North Korea's nuclear doctrine

By Ahn Ho-young

The past several months have been a particularly frustrating time for a large number of North Korea watchers. North Korea began the year with the repeated testing of missiles of various ranges and capabilities, many of them capable of evading interception by missile defense systems deployed in the South. After the Beijing Winter Olympic Games, North Korea tested intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) as well.

On April 1, Defense Minister Suh Wook attended a ceremony to inaugurate the upgraded Strategic Missile Command. He took advantage of the opportunity to respond to North Korean provocations: at the clear and imminent sign of missile attacks by North Korea, South Korea will respond with preemptive strikes on North Korea.

Minister Suh was simply reiterating South Korea's defense policy dating back to previous governments. However, North Korea, used to a more conciliatory and accommodating policy of the South during the past five years, responded with vehement verbal threats on April 2. Two days later, it issued another statement, which threatened the South with what I would call a North Korean version of a nuclear doctrine.

The statement read that the primary mission of North Korean nuclear forces is to deter attacks on itself. However, once a war breaks out, its mission will change to annihilating the military capability of the "other party" at an early time.

North Korea has long threatened South Korea with total devastation, often threatening to turn the South into a "sea of fire." North Korea has also declared its intention to use nuclear forces to unify Korea under its own terms. However, April 4 was the very first time that North Korea disclosed a clear plan of using nuclear weapons against the "other party," implying South Korea and the U.S. I wish to share several important takeaways from this unprecedented declaration by North Korea.

First of all, North Korea declared in unmistakable terms why it is developing nuclear weapons. The April 4 statement repeatedly reminded South Korea that it is not a nuclear power. North Korea is thus already using its nuclear power as a means of intimidating South Korea. However, North Korea's purpose is not only for bluff, intimidation or deterrence. North Korea declared that it is ready to use its nuclear weapons at the start of a war.

Second, the recklessness underlying the April 4 statement concerns me in the most serious manner. The proliferation of nuclear weapons made many defense thinkers to move away from planning all-out war to self-restraint and limited war for fear of what they called nuclear Armageddon. One typical example of such efforts was the escalation ladder of 44 rungs conceived by Herman Kahn. These efforts resulted in President John F. Kennedy adopting a "flexible response" as the basis of the U.S. nuclear doctrine.

I do not read such self-restraint and fear for the consequence of its actions in the North Korean version of nuclear doctrine. The start of war will trigger North Korea to massively employ nuclear weapons at the very start in order to "prevail in the battlefield, annihilate the military capability of the other party at an early time and obliterate the other party's will to fight."

Third, given North Korea's unprecedented declaration of the purpose and the modality of using nuclear weapons, the question we have to face more seriously than ever is how to defend the life and safety of our own citizens in the South.

We have been pursuing the three pillars of "diplomacy, sanction and deterrence." We will have to keep the door open for diplomacy. But no one has high hopes for the path for the time being. We talk about further strengthening sanctions against North Korea. But we know that the prospect is very dim, particularly in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine and deepening divide among the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council.

That leads us to the importance of significantly strengthening deterrence against North Korea. We have to start with upgrading our missile strike and defense capability. Even belatedly, the Moon Jae-in government seems to have found that it can no longer put off the efforts. I am confident that these efforts will continue under the new Yoon Suk-yeol government.

These are quintessential efforts, but not sufficient in my view to meet the growing threats from North Korea. Many ideas have already been put on the table ― South Korea's deployment of nuclear-powered submarines, deeper integration of missile defense systems with the U.S., redeployment of tactical nuclear weapons in the South, NATO-style nuclear sharing, even a South Korean nuclear program.

They are not easy options. But we have to wake up to the seriousness of the situation, review the merits and costs of each of these options against the unprecedented threats posed by North Korea and make fresh efforts to significantly strengthen our deterrence capability. Business as usual will not do.

Ahn Ho-young (hyahn78@mofa.or.kr) is president of the University of North Korean Studies. He served as Korean ambassador to the United States and first vice foreign minister.