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Introduction
The New York Times printed a story on North Korea (summary below), which shows that efforts by South Korea, Japan and China to "open up" North Korea are working. A further result of the Bush policy of unilateral pre-emption is that the United States is more isolated than ever in Korea.

It's worth looking at the foreign policy/military intervention record to see what has or hasn't been achieved.

In Iraq, a notorious case of belligerent American unilateralism, the former dictator Saddam Hussein has been removed. In his place, we now have a weak Iraqi government besieged by Sunni and Shi'ia insurgencies while the Kurdish north is going its own way. American troops are killed almost every day. Non-Arabic people in Iraq run a serious risk of kidnap, torture and death. The insurgents regularly attack oil companies and pipelines, and bomb the very center of authority - the "green zone" - in Baghdad. Now that Iraq is a mess, the issue for Americans is how to get out. Until this disaster area is cleaned up, Americans are paying hundreds of billions for the mistakes George W Bush and his neo-con cronies made.

Meanwhile, because of George W Bush's hostility and neglect, the North Koreans may have promoted themselves into the nuclear club. That threat is been reduced, however, by the sensible policies of South Korea and Japan. Those policies are not "appeasement," as alleged by Washington hardliners. (For neo-cons, anything less than a military solution is "appeasement.") The Asian approach is working, and there is some hope of eventually putting the North Korean Pandora back into the box.

From the New York Times

North Korea Is Reaching Out, and World Is Reaching Back

By NORIMITSU ONISHI
Published: August 20, 2004

EOUL, South Korea, Aug. 15- Even as the Bush administration has worked to isolate North Korea in a campaign to make it drop its nuclear program, Asian and European governments have been actively engaging it on diplomatic, cultural and economic levels. Now, with the pace of engagement quickening, it is the administration that risks becoming isolated, experts say, a possible factor in a recent moderation in its stance.

A country famous for its hermetic borders, North Korea now has embassies in 41 countries and diplomatic ties with 155. It recently held the first-ever military talks with its former archenemy, South Korea, and is moving toward normalizing diplomatic relations with its former colonizer, Japan.

... The Bush administration had come under increasing pressure from Democrats and other participants in talks on North Korea's nuclear program - South Korea, China, Russia and Japan - to come up with an offer.

"They were drifting away from the U.S.'s line, and the U.S. was becoming isolated," said Chung In Moon, a foreign affairs professor at Yonsei University here and an adviser to President Roh Moo Hyun. "They were fed up with America's failure to come up with a concrete plan, and the Americans realized that."

In contrast, Asian and European diplomats and businessmen who have long dealt with North Korean officials describe an eagerness to adopt new ideas and policies ...

Co-operation Works; Hostility Doesn't

From the New York Times

North Korea Is Reaching Out, and World Is Reaching Back