Text Fwd: The United States Can and Should Stop the Escalation

* Text sent from Steve Zeltzer on Dec. 19, 2010
Korea Policy Institute
The United States Can and Should Stop the Escalation
Paul Liem December 18, 2010

In the wake of live artillery exchange between North and South Korea
on November 23, 2010 resulting in the deaths of four South Koreans on
Yeonpyeong Island, the United States and South Korea are planning once
again to conduct live artillery exercises, starting today through
Tuesday, from Yeonpyeong Island, and surrounding areas, in spite of
repeated warnings by Pyongyang that it will again, retaliate.

"Second and third self-defensive blows that cannot be predicted will
be dealt" if the exercises go forward, North Korea warned South Korea
earlier today, according to North Korea's Korean Central News Agency
(KCNA). "The intensity and range of the firepower will create a
situation more serious than the one on Nov. 23," North Korea's
military said.

Efforts by China and Russia to convince the United States and South
Korea to cancel the live artillery exercises have not borne fruit as
yet. Thus there remains the possibility of an outbreak of fighting in
the disputed waters of the West Sea. The possibility that the fighting
might spread uncontrollably beyond the West Sea cannot be discounted.

The Yeonpyeong Island, and several others in the area, lay just south
of the "Northern Limit Line" (NLL) which follows the west coast of
North Korea just 3 nautical miles from shore. The line, which was
drawn unilaterally by the United States after the Armistice, is not
recognized by North Korea. Since the early 1970s the international
community has recognized 12 nautical miles as the conventional
offshore territorial boundary.

The live artillery drills will take place in South Korean territory,
based on the Northern Limit Line, 3 miles off coast, but within North
Korean territory based on the 12 nautical mile convention. Hence, the
characterization, "disputed waters," often employed to describe the
location of deadly naval clashes in the West Sea which occurred in
1999, 2002, 2009, last March and November.

In their article on the history of the NLL, Bloomberg, 12/17/2010,
Daniel Ten Kate and Peter Green report that U.S. officials believed
that the NLL was "contrary to law." "Then-Secretary of State Henry
Kissinger wrote in a 1975 classified cable that the unilaterally drawn
Northern Limit Line was 'clearly contrary to international law.' Two
years before, the American ambassador said in another cable that many
nations would view South Korea and its U.S. ally as 'in the wrong' if
clashes occurred in disputed areas along the boundary," they reported.

The live artillery drills are widely viewed as military posturing by
the administration of South Korean President, Lee Myung Bak, however
the South Korean armed forces remain under the command of the United
States. Ultimately the finger on the trigger for the planned live
artillery firing, weather permitting, is that of President Barack
Obama. At the same time New Mexico Governor, Bill Richardson, is in
Pyongyang reporting that North Korea wishes to restart the six party
talks to denuclearize the Korean peninsula and replace the Korean War
Armistice with a peace treaty. China and Russia are also calling upon
the United States and South Korea to restart diplomacy. After two
years of pursuing a policy of "strategic patience" to contain North
Korea, it appears that President Obama is facing a stark choice
between War and Peace in northeast Asia.

In the event that fighting breaks out on the Korean peninsula we urge
our readers to question efforts to indict North Korea as being solely
responsible for provoking the military clashes in the West Sea. This
is clearly not the case. The U.S. and South Korea are recklessly
pushing tensions on the peninsula to the brink of war as well.
President Obama can and should put a stop to the escalation. We cannot
again, blindfolded, be marched off to war. A good way for readers to
begin learning about the background to recent fighting in the West Sea
would be to read the full Bloomberg article by Kate and Green, and to
study the map of the disputed boundaries in the West Sea that
accompanies their article and which is republished above.