<뉴욕타임스(NYT)>가 11월 29일(현지시각) 흥미로운 칼럼을 게재했다. 해당 매체에 여러 차례 글을 기고해 온 맥스 피셔는 '북한에 대한 중대한 진실 7가지'라는 제목의 글에서 "김정은은 합리적으로 보이며 전쟁을 원치 않는다"고 주장했다. 그러면서 "미국과 북한이 의도하지 않는 '갈등' 상황으로 치달아서는 안 되며 만약 그렇게 될 경우 전쟁이 터질 것"이라 경고했다. 주요 내용을 요약했다.
          
1. 게임은 끝났다. 북한은 현재 핵무기 보유국이다. 북한은 이를 인정받고 싶어 하지만 미국을 비롯한 국제사회는 인정하지 않는다. 북한은 그들의 핵무기를 포기할 하등의 이유가 없다. 이를 없애는 한 가지 방법이 있다. 바로 군사적 공격이다. 그런데 북한 미사일은 이동이 가능하다. 이는 북한도 미국을 한두 차례 공격할 수 있다는 것을 의미한다. 전쟁이 절정에 달할 때 북한이 미국의 주요 도시들에 핵무기 타격을 할 수 있는 것이다. 북한이 미사일에 핵탄두를 실을 수 있다는 것을 믿지 않을 이유가 없다. 기술적으로 '믿을 만한 억지력'(credible deterrent capability)이 있는 것이며, 비(非)기술적인 용어로 말하면 '북한의 핵능력 보유는 피할 수 없는 현실'이다.

     

2. 북한은 워싱턴과 뉴욕을 공격할 수 있다. 몇 차례의 북한 미사일 도발은 미국 서해안은 물론 동해안까지 도달할 수 있다는 점을 보여줬다.

   

3. 북한은 이성적(rational)이다. 따라서 김정은이 전쟁을 먼저 시작하지는 않을 것이다. 북한이 전쟁을 일으키지 않는다는 점에서 이는 좋은 뉴스다. 흔히 김정은이 '미친놈'처럼 표현되지만 그 스스로 이성적이라는 점을 보여주고 있다. 다시 말해 북한을 자살로 몰고 갈 정도의 비이성적인 지도자는 아니다.
     
4. 중국은 북핵·미사일 문제를 해결할 수 없을지 모른다. 트럼프 대통령을 포함한 미국 지도자들은 중국이 북한 문제를 해결할 수 있을 것이라고 희망하고 해당 전략을 펴왔다. 그러나 이런 전략이 제대로 작동하지 않는 것 같다. 북한은 스스로 핵무기를 포기할 때 오히려 미국이 공격해 올지 모른다고 생각하고 있다. 중국이 북한 문제를 해결하기 위해 상당한 압박을 가할 수는 있지만 그것이 북한 문제를 명확히 해소할 수는 없다.
      
5. 북한은 국제사회의 강력한 경제적 제재에도 불구하고 이를 견뎌낼 수 있음을 보여주고 있다. 북한은 이미 과거 몇 차례 이 같은 강력한 제재를 견뎌내 생존해 왔다. 1990년대에 북한은 경제시스템과 배급 체제가 완전히 붕괴됐고 인구의 10%가 굶어 죽었지만, 그 이후 농업 기술을 발전시키며 생존했다. 김정은은 아마도 어떠한 제재도 견딜 수 있을 것이라 믿고 있을 것이다.
      
6. 북한은 전쟁을 원하지 않을 것이다. (오히려 전쟁을) 여전히 두려워하고 있다. 물론 김정은이 어떤 생각을 하고 있는지 아무도 모른다. 북한의 행동을 분석해 볼 때 김정은이 전쟁을 할 수 있다는 식으로 큰소리만 외치고 있다. 상당수 전문가는 북한이 핵무기 보유국이라는 사실을 국제사회로부터 인정받으려 하고 있다고 분석한다. 무력으로 침공하겠다는 것이 아니라 두 개의 한국이 느슨한 연대를 맺으면서 북한이 원하는 대로 '침략자 미국'이 한국에서 떨어져 나가길 원하는 것이다.

     

7. (북핵·미사일 문제는) 걱정거리지만 그렇다고 혈관을 파괴할 정도로 상황을 악화시켜서는 안 된다. 가장 큰 위험은 북한이나 미국이 우발적으로 또는 잘못된 판단으로 의도하지 않는 '갈등'으로 치닫는 것이다. 그렇게 되면 결국 전쟁이 발발할 것이다.

   
정리=백승구 월간조선 기자

   

다음은 NYT이 해당 칼럼 원문이다.

 
Seven Critical Truths About North Korea

   
North Koreans reacting to video of a ballistic missile test being shown in a public square in Pyongyang in July. Credit Kim Won-Jin/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
North Korea’s latest intercontinental ballistic missile test has provoked understandable alarm, particularly among Americans worried about the threat.

But many analysts reacted with something closer to grizzled stoicism, greeting the launch as dispiriting but unsurprising confirmation of North Korea’s capabilities and intentions. For them, news of the test, like the missile program itself, is unwelcome and concerning but not too terrifying.

