 Hello and welcome to NewsClick. North Korea and the United States has been at loggerheads for quite some time, tension ratcheting up to a possible nuclear exchange, missile attack on North Korea in preemptive strike or a nuclear strike by North Korea as well. There also have been discussions about North Korea launching missiles towards Guam which is something like 5 to 6000 kilometers from North Korea. The question is, how did this happen and where are we going? The argument that is quite often advanced is that North Korea as a country has not lived by its commitments made in various agreements and the United States is only responding to it. This is the standard shall we say response of the US media. If we look at the various agreements that have been reached, there was an agreement in 1994 between North Korea and the United States regarding steps North Korea, United States will take. It must be understood that officially North Korea and the United States are still in war and the 1953 agreement is only an armistice which means that officially peace has never been declared on the Korean peninsula. One of the aims that North Korea has always had is that out of this agreement there should be a settled peace agreement and the state of war that exists should not then continue even though it is not a shooting war. The United States wants from North Korean assurance that it will stop its missile program and its nuclear program and this is what it did achieve in 1994. Unfortunately, the United States also had certain conditions which it had conceded to North Korea. One of which was a peace agreement. Others were supplying fuel oil for the interim period while they would build 2 nuclear reactors to supply electricity that North Korea needed. It must be understood North Korea had agreed to stop the work on 2 nuclear reactors which were supposed to provide electricity to North Korea and these reactors had certain investments in them, had done some construction work. All of that was abandoned in 1994 or through the 1994 agreement when they also had a 5 megawatt reactor which they also dismantled. Now, when all these measures were taken essentially North Korea gave up the plutonium based route for a nuclear bomb. Unfortunately, the United States having got North Korea to junk its plutonium processing or plutonium production capacity then moved on not to supply the reactors it had promised not in fact even start construction on the contrary virtually making it clear that this was going to be postponed on various counts. It also dragged its fees over supplying fuel oil which was then highly necessary for North Korea to supply its energy needs. Having done this we also then saw a situation where North Korea started looking at nuclear enrichment having given up its plutonium production capacity when it started looking at uranium enrichment and developing its missiles then the US did come to some negotiations back in 1998 on this but those negotiations were abandoned virtually when Bush came into power and Bush's immediate response was to categorize Iraq, Iran and North Korea essentially as an axis of evil and a deserving quote-unquote of therefore regime change. Iraq was invaded as we know and Saddam Hussein when he was deposed at the time and later killed at the time Bolton the US envoy to the United Nations said that this is a lesson other regimes need to learn that this is the fate obviously that other regimes would also then need to take heed of. North Korea did decided that United States was not in any good faith negotiations with them had virtually given up the replacement nuclear reactors it had promised was dragging its feet over oil and therefore this did not seem to be very fruitful opportunity for them to develop or get into a peace negotiations in the United States. United States also broke its peace negotiations claiming that North Korea had restarted the uranium enrichment program and therefore it was in breach of the 1994 agreement. Now again in 2005 the word negotiations that started with under Bush again six-party agreement was reached the end state of the agreement was always a peace agreement and interim measures were called foreign both sides. North Korea did pause its missile program at various points but in the United States was very clear that it was not going to negotiate for peace in the North in the Korean peninsula and without this agreement being reached without interim measures being in place it was it was apparent to North Korea that this agreement was a one-sided agreement. Both Russia and China were a party to the agreement did ask North Korea to halt its missile tests and said that in lieu of this United States should stop its military exercise it carries out every year on the Korean peninsula a lot of which involves soldiers marching up to the demilitarized zone scenarios in which they are supposed to invade North Korean beaches over flights or flights by bomber aircraft from Guam and nearby other bases all of this with live ammunition. So in effect every year United States with its allies Australia, Japan and South Korea essentially have a pseudo invasion as it were plans for an invasion movement of troops but do not cross the demilitarized zone but at any point if they could stretching North Korea economically and militarily on this. North Koreans as well as the Chinese and the Russians had said that if this is stopped these military exercises are stopped in that case North Korea would also give an undertaking to stop for the time being a moratorium on nuclear bomb development as well as missile development pending further negotiations a peace agreement in which North Korea could give up its nuclear bombs and missiles. Unfortunately the peace agreement is nowhere in sight the missile developments are continuing just as the exercises military exercises are continuing even a few days back North Korea statements may clear in spite of all the saber rattling that one can talk of which certainly North Korea has been doing it has also made conditional offers a moratorium if these exercises are not done if Guam base is not used for overflight of its territory or bomber runs close to its border if these things happen they could do about they could provide they could provide to undertake a moratorium on further missile tests and nuclear tests. Unfortunately this assurance is not coming forthcoming from the US side US side instead wants a moratorium but does not want to concede anything and if that happens then we are likely to see the missile race continue North Korea might again test its missiles further they have already shown they have the ability to reach Guam they probably have an ability to reach Hawaii it is possible they have ability to reach even the North North American mainland whether they have or do not have this ability it is very clear their missile development will bring the US North mainland under their missile threat and possibly the nuclear threat probably in the fairly close future.