Image: policy puzzle map of Northeast Asia generated from Puzzle Paradigm here

Revisiting the Comprehensive Security Roadmap to Reduce theRisk of War on the Korean Peninsula
John Delury, Morton Halperin, Peter Hayes,
Chung-in Moon, Leon Sigal, Tom Pickering
April 19 2024

1About the Author
John Delury is associate professor of Chinese studies at Yonsei University; Morton Halperin is
an American expert on foreign policy and civil liberties; Peter Hayes is Director of the Nautilus
Institute and Honorary Professor at the Centre for International Security Studies at the
University of Sydney; Moon Chung-in is a distinguished professor emeritus of political scienceat Yonsei University; Thomas Pickering is retired US ambassador; Leon Sigal directs theNortheast Asia Cooperative Security Project.

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OVERVIEW
In this paper we revisit the concept of comprehensive security in Northeast Asia as the guiding
principle that should be used to reduce tension, avoid war, and re-engage on a constructive
peace-making cooperative security agenda in Northeast Asia, including reducing theneliminating the threat of nuclear war.
In section 1, we outline the mostly negative security trends in the region over the last five
years.
In section 2, we explain how the DPRK’s 1 nuclear breakout has become the most urgent threat
in the region, but also now demands a more indirect approach at a regional level than in 2018
when we last addressed the issue of comprehensive security. 2
In section 3, we explore how inter-Korean relations have spiraled into hostility, rupture, andpotentially rapidly escalating conflict and unraveled hard-won channels of communication,
cooperation, and collaboration due to how the two Koreas have responded to the evolving
external security context and to their respective domestic imperatives.
In section 4, we suggest four steps that could ease insecurity in the region, especially in Korea,
namely:a) The US and China tacitly act in concert whereby the US tries to restrain Seoulfrom provocative threats or actions animated at Pyongyang while China seeks torestrain Pyongyang from issuing and acting on threats, especially nuclear threats;b) China reaches out to reassure the ROK 3 with concrete steps while the US takes
unilateral steps to reassure the DPRK;c) The US engages China to propose a joint statement with all parties on theinadmissibility of use of nuclear weapons and a dialogue on creating a nuclearweapons-free zone including changes in the nuclear postures of all nuclear-armed
states in the region;d) The US and the ROK explicitly outline the benefits to the DPRK of curbing its
nuclear arming including improved security, access to advanced information
technology, access to space services, and its integration into regional and global
institutions with concomitant increased stature.

1

DPRK, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, sometimes referred to as “North Korea.”

See: Morton Halperin, Peter Hayes, Thomas Pickering, Leon Sigal, "GENERAL ROADMAP AND WORK PLAN
FOR NUCLEAR DIPLOMACY WITH NORTH KOREA", NAPSNet Special Reports, April 10,
2018, https://nautilus.org/napsnet/napsnet-special-reports/general-roadmap-and-work-plan-for-nucleardiplomacy-with-north-korea/
2

MORTON HALPERIN, PETER HAYES, THOMAS PICKERING, LEON SIGAL, PHILIP YUN, "FROM ENEMIES TO
SECURITY PARTNERS: PATHWAYS TO DENUCLEARIZATION IN KOREA", NAPSNet Policy Forum, July 06,
2018, https://nautilus.org/napsnet/napsnet-policy-forum/from-enemies-to-security-partners-pathways-todenuclearization-in-korea/
3
ROK, the Republic of Korea, sometimes referred to as “South Korea.”3

In section 5, we conclude that the steps being taken to reinforce deterrence may lead to adownward spiral that leads to rather than deterring war; and that progress in easing tensions in
Korea could then inspire cooperative security efforts elsewhere in Northeast Asia to the benefitof all parties in the region while re-establishing the conditions needed for a comprehensive
approach to realizing the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.

