Four years ago, President Donald Trump and Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un were preparing for their first summit. Trump had dropped his “fire and fury” campaign and Kim had suspended intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) and nuclear tests. Although skeptics filled the ranks of Washington’s established Korea analysts, for the first time in decades there was a sense of possibility about the bilateral relationship.

The ensuing détente ended the following year with the failure of the Hanoi summit, though Kim maintained his testing moratorium. Last year, he indicated that Pyongyang was planning on ending its forbearance; in January, he unleashed a flurry of short-range launches, capped by a test of long-range missile components. Last month Pyongyang deployed its first ICBM in five years, though the regime apparently misrepresented the missile that was launched. And there is activity at the North’s nuclear site, suggesting a test there is imminent.

Speculation has focused on Kim desiring to force newly elected President Joe Biden to the negotiating table. That was the old model, with the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) greeting every new U.S. administration with a reminder that Pyongyang was waiting for concessions. However, few Washington analysts believe that the DPRK is willing to abandon its nuclear capability, irrespective of any promised benefits for doing so.

After all, Kim, like his father and grandfather, appears to be brutally efficient in retaining power and presumably has seen the video of Libyan dictator Muammar el-Qaddafi’s ugly demise—after he traded away his nukes and missiles for America’s and Europe’s favor. They proved to be faux friends ready to betray Qaddafi at their first opportunity. Add to that the lesson of Ukraine: give up your nukes in return for an unenforceable security guarantee, and get invaded.

Which offers a darker purpose of the North’s accelerating tests. So far, Kim has indicated no interest in talking with Biden, even though the North’s economy is suffering badly, not only from U.S. and United Nations sanctions but self-imposed, coronavirus pandemic-induced isolation. It appears that Kim has decided that he is unlikely to get the sort of economic relief he was denied at Hanoi, so there is no current reason to negotiate. That is, he is unwilling to agree to Washington’s official objective of comprehensive, verifiable irreversible denuclearization, so why bother talking?

While Kim hasn’t said so explicitly, he appears to be determined to expand and improve his nuclear arsenal sufficiently to eventually force Washington to negotiate on his terms. He certainly has not been conciliatory of late. Earlier this month he explained: “Only when one is equipped with the formidable striking capabilities, overwhelming military power that cannot be stopped by anyone, one can prevent a war, guarantee the security of the country and contain and put under control all threats and blackmails by the imperialists.”

The most obvious target of his vitriol is the United States, of course. However, South Korea, with a new, more hawkish conservative government soon to take power, also has been subject to the North’s ire. In this case, Kim loosed his favorite attack dog, his sister, Kim Yo-jong: “In case [South Korea] opts for military confrontation with us, our nuclear combat force will have to inevitably carry out its duty … a dreadful attack will be launched and the [South Korean] army will have to face a miserable fate little short of total destruction and ruin.” She described the South Korean defense minister as a “scum-like guy” and his comments as the “hysteria of a lunatic.” He had threatened preemptive strikes if the North prepared to fire missiles at the Republic of Korea (ROK).

Relations with the ROK are likely to worsen when Yoon Suk-yeol assumes the presidency. He promised to take a tougher stand toward the North and work more closely with the United States. Although this approach is unlikely to achieve much more than President Moon Jae-in’s variant of the Sunshine Policy—no South Korean administration has ever caused anything more than a temporary improvement in bilateral relations with the DPRK—it is more likely to enrage Pyongyang. After all, taking Yoon at his word suggests that there will be no more craven concessions, such as banning private efforts to spread information to the North’s people.

What to do? The current administration’s strategy looks a bit like the Obama administration’s “strategic patience”—aka, kick the can down the road approach. If Pyongyang was doing no more than insulting Washington and Seoul, that strategy might work. However, the North appears to be moving forward full speed to expand its arsenal and, more important from Washington’s standpoint, extend its reach. In just a few years, the RAND Corporation and Asan Institute figure Pyongyang could have a couple of hundred nukes with ICBMs capable of hitting the U.S. homeland. That would be a game-changer.

Although it is impossible to know Kim’s mind, building up his military while refusing to engage Washington suggests he plans to create an arsenal too large for even the harshest DPRK critic to try to dismantle. Gaining the ability to strike U.S. targets would necessarily and dramatically limit America’s options. Washington’s involvement even in a conventional conflict could trigger nuclear retaliation. Yet despite the strong ROK-U.S. ties, they are not worth risking the destruction of American cities.

Washington cannot look to other nations for answers. Through 2017, the United States could rely on China to at least discourage the North’s most ambitious plans. For a few years, Beijing even approved and enforced a succession of new United Nations sanctions. However, Chinese president Xi Jinping switched course after Washington and Pyongyang announced their summit plans, which raised the possibility of a modus vivendi between the DPRK and United States, leaving the People’s Republic of China (PRC) behind. Xi met Kim for the first time and normalized what had been a cold friendship at best. Xi has since maintained that course.

