A $2 million gift honoring Professor William J. Perry, from telecommunications entrepreneur Jeong H. Kim, will create a new professorship on contemporary Korea to be established jointly by the Stanford Institute for International Studies (SIIS) and the School of Humanities and Sciences.

Perry, the 19th secretary of defense of the United States, currently holds the Michael and Barbara Berberian Professorship and is a senior fellow at SIIS. Upon Perry's retirement from Stanford the new Korea chair will be named the William J. Perry Professorship.

"Bill Perry's dedicated work on Korean issues over the last decade and the significant contributions he has made to this very crucial dialogue are unparalleled," said Kim, a member of the SIIS Board of Visitors. "I can think of no one more appropriate than Bill for this chair to be named after."

Kim's interest in the political and cultural life of his native Korea has been sustained over the years in part by following the work of his mentor and friend, Bill Perry, who has played a significant role in encouraging Kim's entrepreneurship.

Learning of Kim's gift, Perry said, "I am pleased that so many students will benefit from this generous gift. I am quite humbled that Jeong and Cindy Kim have chosen to honor me in this way, as Jeong's own accomplishments deserve to be acknowledged and, indeed, emulated."

As Perry related, "Jeong Kim's story is as impressive as it is inspiring. He left Korea at the age of 14 and made his way to America with no money and little English. He worked his way through high school and college, and became a nuclear engineering officer in the U.S. Navy. After leaving the navy, he returned to school, earned his Ph.D. from the University of Maryland, and started an innovative new company in the highly competitive telecom business. Within five years he took his very successful company public and sold it to Lucent Technologies for $1 billion. He went on to manage a major division for Lucent, until offered a professorship at the University of Maryland. His dedication to education is clearly evident, not only by his decision to teach future leaders, but through his endowments of a new engineering building at the University of Maryland and now this chair in Korean studies at Stanford. And all before he turned 45."

"I understand that the university is at a critical juncture in the development of Korean Studies at Stanford," said Kim. "I am delighted to be able to do something meaningful to encourage its growth."

The establishment of an incremental endowed faculty position to be held jointly by both SIIS and the School of Humanities and Sciences is unique and innovative for Stanford University and is a likely precursor to further joint appointments that may characterize the university's upcoming multidisciplinary initiatives.

"Jeong Kim's gift is a momentous tribute to Bill Perry. It also presents a perfect opportunity for the Institute and H&S to work cooperatively to further strengthen Korean Studies at Stanford, which has been growing impressively under the leadership of Program Director Professor Gi-Wook Shin," said SIIS Director Coit D. Blacker.

H&S Dean Sharon Long concurred, "I am so pleased that Dr. Kim has extended such a generous recognition of one of the university's most valued faculty members. This gift will contribute to the growth of our understanding of Korea, a subject of deep concern to our donor and to our faculty and students."

William J. Perry has worked inside and outside of government over the last decade toward a resolution of what he has often called the "dangerous armed truce" on the Korean peninsula. Having served as secretary of defense during the 1994 crisis on the Korean peninsula, he has often said that the United States was closer to war there during that period than at any other time during his tenure.

During the second term of the Clinton administration, Perry served as special advisor to the president and the secretary of state for the review of the United States policy toward North Korea. He continues his efforts for peace on the Korean Peninsula at SIIS and as co-director of the Preventive Defense Project, a research collaboration between Stanford and Harvard.

Beijing tries to read mixed U.S. signals in Korea diplomacy By John W. Lewis

For the past year China has led the quest for a negotiated solution to the Korean nuclear crisis. It facilitated and hosted three-way talks with the United States and North Korea a year ago this week and two sessions of the six-party talks (adding South Korea, Japan and Russia) in August and February. Its officials crisscrossed the globe to explore potential areas of common interest and compromise and this week hosted North Korean leader Kim Jong Il to explore options for the beleaguered Korean Peninsula. Yet, in each of the formal talks, the Chinese have been discouraged by the minimal results. They are now questioning U.S. intentions toward Korea and, in the longer term, toward China.

Beijing considers the unchecked expansion of North Korea's nuclear weapons to be a real possibility, and its reasoning starts with the record of U.S. policies toward nuclear proliferation. That record, the Chinese argue, is mixed and often contradictory. As a result, China worries that Washington might continue to tolerate the program so long as Pyongyang did not cross key red lines, such as the transfer of nuclear materials to terrorists.

Whatever Beijing's past position on nuclear matters, many senior Chinese now regard nuclear weapons on their border to be a direct threat to their national security and suspect Washington of downplaying that danger. For them, it is no great leap to the conclusion that the unfettered growth of the Korean program might embolden others in Asia, including Taiwan, to acquire nuclear weapons despite verbal opposition from Washington. Beijing's leaders can easily imagine how that nightmarish turn of events would undermine the nation's drive toward modernization and end strategic cooperation with the United States.

Despite the fact that all parties at the six-party meeting in February endorsed the dismantling of the North's nuclear weapons program, the Chinese fear that the talks may be dead in the water. Following that meeting, they began to debate other ways to resolve the crisis. They had already reorganized the leadership team responsible for North Korean affairs, and that team had begun acting to prevent the worst case, including offering further inducements to Kim Jong Il this week. Whereas last fall the talk of deepening U.S.-China cooperation on Korea pervaded the news, now, especially after Vice President Dick Cheney's uncompromising stand on Korea and Taiwan last week, the reverse is occurring.

What China can do in these circumstances is quite limited. Its influence on North Korea is largely determined by what the United States does or doesn't do. By refusing to negotiate on a staged process leading to the eventual dismantlement of Pyongyang's nuclear weapons, Washington has tacitly allowed the North's program to proceed. It has rejected proposals for a temporary freeze, technical talks and any interim steps short of the unconditional and complete ending of the program. The result is virtual paralysis.

Beijing has been able to work with North Korea only when it could find areas of potential compromise between Washington and Pyongyang. It cannot or will not act

alone to exert pressure because this would jeopardize its influence on the North. Contrary to a widely circulated story, Beijing did not cut off energy shipments to North Korea for three days in 2003. Beijing would not take such a counterproductive action when its main influence with the North lies in the kind of quiet diplomacy being practiced this week with Kim Jong Il.

Many in Beijing are beginning to question whether there might be a more promising approach with Pyongyang. Should the Chinese, South Koreans and Russians conclude that making progress toward the common goal of the North's complete nuclear disarmament is out of reach, for example, they reluctantly might translate their joint offer of aid in February into a quid pro quo for a partial agreement, such as a limited freeze, that would allow the situation to stabilize. China could worry that such an independent action could endanger the common front with Washington. At the same time, it could calculate that the United States would be sufficiently pleased with any solution that halted the North Korean nuclear program.

None of these developments may come to pass, of course, but who could have imagined a year ago that Washington would have permitted the situation to deteriorate to the present point?