It’s worth reviewing, then, some of the fundamentals that guide those experts’ views of North Korea and its weapons.

   

(1) It’s over. North Korea is a nuclear power now.

Policymakers will debate for years the precise moment at which the door closed to preventing or rolling back North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs. But that door is most likely now closed.

The North Koreans have little reason to give up their weapons programs, which bring them security against their otherwise vastly superior adversaries, and we have no way to make them.

Well, there’s one way: an invasion. But North Korea’s missiles are mobile, meaning it could fire off at least one or two before the United States could take them out. Full-on war would be virtually guaranteed to bring an attempted North Korean nuclear strike against a major American city. (This assumes North Korea can mount a warhead on a missile, but we have little reason to doubt that it can.)

In technical terms, that is described as a “credible deterrent capability.” In nontechnical terms, it means the world has few options but to accept North Korea’s nuclear status as a fact of life.

 

(2) North Korea can probably strike Washington and New York now.

Past tests demonstrated that North Korean missiles could reach major West Coast cities in the United States. This test, according to analysts, showed that it can reach East Coast cities now, too. That probably includes Washington and New York.

  

(3) North Korea is rational, which means it’s unlikely to start a war.

The “good” news is that North Korea has no apparent intention of starting a war, which it would surely lose. In other words, no, North Korea is probably not going to nuke your city out of the blue.

This often gets lost in portrayals of Kim Jong-un, North Korea’s leader, as a wild-eyed lunatic. But while Mr. Kim might be eccentric, he has repeatedly proven himself to be rational. Ruthless and morally reprehensible, but rational. And no rational leader invites national suicide, which is all Mr. Kim would achieve by provoking a war.

The United States has its own nuclear weapons, as well as overwhelming conventional military superiority, to deter North Korea. Historically, deterrence works. It’s how the United States has lived for decades with the threat of Russian and Chinese nuclear weapons.

    
(4) China might not be able to solve the North Korea problem.

American leaders have, since North Korea’s nuclear program began, invested their hopes and their strategies in China. If only Beijing were properly motivated, the conventional wisdom goes, it could rein in its North Korean ally and neighbor.

But it may be time to consider why this strategy never seems to work.

North Korea is convinced that giving up its nuclear weapons would invite an American invasion, similar to what happened to Libya after it surrendered its own warheads. China can put a lot of pressure on little North Korea, but it’s not clear that such pressure scares Mr. Kim more than the threat of national destruction.

In any case, North Korea and China have been increasingly at odds. North Korea’s weapons tests often seemed timed to humiliate and defy Beijing. China has imposed its own sanctions in response. So while Americans sometimes perceive China as supporting North Korea’s provocations, in fact the opposite is often true.

   

(5) North Korea has shown it can endure extreme economic punishment.

Even the most severe sanctions might not be able to impose anything that North Korea hasn’t survived before. In the 1990s, the country’s economy and food supply collapsed simultaneously, setting off a famine that killed up to one-tenth of the population.

Since then, North Korea has improved its agricultural practices. So while Mr. Kim would rather avoid another economic collapse, he probably believes, with some reason, that his country could survive one.

   

(6) North Korea may not want war, but it’s still scary.

No one knows for sure what Mr. Kim wants except for Mr. Kim, of course. But North Korea’s actions still speak pretty loudly. And they suggest one of two long-term strategies. Analysts disagree about which is more plausible.

What these strategies have in common is a desire to secure North Korea’s place in the world.

Theory one, most widely held among experts, says that North Korea wants to use its weapons to pressure the world into accepting it as a legitimate member of the international community. This, the thinking goes, would bring trade and normalization while keeping Mr. Kim’s government in power, sort of like China’s opening in the 1970s. That’s scary because it means Mr. Kim isn’t giving up until the world accepts his government as it is — cruel, provocative and nuclear-armed.

Theory two, more controversial, says that North Korea ultimately wants to reunify with South Korea. The North can never be truly secure, in this view, as long as the freer and more prosperous South remains independent, implicitly undermining the North’s reason to exist as a separate state. This doesn’t mean invading and conquering South Korea outright, but rather slowly building ties between the two Koreas — and breaking the South away from its American protectors — until they reunify bloodlessly.

     

(7) Worry, but don’t burst a blood vessel.

The greatest risk, analysts tend to say, is from an accident or miscalculation that might send North Korea and the United States into an unintended conflict. That’s how war would start.

Maybe, for instance, the United States sends a bomber near North Korea as a symbolic threat, but the bomber veers off course toward Pyongyang, which North Korea perceives as the start of a war, leading it to fire missiles in perceived self-defense.

These sorts of scenarios are unlikely, and require a number of things to go wrong. But the odds aren’t zero and, if it happened, entire cities could be destroyed.

It’s hard to know how to conceptualize that sort of high-risk, low-probability event. It’s worth worrying about. But you’re still at far greater risk from, say, smoking. Or a car accident. Or not having sufficient health care.

 

(The Interpreter is a column by Max Fisher and Amanda Taub exploring the ideas and context behind major world events. Follow them on Twitter @Max_Fisher and @amandataub.)