North Korea set to test new ballistic missile?

Speaking of another major threat that the Bush Administration has steadfastly refused to talk to directly -- Iran's the other one, and yesterday I spoke of it here -- it looks like North Korea may be planning to test a new weapon. The NYT reports here:

North Korea appears to have completed fueling a long-range ballistic missile, American officials said Sunday, a move that greatly increases the probability that Pyongyang will go ahead with its first important test launch in eight years.

A senior American official said that intelligence from satellite photographs suggested that booster rockets had been loaded onto a launch pad, and liquid-fuel tanks fitted to a missile at a site in North Korea's remote east coast.

While there have been steady reports in recent days about preparations for a test, fueling is regarded as a critical step as well as a likely bellwether of North Korea's intentions. Siphoning the liquid fuel out of a missile is believed to be a complex undertaking...

A launch would be a significant milestone in the North's missile capability and effectively scrap a moratorium on such tests declared by the North Koreans after their last test in 1998.

Please note: This ain't no dud of a Scud. This "would be North Korea's first flight test of a new long-range missile that might eventually have the capability to strike the United States". Not to mention far closer to home: South Korea, Japan, China.

Here's what a "senior Bush administration official" said yesterday in response to the impending test: "Why they are doing this, you will have to ask them. It is not in anyone's interest; certainly not theirs. For our part we will not be derailed by their temper tantrums nor have any of our own."

This official is right that this is "a multilateral problem" and that the U.S. ought to "support the six-party process". But being the world's superpower, the one that hopes to spread democracy hither and thither, comes at a price. Ultimately, rogue regimes like Kim Jong-il's North Korea, much like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's Iran, want to talk directly to -- and negotiate directly with -- the U.S. And the U.S., it seems to me, needs to respond in kind. Is there not room in such cases for both multilateralism and a bit of unilateral leadership?

Talks won't stop North Korea's test of its Taepodong 2 missile. Talk soon... or else. Or else what? The prospect of a nuclear Iran is frightening enough. Think of a nuclear North Korea with far more advanced technology.

Diplomatic leadership, Bush ought to know, is just as important as, if not more important than, the capacity to wage shock-and-awe campaigns against perceived threats.

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For more on the need to talk directly to North Korea, and its ilk, see an excellent post by Suzanne Nossel at Democracy Arsenal. Key passage:

I understand the notion that by engaging directly in talks with countries that make threats and flout international norms, the US risks dignifying and publicizing these nations' illegitimate positions and causes. I also recognize that amid bitter and longstanding policy conflicts, the chances that direct talks between diplomats with vastly different objectives and value-systems will help bridge differences may be slim indeed. I don't think that pushing for direct talks with either North Korea or Iran comes close to proffering a "solution" to either crisis. It merely advocates a change in the process by which the conflicts are currently dealt with.

With that said, I wonder whether the US might not be better off with a blanket policy of unconditional willingness to talk directly to North Korea, Iran, and any nation that asks to meet with us face-to-face. We would not be offering to change our positions, concede any of our arguments, or give credence to any of theirs, but rather simply to meet with no strings attached and no promises implied.

Read the whole thing. Suzanne makes a solid case for "such a policy shift".