White House is not ruling out the possibility, if North Korea decides to back down from its nuclear development program, of some sort of energy deal. Is that, in essence, succumbing to nuclear blackmail, if that happens.?
JAMES WOOLSEY, FMR. CIA DIR.: I think not if North Korea first gets out of both its possibly renewed plutonium program and its uranium-enrichment program. This whole thing really got started in October when Assistant Secretary Kelly went in to confront the North Koreans with the fact they had a second nuclear program for obtaining fissional material, enriched uranium, and they admitted it.
Now the press this morning says that they're un-admitting it, so dealing with North Korea, the only reparation is probably watching Loony Tunes. But as of now, they really have to get out of not one, but two fissional material programs, and convince us, I think, and the world they've done so. At that point, we're back to square one and presumably could pick up with at resuscitation of something like the '94 agreement, if the president, and decides that that's the way to go.
ZAHN: The only preparation for this is probably watching Loony Tunes. We wanted to count on your expertise to decipher what a North Korean newspaper threatened today -- a quote -- "thousand-fold revenge if the U.S. seizes another missile shipment." The communist party said this -- quote -- "If the U.S. commits another reckless provocation despite the North Korea's warning, the Korean peoples army will counter with a decisive measure, and the U.S. will be held entirely responsible for all the ensuing consequences."
Are they threatening to use nuclear weapons? WOOLSEY: Well, they threaten things like that for a long time. They have very purple prose, "seas of fire" and so forth. I don't know exactly what that's supposed to suggest. They don't, we believe, have the kind of delivery systems that could permit them to use nuclear weapons yet, effectively, even if they have, say, a couple from the plutonium that they produced back before 1994.
Also, if they were going to put nuclear weapons on ballistic missiles, they really need some technology that is not all that simple in terms of getting them to detonate and the like, but clearly, they are threatening something disastrous, and presumably, they hope that having the fissional material alone will make them sufficiently credible to be able to blackmail us, and they're working very hard at that.
You more than anybody can help us make a reference from 1994 to now. We wanted to put up on the screen something that former national security adviser under the first George Bush, Brent Scowcroft, wrote, calling for preemptive action. That was way back in 1994. He said the time for more decisive action, specifically the United States must make clear whether Pyongyang remains in or withdraws from the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty, the United States will not permit North Korea to process its spent fuel. We will remove its capacity to reprocess.
Now, let's jump ahead to what we saw in the paper yesterday, that Mr. Scowcroft wrote, and he said, while many of the circumstance are different today, the nature of the threat and the consequences of action or inaction have not changed. What does the Bush administration need to do?
WOOLSEY: I think Brent wrote that in '94 before the agreed framework deal, and at the time, people were thinking that that was the only North Korean fissionable material program. It probably was, but they probably started this uranium enrichment program a few months thereafter. So the situation we're in now is that unless they stop both programs, and the plutonium one is the more urgent, but nonetheless, both could produce the material needed for nuclear weapons, unless they stop both, we have to, I think, Brent's right, keep open the possibility of using force.
Now, that's very difficult thing to do on the Korean peninsula, because Seoul is within artillery range of North Korea. They don't need missiles to get to Seoul. It's only 30-some miles from the DMZ. So, it's a very difficult situation but we can't force absolutely off the table. I think he's right about that.
ZAHN: Former CIA director James Woolsey, always good to have your perspective. Thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Crisis>
