North Korean Nuclear Operationality

What are the consequences of a successful nuclear program in North Korea? Despite near-universal opposition to North Korea's moves to acquire nuclear weapons, Pyongyang is determined to succeed. It is only a matter of time before the North Koreans are able to combine their extant nuclear weapons capabilities with a viable delivery system. The threat multiplies in light of the North Koreans having already demonstrated the willingness and ability to sell nuclear technology, materials, and know-how to other nuclear aspirants. In North Korean Nuclear Operationality, Gregory J. Moore asks leading experts in Asian and security studies to consider the international consequences of a North Korea with operational nuclear weapons. How will South Korea, China, Japan, and Russia react, and does it mean an arms race in the region is inevitable? How should the United States handle the situation, both diplomatically and strategically? North Korea has already destabilized the nuclear nonproliferation regime by being the only country ever to withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and then openly test nuclear weapons. What are the repercussions for the nonproliferation regime of a successful North Korean move to nuclear weapons operationality? Given the importance of these issues and the lack of transparency surrounding North Korean politics, North Korean Nuclear Operationality offers critical and timely insight. A foreword by Graham T. Allison, founding dean of the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, sets the stage for a rigorous look at the threats North Korea poses to regional security and the nuclear nonproliferation regime.

Drawing on previously unpublished Russian archival materials, this book is the first detailed history and current analysis of the North Korean nuclear program. The contributors discuss Soviet-North Korean nuclear relations, economic and military aspects of the nuclear program, the nuclear energy sector, North Korea's negotiations with the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization, cooperative security, and U.S. policy. Unique in its focus on North Korean attitudes and perspectives, The North Korean Nuclear Program also includes Russian interviews with North Korean officials.

North Korea is perilously close to developing strategic nuclear weapons capable of hitting the United States and its East Asian allies. The volume contributors contend that the time to prevent North Korea from achieving this capability is virtually over; scholars and policymakers must turn their attention to how to deter a nuclear North Korea.

"Leading Asian and security studies experts consider the question: What would happen if North Korea "goes nuclear?" and their answers are critical. Scholars and policymakers alike need to understand the implications not only for northeast Asian regional security, but also for the international nuclear non-proliferation regime. Moore's contributors evaluate political, economic, and security issues including: how South Korea, China, Japan, and Russia would react to such an event, and the possibility of a regional arms race; what diplomatic and strategic options the U.S. has; and how the global community's expectations regarding nuclear non-proliferation would be effected. Given the instability and mystery surrounding North Korean politics, scholarship on the implications of the country's nuclear capability is critical, which makes this volume with its unique focus a timely addition to the East Asian security studies field"--

This massive compilation provides a complete picture of North Korea and its threatening nuclear weapon and missile programs with hundreds of pages of up-to-date information, featuring professional analysis and background data about the nation and its leadership. There is coverage of the government, military, human rights, and much more. The U.S. response to nuclear and missile testing, confrontations with South Korea, and changes in the dictatorship is included; extensive histories put the current situation into perspective. There is material from many agencies of the American government, including the experts at the Federal Research Division. North Korean country background data provides data on key parameters, people and history, industry, natural resources, and more. The Library of Congress Federal Research Division Country Study is an exceptional review of North Korea and its history.Contents: Chapter 1: North Korea's Nuclear Weapons: Technical Issues * Chapter 2: State Department, White House, Department of Defense Material on North Korean Issues including Nuclear and Missile Programs, South Korean Attacks, Diplomacy * Chapter 3: North Korea Country Background Data (State Department and CIA) * Chapter 4: Human Rights Report: Democratic People's Republic of Korea * Chapter 5: North Korea: A Country Study * Chapter 6: North Korea Country Handbook, Marine Corps Intelligence Handbook - North Korea Military Equipment RecognitionNorth Korea's Nuclear Weapons: Technical Issues - This report summarizes what is known from open sources about the North Korean nuclear weapons program--including weapons-usable fissile material and warhead estimates--and assesses current developments in achieving denuclearization. Little detailed open-source information is available about the DPRK's nuclear weapons production capabilities, warhead sophistication, the scope and success of its uranium enrichment program, or extent of its proliferation activities. In total, it is estimated that North Korea has between 30 and 50 kilograms of separated plutonium, enough for at least half a dozen nuclear weapons. While North Korea's weapons program has been plutonium-based from the start, in the past decade, intelligence emerged pointing to a second route to a bomb using highly enriched uranium. North Korea openly acknowledged a uranium enrichment program in 2009, but has said its purpose is the production of fuel for nuclear power. In November 2010, North Korea showed visiting American experts early construction of a 100 MWT light-water reactor and a newly built gas centrifuge uranium enrichment plant, both at the Yongbyon site. The North Koreans claimed the enrichment plant was operational, but this has not been independently confirmed. U.S. officials have said that it is likely other, clandestine enrichment facilities exist. A February 2012 announcement commits North Korea to moratoria on nuclear and long-range missile testing as well as uranium enrichment suspension at Yongbyon under IAEA monitoring.North Korea: A Country Study: Comprehensive, unique, and up-to-date information and professional analysis of North Korean political, economic, social, military, and national security systems and institutions, written by the experts at the Federal Research Division. Contents: Country Profile * Chapter 1. Historical Setting * The Origins Of The Korean Nation * Korea In The Nineteenth-Century * The Rise Of Korean Nationalism And The Three Kingdoms Period * Paekche * Silla * Korea under Silla * The Choson Dynasty * Florescence * Dynastic Decline * World Order * Japanese Colonialism, 1910-45 * Communism * National Division In The 1940s * Tensions In The 1940s * U.S. And Soviet Occupations * The Arrival Of Kim Il Sung * The Establishment Of The Democratic People's Republic Of Korea * The Korean War, 1950-53 * much more.

The authors argue that the United States and the Republic of Korea (ROK) should pursue firm deterrence of North Korean nuclear weapon use--which might soon pose a serious threat to the United States and the ROK--rather than relying on negotiations.

North Korea's pursuit of nuclear weapons has shaken the foundations of U.S. policy in Northeast Asia. Because of North Korea'a record of state- sponsored terrorism, illicit activities, human rights violations, arms sales, and fiery rhetoric, its development of operational nuclear weapons is deeply disturbing. Although most agree that North Korea should not possess nuclear weapons, nobody has a simple solution. This thesis evaluates three U.S. policy options for the North Korean nuclear crisis: incentive-based diplomacy, coercive diplomacy, or military force. It analyzes them according to four criteria: the impact on North Korea's nuclear weapons, the impact on its neighbors (China, Japan and South Korea), U.S. policy costs, and the precedent for future proliferation. This thesis shows that diplomacy will fail to achieve U.S. objectives for three reasons. First, neither the United States nor North Korea trust one another following decades of agression and the demise of the 1994 Agreed Framework. Second, Kim Jong-il will not permit the extensive inspections that the United States demands to increase transparency. Third, multilateral coercive diplomacy is difficult, time-consuming, and not supported by Washington's regional partners.