US and South Korean soldiers take part in joint military exercises in Pohang, South Korea.
By David Whitehouse
April 22, 2013 -- Socialist Worker (USA) -- In the 60 years since the end of the Korean War, US policy toward North
Korea has fluctuated between the options of "containment" and
"rollback".
Sometimes, the policy has shifted in the course of one presidency.
Bill Clinton and George W. Bush both started out as advocates of
rollback -- regime change, either by military force or by provoking an
internal collapse -- but ended as caretakers of containment.
Barack Obama -- who campaigned for the White House in 2008 on a promise
to conduct direct talks with North Korea, in contrast to the
belligerent rhetoric of the Bush years -- seems to have followed an
opposite trajectory since his first months in office. Though you
wouldn't know it to judge from the US media, this aggressive posture
in Washington is a driving factor in the escalating tensions that have
landed the Korean conflict on the front pages in recent weeks.