The Berlin accords and multilateral engagement with North Korea

This monograph re-evaluates the 1999 Berlin Accords between the United States and North Korea in light of changing American policy. In this agreement, Pyongyang promised to suspend long-range missile testing and Washington responded by lowering economic sanctions. While the Berlin Accords have received little attention from scholars, this paper argues that they embody an important turning point in American policy. Until 1999, American engagement with North Korea, including the 1994 Agreed Framework, focused on resolving short-term crises. Escalating North Korean provocations, climaxing in the 1998 Taepodong-1 missile launched directly over central Japan, however, convinced policymakers in Washington that this policy had failed. Beginning with the 1999 missile talks, American policymakers; began to seek terms for long-term coexistence instead. The first success of this new policy was the Berlin Accords. Because of this, the accords are more important than the narrowly-defined details of the agreement might suggest. This paper also argues that the current Bush policy of multilateral engagement is the result of this policy switch. In spite of intense pressures from some in the Administration to. cease engagement, the changes in US policymaking procedure for Korea that occurred in 1999 allowed pro-engagement partisans to prevail. The Bush Administration does not reject the goals of engagement for long-term stability; it rejects the failed process of bilateral talks between North Korea and the United States in favor of a truly multilateral approach. This distinction offered valuable lessons for Washington, Seoul, and Tokyo as they engaged in six-way talks in Beijing over the North Korean issue.