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MORE THAN A NUCLEAR THREAT:

NORTH KOREA’S CHEMICAL, BIOLOGICAL,

AND CONVENTIONAL WEAPONS

JOINT HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON TERRORISM, 

NONPROLIFERATION, AND TRADE

AND THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ASIA AND THE PACIFIC

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

JANUARY 17, 2018

Serial No. 115–104

Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Affairs

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.foreignaffairs.house.gov/ or

http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/

(II)

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

EDWARD R. ROYCE, California, Chairman 

CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey 

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida 

DANA ROHRABACHER, California 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

JOE WILSON, South Carolina 

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas 

TED POE, Texas 

DARRELL E. ISSA, California 

TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania 

MO BROOKS, Alabama 

PAUL COOK, California 

SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania 

RON DESANTIS, Florida 

MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina 

TED S. YOHO, Florida 

ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois 

LEE M. ZELDIN, New York 

DANIEL M. DONOVAN, JR., New York 

F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR., 

Wisconsin 

ANN WAGNER, Missouri 

BRIAN J. MAST, Florida 

FRANCIS ROONEY, Florida 

BRIAN K. FITZPATRICK, Pennsylvania 

THOMAS A. GARRETT, JR., Virginia 

JOHN R. CURTIS, Utah 

ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York 

BRAD SHERMAN, California 

GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York 

ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey 

GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia 

THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida 

KAREN BASS, California 

WILLIAM R. KEATING, Massachusetts 

DAVID N. CICILLINE, Rhode Island 

AMI BERA, California 

LOIS FRANKEL, Florida 

TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii 

JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas 

ROBIN L. KELLY, Illinois 

BRENDAN F. BOYLE, Pennsylvania 

DINA TITUS, Nevada 

NORMA J. TORRES, California 

BRADLEY SCOTT SCHNEIDER, Illinois 

THOMAS R. SUOZZI, New York 

ADRIANO ESPAILLAT, New York 

TED LIEU, California

AMY PORTER, Chief of Staff THOMAS SHEEHY, Staff Director

JASON STEINBAUM, Democratic Staff Director 

(III)

SUBCOMMITTEE ON TERRORISM, NONPROLIFERATION, AND TRADE

TED POE, Texas, Chairman 

JOE WILSON, South Carolina 

DARRELL E. ISSA, California 

PAUL COOK, California 

SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania 

LEE M. ZELDIN, New York 

BRIAN J. MAST, Florida 

THOMAS A. GARRETT, JR., Virginia 

WILLIAM R. KEATING, Massachusetts 

LOIS FRANKEL, Florida 

BRENDAN F. BOYLE, Pennsylvania 

DINA TITUS, Nevada 

NORMA J. TORRES, California 

BRADLEY SCOTT SCHNEIDER, Illinois

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ASIA AND THE PACIFIC

TED S. YOHO, Florida, Chairman 

DANA ROHRABACHER, California 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania 

MO BROOKS, Alabama 

SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania 

ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois 

ANN WAGNER, Missouri 

BRAD SHERMAN, California 

AMI BERA, California 

DINA TITUS, Nevada 

GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia 

THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida 

TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii 

(V)

C O N T E N T S 

Page

WITNESSES 

Anthony Cordesman, Ph.D., Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy, Center for 

Strategic and International Studies ................................................................... 11

Mr. John Parachini, director, Intelligence Policy Center, RAND Corporation ... 45

Mr. Anthony Ruggiero, senior fellow, Foundation for Defense of Democracies . 58

The Honorable Bonnie Jenkins, founder and president, Women of Color Advancing Peace, Security and Conflict Transformation (former Coordinator 

for Threat Reduction Programs, Bureau of International Security and Nonproliferation, U.S. Department of State) ............................................................ 72

LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING 

Anthony Cordesman, Ph.D.: Prepared statement ................................................. 13

Mr. John Parachini: Prepared statement .............................................................. 47

Mr. Anthony Ruggiero: Prepared statement ......................................................... 60

The Honorable Bonnie Jenkins: Prepared statement ........................................... 74

APPENDIX 

Hearing notice .......................................................................................................... 100

Hearing minutes ...................................................................................................... 101

The Honorable Ted Poe, a Representative in Congress from the State of 

Texas, and chairman, Subcommittee on Terrorism, Nonproliferation, and 

Trade: Prepared statement .................................................................................. 102

The Honorable Gerald E. Connolly, a Representative in Congress from the 

Commonwealth of Virginia: Prepared statement .............................................. 104

(1)

MORE THAN A NUCLEAR THREAT: 

NORTH KOREA’S CHEMICAL, BIOLOGICAL, 

AND CONVENTIONAL WEAPONS 

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 17, 2018

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON TERRORISM, NONPROLIFERATION, AND TRADE

AND

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ASIA AND THE PACIFIC,

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS,

Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:04 p.m., in room 

2172, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Ted Yoho (chairman of 

the Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific) presiding. 