Despite the slight fillip in Sino-American relations after Biden’s inauguration, these ties seem destined to head downward. Disputes over Xinjiang, Taiwan, the South China Sea, and more are no closer to resolution. Beijing’s soft support for Russia in the latter’s war on Ukraine is driving another wedge between the United States and PRC. Kyiv’s plight has captured public attention and energized the most hawkish elements of the increasingly reckless Republican Party, which already seemed comfortable with, if not quite determined on, war with both China and Russia.

Moscow also has influence in the DPRK, though Russia long has trailed Beijing in clout. Today the Putin government has no interest in assisting the United States against Pyongyang even if doing so theoretically advanced Russian objectives. Moscow is more interested in causing trouble for America than reducing trouble by North Korea.

Japan was a member of the six-party talks and could play a role, but the status of Japanese kidnapped by North Korean agents decades ago has long deadlocked negotiations with the DPRK. Tokyo’s ties with the South also are difficult, though the incoming ROK administration hopes to improve this relationship. One advantage of improved coordination between the ROK and Japan—both market-oriented democracies seeking peace and stability in Northeast Asia—would be effectively adding Tokyo’s economic and growing military clout to the inter-Korean balance.

Seoul has the most at stake in DPRK relations but has been left with little authority by the United States. Thus, the North treated even the Moon administration, which did its desperate best to conciliate and appease Pyongyang, with contempt after the collapse of the Hanoi summit. Only an American exit, vigorously opposed by South Koreans across the political spectrum, would force the North to treat the ROK more seriously.

Absent such a switch, Washington appears to have no option other than doing more of the same, which has consistently failed over the last three decades. Despite claims that additional sanctions might bring the North to heel, the Kim government has survived both the pre-2017 period of tougher and more seriously enforced penalties as well as almost complete isolation during Covid-19.

The prospect of conventional retaliation, especially against South Korea’s capital of Seoul, was enough to deter prior U.S. administrations, most notably that of Bill Clinton, from striking North Korean nuclear facilities. Despite Trump’s flirtation with military action during his “fire and fury” stage, the North’s presumed possession of two to three score nukes would have magnified the cost of U.S. military action many times. And while the war would have been “over there,” as the ever war-happy Sen. Lindsey Graham indecorously put it, the human costs would have been catastrophic and included plenty of Americans. As Pyongyang continues to work on a panoply of weapons, including hypersonic and submarine-launched missiles, it soon will be able to retaliate “over here” too, making U.S. military action an impossible option.

The United States should prepare for ICBM and nuclear tests, as well as continued development of new and improved weapons. Alas, Washington has no answer. It complains about every test, demonstrating that it is unnerved by the North’s policy. Then the United States incrementally adds sanctions, without effect. And today the North refuses to even discuss denuclearization.

North Korea has oft been said to be the land of only bad options. That is ever more so as the North rapidly moves ahead with missile and nuclear development.

Moreover, a tougher ROK administration might move in unpredictable directions. A popular majority has supported a South Korean nuclear deterrent for years, with seven in ten currently in favor. Further recognition of allied impotence would likely fuel South Korean support for building an ROK bomb.

The Biden administration should consider a significant change in emphasis, from denuclearization to arms control. Since the latter—such as capping the North’s program, reducing the size of its arsenal, imposing proliferation safeguards, forestalling development of some weapons, and more—would move the peninsula toward the former, Washington need not admit that it had abandoned comprehensive and verifiable denuclearization. However, this appears to be the only practical means to forestall or at least limit a nuclear arms race on the Korean Peninsula.

North Korea has oft been said to be the land of only bad options. That is ever more so as the North rapidly moves ahead with missile and nuclear development. With the promise of the Trump-Kim summits an increasingly distant memory, the Biden administration needs to find a new approach. And quickly.

Doug Bandow is a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute. A former Special Assistant to President Ronald Reagan, he is author of several books, including Tripwire: Korea and U.S. Foreign Policy in a Changed World and co-author of The Korean Conundrum: America’s Troubled Relations with North and South Korea.

Source: https://nationalinterest.org/blog/korea-watch/failure-launch-why-america-can%E2%80%99t-stop-north-korean-missile-tests-201730

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A record month of North Korean missile testing in January highlighted failures of Mr. Moon’s efforts to engineer a breakthrough as his term ends in May, and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has suggested he could order new nuclear tests or intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) launches for the first time since 2017.

“If North Korea’s series of missile launches goes as far as scrapping a moratorium on long-range missile tests, the Korean Peninsula may instantly fall back into the state of crisis we faced five years ago,” Mr. Moon said in a written interview with media in Seoul scheduled for publication on Thursday.

