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There is some sign that North Korea is changing recently. There is ongoing successful negotiation to have a military talk to Pyongyang, which has been stopped for seven years.

To say that the United States has pursued diplomacy with North Korea is a little bit misleading. It did under the Clinton administration, though neither side completely lived up to their obligations. Clinton didn't do what was promised, nor did North Korea, but they were making progress.

So South Korean ability is very much limited to handle North Korean, you know, difficulties. So we don't want to see an immediate collapse of the North Korea regime.

I have had a great deal of interaction with Koreans and feel a fairly strong bond with Korea.

By the mid-1990s, nearly everything in North Korea was worn out, broken, malfunctioning. The country had seen better days.

Up until the end of the Bush Administration, there was indifference to the North Korean suffering under Kim Jong-Il.

North Korea is like China was 30-plus years ago. Through our contact, we are certain they will become more open and more liberated.

Since the Korean War, U.S. and South Korea have established an enduring friendship with shared interests, such as denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula, combating aggression abroad and developing our economies.

So if North Korea continues present isolation, then with such economic difficulties the North Korean government must meet a very serious situation in the future.

While our nation's attention is rightly focused on the Middle East, the North Korean threat has grown exponentially, while there seems to be a falling asleep, so to speak, at the switch when it comes to North Korea.