WASHINGTON —
North Korea would attack Japan if another war with the reclusive country erupted as a result of efforts to implement recently strengthened U.N. sanctions against Pyongyang over its second nuclear test, a U.S. scholar said Wednesday.
Selig Harrison, Asia Program director at the Washington-based Center for International Policy, who visited North Korea in January, sounded the warning during a House Foreign Affairs Committee subcommittee hearing on North Korea policy.
eeIn the event of another war with North Korea resulting from efforts to enforce the U.N. sanctions, it is Japan that North Korea would attack, in my view, not South Korea,ff he said.
eeNationalistic younger generals with no experience of the outside world are now in a strong position in the North Korean leadershipff in the wake of the illness suffered by the countryfs leader Kim Jong Il last year that led to eehis reduced role in day-to-day management,ff he said.
Earlier this month, the U.N. Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution to punish North Korea over its second nuclear test in late May, centering on tougher financial sanctions and the stricter enforcement of North Korean cargo inspections.
North Korea reacted with anger to the resolution, saying it would eeweaponizeff more plutonium, begin uranium enrichment and react militarily to blockades.
Harrison attributed North Koreafs eagerness to attack Japan to the U.S. military presence in Japan. eeThe reason—U.S. bases in Japan, in all likelihood,ff he said.
Harrison said the U.N. sanctions have further strengthened the generalsf hard-line position because all North Koreans feel threatened by U.S. nuclear arms deployed near their border, and would be united if tensions caused by attempts to implement the sanctions should escalate to war.
The generals, he said, eehave alarmedff others in the North Korean regime with their eeunrealistic assessments of Pyongyangfs capabilitiesff in the case of a conflict with Tokyo.
The scholar also said some of the generals were angry at the North Korean leaderfs apology for Pyongyangfs past abductions of Japanese nationals during his September 2002 talks with then Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi.
Despite the apology, Japan and North Korea remain at odds over the abduction issue and rows over the problem have been an obstacle to normalizing ties.
eeWhen Kim Jong Il apologized to Prime Minister Koizumi in 2002, this was a very sensitive matter inside North Korea. This was regarded as very unfortunate by many of the nationalistic younger generals and other generals and others within North Korea,ff Harrison said.
eeBut this is history. Japanese colonialism was the biggest event in the history of Korea that had an impact on the current situation, in many ways,ff he added.