1. INTRODUCTION: DEGRADATION OF NORTHEAST ASIANSECURITY SINCE 2018
The security environment in Northeast Asia has deteriorated significantly over the past five
years. The most alarming development is the sharp increase in US-China competition. That
rivalry, coupled with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, has led to a firming up of US-ROK-Japan
military cooperation and a widening Asia-Pacific effort to contain China.
A US-driven effort to impede exports of militarily significant technology to China and to
reduce its supply chain dependence has led to some economic decoupling, compounding thedislocation of global trade resulting from China’s shutdown during the COVID pandemic. The
Chinese economy has yet to recover. Beset by deflation, its growth has slowed appreciably,with adverse consequences for GDP in South Korea and Japan. It has also limited Chinese
economic support for the DPRK.
The economic fallout of these two developments has affected domestic politics in Northeast
Asia. Economic slowdown, rising inequality, and slumping support for leaders, have spawned
fear and loathing and scapegoating of “the other” in most countries and rising authoritarianism
in some.
Russian revanchism has affected regional security—not only because of its aggression in
Ukraine, but also because of its effort to restore its influence in the former Soviet republics, its
active courting of North Korea, and its reintroduction of submarine-launched ballistic missiles
in the northwest Pacific and the Arctic and other shorter-range nuclear missile and strategic
bomber aircraft, including on the Russian-Chinese border. Moscow’s veto of UN sanctions
monitoring and potential help for DPRK missile and nuclear development in return for
Pyongyang’s supply of military arms for use against Ukraine are fundamentally destabilizing.
Although Russia’s provision of oil, military technology, and employment of North Korean
workers ties may benefit the DPRK in the short run, it cannot meet Pyongyang’s long-term
technological and infrastructure rehabilitation needs. Nevertheless, Russia’s new assertivenessposes a challenge to China’s dominant role in the DPRK’s external relations, arousing concern
in Beijing.
Arms racing is speeding up as military budgets expand. The US is modernizing its nuclear
arsenal as is Russia. China is expanding its nuclear forces by 7 per cent a year, rapidly andmassively increasing their lethality. In South Korea and Japan there is louder talk and increased
public support for nuclear arming. Submarine capabilities are increasing throughout the region.
China is developing an offshore anti-submarine warfare capability, which may eventuallyenable it to challenge US and Japanese naval dominance in the Taiwan Straits. Space-based
4capabilities are growing, along with cyberthreats, which endangers C3I assets. Arms control ismoribund.
Northeast Asia is riven by conflict—between the DPRK and the ROK and its allies, between
the United States and Russia over the war in Ukraine, between the United States and China
over the Taiwan Straits and the South China Sea, and between Japan and China over the
Senkaku/Daioyu Islands. Elsewhere there is the potential for clashes in the South China Sea
and the Indian Ocean and the risk of horizontal escalation of the wars in Ukraine and Gaza.
Two flashpoints in Northeast Asia stand out—the Korean peninsula and the Taiwan Straits—
spurring fear of a two-front war in the region. 4 The most imminent risk of military conflictarises from the rivalry between the ROK and the DPRK.
Top military commanders perceive that the risk of inadvertent war and possible nuclear
escalation in Korea is increasing. As Kim Jong Un himself has acknowledged, a “physical clash
can be caused and escalated even by a slight accidental factor in the area along the Military
Demarcation Line where large armed forces of both sides are standing in confrontation with
one another.” 5

2. COMPELLING NEED FOR COOPERATIVE SECURITY
IN THE REGION
Amid this unraveling, diplomatic re-engagement, de-escalation, and arms control are
imperative and there is no shortage of opportunities for cooperative initiatives on climatechange; energy insecurity; pandemic threats; regulation, standard setting, and sharing oftechnological innovation in sectors ranging from vaccines to AI; food and energy insecurity;
nuclear insecurity due to terrorism; regulation of new military and economic competition in
the melting Arctic and Antarctic, in space, or on and beneath the oceans (the latter perhaps
spearheaded by retired submariners and starting with a commitment to cooperative rescue
operations).
The region faces some disturbing and immediate uncertainties. What, for example, are theprospects for balancing against an expansionist Russia? Is the DPRK’s alignment with Russia
a marriage of convenience that does not preclude its eventual reaching out to the US? Is China
subtly tilting the global balance against Russia, just as the US did with China in the late 1960s?
In 2018, we saw the Korean nuclear issue to be a relatively easy starting point for greater
power cooperation that would enable the formation of a regional security institution. Today,
we see that a regional approach, short of an inclusive institutional framework, as the best way
to address the grave risk of war in Korea with attendant risk of escalation to nuclear war.
Progress in reducing tension on the Peninsula could facilitate broader collaboration in othercontested areas, thereby creating the conditions for dialogue about a comprehensive regional
security settlement and framework and inverting our earlier assumption that a regional security
Markus Garlauskas, “The United States and Its Allies Must Be Ready to Deter a Two-Front War and Nuclear
Attacks in East Asia,” Atlantic Council, August 16, 2023.
5
KCNA, “Report on 9th Enlarged Plenum of 8th WPK Central Committee,” December 31, 2023.
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dialogue and institution building should precede and thereby enable an incremental resolutionof the Korean nuclear issue.
In previous reports, we examined the prospects for a Comprehensive Security Settlement at
the global and regional level with a focus on nuclear war risk reduction via denuclearization of
the Korean Peninsula in the form of war avoidance, crisis management, and eventually,
disarmament in Korea, combined with constructive peace-making centered on a Northeast Asia
Security Council. 6
Although a regional approach is still valid, a key premise—that a Council should be convened
to kickstart a comprehensive regional security process—is currently open to question. If it were
to be formed now, such a Council might function to firm up two new blocs, which would
impede rather than promote resolution of any regional conflicts. Moscow’s involvement may
complicate efforts to resolve differences between Washington and Beijing, who might makemore headway trying to ease tensions bilaterally, starting with issues where they have interests
in common such as climate change, pandemics, etc. Also, a Council may prove dysfunctional
at a time when conservatives in Seoul and Tokyo strongly support security trilateralism based
on upgraded military cooperation with each other and their US-led alliances.
Conversely, some in Tokyo and Seoul (mostly on the center-left) may be concerned about
entrapment in a US-China conflict over Taiwan. They in turn may resist security trilateralism
and support cooperation in the Council’s deliberations. Overall, the Council idea seems
premature in today’s circumstances and as likely to be divisive as constructive of security
cooperation.
Another of our premises was that the DPRK would engage seriously, and in the long run,would have no alternative but to curtail its nuclear program, rather than to stay at the bottomof the deep economic hole it has dug for itself leading to isolation and poverty that undermine
the foundations of its national power, and therefore, reduce the prospects for regime
survival. Underlying that premise was the assumption that the DPRK was motivated to seek afundamental improvement in its political relationship with the United States, the ROK, andJapan—to end US enmity, or what it called the United States’ “hostile policy”—to hedge
against excessive dependence on a rising China and to curtail the ROK using its rising power
to crush the DPRK and to entertain US troops remaining in the ROK. In return for US
commitments to reduce its hostility embodied in various types and levels of cooperation—mostnotably the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO) and more recently,
not staging US-ROK military exercises, the DPRK showed it was prepared to restrain its
nuclear and missile programs. Today Pyongyang has less urgent need to improve relations with
Washington, Seoul, and Tokyo in order to hedge against the rise of China because of its
warming ties with Moscow, which, in turn, might make Beijing reluctant to differ with
Pyongyang.
An implicit message of the regional concept in our 2018 analysis was that Korea was only
one of a number of security issues that needed to be settled in Northeast Asia, and was not eventhe most important of them, although it would likely be the first to be taken up in a regional
approach, and in fact any progress on that front would make addressing other security issues
easier.
6