Mr. YOHO. The subcommittee will come to order. Chairman Poe 

got detained because of the weather, and I guess Texas isn’t set up 

for equipment like that, deicing planes. 

Members present will be permitted to submit written statements 

to be included in the official hearing record. Without objection, the 

hearing record will remain open for 5 calendar days to allow statements, questions and extraneous material for the record, subject to 

length limitations in the rules. 

Good afternoon. I would like to thank Chairman Poe for calling 

this hearing. It is such an important hearing to have in today’s climate. And Ranking Member Keating, Ranking Member Sherman, 

and all other members of the subcommittee for gathering today to 

continue working on one of the most urgent security threats facing 

the United States. 

As we will hear from our witnesses today, the danger North 

Korea poses to the world is more than just its rogue nuclear program and ballistic missile brinksmanship. Pyongyang develops 

other weapons of mass destruction and backs them with significant 

conventional military capabilities. 

As his pursuit of chemical and biological weapons shows, Kim 

Jong-un commands tools of indiscriminate mass murder beyond nuclear weapons, and U.S. policy must be responsive to these threats 

as well. 

North Korea, one of only 6 countries that has not signed the 

Chemical Weapons Convention, is believed to have stockpiles of 

thousands of tons of chemical weapons, including sulfur, mustard 

gas, chlorine, sarin, and VX, some of the worst chemicals that mankind has devised. These agents could be delivered by a variety of 

2

North Korean weapon systems, notably the massed artillery deployed near the DMZ which would place Seoul at extreme risk. 

Experts believe North Korea would not hesitate to use such tactics as a way to make up the deficiency in its aging military and 

that such an attack could feasibly result in millions of civilian casualties in South Korea. 

Recent reports have also highlighted North Korea’s continuing 

work on another longstanding WMD program, the production of biological weapons, including anthrax and smallpox. It has been 

known for some time that North Korea possesses the capability to 

produce anthrax for military purposes, and just last month, a Japanese newspaper reported that North Korea has begun experiments 

to load anthrax into ICBMs. Tellingly, this assertion is reiterated 

in the administration’s recent national security strategy. The 

frightening truth is that we already have at least one data point 

to show that North Korea is ready and willing to use such horrific 

weapons to accomplish its goal. 

In early 2017, we all remember North Korean agents assassinated Kim Jong-nam, the half brother of Kim Jong-un, with VX 

nerve agent in Malaysia. This operation proved to the world not 

only that North Korea has access to chemical lethal weapons, but 

also the willingness and the expertise to transport and apply them 

in a targeted and sophisticated manner. 

Partly in response to this killing, the White House in November 

announced that it was redesignating North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism in a large part due to Judge Poe and other members of this committee. An overdue step to remind the world that 

Kim’s unlawful regime is an international pariah. But the threat 

remains. 

To backstop its asymmetric capabilities, North Korea also maintains the world’s fourth largest standing army, with over 1 million 

personnel, accounting for almost 5 percent of its total population. 

North Korea keeps its substantial conventional forces in a forwarddeployed posture, keeping Korea and also Japan under constant 

threat. 

For example, even conservative estimates place hundreds of 

North Korean artillery tubes within range of Seoul, able to rain 

thousands of shells per minute down on the metropolitan area. 

These weapons could inflict enormous costs on South Koreans and 

the 230,000 Americans living in South Korea. Combined with 

chemical or biological payloads, the cost would be unimaginable 

even in the absence of nuclear weapons. 

North Korea’s conventional, chemical, and biological weapons 

raise a number of questions that are too often overlooked in the 

congressional debate over our policies toward North Korea. North 

Korea’s investment in these weapons may increase the cost of potential contingency and constrain U.S. strategic planning. They 

may give Kim Jong-un additional strategic options to escalate a 

conflict without using nuclear weapons and provoking regime-ending war. 

