Here’s the only strategy for handling North Korea’s nuclear threat, says Retired General Wesley Clark.
News that North Korea has miniaturized nuclear warheads for its missiles and might soon be capable of striking the United States has shocked the public. But what we need right now is steady leadership, not bellicose rhetoric in deterring North Korea.
North Korea’s objectives have been unchanging for decades: Regime survival, forcing U. S. forces out of South Korea, and then a takeover of South Korea. During this time the North has sustained a million-man Army poised to invade the South, and built the artillery, rocket, poison gas, and bio-warfare means to ensure that any conflict would produce horrendous civilian casualties in the South.
But the United States and South Korea have consistently maintained sufficient forces to prevent a sudden “land-grab” by the North, and, with U. S. long range strike assets, to convince the North that their regime would be destroyed should fighting resume. This was deterrence. And this deterrence provided the South the confidence to become a strong democracy with one of the most vibrant economies in Asia.
That deterrence should still hold, even despite North Korea’s threat of an August missile strike against a U. S. naval base in Guam. Should the North attack, its leadership would inevitably lose, and quickly, and they know it. A nuclear North Korean ICBM doesn’t change that deterrence. During the Cold War the United States faced nuclear ICBMs from both the Soviet Union and China, and deterrence held.
Of course, it would be better if the North had neither nuclear weapons nor ICBM’s. We have known this. Our anti-proliferation efforts have definitely impeded the North’ acquisition of these weapons. But today, after decades of relentless North Korean efforts, assisted by a few other states, they are now a nuclear power.