Ibid.

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Today, the risk of a conflict in Korea that could escalate to nuclear war demands urgent
attention in its own right. Moreover, it may also be necessary to defer striving directly fordenuclearization of the Korean peninsula for the moment although we believe that it is still
possible to approach that issue on a regional basis in a carefully sequenced manner, as we
explain below.

3. THE NEW CONTEXT IN KOREA
As in the region, so too in Korea much has changed since 2018, little of it for the better.
During the Cold War, Kim Il Sung played off the former Soviet Union and China against one
another in a delicate balancing act to maintain some freedom of action of its own. In 1988,
anticipating the collapse of the former Soviet Union, Kim felt compelled to reach out toWashington, Seoul, and Tokyo in hopes of securing greater autonomy from a rising China anddeveloping the DPRK’s economy. His son Kim Jong Il, and then his grandson Kim Jong Un,
sustained that effort. The Kims demonstrated their willingness to reciprocate. After
Washington announced its intention to withdraw tactical nuclear weapons from Korea,
Pyongyang unilaterally stopped reprocessing plutonium in 1992, then concluded the 1994 USDPRK Agreed Framework with the United States shutting the operating nuclear reactor at
Yongbyon, halting construction of a larger reactor, storing plutonium-laden spent fuel in acooling pond, and allowing around-the-clock international monitoring from 1994 until 2002—
at a time when North Korea had no nuclear weapons.
The DPRK changed its strategy after Donald Trump walked away from the 2019 Hanoi
summit with Kim Jong Un and reneged on his subsequent promise to forgo joint military
exercises in Korea. Perceiving little prospect of persuading Washington to end enmity,
Pyongyang had no motive to curtail arming. Instead, it reverted to its Cold War strategy ofplaying off a revived Russia and a greatly strengthened China. At the same time, Kim Jong Un
stepped up its development and testing of missiles and expanded the DPRK’s nuclear arsenal.
When a conservative government was elected in 2022 in Seoul that confronted the DPRK withprovocative “Kill Chain” plans for preemptive attack, hardline rhetoric, and an increase inintensity and pace of joint ROK-US drills—including a well-publicized “decapitation” of the
DPRK leadership exercise by special forces—Pyongyang reacted with ever more menacing
arming, missile tests, rhetoric, and military drills. As part of its new strategy, Pyongyang has
cut off nearly all contact, both official and unofficial, with Washington and Seoul for the past
five years. Yet it has held several meetings with Japanese officials and Kim Jong Un even senta message of sympathy to Prime Minister Kishida Fumio after a January 2024 earthquake. 7
Kishida has encouraged contacts, but his term as prime minister is coming to an end andPyongyang’s opposition to discussing denuclearization or abductees raised doubts aboutprospects for summitry anytime soon.
Much of the DPRK’s hostile rhetoric is a tit-for-tat response to ROK threats. For instance,
after ROK President Yoon Seok-yol warned, "If North Korea uses nuclear weapons, its regime
Jesse Johnson, “North Korea’s Kim Sends Rare Sympathy Message to Japan over Ishikawa Quake,” Japan
Times, January 6, 2024.
7