If North Korea truly wants to rejoin the international community 

in a meaningful and lasting way, the Kim regime will have to bring 

something to the negotiating table. Perhaps the regime’s chemical, 

biological, and other weapons aimed solely at civilian populations 

3

might be a fitting place to start as we work toward the goal of full 

denuclearization. 

I look forward to working toward answers to these and other 

questions, and I thank the panel for joining us today to discuss this 

concerning topic. 

And without objection, the witnesses’ written statements will be 

entered into the hearing record. And I now turn to the ranking 

member on TNT for any remarks he may have. 

Mr. Keating. 

Mr. KEATING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. YOHO. Take it away. 

Mr. KEATING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for holding 

the hearing today. One of President Obama’s outgoing warnings to 

President Trump was about the threat posed by North Korea. And 

here we are. 

Today we are not talking about the nuclear threats. It is axiomatic, almost, the question theoretically that was posed to one of 

our first ladies once, saying, ‘‘Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how 

did you enjoy the theater?’’ But there are, indeed, other real 

threats posed by North Korea’s non-nuclear weapons. As tensions 

rise and the rhetoric heats up about military options, we need to 

be having an honest, realistic conversation about the types of 

threats that we are facing from North Korea and the full range of 

options we must consider given the very real risk we face. 

Frankly, reports that the administration is considering ‘‘a bloody 

nose strategy in North Korea’’ is deeply concerning. War is not a 

matter of bloody noses. It is human lives, constant uncertainty, 

long-term challenges in our investments to achieve some amount of 

security. And we know all too well that this investment can easily 

take a generation because security is not just fighting the battle 

and then going home. It is also everything that comes afterwards. 

We know this because we are fast-approaching 20 years of military 

engagement in Afghanistan and Iraq. That is because the instability produced by war is itself a threat. 

The chemical, biological, conventional and other non-nuclear 

threats posed by the North Korean regime are serious indeed. And 

it is our duty to come together in Congress to best ensure the safety of the American people. Whether we like it or not, if the President launches an attack on North Korea, we will need to make a 

decision on whether we will give him the authority to continue that 

military engagement. 

U.S. Pacific Commander Admiral Harris, who I had the opportunity to meet with when I visited the Pacific and South Korea 

roughly 1 year ago, was one of those voices we should listen to 

closely when it comes to formulating U.S. strategy in North Korea. 

So when Admiral Harris categorized diplomacy as the most important starting point, we should be taking a hard look in Congress 

at whether our diplomatic options truly are being pursued as aggressively as we can. Because protecting the American people does 

not automatically mean sending them to war, or worse yet, all but 

inviting an attack from a hostile regime. 

Before jumping to the military options, we need to be clear on 

what they look like and most importantly, the full range of diplomatic options that we have available to us. 

4

We need to be clear on our options because the options we choose 

will matter tremendously to our women and men in uniform and 

to their families and friends. It will matter to families living across 

the United States wondering if they might live within the blast radius where North Korea has the ability to strike here at home, and 

it will matter to the generations forced to clean up the mess left 

behind by what would inevitably be a long and complicated conflict 

on the Korean Peninsula. 

North Korea is likely not to go its way and follow international 

law on the use of chemical and biological weapons. It was not so 

long ago that another brutal regime used chemical weapons in the 

midst of a conflict. What does it mean to operate on a battlefield 

where chemical and biological weapons could be in play? What do 

the civilian casualties look like? Can these weapons be secured in 

the midst of an armed conflict, and if not, what types of the proliferation risks should we consider? 

All this, in addition to the concerns presented by North Korea’s 

conventional forces. What could such a conflict breed in terms of 

the spillover effects into other countries. A military option should 

only be used when necessary and once there are no other effective 

options left on the table. 

So I am looking forward to discussing our other options today, 

our diplomatic options. And I thank the panel for being here to 

help us in that endeavor. 

Congress has already passed sanctions to deal with the threats 

from North Korea, so where is the diplomatic follow through? 

Where is our State Department? Where are our Ambassadors? The 

United States still does not have an Ambassador to South Korea 

in place. Our allies are not reassured by this administration’s actions, and we are not even at the table as North and South Korea 

negotiate, even though our own security is also very much at stake. 

