North Korea’s Political Warfare Strategy Has Failed: ROK – U.S. Alliance Needs a Superior Strategy

About halfway into his first term he ahref=”https://www.19fortyfive.com/2023/02/can-joe-biden-make-the-ultimate-comeback/”>President Joe Biden A Wake up From Kim Jong Un North Korea is still a top national security risk. The strategic competition has caused some policymakers, pundits and the public concern that the administration has not given enough attention to North Korea in the two years since he took office. ChinaTensions should be relieved Taiwan And South China Sea, Putin’s War in UkraineThe threats that emanate from Iran. 

These are just a few of the additional challenges. Kim Jong Un’s new major policy directions for 2023 that he laid out at the plenary session of the ruling Korean Worker’s Party meeting. He Announced He plans to increase his wealth exponentially. nuclear arsenal And develop a New ICBM In 2023. In 2023, he also called South Korea his. “undoubted enemy.” Kim has just announced his new policies. It’s time for the U.S./ROK/U.S. Allies Implement a new strategy.

Such rhetoric is emblematic of Kim Jong Un’s tried and true political Warfare Strategies to use hostility and aggression to slowly alter the status quo, and extort.https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-63494752″>concessions South Korea and the U.S. To divide and destroy the ROK/U.S. alliance. Kim Jong Un backs his tactics of political warfare Provocations of military nature He ahref=”https://en.yna.co.kr/view/AEN20230101001053325?section=nk/nk”>conducted In 2022, a new record was established at more than seventy.

Biden Should Examine North Korea Strategy 

The Biden administration should concentrate on creating a future for the rest of his first term. Superior political warfare strategy In tandem with the ROK Government ROK/U.S. ROK/U.S. Northeast Asia remains the key to peace and security in the region.https://www.pacom.mil/About-USINDOPACOM/USPACOM-Area-of-Responsibility/”>INDOPACIFIC. The strategy will include various pressure methods that combine diplomatic, economic and cyber tools to show Kim Jong Un the cost of nuclear weapons. More importantly, such actions must influence the elite and military leaders as well as the Korean people in the north that Kim Jong Un’s strategy has failed and that they can exert the only kind of pressure that could force Kim to change, pressure from within. 

At the start of 2023 it is important to note that Kim’s seemingly increasing Hostility This reflects the extent of his strategic failures since 2017. He did not negotiate concessions to the relief of sanctions at the Hanoi summit and his regime’s Failure economy It continues to suffer from the COVID19 pandemic, which it has self-imposed isolation. 

Trump, Moon and Yoon deserve credit for remaining firm in their support of all sanctions. This is despite North Korean threats, tensions rising, provocations and sanctions evasions activities, with Chinese and Russian complicity. They ignored calls from pundits, who don’t understand the strategy, nature, and objectives of the Kim family regime to lift the sanctions to incentivize Kim to come to the negotiating table. 

Sanctions are crucial in stopping illicit cash flows that fuel Kim’s regime. The absence of sanctions relief has been cited by escapees as one of the greatest failures of Kim’s family regime since 1953. 

Correctly, President Biden further Extend North Korean sanctions to be implemented in June 2021. Kim’s failures in turn have led to some of Kim’s worst domestic problems that pose the potential for Internal instability. Kim must take steps to mitigate this. “externalize” threats. This is evident in South Korea being called the “undoubted enemy” and reminding Koreans in the north of the pressing need to ”exponentially increase their nuclear capabilities” in his Speech during the plenary session of the ruling worker’s party congress. These statements are clear indications that Kim won’t give up on his nuclear and missile program. The main reason Kim Jong Un is not granting concessions to him is because he would be able to assess whether his blackmail diplomacy and political warfare strategies have been successful. Instead of negotiating in good will, he will continue to use these strategies because they are effective.

Credit to the Biden administration for maintaining scheduled Exercises in military operations ROK/U.S. Combined Force Command will restore readiness following the previous decision Cancel exercises in 2018 When the former president used the term “a href=” to refer to exercises,https://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-usa-wargames/trump-says-to-stop-expensive-provocative-south-korea-war-games-idUSKBN1J80T5″>“provocative and expensive war games.” 

