The world is already plagued by crises, and here there may be another: North Korea is acting in very unusual ways, leading some veteran analysts to fear that it is preparing a surprise attack on South Korea and perhaps Japan and Guam as well. .
I have seen many false alarms since I began covering and visiting North Korea in the 1980s.
Kim Gunn, Special Representative for Peace and Security on the Korean Peninsula, poses with Namazu Hiroyuki, director general of Japan and assistant minister of the Bureau of Asian and Oceanic Affairs, and Jung Pak, senior US official for North Korea, in their trilateral meeting at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Seoul, South Korea, Thursday, January 18, 2024. Ahn Young-joon/Pool via REUTERS
I wouldn't write about this latest warning if it weren't for the fact that it comes from
two especially credible experts
who bluntly conclude that "Kim Jong Un has made the
strategic decision to go to war
."
This is speculation without solid evidence to support it, and they recognize that this type of prediction is risky.
But one of those experts is
Robert Carlin
, who has spent 50 years analyzing North Korea for the CIA, the State Department and other organizations.
The other is
Siegfried Hecker,
a Stanford nuclear expert who has visited North Korea seven times and had extensive access to that country's nuclear programs;
Apparently, he is the only American to have had North Korean plutonium (in a vial) in his hands.
Carlin and Hecker published their warning in an essay on the North Korea-focused
website
38 North .
They raised the possibility that North Korea would use its nuclear warheads to attack the region (it is unclear whether its warheads could reach the United States and survive re-entry into the atmosphere).
Carlin and Hecker said they do not know when an attack by Kim, the country's leader, would occur or what form it might take.
"Is it going to be an all-out attack?"
Carlin asked.
"I have no idea what your army's thinking is right now. I suspect that they are making plans, and that they are arguing about it. And some of them are saying:
'This is crazy.
We can not do it'.
Others say, "This is what the leader wants and we're going to do it."
And in fact,
we have enough missiles and nuclear warheads
to do it.'"
Just threats?
North Korea is notorious for its bravado and insults (remember "dotard"?), and my general opinion is that Kim is a pragmatist who uses grandiloquence to negotiate.
Maybe this time it will be like this:
We have never really understood what happens to the North Koreans, and perhaps they are just seeking attention.
My inclination would be to dismiss these warnings, if they came from anyone else.
But Carlin and Hecker are professionals who deserve to have their alarm taken very
seriously.
It has been evident for some time that something is afoot in North Korea.
Kim pinned his hopes on a 2019 summit with President
Donald Trump
in Hanoi, Vietnam, which collapsed and left Kim humiliated.
For decades, under three leaders, North Korea sought an agreement with the United States that involved
trade, prestige and economic benefits
, but now appears to have given up on that.
Instead, it has strengthened ties with
Russia,
improved its nuclear capabilities and stepped up its rhetoric.
This week, North Korea announced that it would take a much
tougher
approach toward South Korea, changing its constitution and long-standing reunification policy, and not respecting traditional border lines.
Kim declared that his military was preparing for "a major
revolutionary event
," a phrase Carlin said had previously been used to describe the war with South Korea.
Kim said North Korea did not want war, but suggested it could come:
"The war will terribly destroy the entity called the Republic of Korea" - South Korea's official name - "and put an end to its existence. And it will inflict an unimaginably crushing defeat on the United States."
I contacted other experts to get their opinions.
Joel Wit,
a longtime North Korea expert at the State Department, now at the
Stimson Center
, said he takes Carlin and Hecker "extremely seriously."
Wit said a recent incident in which North Korea fired artillery shells near disputed waters with South Korea "shook me" because it seemed like a
possible rehearsal
for a larger provocation.
The Biden administration has not focused on North Korea for understandable reasons:
You are dealing with many other urgent crises.
It may be too late to engage in diplomatic dialogue with the North if it has resolutely renounced the United States, Wit said, but added that China is now so alarmed by North Korea that
Beijing could be of help
.
Deborah Fikes, a member of the National Committee on North Korea, a coalition of people with extensive experience in the country, said that many nonprofit organizations that normally
have working relationships with North Korea
have not even been able to get answers to their questions. .
She is also concerned about the risk of conflict.
Cost-benefit
On the other hand, one reason for skepticism is that it is difficult to see how North Korea benefits by attacking its neighbors.
Carlin and Hecker don't have a solid answer on this, but they point out that there is a long history of surprise attacks around the world that were surprising precisely because they made no sense to those attacked.
Hecker noted that North Korea is one of only three countries that constitute a potential nuclear threat to the United States - the others being Russia and China - and yet North Korea has not received much high-level attention lately.
Ought.
What I have learned most from covering North Korea is not to make predictions about it.
But it seems prudent to me for the Biden administration to intensify its
diplomatic contacts
with North Korea, try to engage China on this issue at high levels, allocate intelligence resources to better understand North Korean risks, and ensure that our military forces are prepared.
None of us know what is going to happen, and it would be wise to be prepared for anything.
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