The Daily - North Korea’s Fear? Becoming Libya

Episode Date: May 21, 2018

John R. Bolton, President Trump’s new national security adviser, has said that negotiations with North Korea should follow “the Libya model.” Now, North Korea is threatening to call off the planned summit meeting with Mr. Trump. What risks does the Libya model hold for Kim Jong-un? Guest: Mark Landler, a White House correspondent for The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.

From The New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily. Today. Last week, the president's new national security advisor came out and said talks with North Korea should follow the Libya model. Now, North Korea is threatening to call off the talks. What's so bad about the Libya model?

It's Monday, May 21st. North Korea says it may back out of upcoming talks with Trump. Saying, quote, we'll have to reconsider whether we will accept the upcoming North Korean-U.S. summit. On Wednesday, their state media said if Washington keeps pushing the North to get rid of its nuclear weapons, it won't come to the table. pushing the North to get rid of its nuclear weapons, it won't come to the table. Mark Landler, how does North Korea justify wavering on this planned summit? The North Korean argument is that they don't want to go into a negotiation where they give up their entire nuclear program up front and only get some incentives afterwards. He then went on to reject what he called Libya-style denuclearization. And interestingly, they also are fixated on this issue of Libya.

It is a manifestation of a seriously dishonest attempt to force the fate of the collapsed Libya and Iraq on the dignified state of Korea. Not once, but several times in their statement, they said the problem is we don't want a replay of Libya. The world knows too well that the DPRK is not Libya or Iraq, which met a miserable end. So Libya might be actually at the heart of what the North Koreans are worried about. They don't want to be put into the same position that Libya was

when it underwent a similar negotiation. So what happened in Libya that North Korea seems so fixated on and worried about? Well, to put it into context, let's go back to the period just after the 9-11 attacks. Libya's exotic looks might be a feast for the eyes, but getting there isn't easy. UN sanctions mean there's no direct flight, so a trek across a baking desert or an overnight boat from Malta are the only alternatives. Muammar Gaddafi, the leader of Libya, is under very strict United Nations and US sanctions. His country is treated virtually strict United Nations and U.S. sanctions. His country is

treated virtually as a pariah state. The international ban has crippled Tripoli's harbor and the economy as a whole. And the victims, the Libyan people, dying because of the sanctions. And so he's really trying to get out from under these sanctions to figure out how to end the isolation of his country. But adding to that, he suddenly sees President George W. Bush invade Iraq. Saddam Hussein and his sons must leave Iraq within 48 hours. Their refusal to do so will result in military conflict.

And he sees what happens to Saddam Hussein. The tyrant will soon be gone. The day of your liberation is near. And he sees what happens to Saddam Hussein. And he realizes that if he doesn't figure out another way out, he could face a similar fate. So he now publicly made an offer to the Bush administration, as well as the British and the Russians. And what is the offer that Gaddafi makes? It's really very simple. He was offering to box up his entire nuclear program, put it on American cargo planes, and fly it out of the country. Wow. Just walk away from any ambitions to have nuclear weapons.

That's right. And because his program was relatively limited in scale, it was actually something he could put on the table. So on January 27th, a joint American and British team removed from Libya 55,000 pounds of uranium hexafluoride centrifuge equipment and other materials. They brought all of this material,

along with Libya's detailed nuclear weapons designs, back to the United States for evaluation, testing, and destruction. And what did Qaddafi demand in return for that? He wanted to have sanctions lifted. He wanted to be readmitted to international organizations, a seat on the United Nations Security Council when it was Libya's turn. He basically wanted to be readmitted

to the Club of Nations. And importantly, although this was a subtext, he wanted to be guaranteed that he wouldn't face the kind of fate that Saddam Hussein faced in Iraq. He wanted some security guarantees as well. Colonel Qaddafi correctly judged that his country would be better off and far more secure without weapons of mass murder. The Bush administration presented the Libya example as the ultimate good news story for disarmament. Good things would flow to the Libyans. Libya would find itself more prosperous, more widely accepted. Old hostilities do not need to go on forever. And I hope that other leaders will find an example in Libya's announcement today.