The COVID pandemic also reduced readiness. Maintaining Alliance military readiness is the number one priority to demonstrate the Alliance’s combined resolve in the face of North Korean provocations and to deter war.

South Korea Participates

South Korea is constantly improving its military capabilities. It has established the ahref=”https://en.yna.co.kr/view/AEN20221109009600325″>Directorate WMD CountermeasuresIt said that the directorate will be the foundation for a new command. Building on the directorate, the South Korean military plans to launch the strategic command – an overarching entity spearheading overall operations against the North’s nuclear and WMD challenges. 

The military continues to improve the ahref=”https://en.yna.co.kr/view/AEN20230101003451325″>three-pronged system Consisting of the Korea Massive Punishment & RetaliationAn operational plan to incapacitate North Korean leadership during major conflicts; Kill Chain is a preemptive strike platform; and Missile Defense System and Air Defense System of Korea. The U.S. continues to send strategic assets to the region in order to support extended deterrence.

For the alliance to move forward with a new strategy, it is crucial that they have a solid foundation in defense and deterrence. Kim Jong Un doesn’t think so. If he feels that he cannot defend himself against overwhelming strength, he will not attack. This gives the alliance the freedom to pursue a superior strategy of political warfare.

However, a href=”https://www.usip.org/publications/2022/12/incremental-denuclearization-korean-peninsula”>denuclearization While the goal of the northern remains worthy, it must still be considered as a href=”https://carnegieendowment.org/2022/11/15/u.s.-policy-should-reflect-its-own-quiet-acceptance-of-nuclear-north-korea-pub-88399″>aspirational As long as the Kim family remains in power. The conventional wisdom has always been that denuclearization must come first and then unification will follow. To accomplish this, it has also been said there should be no discussion of human rights out of fear that it would prevent Kim Jong Un from making a denuclearization agreement. 

Today even a blind man can read the tea leaves and know that Kim Jong Un will not denuclearize, even though his policies have been an abject failure. His political warfare and blackmail diplomacy strategies completely failed in 2022 because Presidents Yoon and Biden, like their predecessors, refused to make the political and economic concessions he demanded just to come to the negotiating table: namely to remove sanctions.  

Recently, a group of authors Produced a new strategy recommendation It is based upon the realization that Kim Jong Un refuses to agree to denuclearization. It is a strategy that is focused on human rights and influence operations. It provides a framework to deal with North Korea as it is, rather than as some wish it would be. It is time for the U.S./ROK/U.S. to take a new approach. An alliance was formed to carry out a strategy for political warfare that changes the conventional wisdom. It seeks unification and then denuclearization. This allows Kim to choose to change or be altered from within, due to his own failures to the elite, military and Korean people.

The international community needs to understand that ending the nuclear program is only possible if the entire international community accepts this. Human rights violations Unification of the Korean peninsula is possible. The ROK and U.S. must continue to maintain the highest state of military readiness to deter war and then adopt a human rights upfront approach, a comprehensive and sophisticated information and influence activities campaign, and focus all efforts on the pursuit of a free and unified Korea – ultimately leading to a United Republic of Korea (UROK).

Expert Biographies & Expertise 

Mathew Ha is a political science PhD student at George Mason University’s Schar school of Policy and Government, he is a former research analyst focused on North Korea and China at   the Foundation for Defense of Democracies n former analyst from Valens Global. His expertise is in U.S. foreign policies in Asia, North Korean cyber operations, and sanctions policy.

David MaxwellRetired US Army Special Forces Colonel, 1945 Contributing Editor. He has been in Asia for more than 30 years and is an expert in North Korea, East Asia Security Affairs, irregular, unorthodox, and political warfare. He is also the Editor-in Chief of Small Wars Journal. He is a Senior Associate at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, and a Senior Fellow with the Global Peace Foundation. His focus is on a unified Korea.