Resolving the North Korean Nuclear Crisis : Challenges and Opportunities in Readjusting the U.S.-ROK Alliance

This chapter begins by examining the questions, “What are America's interests, vis-à-vis North Korea?” and “What should America be willing to do to ensure the integrity of its interests?” Between 1950 and the late 1980s, the U.S. government predominately viewed North Korea as a direct threat against the security of South Korea, an important East Asian ally. During this period, in order to deter North Korea from attacking South Korea and to assure South Korea of America's intention to defend its territorial integrity, the U.S. stationed tens of thousands of combat troops on the South Korean peninsula. However, since 1986, when North Korea began operating its 5-megawatt (electric) nuclear power reactor at Yongbyon, followed in 1988 by a U.S. satellite detection of a Yongbyon-based plutonium reprocessing plant, the U.S. has viewed North Korea as more than just a regional threat. Now as a potential nuclear weapons proliferator, American national interests towards North Korea have exponentially increased. An effective denuclearization policy should contain the following principles: provide Pyongyang with an official security declaration, tangible economic incentives, legitimacy through economic and political normalization, in exchange for dismantlement of its nuclear programs