It Makes a Difference to the Sheep

ARE PRIVATE DELEGATIONS REALLY PRIVATE? Fred Kaplan makes an interesting observation concerning how the North Koreans may view the latest private delegation that is slated to visit Yongbyon.

However, private delegations sometimes hold a special status in the eyes of North Koreans, and this one seems very intriguing. It may be that the North Koreans view these private groups—especially when they involve former high-level Western officials—as de facto official emissaries that pretend to be "private" for face-saving purposes. (It may be difficult for North Koreans, brought up in a totalitarian system, to discern a genuine distinction between private and public—and perhaps impossible for them to conceive that an ex-official might travel to a hostile country for some truly independent purpose.)

Remember that the 1994 Agreed Framework was essentially negotiated by Jimmy Carter who traveled to North Korea as a private citizen. My discussions with folks around town who have had direct experience with talking with North Korean officials over the years leads me to conclude that the DPRK's awareness of the complexity of the American political process and of the concept that various actors in the U.S. polity are essentially independent is shallow at best. There is, then, a real possibility that the DPRK will see its reception and treatment of visiting delegations like the one that will visit Yongbyon as a good-faith effort to reach a negotiated settlement while the Bush administration will downplay or ignore the efforts of these private groups because they are merely private groups.