And they hoped and were very open about saying that the Libya model could be a model for other countries, other nuclear states, including at the time North Korea, that if they followed this model, they would reap the same kinds of benefits. So this seems like a possible roadmap for North Korea and denuclearization. Well, yeah, except if you remember, Muammar Gaddafi didn't come to a good end. Either this is the first Arab revolution

of the 21st century, or it will be brutally suppressed. Tense new beginnings for Tunisia. Its Arab neighbors nervous of how revolutionary feelings could spread. Well, in 2010 and 2011, the entire Arab world was caught up in the Arab Spring, including in Libya. We do have some new details this morning about what's happening in Libya, as the Obama administration is now estimating that the death toll in Libya after two months of fighting could be as high

as 30,000 people. And what you saw in Libya was a bitter tribal battle that really split the country into a number of factions. And Qaddafi was very brutally trying to put down this uprising. The U.S. ambassador to Libya says it's hard to gauge how many people have died in Muammar Qaddafi's crackdown on protesters and also in the fighting between rebels and pro-government forces. And the fears of a humanitarian catastrophe

actually drove the Obama administration and its NATO allies to mount an intensive air campaign to, in effect, halt Qaddafi's forces, which were bearing down on the city of Benghazi. Well, in Libya overnight, the heaviest NATO bombing raids in weeks. NATO targeted several locations in Tripoli, the capital of Libya. Residents say that Muammar Qaddafi's compound was one of the targets. A building used by Libyan military intelligence was also hit as was a… Which did stop Gaddafi's forces in their tracks.

Going forward, we will continue to send a clear message. The violence must stop. Muammar Gaddafi has lost legitimacy to lead and he must leave. But it had another effect. It actually led the rebels to feel empowered to go after Qaddafi directly. Fighters discovered Qaddafi hiding in a drainage pipe beneath a roadway. Outside of the town of Sirte. This is where he fled to when his convoy was hit. And then rebel fighters spotted him, pulled him out of the pipe, dragged him about 50 yards, put him up against a jeep. And according to one fighter who we talked to at the scene, he asked desperately,

what have I done to you, my sons? To which the fighter told us he replied, more than 40 years of killing. They forced him out of his palace, put him on the run, and then subjected him to the most humiliating possible fate for a leader like this. Several men beat Gaddafi before they shot him to death. In full view of cameras and people's iPhones, killed by his own people. We are so happy. It's a great, greatest moment in all my life. When I saw Gaddafi's face covered with blood,

I saw a man who covered Libya for four decades with blood. So he has to, in his last moment, last day, he was covered with the blood that he covered Libya with. So Qaddafi ends up dead in this very brutal public way. What's the connection between that and the denuclearization deal that Libya struck with the U.S.? Well, the basic question here is, would NATO, would the United States, would the Europeans have felt so emboldened to intervene the way they did if Qaddafi still had nuclear weapons, if he had the nuclear shield. And the argument that many other leaders make is that would have been the insurance policy that would have protected Gaddafi

from facing that kind of a military attack. That's the one threat that you can make that might cause the U.S., cause NATO, cause the Europeans to think twice. So whenever the subject of denuclearizing North Korea comes up, the fate of Gaddafi is always on the minds of the Kim family. And the Libya precedent is particularly at the top of their minds now. I think he's going to be a fantastic representative of our team.

He's highly respected by everybody in this room. And John, I want to thank you very much. This is going to be... Because as they face the prospect of a disarmament negotiation with President Trump, there's a new member of the Trump team, John Bolton, Trump's new national security advisor. In the case of Libya, I had the opportunity to work in close consultation with our British colleagues in diplomatic efforts

to secure the verifiable elimination of Libyan weapons of mass destruction. Who happens to be the same guy who engineered the deal to disarm Libya back in 2003. Wow. And he has come forward just in the last couple of weeks and said he views Libya as his template for negotiating with North Korea. We have very much in mind the Libya model from 2003, 2004. There are obviously differences.

