North Korea does not pose a serious threat to Japan or the US at present. But it has a large arsenal of old-fashioned weapons that could do terrible damage to the South Korean capital, Seoul. Which why South Koreans are entitled to reject the reckless calls from former Japanese and US defence chiefs for pre-emptive attacks on North Korea.
No good outcome is readily available on the Korean peninsula. Although reunification following the collapse of the brutal regime in the North would benefit its sorely oppressed population, this outcome would saddle the South with huge reconstruction costs for decades to come. Despite the former East Germany being in far better economic and social shape than North Korea, re-unification caused enormous difficulties for West Germany.
On the other hand, the option of attacking North Korea would be extraordinarily dangerous. Nevertheless, last week a former Japanese defence chief General Nakatani advocated launching cruise missiles against North Korea. A former Defence Secretary in the Clinton administration William Perry had earlier urged a similar attack to prevent the North from testing a missile. General Nakatani is now a member of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party in the Japanese parliament, the Diet, which contains several influential figures who want Japan to scrap its pacifist constitution so it can undertake a pre-emptive stike against North Korea.
The ailing North Korean dictator Kim il Jong did nothing to reduce tensions with last week’s successful underground detonation of a nuclear device, after its unimpressive first test in 2006. Last week, the North also threatened to attack South Korea if it joins the US in inspecting vessels suspected of carrying weapons and says it no longer regards itself as constrained by the 1953 armistice that ended the Korean War. But there are few indications that Kim and his leading generals want to start a new war that would guarantee the destruction of their regime.
Most analysts expect it will be several years before the North could turn its nuclear devices into weapons small enough to fit into the nose cones of its notoriously inaccurate missiles. Any North Korean fighter plane would almost certainly be turned back down, or shot down, if it left its own airspace. Perhaps the North could sneak a ship or midget submarine carrying a nuclear device into a South Korean harbour. But it knows that exploding a nuclear weapon outside its borders would guarantee massive retaliation by the US and South Korea.
While the North’s nuclear program is disturbing, the bigger short-term danger remains its 11,000 artillery barrels concealed within range of Seoul. These guns reportedly can fire 500,000 shells an hour into the southern capital. While US and South Korean artillery and airpower could silence many of these big guns, thousands would survive for long enough to devastate Seoul, a city with a population of over 10 million.
Again, the North’s leadership is aware that an attack on Seoul would guarantee a response that destroyed the regime. This helps explain why the North has not fired a barrage into the South for the last 56 years. Conversely, any pre-emptive attack by the US, Japan and South Korea would be extremely likely to ensure that the North retaliated by turning much of Seoul to rubble.
South Africa is the only country to have developed nuclear weapons and then voluntarily dismantled them. The then President F W De Klerk revealed in 1993 that six nuclear bombs had been produced, but were scrapped in 1990 because improvements in the outlook for South Africa’s security meant the weapons were redundant. Clearly, the North Korean leadership does not feel sufficiently secure to abandon its program at this stage. But this does mean that deterrence — which has proved remarkably effective since 1953 — will no longer stop the North from using any weapons they produce.
Eight other countries have nuclear weapons and only one has used them. That occurred in 1945 when the US dropped two bombs on Japan, which at that stage had no way of deterring an attack. Although the US seriously contemplated using nuclear weapons during the 1950-53 Korean War, it didn’t go ahead. However, the North still suffered horrific damage from conventional US bombings and the extensive use of napalm.
After George Bush took steps that the North regarded as hostile, his administration subsequently entered into the so-called “six party” talks to find a diplomatic solution. But the North has now abandoned that process. A number of observers argue that the US should still agree to the one-on-one talks that North says it wants to lead to the normalisation of relations and a non-aggression agreement. But no-one knows if attempts to reduce the isolation of such a cantankerous regime would work any better that the tougher sanctions — and further isolation — that seem unavoidable in the short term.
So far, tight sanctions have not convinced a stubborn North Korean leadership to abandon weapons that other countries have developed with impunity. Tougher sanctions would also hurt innocent people who are close to starvation while a despicable regime diverts resources to weapons.
There are some tentative grounds for hope. Provided deterrence continues to prevent war, as it has for 56 years, the existing regime in the North, or an equally nasty successor, will not last forever. Sadly, there is no foolproof way for Australia or any other country to hasten this process. But it makes sense to keep the door ajar so continued contact is possible.