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will be brought to an end by an overwhelming response from the ROK-U. S. alliance.” 8 Kim
countered, “If the ROK dares attempt to use armed forces against the DPRK or threaten its
sovereignty and security and such opportunity comes, we will have no hesitation in annihilating
the ROK by mobilizing all means and forces in our hands.” 9Worse yet, both sides eroded existing checks on military confrontation. Notably, theSeptember 19th Agreement on the Implementation of the Historic Panmunjom Declaration in
the Military Domain, or the Comprehensive Military Agreement (CMA), 10 made public at the
Panmunjom summit meeting between Moon Jae-in and Kim Jong Un, is now defunct. It barred“all live-fire artillery drills and field training exercises at the regiment level and above within
5km from the MDL [the Military Demarcation Line that splits the Demilitarized Zone
separating the ROK and the DPRK] ,” “all live-fire and maritime maneuver exercises” near thecontested waters of the East Sea, imposed “no fly zones” on various aircraft in the vicinity of
the MDL, established “permanent communication channels”—hotlines—to prevent any
accidental military clash, provided for a “maritime peace zone” in the West Sea “to prevent
accidental military clashes and ensure safe fishing activities,” committed the sides to“completely withdraw all guard posts within the DMZ,” to demilitarize the “Joint Security Area
in Panmunjom,” and set up a “Joint Remains Recovery Site and minesweeping” area in the
DMZ. Both sides gradually whittled away the provisions with repeated violations. Having
disparaged his predecessor’s handiwork, President Yoon seized on a North Korean launch ofits first satellite in November 2023 to suspend the accord partially. 11 A North Korean drone
flight over the South in January 2024 prompted him to threaten to suspend the accord
altogether. 12
Kim Jong Un beat him to the punch. In a fundamental restatement of inter-Korean policy, hetold a plenary meeting of the Central Committee on December 30, 2022, “The general
conclusion drawn by our Party, looking back upon the long-standing north-south relations isthat reunification can never be achieved with the ROK authorities that defined the ‘unification
by absorption’ and ‘unification under liberal democracy’ as their state policy.” 13
He went on, “The north-south relations have been completely fixed into the relations between
two states hostile to each other and the relations between two belligerent states.” From now on,
the South would be treated as a separate state: he “stressed the need to take measures forreadjusting and reforming the organizations in charge of the affairs related to the south
including the United Front Department of the Party Central Committee.” 14He elaborated that stance in a speech to the Supreme People’s Assembly on January 15, 2024,“We have formulated a new stand on the north-south relations and the policy of reunificationand dismantled all the organizations we established as solidarity bodies for peaceful
Sarah Kim, “Alliance Will End Regime If North Uses Nukes, Yoon Warns,” JoongAng Ilbo, September 26, 2023.
KCNA, “Respected Comrade Kim Jong Un Inspects Major Munitions Factories,” January 10, 2024.par
10“Agreement on the Implementation of the Historic Panmunjom Declaration in the Military Domain,”
September 19, 2018, at: https://www.ncnk.org/resources/publications/agreement-implementation-historicpanmunjom-declaration-military-domain.pdf
11
Kim Han-joo, “S. Korea Partially Suspends 2018 Inter-Korean Military Accord,” Yonhap, November 22, 2023.
12
Kim Mi-na and Bae Ji-hyun, “Yoon Threatens to Suspend Inter-Korean Agreement Aimed at De-Escalation,”
Hankyoreh, January 5, 2024.
13
KCNA, “Report on 9th Enlarged Plenum of 8th WPK Central Committee,” December 31, 2023.
14
Ibid
8
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reunification at the current session of the Supreme People’s Assembly which discusses the lawsof the DPRK.” 15
Kim drew particular attention to the contested waters of the West Sea, where deadly clashes
have taken place in prior decades: “As the southern border of our country has been clearlydrawn, the illegal ‘northern limit line’ and any other boundary can never be tolerated, and if
the ROK violates even 0.0001 mm. of our territorial land, air, and waters, it will be considered
a war provocation.” 16
He also called for the removal of a monument to reunification, and added, “We can specify
in our constitution the issue of completely occupying, subjugating and reclaiming the ROK andannex it as a part of the territory of our Republic in case a war breaks out on the Korean
peninsula.” He called for education to instill “the firm idea that ROK is their primary enemy
state and invariable principal enemy.” He went on, “We will never unilaterally unleash a war
if the enemies do not provoke us…We do not want war, but we also have no intention of
avoiding it. There is no reason to opt for war, and therefore, there is no intention of unilaterally
going to war, but once a war becomes a reality facing us, we will never try to avoid it.” 17
By reformulating the North’s relationship with the South as an enemy state, not part of one
nation, Kim underscored plans to use nuclear weapons against it, a step that Kim Il Sung had
opposed but his grandson first promulgated in the revised Law on Nuclear Forces Policy
enacted in 2022. 18 At least theoretically, Kim Jong Un also left open the possibility ofabandoning efforts to subvert each other and even establishing normal state-to-state relations
between the two Koreas, however unlikely any diplomatic engagement between them seems
for the foreseeable future.

