Description
Book SynopsisNorth Korea is perilously close to developing strategic nuclear weapons capable of hitting the United States and its East Asian allies. Since their first nuclear test in 2006, North Korea has struggled to perfect the required delivery systems. Kim Jong-un's regime now appears to be close, however. Sung Chull Kim, Michael D. Cohen, and 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. The United States, South Korea, and Japan must also come to terms with the fact that North Korea will be able to deter them with its nuclear arsenal. How will the erratic Kim Jong-un behave when North Korea develops the capability to hit medium- and long-range targets with nuclear weapons? How will and should the United States, South Korea, Japan, and China respond, and what will this mean for regional stability in the short term and long term? The international group of authors in this volume address these questions and offer a timely analysis of the consequences of an operational North Korean nuclear capability for international security.
Trade ReviewA valuable new volume of scholarly essays. * New York Review of Books *
[Has] a strong cast of characters [and] is a good place to go for an introduction. * Peterson Institute for International Economics *
[T]he volume greatly contributes to our understanding of nuclear North Korea and how to cope with it. * Pacific Affairs *
Table of ContentsIntroduction: A New Challenge, a New DebateMichael D. Cohen and Sung Chull Kim 1. North Korea and Nuclear Weapons: Nonproliferation or Deterrence? Or Both?Patrick Morgan 2. North Korea's Nuclear Doctrine and Revisionist StrategySung Chull Kim 3. North Korea, Nuclear Weapons, and No Good Options? A Controlled Path to PeaceMichael D. Cohen 4. The Unraveling of North Korea's Proliferation Blackmail StrategyTristan Volpe 5. Does Nuclearization Impact Threat Credibility? Insights from the Korean PeninsulaVan Jackson 6. The North Korean Nuclear Threat and South Korea's Deterrence StrategyChaesung Chun 7. Stability or Instability? The US Response to North Korean Nuclear WeaponsTerrence Roehrig 8. Between the Bomb and the United States: China Face the Nuclear North KoreaFei-Ling Wang 9. Spear versus Shield? North Korea's Nuclear Path and Challenges to the NPT SystemYangmo Ku Conclusion: Deterrence and BeyondSung Chull Kim and Michael D. Cohen ContributorsIndex