To him, the Libya disarmament deal was the kind of rapid, clean, and thorough deal that he would love to see repeated with North Korea. A top North Korean official called Bolton's comments an awfully sinister move to impose on our dignified state the destiny of Libya or Iraq. We have already made clear what kind of a man Bolton is and do not conceal our sense of refusal of him. So Bolton is very much the bogeyman in this whole equation. Mark, why would John Bolton mention Libya when you'd think as national security advisor, he knows well that it strikes fear in the hearts of the North Koreans. Well, I think that goes back to John Bolton's view of how this process should unfold.

What he is talking about is very much what happened in 2003, 2004, where Libya agreed on a voluntary basis to give up all its weapons up front. That is what he's focused on. He's not focused on the bloody aftermath, what happened in 2011. But do you suspect that John Bolton kind of did know that this would be interpreted as a threat by North Korea, that there was a double meaning here,

that he could pretend to be talking about 2004, but really mean 2011 and Kim's worst fears? Well, I think this requires climbing into John Bolton's head a little bit. But if you look at his record, if you look at what he has said about North Korea over the years, he has never hesitated from taking the most maximal threatening position. So I think it's probably fair to say, and John Bolton is a very smart guy.

He knew exactly what he was doing. I think by invoking Libya, he's also sending the Kim regime a message, which is if you don't do this one way, you may wind up doing it another way. I think that the maximum pressure campaign that the Trump administration has put on North Korea has, along with the

politico-military pressure, has brought us to this point. Relieving that pressure isn't going to make negotiation easier. It could make it harder. Okay, so after North Korea threatens to back out of this summit because of its worry about replicating what happened in Libya, how does the Trump administration respond? Well, oddly enough, President Trump very quickly walks away from what his national security advisor John Bolton said. Well, the Libyan model isn't a model that we have at all. He basically says the Libya model is not the model that we're looking at. Well, we're thinking of North Korea. In Libya, we decimated that country.

That country was decimated. There was no deal to keep Gaddafi. That, in fact, the model that we're looking at would have Kim Jong-un staying in power. This would be with Kim Jong-un something where he'd be there, he'd be in his country, he'd be running his country. His country would be very rich. His people are tremendously industrious. If you look at South Korea... So he's in effect extending a security guarantee to Kim, saying that if you give up your weapons,

I will guarantee that you will survive and not only that, that you will thrive. But he's also saying, you know what? What happened in Libya was really bad. And in that sense, he's recognizing Kim Jong-un's version of what the Libya model represents. You're right. He's in fact embracing the North Korean narrative

because what he's saying is, we really decimated that country. We got rid of the leader. We don't plan to do that with you, provided you're willing to give up your weapons. Is that a surprising position for President Trump to take to basically embrace Kim's version of Libya, which is that it's a bad

news story for North Korea. Well, it's interesting. At one level, it is a surprise to see the president, in effect, embrace the North Korean narrative and also distance himself from his own national security advisor. But when you step back and look at the history of Libya, it's perhaps somewhat less surprising because other people, Democrats and Republicans, have agreed over time that what happened with Libya is really a cautionary tale. Since I'm sure this is a sentimental journey for you, I'd like to do a lightning round about the past eight years. Quick questions, quick answers. Worst mistake? quick questions, quick answers. Worst mistake?

Probably failing to plan for the day after what I think was the right thing to do in intervening in Libya. Here is a country that agreed to give up its nuclear arsenal and later was subjected to a NATO air campaign that left the country in a shambles with no leadership at all and continues even today to be in a state of near anarchy.

So Libya is by all means not a good example for anybody, not for NATO, not for the United States and not for North Korea. So at some level, for Donald Trump to distance himself from the Libya precedent is probably a helpful thing. And one could argue even that John Bolton perhaps

shouldn't have raised it in the first place. Exactly. It feels like trying to present Libya as a positive model for North Korea feels like an inherently flawed idea. If the goal here is to give the North Koreans an incentive to sit down at the table and make concessions, it's probably the worst possible precedent that you can raise. The Libyan model that was mentioned was a much different deal. We never said to Gaddafi, oh, we're going to give you protection,

we're going to give you military strength, we're going to give you all of these things. We went in and decimated him. But what's even more interesting is what President Trump went on to say next. Now, that model would take place if we don't make a deal, most likely. After telling the North Koreans that at some level he understood and embraced their reservations about the Libya model. He then said, if Kim Jong-un did not make a deal with the United States, he might suffer the fate of Gaddafi.

