It has mostly fallen off our foreign policy radar, overshadowed by Ukraine and Taiwan concerns. But North Korea’s launch of yet another ICBM missile is a stark reminder: The ominous peril of a nuclear North Korea continues to grow. In fact, the next crisis may be just around the corner.
With pilfered cryptocurrency, Kim Jong Un’s dynastic regime is racing to build a full spectrum missile and nuclear force with ICBMs, submarine-launched and tactical nukes. After a record launching of over 95 missiles in 2022, and punctuating 2023 by testing a new solid fuel long-range ICBM, the Hwasong-15, which can reach most of the U.S., Pyongyang is making more threatening noises.
Much has been written about Pyongyang’s seemingly endless nuclear-capable missile tests. But what do they add up to?
Though little noticed, last month, the DNI’s National Intelligence Council (NIC), declassified a national estimate (NIE) assessing how Kim is likely to leverage his accelerating nuclear and missile capabilities. The NIE says both the best and worst-case scenarios are the least likely: Neither a passive use of nuclear weapons solely for deterrence nor a worst-case use of aggression — including using nuclear weapons — to dominate the Korean Peninsula.
Unfortunately, that is cold comfort. Why? The intelligence community tells us that over the rest of this decade, Kim is more likely to, ”employ a variety of coercive methods and threats of aggression to try to make progress toward achieving his national security priorities.” The NIE adds that he, “may be willing to take greater conventional military risks, believing that nuclear weapons will deter an unacceptably strong U.S. or South Korean response.”
Still, more ominously, the NIE says that Kim’s regime ”most likely will continue to use its nuclear weapons status to support coercive diplomacy, and almost certainly will consider increasingly risky coercive actions as the quality and quantity of its nuclear and ballistic missile arsenal grow.”
With North Korea thus far ignoring even unconditional talks offered by Biden, North Korea’s breakneck efforts to attain greater nuclear and missile capabilities have reinforced a dangerous cycle of action and reaction: Kim’s sister, Kim Yo Jong, a frequent top spokesperson, recently threatened to shoot down U.S. surveillance planes even though they were flying over international waters near the North Korean coast.
With each step to enhance North Korea’s nuclear capacity, there has, as Newton’s Third Law of Motion warned, been an equal and opposite U.S. and South Korean reaction, ratcheting up tensions. Thus, there have been more U.S.-South Korea joint military exercises and more U.S.-South Korea-Japan defense cooperation. The U.S. has stepped up efforts to respond to Seoul’s nuclear fears — and popular support for nuclear weapons.
The U.S. has gone to extraordinary lengths to reassure South Koreans. The centerpiece of the April U.S.-South Korean Summit was the Washington Declaration, which established new mechanisms for closer regulation consultation on nuclear planning, including tabletop nuclear exercises. To underscore U.S. nuclear deterrence commitments to Seoul, the White House has taken unprecedented moves, sending U.S. nuclear-capable bombers and nuclear missile submarines to South Korea, the first of what may be periodic shows of force to underscore the credibility of U.S. extended deterrence.
Predictably, each U.S. action has triggered angry, threatening North Korean responses. This raises the risk of Pyongyang miscalculating and sparking conflict.
Why? North Korea has enshrined its nuclear status in a 2012 constitution. Last year, it passed a new law articulating its nuclear doctrine of first use if Kim deemed a threat imminent or even felt there were preparations for a nuclear attack. With the absence of regular communication or crisis-response mechanisms between Pyongyang and Washington or Seoul, these moves dramatically raise the risk of miscalculation and accidental conflict — like shooting down U.S. surveillance planes.
North Korea recently sent drones over South Korea, prompting Seoul to scramble fighter jets and launch a $440 million counter-drone military program. Even before Pyongyang acquired its current missile and nuclear arsenal, it has periodically militarily provoked South Korea, often to assert claims to the Northern limit line, the sea border between North and South. In 2010, Kim attacked a South Korean military facility on Yeonpyeong Island, in an exchange of fire killing two soldiers and two South Korean civilians. That same year, Pyongyang sunk the Cheonan, a small South Korean Navy ship, killing 46 sailors. Kim’s military provocations are ongoing and frequent — last April, the South Korean Navy repelled a North Korean ship that intruded into its waters.
How emboldened might Kim feel now with his full spectrum missile and nuclear arsenal in place? The worst-case scenario would be a situation where the U.S. is in a hot war, for example, a military conflict with China in response to a Chinese attack on Taiwan. Kim might see a diverted U.S. as an opportunity to attack South Korea and fulfill the long-time fantasy of reunification on North Korea’s terms.
As the NIE argues, such a use of force to dominate, not just provoke, South Korea is unlikely. But in a period of U.S.-China rivalry and an increasingly unsettled Northeast Asia, this wicked predicament just gets nastier. If there is a saving grace, it is as the NIE points out, Kim is not suicidal. Kim knows as Biden reminded him last April, that any North Korean nuclear attack would be “the end” of his regime.
Americans tend to think that all problems have solutions. But after nearly 30 years of failed diplomacy with North Korea, there are arguably some problems that can only be managed, not solved. And even if well-managed, North Korea may have a strategic surprise in store for everyone.
Robert A. Manning is a distinguished fellow at the Stimson Center. He previously served as senior counselor to the undersecretary of State for global affairs, as a member of the U.S. secretary of state’s policy planning staff and on the National Intelligence Council Strategic Futures Group. Follow him on Twitter @Rmanning4.