Serious doubts existed about whether Pyongyang had an HEU program. “The imprecision in the CIA analysis,” Clemens contends, “underscored the difficulties of estimating the capabilities and ultimate purposes of [its] enrichment program—a point that begs the question of how complete and compelling the intelligence data may have been on which the United States decided to confront North Korea.”52 Acting on what he wanted to believe, Bush chose to use the HEU issue to ignite the second North Korea nuclear crisis. On 3 October 2002, James Kelly, Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs, accompanied by a delegation of administration officials, set off for two days of talks in Pyongyang. NSC hardliners, Hersh explains, provided him with a carefully scripted message, demanding that North Korea halt its uranium enrichment program as a condition for further discussions because it was in violation of the Agreed Framework and the NPT. In response, his counterpart Kim Gye-gwan denied the accusation and abruptly adjourned the meeting after less than an hour, ending what Pritchard, who was present, later called “a bad caricature of a party game gone wrong.” According to Japanese sources, Kelly’s charge shocked North Korean leaders, who met in an all-night session to decide on a course of action. Meeting again the next day, Kelly repeated his accusation. Refusing to discuss the HEU issue, Kim replied that ”the United States did not have a real desire to move forward to resolve the issues and . . . was attempting to disarm North Korea and change its system by means of force, coercion, and pressure.” Since it now had become clear that the United States planned “to carry out a policy of ‘strangulation,’ Pyongyang had no choice but to counter with an ultra-hard-line response of its own.” 53