“Preventing such a crisis through persistent dialogue and diplomacy will be the task that political leaders in the countries concerned must fulfil together,” he added.

Mr. Moon had expressed concern that the series of missile tests was so close to the March 9 presidential election in South Korea, where the candidate from Mr. Moon’s Democratic Party is in a tight race with a conservative opponent.

Mr. Moon admitted he appears to have run out of time, saying it is unlikely a last-minute summit with Mr. Kim or the adoption of his proposal for a declaration ending the 1950-1953 Korean War would happen before he leaves office.

Still, he said the United States and South Korea have agreed on the text of the declaration, and that a summit between Mr. Kim and US President Joseph R. Biden “is just a matter of time” if all sides wish to avoid a crisis.

“Since dialogue is the only way to resolve problems, a meeting between President Biden and Chairman Kim is expected to take place eventually,” he said.

Mr. Moon has pushed for a formal end to the Korean War to replace the armistice that stopped the fighting but left it and the US-led U.N. Command still technically at war.

“I would at least like to make conditions ripe for an end-of-war declaration and pass that on to the next administration,” he said.

Mr. Moon said his most rewarding achievement was helping “shift the direction toward dialogue and diplomacy rather than military confrontation.”

The biggest regret of his term, however, is the failure of the US-North Korea summit in Hanoi, he said, where Kim and then-US President Donald Trump walked away with no agreements on reducing North Korea’s nuclear weapons or missiles in return for easing international sanctions.

“It is very regrettable that the summit ended in ‘no deal’ when the continuation of dialogue should have been ensured at least,” he said, arguing that a smaller, phased deal should still have been pursued when it became clear that a “big deal” was out of reach.

“Still now, if they learn from that experience and put their heads together to discuss mutually acceptable, realistic measures… I believe there will be ample opportunities to find a solution,” he added.

In a phone call with his US and Japanese counterparts on Thursday, South Korean Defense Minister Suh Wook said the recent launches posed a “direct and serious threat”, and vowed to bolster response capabilities based on the US alliance.

Mr. Biden’s administration has said it is willing to meet the North Koreans any time without preconditions, but Pyongyang says it will not resume negotiations unless Washington and Seoul drop “hostile policies” such as military drills, sanctions, and arms buildups.

Despite the stalled talks and increase in tensions, Mr. Moon says “necessary communication” with Mr. Kim has continued, and he doesn’t think Mr. Biden has returned to the “strategic patience” policies of the Obama administration because he continues to make practical efforts to resume dialogue.

“We cannot afford to give up this task,” he said. — Reuters

Source: https://www.bworldonline.com/new-north-korea-nuclear-icbm-testing-would-trigger-instant-crisis-moon/

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The Chinese military successfully tested a mock launch of a nuclear-armed intercontinental ballistic missile, state media reported on Jan. 21, 2019.

At the same time, experts stressed that China would never be the first country to launch a nuclear attack.

“The People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force conducted a simulated intercontinental ballistic missile strike mission from an underground bunker against an imaginary enemy,” Global Times reported, citing China Central Television.

The report didn’t specify the time or location of the launch or the type of missile involved.

But the exercise underscored Beijing’s main approach to nuclear deterrence. Mount ICBMs on mobile launchers and hide them underground. “China’s strategic missiles are usually placed in deep, protective bunkers,” Global Times paraphrased military expert Song Zhongping as saying.

Crew must endure underground living in crowded, stressful conditions. “Long-term survival training in closed environments has become routine for the troops to ensure counterattack capability in case a war breaks out,” Global Times explained.

The People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force, or PLARF, is getting new and better missiles with better multiple-independent-reentry-vehicle warheads, or MIRVs, according to a January 2019 report from the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency.

“The PLARF … continues to enhance its nuclear deterrent, maintaining silo-based nuclear ICBMs and adding more survivable, mobile nuclear delivery systems,” the DIA explained.

“China cur­rently has 75 to 100 ICBMs, including the silo-based CSS-4 Mod 2/DF-5A and MIRV-equipped CSS-4 Mod 3/DF-5B; the solid-fueled, road-mo­bile CSS-10 Mod 1/DF-31 and CSS-10 Mod 2/ DF-31A; and the shorter range CSS-3/DF-4.”

“The CSS-10 Mod 2/DF-31A has a range of more than 11,200 kilometers [6,960 miles] and can reach most locations within the continental United States. China also is developing a new MIRV-capable road-mobile ICBM, the CSS-X-10/DF-41.”

Song told Global Times the new DF-41 might appear in public for the first time during the October 2019 celebrations marking the 70 anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China.

