Nukes and Norms and North Korea
At the stroke of midnight, the whole of North Korea took to the streets to celebrate the 75th anniversary of North Korea’s ruling Workers’ Party. The celebration, as per custom of these performances, was headlined by an extravagant and heavily choreographed military parade and an emotional speech from Chairman Kim Jong-un. More notably, however, North Korea unveiled to the world its newest, and largest to date, intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).
The development of nuclear weapons in North Korea is not new. In 1994, following North Korea’s intent to withdraw from the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT), which requires non-nuclear weapon states to forgo the development and acquisition of nuclear weapons, the United States and North Korea signed the Agreed Framework, where Pyongyang committed to freezing its illicit plutonium weapons program in exchange for aid. The agreement collapsed in 2002, and North Korea claimed that it had withdrawn from the NPT in January 2003. Again, it began operating its nuclear program. As it stands, North Korea is the only country to have withdrawn from the NPT to then pursue a nuclear weapons program with an increasingly sophisticated nuclear arsenal. Diplomatic effort to denuclearize North Korea was invoked again during the Six-Party Talks of August 2003. These talks involved China, Japan, North Korea, Russia, South Korea, and the United States. Those talks resulted in a critical breakthrough in 2005, when North Korea swore to abandon its nuclear program - including both weapons and testing development - and revisit the NPT. In 2007, those countries developed a series of steps to implement this. This plan fell through in 2009 when North Korea went through with a rocket launch. North Korea remains outside of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), and has repeatedly violated the international norm against nuclear testing by conducting multiple tests in 2006, 2009, 2013, 2016, and 2017, the last of which allegedly involved a thermonuclear weapon, also known as a hydrogen bomb, which is more sophisticated and capable of greater damage then previous atomic weapons.For years, the international community has negotiated towards a complete denuclearization of North Korea. This includes an end to their nuclear and missile development and their export of ballistic missile technology. Throughout this time, the United Nations Security Council has passed numerous resolutions condemning North Korea’s nuclear activities. These have come with increasingly harsh sanctions on the North Korean military and economy. This has historically resulted in a pattern of crisis, stalemate, and tentative progress towards denuclearization.
The newest addition to North Korea’s nuclear arsenal proves North Korea to be a key challenge for the global nuclear nonproliferation regime. Chairman Kim Jong-un first referenced the new ICBM in his new year's address describing it as a “new strategic weapon” which could play a role in future relations with the United States of America. Now that the ICBM has been revealed as this strategic weapon, the threat is on. The most recent testing of ICBMs by North Korea was in 2017. In a report by BBC World News it was stated, “The Hwasong-14, tested twice in 2017, has a range of 10,000km (6,213 miles) which can reach nearly all of western Europe and about half of the US mainland carrying a single nuclear warhead. The Hwasong-15, tested once in 2017, has a range of 13,000km, which can reach anywhere in the US mainland carrying a single nuclear warhead.” Without a test, we can not yet determine the range of the newest ICBM, however it is notably bigger than the past models. Now that they no longer need to increase the range of the missiles, North Korea’s focus can turn towards increasing the number of transport erector launchers (TEL) which are trucks used to transport and erect missiles. By increasing the number of launchers, they can fire more missiles simultaneously. North Korea has already demonstrated its ability to obtain and, potentially, to manufacture launchers despite sanctions.
Currently held norms in international society on the whole regard nuclear weapons as “taboo” which has delegitimised both the acquisition and use of nuclear weapons. North Korea does not prescribe to this norm the same way most Western nations do, which has led to the vilified representation of North Korea by Western nations - particularly the U.S. North Korea is seen to be a dangerous, authoritarian country seeking to destroy democratic values. The social realities of the West and of North Korea are, importantly, not the same, and neither are their perceptions of norms. For many countries whose military or economy falls below the ranks of the West, there is an existing norm which connects the possession of nuclear weapons to power and international status. Great powers such as the U.S., the U.K., France, Russia, and China all have nuclear weapons. They also all hold influential status in the creation of identity, norms, and structure of international society. North Korea’s policies regarding its nuclear program are due to its perceptions of its identity which is infused by a strong sense of nationalism. A strong nuclear arsenal is a physical embodiment of North Korea’s self-perceived greatness, satisfies its craving for international status, and rebukes the current Western hegemony.
It is clear, then, that North Korea’s unceasing commitment to its nuclear weapons development is tied to its perception of self identity. Its newest ICBM sends the message that this identity should not be underestimated. Action taken with the goal of denuclearization is no longer viable. We are not able to change the nuclearization of North Korea because we are unable to change North Korea’s self made identity. Only they can do that. Deterrence must become the new policy and should be implemented firmly and with careful calculation using the full range of national and international power. It is only through a process of nuclear deterrence, combined with a paced international socialisation with North Korea’s identity, that we may create effective dialogue.
Image courtesy of the State Duma of the Russian Federation (duma.gov.ru), ©2019, some rights reserved.