So there's a paradox in what the president is saying. He's saying, on the one hand, I understand why you wouldn't like the Libya precedent, but if you don't agree to give up your nuclear weapons, you may end up suffering the same fate. So in a sense, we've kind of come full circle here. And President Trump is now threatening Kim that he could end up like Gaddafi, but not as the inevitable outcome of denuclearizing, but as a result of what might happen if he doesn't denuclearize? Well, I think the argument that the president would make is, if you do give up all your weapons voluntarily, we can give you some form of security assurance. In other words, I believe that Trump is suggesting he's willing to go further

than foreign leaders were back in 2003 with Gaddafi, which is to say, if you make this deal with us, we will help ensure that you stay in power. The question is, is that a security guarantee

the United States can really afford to make? And can President Trump actually offer Kim Jong-un security? Can he actually assure him, given everything we've just discussed, that he can give up his nuclear weapons and remain in power? Well, that's a really interesting question, because what the United States can say to North Korea is, we commit we will not invade your country, we will not attack your country,

we will not support anyone else attacking your country. But the one thing that the United States can't do is guarantee that Kim won't face an uprising from his own people. And to go full circle, it's an uprising of his people that eventually took Gaddafi out of power. It required the intervention of NATO and the United States,

but the Arab Spring was an internal popular revolt. And that's one thing the United States cannot protect Kim Jong-un from. And Kim knows that, which is probably why Kim is so reluctant to give up his nuclear weapons. So the U.S. has kind of embraced Kim's ultimate fear of being forced from power in the end, right? Yeah, that's right.

I mean, they are basically presenting Kim with this very difficult choice, which is if you agree to give up your weapons, you will have a shot at surviving. weapons, you will have a shot at surviving. Even though we understand your fear that by giving up your weapons, you might be putting your long-term survival at risk. So that's the underlying paradox in the way that President Trump is approaching this negotiation. Mark, thank you very much. Pleasure, Michael. We'll be right back. Here's what else you need to know today. In an interview with The Times,

President Trump's lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, said the special counsel hopes to finish a key part of its investigation into whether the president obstructed justice by September 1st. Giuliani said Mueller's office had provided the timeline during negotiations over whether Trump would sit for an interview, and that Mueller's team had said the date was contingent on him doing so. Giuliani told The Times that waiting any longer than September 1st risks improperly influencing voters in November's midterm elections. And on Sunday, as part of a series of tweets venting about the special counsel investigation, President Trump took things a step further and ordered the Justice Department to actually open a new inquiry into whether it or the FBI had infiltrated his presidential campaign at the request of the Obama administration. In response, the Department of Justice said it would ask its inspector general

to expand an existing review of the Russia investigation to include the president's request. Finally, joining me now, the next president of the National Rifle Association, Oliver North. Ali, welcome back to Fox News Sunday. Thank you, Chris. In an interview on Sunday with Fox News' Chris Wallace, the new head of the NRA, Oliver North, blamed the latest school shooting in Santa Fe, Texas, on American culture and medicine,

and resisted calls for any gun control. The problem that we've got is we're trying like the dickens to treat the symptom without treating the disease. And the disease in this case isn't the Second Amendment. The disease is youngsters who are steeped in a culture of violence. They've been drugged in many cases. If you look at what has happened to the young people, many of these young boys have been on Ritalin

since they were in kindergarten. On Friday, the 17-year-old Texas shooter killed eight students and two teachers, despite the fact that his school had an active shooter plan and two armed guards on duty. Still, North said more could be done to harden the school against shootings. If that means five metal detectors

getting in and out of the high school, you get five metal detectors. That's it for The Daily. I'm Michael Barbaro. See you tomorrow.