Reassessing U.S. Strategy on North Korea

On the radar: Obama on the peninsula; Preparing for a fourth North Korean nuclear test; ICBMs could outlive all of us; Nuclear families; US to start fielding NATO missile interceptors that may or may not work; Implications of China’s new SSBN fleet; and Two tracks for dealing with North Korea.

April 25, 2014 | Edited by Geoff Wilson

There are things we haven’t sanctioned yet? - “President Barack Obama says it may be time to consider further sanctions against North Korea ‘that have even more bite,’ as the country is threatening its fourth nuclear test,” Darlene Superville reports for theAP. “Addressing a joint news conference alongside South Korean President Park Geun-hye, Obama said threats by North Korea will get it ‘nothing except further isolation’ from the global community. But Obama acknowledged there are limits to what impacts additional penalties can have on the country.” He said that, “North Korea already is the most isolated country in the world by far. Its people suffer terribly because of the decisions its leaders have made. And we are not going to find a magic bullet that solves this problem overnight.”

--“Obama said the missile technology and nuclear weapons that North Korea is developing pose a direct threat to Korea and Japan, two very close U.S. allies in the region, but to the United States as well.” The president went on to say that, “We can’t waver in our intention. We have to make sure that, in strong concert with our allies, that we are continuing to press North Korea to change its approach.” Read the full report here. http://bit.ly/1rtaRPU

Talks and tests - “South Korean President Park Geun-hye said a fourth nuclear test by reclusive North Korea would render the six-party talks, aimed at reining in the North's nuclear ambitions, meaningless,” Reuters reports. Full report here. http://reut.rs/1rrn7yq

Prepped - “North Korea has completed all of the preliminary steps required to conduct a nuclear test,” report Stella Kim, Jethro Mullen and Andrew Demaria for CNN. According to a South Korean government official, “the South detected the closure of the entrance of a tunnel at the Punggye-ri site in a northeastern region of North Korea. It means that Pyongyang is now ready for what could be its fourth nuclear test.” Read the full report here. http://cnn.it/QLzGcc

ICBMs into the 22nd century - “The U.S. Air Force has suggested it is looking into extending the operational life of its strategic nuclear missile for several more decades,” Global Security Newswire reports. “Under the 2010 Nuclear Posture Review, the Obama administration committed to prolonging the service life of the country's arsenal of Minuteman 3 intercontinental ballistic missiles to 2030 and studies were quickly launched to explore options for its replacement. Minuteman 3 missiles were rolled out during the 1970s, with the newest weapons introduced in 1978.”

--“Air Force Brig. Gen. Fred Stoss, who manages Global Strike Command's weapon requirements, said in an interview with Foreign Policy that both the Minuteman 3 and whatever follows it could last for decades more than earlier foreseen. Stoss said that “We have to make sure we have an affordable way to make the Minuteman 3 and its successor out as long as the nation needs the ICBM. Some of our studies as we're looking at it, we're thinking 75 years or longer for the capability we're looking to do." Read the full report here. http://bit.ly/1mLESe0

Tweet - @NTI_GSN: U.S. Air Force Preps Revamped Nuclear Bomb for Key Tests http://bit.ly/1mLJ1Pg

The B61 nuclear family - “The Obama administration is about to give birth to the newest member of the B61 family: the B61-12. And this is a real golden baby estimated at about $10 billion,” write Hans M. Kristensen in a piece for the FAS Strategic Security Blog.

--“The B61 family has lost a lot of members over the years. Nine of the fifteen total variations have been retired or canceled. The remaining five versions currently in the stockpile were built in 1979-1998. Although based on the same basic warhead design first developed in the 1960s, the capabilities of the remaining version vary considerably with explosive yields ranging from 0.1 kilotons to a whopping 400 kilotons – more than 30 times as powerful as the bomb that destroyed Hiroshima in 1945. Now the Obama administration has proposed that four of the remaining versions (B61-4, B61-7, B61-10, and B61-11) can be retired if the last version – the B61-4 – is converted into a guided standoff nuclear bomb. An even larger bomb, the B83-1, can also be retired, they say (even though its retirement was planned anyway).

