The Meaning of Denuclearizing North Korea

• In Event: Traditional and New Security Issues in Korea

Abstract

Denuclearization, based on the notion that nuclear weapons are fundamentally different from conventional weapons, is a process of radical disarmament that aims to not just dismantle all materials and facilities related to nuclear weapons, but abandon the idea of using nuclear weapons for military and political means. Thus, nations that genuinely want to achieve denuclearization should enhance an opponent’s security as well as their own by pursuing reciprocal nuclear disarmament. This paper argues that what the United States has tried for the last 30 years to prevent the nuclear acquisition of North Korea is not ‘denuclearization negotiation’, as mostly defined by many pundits, but rather ‘nuclear nonproliferation negotiation.’ The US rarely had a serious denuclearization negotiation with any other states except for its nuclear deals with the Soviet Union near the end of the Cold War. Instead, the US mostly took unilateral and coercive approaches to prevent nuclear proliferation of non-nuclear states, as it dealt with the nuclear acquisition attempts of North Korea, Iraq, and Iran.

Author

• Myung Chul Kim, Ajou University