While global concern is rising high over North Korea's drive for nuclear weapons, the options are few on how to thwart this ambition, say campus political scientists.

North Korea two weeks ago announced that it is harvesting plutonium for new bombs, and some U.S. intelligence officials have said they think North Korea could be preparing for an underground nuclear test.

As a result, the U.S. warned North Korea not to conduct testing, and is debating whether to seek UN authorization to allow searches of nuclear-related materials on ships leaving or entering North Korea, which has recently said it might return to regional talks over its nuclear program.

But it is not an easy issue for nuclear arms negotiators.

'Hard to sanction'

"The United States has virtually no leverage over North Korea," said political science professor Miroslav Nincic, an international relations scholar who studies war, U.S. foreign policy, national security and the arms race.

Nincic said the only two countries that seem to hold any influence over the reclusive North Korean state are China, which provides North Korea with food and fuel aid, and South Korea, which has economic relations with the country. Otherwise, the Communist country is largely cut off from the rest of the world.

"It is hard to sanction an isolated country," Nincic added.

Still, Nincic noted, neither China nor South Korea wants to "provoke an implosion of the North Korean regime." China's security interests are at stake, he said, and South Korea does not want to "absorb and rehabilitate a bankrupt, devastated country," which would be an entirely different case than when West Germany "re-absorbed" East Germany."

Nincic said, "Probably the most effective way of dealing with the North Korean threat is to give them the non-aggression treaty they so badly want."

In recent years, North Korea has demanded a non-aggression pact from the U.S. as well as diplomatic and economic concessions, while Washington wants Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, to immediately and verifiably dismantle its nuclear programs.

The fear is that if North Korea and Iran — which also has a developing nuclear program — become nuclear weapons states, many of their neighbors will follow, a sign that the decades-old global policy of nuclear containment is breaking down. Since 1945 when America ushered in the nuclear age in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, it and other Western powers have sought to limit the number of countries with nuclear weapons.

'Most serious problem'

Joyce Kallgren, political science professor emerita, says the weapons of mass destruction issue with North Korea's program may well pose the "most serious security challenge of the Bush second term."

"There is no obvious set of alternatives for coping with the problem," said Kallgren, adding that U.N. sanctions are not possible as Security Council members clearly oppose them and the return to regional negotiations — known as the "Six Power talks" — shows little promise of success.

Even encouraging Pyong-yang to drop its nuclear program in exchange for "economic incentives" is clouded by a long history of misunderstanding, said Kallgren, who is the chair of the non-profit U.S. Committee on Security Cooperation in Asia Pacific.

The stakes are high. She said a "miscalculation" — such as a North Korean missile test — could yield a "serious challenge and perhaps a response" by Japan, the United States, South Koreans and even the Russians.

Randolph Siverson, a political science professor in international relations, says it is not even clear that North Korea is about to test a nuclear weapon.

"There is so little information that it is difficult to evaluate any of their statements," said Siverson, acknowledging that he is not an expert on the subject of North Korea. "A test, however, would be unmistakable and would bring a call for sanctions."

Siverson believes that China — "which likes to see itself as the arbiter of matters in East Asia" — would likely oppose sanctions and call for more talks. He agrees with Nincic that the United States has little control over North Korea.

"All we can do is try to make it tougher on the North Korean economy, which is already pretty badly off, and only the people, as opposed to the elite, suffer," said Siverson.

An American attack on North Korea seems a bad option, he said, as North Korea could easily use its most destructive weapons on neighboring South Korea. And then there is the Korean factor. Siverson said most U.S. analyses tend to overlook the increasing sympathy in South Korea for North Korea, and thus it is not clear how South Korea would react to a U.S. strike.

Domestic angles

As for how domestic politics play into the North Korean situation, political scientist Scott Gartner says that little public appetite — and budget — may exist for yet another military conflict.

"Given current trends, in less than a year, the United States' defense spending will exceed the rest of the world combined," said Gartner, who studies public opinion during war and its effects.

Despite enormous expenditures in the Iraq conflict, limitations exist on current U.S. military power, Gartner says. "Right now, it would be extremely difficult for America to launch another major military operation."

And it is not all about money, but winning hearts and minds, too.

"As casualties (in Iraq) have gone up," Gartner said, "support for the war in Iraq has gone down, as has the U.S. military's ability to recruit. Additional conflicts would likely exacerbate recruitment problems severely."

Is the average American following the game of nuclear brinksmanship going on in a faraway place like North Korea?

Gartner points out that recent research suggests that people pay more attention to foreign policy issues than was previously thought, especially in times of war.

"Casualties greatly increase people's attention to and concern about foreign policy. It also seems that people's views on foreign policy are pretty moderate, and not the knee-jerk, frantic response to crises that many had previously suspected," he said.

Maybe a North Korean solution can be found, Gartner suggests, if China realizes that defusing the North Korean nuclear situation is the best option for humanity.

"Any U.S. military action will astronomically increase already high North Korean perceptions of threat," Gartner said. "The U.S. needs to work with China to reduce marginally, but steadily, North Korean fears and global isolation."