Alfonse D'Amato

As leaders gathered, a reminder of how to lead

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President Trump’s trip to Europe last week highlighted the foreign policy and military challenges facing him around the globe.
The trip began on just the right note, with a visit to Poland, a nation that has made a remarkable transition to a free, stable and prosperous U.S. ally since it escaped the Soviet grip after the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Poland was, after all, the epicenter of the earthquake that brought down what President Reagan called the Soviets’ “evil empire.” It was there that the Solidarity resistance took root, and where the first cracks in Soviet domination appeared. Great leaders like Reagan, England’s Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Poland’s own native son, Pope John Paul VI, showed a steadfastness toward democratic values that helped extend freedom and human dignity to Eastern Europe.
Much of what brought a successful conclusion to the Cold War still applies today. Back then, the key was the U.S.’s and Europe’s unwavering dedication to shared ideals and an equally unshakable commitment to the common defense of those ideals. Without the firing of a single shot, the world stepped from nuclear brinkmanship and seemingly endless conflict to a generation of peace, freedom and prosperity.
That same kind of steely determination is what’s called for in today’s dangerous world, especially when it comes to the free world’s seemingly intractable conflict with the outlaw nation of North Korea. Unfortunately, the past three American presidents, from Bill Clinton to George Bush to Barack Obama, showed no strong, steady leadership on North Korea’s dangerous nuclear buildup. Instead they vacillated, set false deadlines and generally sent mixed signals to North Korea’s dictator.

The result is a North Korea that has built a nuclear weapons and missile capability that will now be very hard, if not impossible, to undo. What the rest of the free world can do, however, is take a page from the successful Cold War struggle. I say “free world” because so far we haven’t been able to rely on authoritarian regimes, like Russia or China, to be constructive partners in this crisis. They seem only to respond to constant diplomatic pressure, credible threats of economic sanctions and the united front of democratic nations to face down the Korean threat with or without their help.
While the meeting between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin was a good first step in bridging differences over conflicts in Ukraine and Syria, it is in the broader context of controlling the spread of nuclear arms that these two superpowers could have the most impact. But they will have to reach beyond their current stalemate to achieve the sort of consensus that ultimately led to reductions in nuclear arms after the Cold War’s end.
World leaders today would do well to ask, What would giants like Reagan and Thatcher have done? They would signal to North Korea in no uncertain terms that the economic and political pressure on the regime would be relentless, and backed up with a credible level of military deterrence, both offensive and defensive.
In the very near future, North Korea may have both sophisticated nuclear weapons and delivery systems capable of hitting almost all of Asia and even parts of the U.S. But unlike the Cold War, when nuclear conflict was averted because of the prospect of mutually assured destruction, North Korea will never be in a position to threaten the total destruction of its adversaries. It would inevitably lose any nuclear war it started.
Trump and our democratic allies should make it crystal clear to North Korea’s dictator, Kim Jun-un, that if his regime attacks any other country with nuclear weapons, the response will be a nuclear retaliatory response that will destroy his entire country. Maybe that would send a long-overdue signal to his generals that failure to rein in their little dictator could have devastating consequences.
The free world is making progress on fighting its other major scourge of terrorism, which shows how concerted action can defeat the most determined foe. As the world’s leaders met last week, the ISIS terror “caliphate” had been reduced to a few square rubbled blocks of its capital in Raqqa, Syria. This success isn’t occurring in a vacuum. It is the result of the same resolve and gritty determination of an international alliance that brought down the curtain on the Cold War. Now the democracies of the world must direct that same resolve toward the looming threat in Korea. History is waiting, and also showing the way.

Al D’Amato, a former U.S. senator from New York, is the founder of Park Strategies LLC, a public policy and business development firm. Comments about this column? ADAmato@liherald.com.