These are serious issues and we have very little information to 

understand and properly counter these threats. So we need to take 

stock of what we do have and what we have to do. We have long 

had strong allies and partnerships in South Korea, Japan and so 

many other countries that are similarly concerned by the threats 

posed by North Korea. When we face serious threats of this nature, 

such as nuclear threats from Iran, what have we done in the past? 

We worked closely in a coalition of partner nations. 

The women and men of the State Department have long been 

some of our strongest assets in representing the United States at 

the table to negotiate peace and to make it possible for Americans 

to sleep soundly at night. Under this administration, they have 

weakened our State Department and confused our allies. We 

should be concerned that once a leader, the United States is rapidly becoming a pariah on the international stage, and that does 

not make us safer. 

So I appreciate the witnesses being here. I hope to hear from you 

on what we could be doing, even in light of the challenging circumstances and alarming threats that we face. 

I yield back. 

Mr. YOHO. Thank you, Mr. Keating. Words well spoken, well 

meaning, and hopefully well taken as we go through this. 

5

Being the chair of the Asia-Pacific Subcommittee, and Judge Poe 

is not here, I am going to turn to the ranking member, good friend, 

Mr. Brad Sherman from the State of California, who is the ranking 

member of the Asia-Pacific Subcommittee. And it is important that 

everybody knows that the two committees have come together on 

this important topic. 

Mr. Sherman, thank you. 

Mr. SHERMAN. Thank you. And for many years our policy on 

North Korea has focused on its nuclear program. We have to make 

sure that we don’t stumble into war. And I am concerned about the 

rhetoric that sounds like adolescent boys at a junior high school. 

The idea that we could bloody the nose of our adversary without 

risk to the Korean Peninsula and the world is absurd. 

In today’s hearing, I look forward to hearing from our panel on 

chemical, biological and conventional weapons, but at least in my 

opening statement, I am going to also focus on the nuclear. 

I have cosponsored five bills, many of us have, that sanction and 

condemn North Korea. But I have also cosponsored the No Unconstitutional Strike Against North Korea Act, because we should not, 

by presidential fiat, be conducting military strikes and going to war 

with North Korea. 

We need a strong military to deter North Korean action, but we 

also need diplomacy. And diplomacy starts with reasonable objectives. I am old. I was here when North Korea had as one of its objectives just getting a nonaggression pact with the United States. 

We turned them down. Vice President Cheney imagined that we 

could have a righteous invasion of North Korea. Bad idea now. Bad 

idea then. 

We might very well look at the freeze-for-freeze initiative. We 

could suspend our military exercises in return for a verifiable 

freeze on North Korea’s nuclear and missile testing and production—and I want to emphasize the word ‘‘production’’ because I 

don’t think China has gone that far in its proposal—of both nuclear 

material and missiles, but also chemical and biological materials. 

To reduce the biological threat, we can ask North Korea to affirm 

that it will remain in the Biological Weapons Convention. We 

should encourage it in public health and agricultural dialogues to 

limit bioweapons. And as suggested by one of our witnesses, push 

a no-first-use pledge and give one ourselves with regard to chemical and biological weapons use. We need to prepare for chemical, 

biological, and nuclear weapons use in the Korean Peninsula because it may indeed happen. 

The idea that you can’t reduce casualties from a nuclear strike 

because a nuclear strike is beyond our imagination, in its horror, 

is to say that there is no difference between 100,000 casualties, 1 

million casualties, and 5 million casualties. Likewise, when we look 

at the chemical threat from North Korea, we estimate it to have 

2,500 to 5,000 tons of chemical agents. We see that the distribution, not only to our troops, but to relevant Korean civilians, of gas 

masks and more sophisticated countermeasures might well be the 

investment, not because it would render us invulnerable or our allies invulnerable to such an attack, but only because it would reduce casualties. 

6

Finally, two other points I want to make. One is, North Korea 

may soon be interested in selling its nuclear weapons or chemical 

or biological weapons. Roughly 10 years ago Israel destroyed a Syrian nuclear facility which seemed to have Iranian participation. 

That was all North Korean technology. 

North Korea will not currently sell its nuclear weapons because 

it needs a certain number of weapons to defend itself from us in 

their mind. But they will quickly in 1 year, 2 years, 3 years, get 

to the point where they can afford to sell one or more nuclear 

weapons. They won’t sell for a cost that a terrorist group can afford, but sovereign states can indeed produce a billion or several 

billion dollars, if that is the asking price. 

