North Korea’s Nukes
North Korea’s Nukes
(Bloomberg) -- North Korea isn’t your regular totalitarian dictatorship. Yes, it has an appalling human rights record, corruption and poverty are rife, and there is no political or economic freedom to speak of. Yet a couple of chilling characteristics set it apart: a nuclear weapons program and a ruthless young leader. Whether Kim Jong Un’s military is capable of an effective nuclear strike is open to question. But the Asian country’s aggressive rhetoric and regular missile tests, in defiance of United Nations resolutions, are vexing the international community and pressuring China, North Korea’s only major ally, to rein in its errant neighbor. U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened to deal with Kim's regime “very strongly,” saying all options — including military ones — are on the table.
The Situation
After a year of escalating tensions and aggressive rhetoric, the landscape shifted dramatically in early 2018 as Kim agreed to a landmark summit with Trump and met with China President Xi Jinping in Beijing. Kim had opened the year on a conciliatory note by calling for talks with South Korea and sending a team there for the Winter Olympics. South Korean envoys said North Korea was willing to give up its nuclear weapons if the safety of Kim’s regime is guaranteed. Trump hailed the ``great progress'' and is set to take part in the first meeting between serving leaders of their countries sometime before May. Just months earlier, Kim’s regime had said it would make the U.S. “pay dearly” for imposing sanctions and Trump had threatened to unleash “fire and fury.” North Korea had also declared its nuclear force ``complete'' after test-firing long-range intercontinental ballistic missiles — and saying the entire U.S. was now in range - and carrying out its sixth nuclear test. In September, it detonated what it said was a hydrogen bomb that could be fitted onto an ICBM. The UN Security Council approved tougher sanctions against North Korea in August and again in December. Some military analysts upgraded their assessment of North Korea’s nuclear capability, with one study concluding the country had successfully produced a miniaturized nuclear warhead that can fit inside its missiles. While Trump repeatedly criticized China for failing to do enough to pressure the Pyongyang government, the Chinese suspended critical coal purchases while pushing for peace talks and backing tougher sanctions. Over objections from China, the U.S. deployed a defense system in South Korea designed to take out North Korean missiles aimed at the south. The border between the two Koreas is lined with hundreds of thousands of troops.
The Background
North Korea has a reputation for escalating and then lowering tensions to win diplomatic and economic benefits. In the 1990s, it removed spent fuel rods from its nuclear reactor, a possible prelude for use in weapons, before former U.S. President Jimmy Carter brokered a deal freezing its program in exchange for help in building a civilian nuclear-energy program. After North Korea’s first nuclear test in 2006, multinational disarmament talks produced another doomed agreement to close nuclear facilities, this time in exchange for food and energy assistance. North Korea blames the collapse of various deals on the U.S. breaking its commitments. North Korea has been on a war footing since its creation in 1948, following decades of Japanese occupation. Its founder, Kim Il Sung, grandfather of the current leader, invaded South Korea to start the 1950-53 Korean War. Believed to be in his early 30s, the Western-educated Kim Jong Un has carried out the majority of his country’s nuclear tests while railing about America’s “reckless moves” toward a war. North Korea, which is thought to have six to 20 nuclear warheads, describes its weapons as a “precious sword of justice” against invaders and points out the demise of Iraqi and Libyan regimes after they gave up on nuclear arms. Some 1.3 million of North Korea’s 25 million people are in the active military, with reservists numbering 7.6 million. Weapons aren’t the only concern: A 2014 UN inquiry accused the regime of human rights abuses on a scale unparalleled in the contemporary world.
The Argument
Neither the carrot approach (aid and energy in return for concessions) nor stick (international sanctions and military exercises) has produced more than a temporary halt to North Korea’s nuclear program. China, North Korea’s biggest trade partner and supplier of most of its food and energy, could do more to make sanctions effective, according to some critics. For its part, China fears a collapse of the Pyongyang government might prompt an influx of millions of refugees and — in the event of South Korea absorbing its neighbor — create a well-armed U.S. ally straddling its border. A pre-emptive military strike might succeed in taking out North Korea’s known nuclear and missile sites, but the country has too many facilities spread out over too much terrain to destroy simultaneously. Even if North Korea reacted only with conventional weapons, its response, and South Korea’s counterattack, could produce enormous casualties. Other options include tightening economic sanctions or awaiting the downfall of the Kim dynasty, whether through Kim Jong Un’s ill health or political infighting. Kim has executed senior advisers including his uncle and one-time guardian, raising concerns about his temperament and the absence of considered counsel. His half-brother was murdered in Malaysia in February 2017. Some analysts warn that a collapsing North Korea with nuclear weapons would be more dangerous than a stable North Korea with nuclear arms.
The Reference Shelf
- A Bloomberg infographic considers the range of North Korea’s missile threat.
- A QuickTake on what U.S.-North Korea hostilities might look like and another on Trump and his allies’ options for dealing with Kim's regime.
- A Q&A on Thaad, the U.S. missile system angering China, and another on why a Trump executive order may bite harder than UN sanctions.
- Bloomberg News showed how money funneled through China makes it harder to apply sanctions to North Korea than it did to Iran.
- Bloomberg also explained why joining the nuclear club is an obsession of North Korea’s leaders.
- A research paper from the U.S.-Korea Institute outlines the expansion of North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs.
- Siegfried S. Hecker’s Stanford University paper details his 2010 visit to nuclear facilities and concludes: “The only hope appears to be engagement.”
- The Guardian’s interactive map of incidents between North and South Korea since the end of the Korean war, and a 2014 article on how North Korean defectors think the world should respond.
- “North Korea has a serious image problem in South Korea,” says a 2015 survey on South Korean attitudes toward reunification by the Asian Institute for Policy Studies.
- QuickTakes on sanctions and chemical weapons.
Sam Kim contributed to the original version of this article.
First published Feb.
To contact Bloomberg News staff for this QuickTake: Sam Kim in Seoul at skim609@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this QuickTake: Grant Clark at gclark@bloomberg.net.
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