4. TOWARD COOPERATIVE SOLUTIONS IN KOREA
The very steps that both sides in Korea are taking to bolster deterrence—stepped up arming,
accelerated tempo and increased size of military exercises, and threatening rhetoric—haveincreased the likelihood of inadvertent loss of control or accidental clashes that could quickly
escalate.
Deterrence alone will not suffice to forestall war in Korea. Reassurance is also needed. And
it is not enough to reassure US allies. It is also essential to reassure the DPRK’s leaders.
In this respect, actions can speak louder than words. Although Washington trumpets its
commitment to deterrence, USFK has quietly discouraged Seoul from conducting live-firedrills too close to the contested waters of the West Sea.
Yet with the 2019 CMA guardrails dismantled, both Korean leaders are engaged incompetitive risk-taking.

Ibid
Ibid.
17
Ibid.
18
KCNA, “Law on DPRK’s Policy on Nuclear Forces Promulgated,” September 9, 2022.
15
16

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Given these negative trends and dangerous dynamics, does a comprehensive cooperative
security strategy still offer a way to establish a durable peace and to improve security while
reducing the risks of nuclear war and proliferation?
We highlight four cooperative solutions to reduce the insecurity that grips the region, inparticular, the risks arising from the nuclear-prone Korean conflict. In sum, these are:1.
Tension Reduction: The US concentrates its diplomacy on restraining Seoul
while China does the same in Pyongyang using measures that underscore theseriousness of their respective demarches.
2.
Reassurance: Concurrently, China reaches out to reassure the ROK while the
US takes steps to reassure the DPRK, employing measures that suffice to underscorethe seriousness of their respective demarches.
These combinations of restraint and reassurance diverge from typical unilateral great
power influence in that the respective foci of China and the US would reinforce rather
than opposing each other’s effects in Seoul and Pyongyang.
3.
Inadmissibility of Nuclear Weapons Use Declaration: Capitalizing on Beijing’s
stance opposing nuclear use in Ukraine, the US quietly suggests that China take thelead in proposing a joint statement renouncing the threat or use of nuclear weapons inNortheast Asia similar to the G-20 and other statements as to the inadmissibility of useof nuclear weapons. That, in turn, would lead to formulating a nuclear-weapons-freezone and to articulation of a changed US nuclear posture in Korea (that was always
implicit in the denuclearization of the whole Korean peninsula declared as a Six-Party
goal in 2004), in turn reengaging Pyongyang to resume steps towards its own
denuclearization.
4.
Peace regime in Korea: Capitalizing on Kim Jong Un’s implicit proposal tonormalize relations between the ROK and the DPRK, Washington and Seoul makeexplicit the political and economic benefits to the DPRK of curbing its nuclear
armament, including a peace process to culminate in an inter-Korean peace treaty,
access to advanced information technology, access to space services, and its integration
into regional and global institutions with concomitant increased stature. Seoul under acenter-left government might be better positioned to open the way for Pyongyang toengage Washington, but it would have to overcome DPRK skepticism about past failure
to deliver on that potential. Conversely, conservatives can shift quickly whencircumstances change and external imperatives that affect the DPRK and the ROK in
fundamental ways are possible over the next few years. It is therefore prudent to prepare
for the best as well as the worst possible outcomes.
We spell out these steps in more detail in the rest of this section.
A. US-China cooperation on Korea
Getting the DPRK and the ROK to back away from the brink will be difficult without
engagement by outsiders. The key to that effort lies in Washington and Beijing.

