The forces driving North Korea’s nuclear weapons program are reminiscent of Cold War strategies pursued by the Soviet Union. Most notable was Moscow’s decision in the mid-1970s to deploy 243 SS-20 intermediate-range ballistic missiles (IRBMs) with three independently targetable warheads apiece and a range of 3,000 miles, putting major Western European capitals in their crosshairs. Aside from their explicit military capability, these mobile missiles epitomized a move by Moscow to decouple the United States from its transatlantic allies, whose security rested on anticipation that a Soviet invasion of NATO territory would precipitate a U.S. nuclear strike against the Soviet Union.
By poking a hole in America’s nuclear umbrella over NATO Europe, the SS-20s constituted both a threat and a potential bargaining chip. In the event of Soviet aggression against Western Europe, the United States would face a Hobson’s choice of conceding NATO’s defeat or launching a retaliatory strike against the USSR that would spark escalation to full-scale nuclear war. Thus arose a conundrum: Would the U.S. government have been willing to sacrifice New York or Chicago for Bonn (the West German capital) or Paris?
The Reagan administration responded definitively to the SS-20s by preparing to deploy 108 Pershing-2 IRBMs and 464 ground-launched cruise missiles (GLCMs) in Western Europe. The Pershings had a speed of nearly Mach 8 and could deliver a warhead over a distance of more than 1,100 miles with pinpoint accuracy. Their reach extended to the western USSR, just short of Moscow. Their deep penetration capability made possible a direct hit on the USSR’s hardened missile silos and subterranean command bunkers and thus posed the threat of a decapitation strike against the Soviet military and political leadership.
The GLCMs had a subsonic speed of 550 miles per hour and could swoop down from a high altitude to 50 feet above ground, using a terrain-sensitive and radar-avoiding guidance system to hone in on their targets. The GLCMs could deliver up to a 50-kiloton warhead over a distance exceeding 1,500 miles.
Moscow’s hysterical reaction to the planned deployment of these “Euromissiles” involved the mobilization of its worldwide assets in the “peace movement” to sponsor massive demonstrations, protest marches, and propaganda campaigns. When these measures failed to prevent the deployments, the Kremlin resorted to diplomacy. But Ronald Reagan dismissed a putative compromise between Soviet and American representatives by instructing chief negotiator Paul Nitze to “just tell [the Russians that] you’re working for one tough son-of-a-bitch.” The outcome was Soviet acquiescence in Reagan’s “zero option”— the withdrawal of all IRBM’s from both sides. These missiles included more than 100 SS-20s deployed beyond the Urals to target America’s East Asian allies with the same decoupling strategy attempted in Europe.
North Korea’s nuclear arms pose a threat even greater than did the Soviet SS-20s, given that they can potentially reach the West Coast of the United States. And while the Russian leaders were generally rational and prudent, American observers often refer to North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un as a “crazy fat boy”—one who has threatened to “’turn the American empire into a sea in flames.” Pyongyang has employed high-risk strategies ever since its invasion of South Korea in 1950 that started the Korean War; but it failed to anticipate the robust response of the U.S.-led military forces. North Korea continues to seek normalization of relations with the United States and to convert the 1953 armistice accord into a peace treaty that would formally end the Korean War and validate North Korea’s status as a fully sovereign nation. Ultimately Kim wants to reunify the Korean Peninsula under Pyongyang’s rule. But his chief near-term objective is to sow doubt in South Korea and Japan about America’s commitment to defend them with its nuclear umbrella in the event of North Korean aggression—the same doubt that the Soviet Union tried to instill in NATO’s West European members with its SS-20 missiles. Would the United States sacrifice Los Angeles for Seoul or Tokyo?
Kim almost certainly does not intend to unleash a nuclear war, which would guarantee the destruction of his regime and his country. He is brandishing his nuclear weapons as a threat and potential bargaining chip in much the same way that Moscow used the SS-20. The Trump administration’s response should be as tough as Reagan’s.
President Trump must address, of course, the concerns of Japan and South Korea, both of which have treaties of alliance with the United States. Japan, the world’s only victim of a nuclear attack, maintains a nuclear allergy and an attachment to the pacifism that is enshrined in its postwar Constitution; but it is moving gradually to strengthen its military forces. Some influential South Koreans express support for a redeployment of U.S. tactical nuclear weapons that were removed after the end of the Cold War. On Sept. 4, South Korean Defense Minister Song Young-moo recommended a review of this issue. The weapons could provide a tripwire and also obviate the need for South Korea and Japan to develop their own nuclear arms.
Some South Korean lawmakers have suggested that the country should produce its own nuclear arsenal. Two years ago, for example, Chung Moon-jong, a member of the National Assembly, declared that “if North Korea still refuses to surrender its nuclear weapons, then we will have no choice but to go nuclear.” He opined further that South Korea should withdraw from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) and “match North Korea’s new progress, step-by-step, while committing to stop if North Korea stops.” Won Yoo-cheol, a floor leader in the Assembly, stated recently that “we cannot borrow an umbrella from a neighbor every time it rains. We need to have a raincoat and wear it ourselves.” A nuclear-armed confrontation between North and South Korea would constitute a dangerous new flashpoint in Asia, however, alongside the Indo-Pakistani nuclear standoff.
The policies of President Moon Jae-in’s new administration are still evolving. Discussions continue between Washington and Seoul about the the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) missile defense system installed in South Korea. President Moon seems to favor diplomacy over military measures to ease the nuclear crisis. A key North Korean demand is the cancellation of the annual U.S.-South Korean military exercises that are held along the coast of the Korean Peninsula. Acquiescence in to such a demand in exchange for the slowdown or freezing of Pyongyang’s nuclear program, aside from being unenforceable, would only provoke further North Korean demands that would resemble the “salami tactics” employed by the Soviet Union.
Many NATO officials opposed the “Euromissiles” as too provocative, and there is similar opposition to bolstering South Korea’s defenses. But the redeployment of tactical nuclear weapons along with a new round of joint U.S.-Korean military exercises would put Pyongyang on notice, in a way that merely installing a THAAD system cannot, that Washington and its Asian allies will not tolerate North Korea’s aggressive behavior. Such an American response should also prove amenable to China, which would resist any North Korean moves inimical to Beijing’s blossoming economic and trade relationship with Seoul. Hopefully, a combination of pressure from the United States and its allies, along with China, will induce North Korean restraint before Washington opts for a campaign of “fire and fury.”
Dr. Leighton holds a Ph.D. in international relations from Columbia University and is a specialist in Cold War history.
