North Korea's Nuclear Posture: an Evolving Challenge for U.S. Deterrence
A more capable, nuclear-armed, North Korea will pose very substantial challenges to the U.S. deterrence posture.
While North Korea’s nuclear program already serves multiple functions in its security strategy, it is likely to acquire an even greater role over the coming years. Once the regime deploys more advanced nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles, it might be tempted to pursue a revisionist agenda focusing either on the reunification of the Korean peninsula or on more limited aims. In support of such ambitions, Pyongyang may develop a theory of victory relying on the threat of nuclear escalation to deter enemies from pursuing regime change and to compel them to accede to its demands. As North Korea’s capabilities mature, the United States, South Korea, and Japan will need to articulate a comprehensive approach to deterring Pyongyang while managing their differences to respond to North Korea’s behavior during peacetime, crisis, and conflict. To deter Pyongyang, coordination is key, hence the need for the United States and its allies to adopt a layered deterrence strategy and determine courses of action that, if pursued vigorously and carefully, would increase their chances of containing a nuclear-armed North Korea and avoiding nuclear war.
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North Korea's Nuclear Posture: an Evolving Challenge for U.S. Deterrence
Security Studies Center
Heir to a tradition dating back to the founding of Ifri, the Security Studies Center provides public and private decision-makers as well as the general public with the keys to understanding power relations and contemporary modes of conflict as well as those to come. Through its positioning at the juncture of politics and operations, the credibility of its civil-military team and the wide distribution of its publications in French and English, the Center for Security Studies constitutes in the French landscape of think tanks a unique center of research and influence on the national and international defense debate.
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