U.S. Weighs Threats, Credibility with Sudan, N. Korea

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Secretary Rice's ultimatum to Sudan is just one of a number of threats made recently by U.S. officials. There is also been tough talk aimed at Iran and North Korea. But beyond the words, there are questions about whether the U.S. could back up the threats?

NPR's Jackie Northam reports.

JACKIE NORTHAM: Many diplomats believe that one of the keys to successful negotiations is to make sure your opponent knows that there's strength behind your words, that ultimatums or threats are put on the table, that they'll back up with force if necessary. Max Boot is a senior fellow at the Council for Foreign Relations and the author of War Made New: Technology Warfare and the Course of History.

Mr. MAX BOOT (Council on Foreign Relations): Nothing undercuts in my credibility more than to make empty threats that we don't back up.

NORTHAM: Yesterday, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Chris Hill said that the U.S. will not live with a nuclear North Korea and warned Pyongyang that it can have a future or weapons but not both. Boot says very few people took Hill's comment seriously.

Mr. BOOT: If you issue a threat, you got to do something about it. And I don't see us doing very much about it with any of these rogue states that we're dealing with, whether Sudan or Iran or North Korea, in part because we're so pinned down in Afghanistan and Iraq.

NORTHAM: U.S. ground forces in both those countries are stretched thin. Some military officials have expressed concern there would not be enough troops available if the U.S. opens another theatre of operations. This fact is not lost in our adversaries, says retired Major General Robert Scales, the former commandant of the Army War College and a military historian. Scales someone like Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad could use it to his advantage.

Major General ROBERT SCALES (Retired, U.S. Army War College): A lot of this bellicosity, a lot of this ranting and raving is done - I think the sure knowledge that there's very little that the United States can do militarily to threaten him right now. And he knows it and virtually everybody else in the Middle East knows it as well.

NORTHAM: And America's allies also know it. Anthony Cordesman, an analyst with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, says traditional U.S. allies prefer diplomacy at the moment and have no appetite to become embroiled in another U.S. military operation.

Mr. ANTHONY CORDESMAN (Center for Strategic and International Studies): It's one thing to say that we will work with our allies to isolate North Korea. It's another thing to try to confront it with what appears to be as stark choice which could only be enforced with military force and where, frankly, there's no ally backing at all.

NORTHAM: But Cordesman says there is a point where the U.S. would have to back up its threats. For example, if Ahmadinejad launch to strike Tel Aviv or North Korean strong man Kim Jong-il fired a nuclear weapon. Cordesman says at that point, the U.S. would pull out all its weaponry.

Mr. CORDESMAN: We still can inflict unacceptable damage on any foreign country and we can destroy virtually any group of targets in any of these countries that threatened us. The problem is not that we lack power. The problem is making power effective, dealing with the consequences, ensuring we have international support and avoiding the use of military options.

NORTHAM: Max Boot with the Council for Foreign Relations says some officials believe if the U.S. strength is in its military might, why not use that as a bargaining chip?

Mr. BOOT: I think part of it comes out of there are in fact officials within the U.S. government who think that we had to take very strong measures against certain states and therefore issue these ultimatums in public, but there is no sense of coordination and no sense of - if the whole government's really on board for backing up these threats.

NORTHAM: Boot says other administration officials make threats out of sheer frustration over the slow pace of diplomacy.

Jackie Northam, NPR News, Washington.

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