10The DPRK’s new strategy worries China’s leaders. Preoccupied with its domestic concerns,
Beijing does not want trouble on its borders. Addressing the Munich Security Conference on
February 17, 2024, Foreign Minister Wang Yi said, “Now the most pressing task is to preventa vicious cycle, address relevant parties’ reasonable security concerns, and de-escalate andstabilize the situation.” 19 Beijing also showed resentment at Pyongyang’s warming relations
with Moscow as undercutting its own influence. During DPRK Foreign Minister Choe SongHui mid-January mission to Moscow, she was hosted by Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov andmet with President Vladimir Putin presaging a return summit meeting with Kim Jong Un.
Contrast that with her low-key meeting later that month with Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs
Sun Weidong in Pyongyang.
A deadly clash in Korea may pose a difficult choice for Beijing: whether to intervene
militarily to support a conventionally inferior Pyongyang or risk North Korean escalation of
the conflict to nuclear war. At that point, too, Washington’s bluff could be called: whether toengage in a conventional war with China or resort to nuclear escalation of its own. Tensions in
the Taiwan Straits could add to the incentives for both Beijing and Washington to calm tensions
in Korea.
Such considerations might provide an opening for cooperation between the United States andChina to engage in preventive diplomacy in an effort to forestall war in Korea.
This cooperation might take either of two paths. First, Washington might temper Seoul’sassertiveness while Beijing attempts to reassure Pyongyang. The impediment to this alternativeis the deep distrust between China and the DPRK.
Alternatively, the Chinese might reach out to Seoul while it would be up to the Americans—as the stronger party—to counter the DPRK’s distrust of the US built up from decades of failed
negotiations by taking some unilateral steps to open the way for talks with the DPRK to resume:●
Washington might restrain Seoul from conducting especially provocative
military exercises and adjust the tempo of its own forward deployments. It might also
discourage Seoul from demonizing Pyongyang and encourage it to tone down its rhetoric.
●
At the same time, Beijing might indicate to Seoul and Tokyo its willingness toenter into trilateral dialogue on a range of contentious low and high security issues,possibly at meetings of the existing Trilateral Cooperation Secretariat.
●
Joint US-ROK military exercises are a bête noire for the DPRK which not only
sees them as evidence of enmity but also compels it to mobilize some of its own forces
as a precaution. A more demanding gesture would be to convince Seoul to suspend aplanned large-scale joint exercise and gauge Pyongyang’s reaction.
●
At the same time, China might refrain from naval exercises near Korean waters.
●
Depending on Pyongyang’s reaction, and with Seoul’s acquiescence,
Washington might make an even more forthcoming move by trying to open backchannel diplomacy with the DPRK and pledging to work toward what former Secretaryof State Mike Pompeo once called “a fundamentally different strategic relationship”

Choi Hyun-june, “China’s Wang Yi Calls for ‘Political Resolution’ to Korean Peninsula Issue,” Hankyoreh,
February 19, 2024.
19

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with the DPRK.20 That pledge could be underscored in a letter to Kim Jong Un from the
US president committing to negotiate an end-of-war declaration, as the starting point ofa peace process in Korea, and designating a presidential envoy to engage the DPRK on
this process.
As noted above, for all Kim’s tough talk and rewriting of DPRK laws and its
constitution, the DPRK faces irresoluble economic and strategic dilemmas unless heobtains significant external support that only the United States can deliver. That makes
it difficult for Kim to ignore American overtures in the long run even as he buys timeand seeks strategic flexibility by embracing Russia in the short-term.
●
Behind the scenes, USFK might talk to Seoul about restoring confidencebuilding measures as an initial step to reviving the September 19th Comprehensive
Military Agreement between North and South. Meanwhile, China might quietly suggestthat Pyongyang reciprocate by restoring its military and other hotlines with Seoul.
●
A more far-reaching and more likely more effective move would be for
Washington to propose establishing a hot line between the US President and the DPRK’s
leader to kick-start a top-down approach to “rebooting” the US-DPRK relationship.
Such steps could pave the way to more far-reaching regional cooperation efforts enumerated
below.
B. Gradually relax sanctions on the DPRK over time
Although the DPRK’s economy has limped along even when sanctions were applied
maximally by the UNSC and the United States and its allies, it remains at the bottom of a very
deep economic hole. The DPRK simply does not have the wherewithal to self-fund the capitalreconstruction of its key infrastructure and its state-owned industries. This reality does notinhibit its nuclear weapons program which is relatively cheap. Nothing Kim has said or done
has resolved this strategic dilemma. Closely related to this domestic situation is the DPRK’s
continuing high dependence on China for trade and essential inputs, especially food, given thelimits of trade with Russia. This reality constitutes a second strategic dilemma that remains
unresolved by Kim Jong Un. Re-engaging Russia and deploying nuclear weapons buys Kim
Jong Un some time, but his options remain highly constrained by these twin, inter-twined
strategic dilemmas. Ultimately, Pyongyang needs an opening to Seoul and Washington in orderto prosper and to lessen China’s grip on the DPRK’s future.
Sanctions on the DPRK have always served primarily as a political tool with limited economic
effectiveness. Politically, they allow the proponents of sanctions to claim they are doing
something to punish Pyongyang for its perceived transgressions. Yet the crime-andpunishment approach has never worked. Despite the enthusiasm for sanctions in some political“Secretary of State Mike Pompeo With Hideki Yui of NHK,” US State Department, June 7, 2018, at:https://2017-2021-translations.state.gov/2018/06/07/secretary-of-state-mike-pompeo-with-hideki-yui-ofnhk/
20

