Despite President Obama’s vow to never accept North Korea as a nuclear state, the U.S. general nominated to be the next commander of America’s nuclear arsenal told Congress he believes North Korea “will get there.”
Air Force Gen. John Hyten was testifying Tuesday before the Senate Armed Services Committee considering his nomination to be the commander of U.S. Strategic Command.
Hyten said while Russia is the most dangerous threat to America, followed closely by China, the next threats are North Korea and Iran.
Hyten singled out North Korea as “very unpredictable,” adding “It’s hard to tell exactly what they are going to do.”
Hyten said while North Korea’s testing of nuclear weapons and related missile technology is crude by U.S. standards, it’s just a matter of time before it solves the technical problems and achieves a nuclear capability.
“When you think back to where we were when we started flying missiles and we started building those capabilities, we had failure after failure after failure, and we ended up getting there.
“So what concerns me most is they will get there. They’re gonna get there, and once they have those capabilities, what are they going to do with them? That’s my biggest concern. And if I’m confirmed as commander of STRATCOM that will be at the top of my list, to figure out how we best respond to that threat.”
Pyongyang has continued with an ambitious program of underground nuclear tests, along with development of long-range ballistic missiles that could threaten the United States.
After North Korea’s latest nuclear detonation Sept. 9, President Obama issued a statement that included the vow, “To be clear, the United States does not, and never will, accept North Korea as a nuclear state.”
But the Obama adminsitration has few options for dealing with North Korea, aside from condeming its actions in the “strongest possible terms” and to call for new sanctions.
But North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un has shown himself to be immune to pressure from the international community, even from China, the country believed to have the most influence with Pyongyang.
Defense Secretary Ash Carter Monday expressed deep skepticism about the chances for diplomacy to persuade North Korea to give up its nuclear ambitions.
“Unfortunately, the diplomatic picture is bleak at the moment, and we continue to be open to an improvement in that and try to get Russia and China and others interested down that road, but it’s hard to project that that’s where it’s going,” he said in remarks at the Hoover Institution. “North Korea is one of these things that just never seems to go away.”
Hyten said one of his worries is about deterring someone like Kim Jong-un who is unpredictable, which is why he also endorsed a strong missile defense without mentioning any program specifically.
“That’s why you have to have a defensive mechanism that will assure that if they want to attack the United States, it will fail, and then leave the president all the response options with the rest of the capability that we have.”
But the challenge, said Hyten, is to get that point across to North Korea. “They have to know that, so we have make sure that is readily transparent to all the world and all our adversaries.”