--”The sales pitch is as arcane as the family name: building a new bomb is good for disarmament. But most of the B61 bombs and the B83 could probably be retired anyway for the simple reason that deterrence no longer requires six different ways of dropping a nuclear bomb from an aircraft. A much simpler and cheaper life-extended version of the B61-7 could probably do the job.” Read the full report here. http://bit.ly/RSCNjW

Design and deployment delays - “The United States has begun fielding a new missile interceptor that is planned in the short term to be deployed in Romania and the Mediterranean,” Global Security Newswire reports. “The U.S. Navy is now deploying the Standard Missile 3 Block 1B interceptor, which is designed to destroy short- and medium-range ballistic missiles, producer Raytheon Co. announced in a Wednesday press release.” But the future of the second-generation interceptor includes some uncertainty. The Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency recently revealed to Inside Defense that it had decided to postpone for one year plans to seek congressional approval for a multiyear production deal with Raytheon. The decision came after the agency determined it cannot yet show a reliable funding stream for the Block 1B missile, a sustained military need or a stable design. A recent report by Congress' internal auditor recommended delaying full production until it is determined whether changes to the missile interceptor's design are warranted, following an intercept attempt last year in which a launched Block 1B failed to perform.” Full report here. http://bit.ly/1iil7I8

New boats, new mission, new unknowns - “China over the past decade has built an infrastructure of naval facilities to service the new SSBN fleet…. Apart from how many Jin SSBNs China will build, the big question is whether the Chinese government will choose to operate them the way Western nuclear-armed states have operated their SSBNs for decades – deployed continuously at sea with nuclear warheads on the ballistic missiles – or continue China’s long-held policy of not deploying nuclear weapons outside Chinese territory but keeping them in central storage for deployment in a crisis.

--“In building the Jin-class SSBN fleet, however, China appears more to mirror the nuclear postures of the United States, Russia, Britain and France rather than demonstrating a clear purpose and contribution of the SSBN force to China’s own security and crisis stability in general. As a new second-strike capability added to the Chinese nuclear arsenal, the Jin SSBN fleet only makes strategic sense if it is more secure than the Second Artillery’s land-based ICBM force. Its justification must be based on a conclusion that the ICBMs are too vulnerable to a first strike and that a more secure sea-based second-strike force therefore is needed.”

--“Whatever their ultimate capability may be, however, the Jin SSBNs and the infrastructure China is building are symbols of the extensive nuclear modernizations that are underway in all the nuclear-armed countries. The Chinese government says it “will never enter into a nuclear arms race with any other country,” but it is certainly in a technological race with the United States, Russia and India about developing improved and more capable nuclear weapons.” Read the full report from Hans M. Kristensen for the FAS Strategic Security Blog here. http://bit.ly/1rrrJEB

Reassessing strategic patience - “When Mr. Obama lands here on Friday on the second stop of his Asia tour, he will be confronting the question of whether his strategy of ‘strategic patience’ with the North has been overtaken by reality: an unpredictable, though calculating, ruler in Mr. Kim, who has proved to be more ruthless, aggressive and tactically skilled than anyone expected,” writes David E. Sanger in a review of U.S. policy toward North Korea for The New York Times.

--Contingency plans: “The latest revision of OpPlan 5029, the war plan for the Korean Peninsula, assumes that if a conflict broke out, the North would be able to deliver a crude nuclear weapon, though perhaps by truck or ship. American intelligence officials do not believe the North is yet able to shrink a bomb to a size that could fit on one of its Nodong missiles, the key breakthrough it needs.” Full story here. http://nyti.ms/1iVmbRV

Quick-hits:

--“The Usual Suspects Aim to Spoil Iran Nuclear Deal” by John Tirman for The Huffington Post. http://huff.to/1jLUMhW

--“MOX dodges more than 1,000 layoffs” by Derrek Asberry for the Aiken Standard. http://bit.ly/1mHxH6M

Events:

--“Preparing for Deep Cuts: Options for Enhancing Euro-Atlantic and International Security.” Discussion with Ulrich Kuehn, Götz Neuneck, Eugene Miasnikov, and Greg Thielmann; moderated by Steven Pifer. April 28 from 10:00-11:30 at The Brookings Institution, Falk Auditorium, 1775 Massachusetts Ave. NW. RSVP here. http://bit.ly/1hOGcd1

--“The United States and Iran: Can Diplomacy Prevent an Iranian Bomb?” Discussion with former Amb. Thomas Pickering and Shaul Bakhash. April 28 from 6:00-7:15 at American University, Abramson Family Founders Room, 4400 Massachusetts Ave., NW, Washington. RSVP here. http://conta.cc/1eEMAyC