12

circles in Washington, Seoul, and Tokyo, they have had limited effectiveness in compelling
Pyongyang to do what the sanctions enthusiasts want.
Evasion has been rampant—all the more so as the competition between Russia and China for
influence in Pyongyang has intensified. Most borders are porous: few states have been able tocontrol smuggling.
Sanctions have always been regarded in Pyongyang as evidence of enmity. Given the DPRK’s
pre-existing economic isolation and the recent shift in Russian and Chinese enforcement ofsanctions imposed on the DPRK, easing them might not matter much economically to
Pyongyang but it would send an important political signal.
US unilateral sanctions rely primarily on market mechanisms that cannot be simply reversedby state-diktat. Lifting them has seldom been easy, politically or administratively, and takes
time; but it is an essential tool for easing tensions. Coordinating UNSC de-sanctioning with
China, Russia, and other member states would be easier as a first step and also may enable theUnited States to realign its policies with the reality of already-eased sanctions by China andRussia in recent years.
C. Declare non-hostility
This is a critical step to ease tensions on the Korean Peninsula. It should not be taken lightly.
Rhetoric alone will not suffice; actions that match the words are essential. Pyongyang has heard
Washington say such words many times before and vice versa. Seoul would do well tounderscore the political gesture with military moves to build confidence. Washington might
lend credence to its words by communicating its willingness to normalize diplomatic relations
and to begin a peace process that would culminate in a peace treaty.
A lesser version of this approach would be to declare that the US will not be first to use nuclear
weapons in Korea; that it will not use cyberattacks to disable DPRK nuclear command-andcontrol systems; and that it will not introduce AI systems into US NC3. These measures could
be offered unilaterally or introduced on a mutual basis. A US-DPRK presidential hotline could
serve as a political kick-starter to this process.
D. Begin a peace process to replace the Korea Armistice with a peace treaty and/or
a “peace regime.”
If Pyongyang is willing to re-engage diplomatically with Washington, then it is up to Seoul
to convey its seriousness by toning down its rhetorical excesses and curb some of its military
drills. The peace process could begin with confidence-building measures by both sides,
culminating in the revival of the September 19th Comprehensive Military Agreement.
In light of Kim Jong Un’s policy change renouncing claims to sovereignty over the ROK, theDPRK may be open in the future to a formal inter-state treaty between the two Koreas that wasformerly precluded by their mutual claim to sovereignty over the other. That is more likely if
13the center-left comes to power in Seoul but if external circumstances change rapidly andmassively, a conservative-led government may abandon anachronistic reunification goals anddiscover that Kim Jong Un’s generation in both the ROK and the DPRK prefer pragmatic
peace-making to conducting ideological battles let alone war.
E. A US-China Nuclear Initiative
As part of its stance on Ukraine, China stated on February 24, 2023: “Nuclear weapons mustnot be used and nuclear wars must not be fought. The threat or use of nuclear weapons shouldbe opposed. Nuclear proliferation must be prevented and nuclear crisis avoided.” 21 Thatstatement provides an opening for a US-China initiative to address North Korea’s growing
nuclear weapons arsenal.
A year later, on February 26, 2024, the director-general of the arms control department of the
PRC Foreign Ministry, Sun Xiaobo, told the UN Disarmament Conference in Geneva,“Nuclear-weapon states should negotiate and conclude a treaty on no-first-use of nuclear
weapons against each other or make a political statement in this regard." 22
Taking up this initiative, Washington might quietly broach the idea that China propose a joint
US-PRC declaration on the inadmissibility of using or threatening to use nuclear weapons inNortheast Asia as a stepping stone to resuming talks with Pyongyang on the nuclear issue.
Once they agree, Washington would sound out Seoul and Tokyo about the possibility of anegotiating nuclear-weapons-free zone (NWFZ) in Northeast Asia as a means of inducing
Pyongyang to resume incremental steps toward denuclearization starting with a reaffirmationof its commitment to nuclear disarmament and willingness to adjust its own nuclear posture in
the region as it pertains to the Korean peninsula. Beijing would do the same with Pyongyang.

F. Defer Formation of a Six-Party Northeast Asia Security Council
Participation in an inclusive Northeast Asia Security Council would obliquely address alongstanding DPRK demand for “respect for its sovereignty.” At its heart that demand meansthat other states will not attempt to overthrow its government. Its membership in a regional
security council also would underscore its stature as a sovereign equal and give it a voice in arange of regional security concerns including threatened use of nuclear weapons. But all these
possibilities would require it to re-engage with the ROK, which is difficult to foresee with thecurrent ROK presidential incumbent.