In addition to land-based missiles, China also deploys nuclear warheads on at least four Type 094 submarines. The Chinese air force is developing a nuclear-capable stealth bomber.

But China’s nuclear arsenal is small compared to America’s and Russia’s own arsenals. Beijing maintains 280 nuclear warheads on ICBMs, medium-range rockets and submarine-launched missiles. The United States possesses 3,800 nukes and deploys 1,750 of them. Russia has 4,350 warheads and deploys 1,600.

The United States and Russia risk a nuclear arms race between them. Between withdrawing various treaties and developing new, seemingly more useable smaller nukes and deterrence-undermining missile-defenses, Washington and Moscow might seem determined to make the world less safe.

U.S. president Donald Trump’s 2018 nuclear-weapons review broadened America’s atomic rules of engagement. Before, it was U.S. policy that only a nuclear sneak attack or some other existential threat would justify a retaliatory atomic strike from the United States.

By contrast, Trump’s nuclear review warned that a major hacking event or an online assault on U.S. financial infrastructure could warrant a nuclear counterattack.

Combined with looser policy, Trump’s own recklessness could elevate the likelihood of atomic war. “The risk is that he will be quicker to order their use in a confrontation with Russia, China, North Korea or Iran and that the conflict will escalate to all-out nuclear war,” Bruce Blair, a nuclear expert at Princeton University, told The National Interest .

Beijing, on the other hand, has urged restraint and reaffirmed its commitment to a “no-first-use” policy. “As China promises never to use nuclear weapon first and will only use them in a counterattack, China’s strategic missile storage facilities must be able to survive the first wave of hostile nuclear strike,” Global Times paraphrased Song as saying.

“Without a first strike against China, China will never use the weapons,” Global Times stressed. “An ICBM loaded with nuclear warheads will likely never be used as it would precipitate an all-out nuclear war, say analysts. The weapon’s primary purpose is deterrence, and to facilitate political and diplomatic discussions.”

David Axe serves as the new Defense Editor of the National Interest. He is the author of the graphic novels  War Fix, War Is Boring  and Machete Squad.

Image: Reuters.

Source: https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/china-just-practiced-launching-nuclear-weapon-42347

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The post Why can’t we live with a nuclear North Korea? first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

The Korean Central News Agency, North Korea’s propaganda arm, said that that dictator Kim Jong-un inspected “an H-bomb to be loaded into [a] new ICBM” during a visit to the North’s Nuclear Weapons Institute. Photos accompanied the statement showed the purported hydrogen bomb being developed in a lab.

The explosive power of the “homemade” bomb is “adjustable from tens kiloton to hundreds kiloton,” KCNA said.

Aside from the factuality of the North’s claim, the language in its statement seems a strong signal that Pyongyang will soon conduct another nuclear weapon test, which is crucial if North Korean scientists are to fulfill the national goal of an arsenal of viable nuclear ICBMs that can reach the U.S. mainland. There’s speculation that such a test could come on or around the Sept. 9 anniversary of North Korea’s national founding, something it did last year.

There was no immediate comment from the Pentagon or other U.S. officials. However, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats told Congress in March that North Korea had developed the ability to put a nuclear warhead on a missile.

Experts have previously expressed skepticism about previous North Korean weapons claims. However, the announcement will raise already high worries in East Asia and in Washington that the North is closer to its goal of an arsenal of viable nuclear ICBMs that can reach the U.S. mainland.

In July, conducted its first ever ICBM tests, part of a stunning jump in progress for the country’s nuclear and missile program since Kim rose to power following his father’s death in late 2011. The North followed its two tests of ICBMs, which, when perfected, could target large parts of the United States, by threatening to launch a salvo of its Hwasong-12 intermediate range missiles toward the U.S. Pacific island territory of Guam in August.

It flew a Hwasong-12 over northern Japan last week, the first such overflight by a missile capable of carrying nukes, in a launch Kim described as a “meaningful prelude” to containing Guam, the home of major U.S. military facilities, and more ballistic missile tests targeting the Pacific.

North Korea has conducted five nuclear tests since 2006, including two last year. The first of those tests involved what it claims to have been a hydrogen bomb and the second was its most powerful ever.

The key question is how far North Korea has gotten in efforts to consistently shrink down nuclear warheads so they can fit on long-range missiles.

South Korea’s main spy agency has previously asserted that it does not think Pyongyang currently has the ability to develop miniaturized nuclear weapons that can be mounted on ballistic missiles. Some experts think the North may have mastered this technology.

North Korea is thought to have a handful of rudimentary nuclear bombs and has spent decades trying to perfect a multistage, long-range missile to eventually carry smaller versions of those bombs.

Fox News’ Lucas Tomlinson and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2017/09/02/north-korea-claims-to-have-hydrogen-bomb-for-long-range-missile.html

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