PRC Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “China’s Position on the Political Settlement of the Ukraine Crisis,” February
23, 2023.
22
Reuters, China Urges the Largest Nuclear States to Negotiate a ‘No-First-Use’ treaty,” February 27, 2024.
https://www.reuters.com/world/china-urges-un-define-roadmap-exempt-non-nuclear-states-nuclear-threatstate-2024-02-28/
21

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The inclusion of Russia would give the DPRK some assurance that the other parties would
not gang up against it, a complaint it voiced in the Six-Party Talks whenever China sided withthe common front put up by the United States, ROK, and Japan.
Conversely, while it would likely be welcomed in Pyongyang, Russia’s involvement undercurrent geopolitical circumstances would pose serious political difficulties in Washington aslong as Vladimir Putin wages war in Ukraine. That difficulty is compounded by North Koreanarms exports to Russia, including artillery shells and short-range missiles that have been usedon the battlefields of Ukraine. In return, the Russians are suspected of offering technologicalassistance for DPRK arming as well as busting the UNSC sanctions aimed at reversing the
DPRK’s nuclear armament. Worse yet, Moscow may have an incentive to keep tensions highin Korea in order to distract Washington from its aggression in Ukraine.
The Council might also become embroiled in disputes between China and the United States,
reducing its utility in solving problems on the Korean Peninsula. Beijing may also be reluctant
to side with Washington given its rivalry with Moscow over Pyongyang’s affections. In short,Council deliberations might exacerbate inter-Korean differences without helping to resolve
them, let alone reduce the risk of war and nuclear escalation.
While it is necessary to defer its establishment for now, the eventual establishment of theCouncil remains a critical step for regional security since it would provide a forum for all the
relevant parties. The Council is also an ideal vehicle for providing the DPRK with multilateral
security assurances that are critical to establishing a nuclear weapons free zone. Some elementsof our regional approach may be helpful in ameliorating if not resolving the looming crisis in
Korea and any progress might underscore the value of such an approach. At some point,
sufficient cooperation may be achieved to bring back the Council idea usefully as a vehicle forproviding the DPRK with multilateral security assurances—but not now.
For the same reason, regional summitry by heads of state as suggested in 2018 is premature
until Putin’s war on Ukraine is resolved or at least eased to the point that the US and Russian
heads of state are able to meet.
Meanwhile, finding a diplomatic pathway whereby China and the United States can realignon how best to curb the DPRK’s nuclear and military threats to the United States and its allies
is the highest priority.
In the short-term, this imperative entails changing Kim Jong Un’s calculus as to the value ofembracing Putin and his war in the Ukraine and bringing ROK president Yoon Suk-Yeol or his
successor to the negotiating table with the DPRK.
G. Establish a nuclear weapons-free zone (NWFZ) to re-establish the DPRK’s nonnuclear commitment in a legally binding manner that treats all parties on an equal
basis
Although denuclearization remains the ultimate goal, the NWFZ we proposed in 2018 needs
to give way for now to heading off the risk of war on the Korean Peninsula. Not focusing on
its nuclear assets may reassure the DPRK for the moment.

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By the same token, the drumbeat of proponents of nuclear-arming in the ROK and Japan posesa risk that might be headed off by involving them in talks about a NWFZ—if the US-China
initiative succeeds. That might pave the way for eventually engaging the DPRK on joining a
NWFZ. Thus, we propose that China, the United States, and perhaps other regional states
initiate an inclusive, UN-led dialogue to discuss a NWFZ in the region as the follow-on to aregional declaration on the inadmissibility of nuclear weapons in the region suggested above.

5. CONCLUSION
The temptation for leaders is to bolster deterrence and tighten alliances, relying on them toprevent war. Yet the resulting downward spiral of security in Northeast Asia, if not arrested,
could lead to the very war that deterrence is presumed to prevent.
Slowing and reversing that spiral requires diplomatic re-engagement, de-escalation, and arms
control—in short, a revival of cooperative security—starting in the Korean peninsula where
tension is highest and rising prompting the two sides to bolster deterrence in ways that could
erupt in a deadly clash with the attendant danger of escalation. There, too, lies the best prospect
for cooperation with the highest payoff in security gains, however difficult it may seem.
If successful, diplomatic intervention by the US and China could, in turn, reopen the way toaddress the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. As an inducement to DPRK steps todenuclearization, that process could begin with a US-PRC commitment to negotiate a regional
declaration on the inadmissibility of using or threatening to use nuclear weapons in Northeast
Asia as a stepping-stone to resuming talks with Pyongyang on the nuclear issue, followed byefforts to negotiate a nuclear-weapons-free zone in Northeast Asia that the DPRK could
ultimately join.
Any progress in easing tensions in Korea could then inspire cooperative security efforts
elsewhere in Northeast Asia, thereby laying the groundwork for resumption of efforts to createa regional Security Council and other institutional means that are required to lay thefoundations for a durable peace built on comprehensive security.

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