We need to work with China to make sure there are no nonstop 

flights between Iran and North Korea. I spoke to the President 

about this, President Obama about this, and he assured me that 

we were checking ships, but we have no way of stopping planes. 

China, however, can require refueling of any plane between those 

two countries. 

Second, we have to be willing to risk our trade relationship with 

China to get a level of cooperation from China on this issue that 

goes beyond the foreign policy decision that they have made. And 

if we are not willing to do that, then we are putting the profits of 

entities of Wall Street above the security of the American people. 

It is not something we haven’t done before, but we continue to do 

it when it comes to the Korean issue. 

And I yield back. 

Mr. YOHO. Thank you for your comments. Next, we will go to Mr. 

Chabot, who used to chair the Asia-Pacific Subcommittee, the previous chairman. Thank you, sir. 

Mr. CHABOT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And you are doing a fine 

job of it, maybe not as good as I did, but really good. No, just kidding. 

It was mentioned that we are not a part of the talks between 

South Korea and North Korea, and that is true. But I would argue 

that those talks are—it is blackmail, it is a fraud, it is a sham, in 

my view. South Korea is concerned that North Korea is going to 

screw up the Olympics for them and North Korea is going to get 

everything they can out of this, as they always do. We have had 

previous administrations, both Republican and Democrat, who have 

been suckered by the North Koreans time and time again. 

They promise to give up their nuclear program. We give them 

food, we give them oil. And it doesn’t matter whether we are in sixparty talks or whoever, all of the countries that deal with North 

Korea fall into line. We give them a bunch of stuff. They promise 

to behave. They don’t behave. 

And now they have nuclear weapons which now can threaten us 

right here in the continental United States. They have chemical 

and biological weapons programs that they are proceeding for their 

conventional weapons programs, whether it is tanks or the artillery 

system that they have and how they can target Seoul, and us for 

that matter. It is horrendous that we have, we being the rest of the 

world, have allowed them to get to this point. 

The key to solving this whole thing, in my view, was/is continues 

to be China. China talks a good game. They act like they are going 

7

to do things, they are going to cooperate and rein in, and they get 

embarrassed by the regime, the North Korean regime on occasion, 

but they are not going to rein them in. They are helpful to them. 

They keep us and our allies off balance. And so even though they 

act like they are very disappointed, in general what North Korea 

does benefits China as much as it keeps them off guard to some 

degree. 

China is the key, and as long as China believes that we are not 

going to be serious with them about cutting them off basically, they 

benefit one heck of a lot more from trade and a relationship with 

us than we do from them. And until we get serious—previous administrations never got serious with China. I think there is at least 

the chance for this administration. 

I do believe this President, you know, went into it being very 

tough with China. And he listened to the Chinese leadership. And 

I think he has been too gullible, really, in believing what they are 

saying, and they pump him up and how great he is. And he listens, 

unfortunately. And that really is unfortunate, because this administration either gets tough with China who can lean on North 

Korea and get him to back down, or they don’t. 

In which case, we have a nuclear North Korea now and one of 

these days something will happen, which the world will regret. 

So we are way past too late, but let’s hope too late isn’t here yet. 

And I yield back. 

Mr. YOHO. Thank you for those comments. 

Next we will go to Mr. Connolly from the State of Virginia. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I echo what Ben said. 

I was in Korea last year and went to the DMZ. And what really 

struck me was that the DMZ is to Seoul what Dulles Airport is to 

Washington, DC. It is virtually that close. 

Mr. YOHO. Yeah. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. And so we need to be careful when we saber rattle, when we tweet, when we throw out threats, because it 

unsettles that part of the world. We have to be careful about how 

that is interpreted by the North Korean regime and how it can 

sometimes inadvertently strengthen that regime and its resolve to 

develop nuclear weapons. But most importantly, that there are 25 

million people who live in Seoul who will be the first victims of a 

violent outbreak. The second victims will be in Japan. 

And so we need to be cognizant of that. That isn’t to say don’t 

be strong. Is it to say, however, we need to look at carrots as well 

as sticks, points of leverage to try to engage North Korea, even at 

the 11th hour, to try to get them to desist. And I think that ought 

to be the paramount goal of U.S. policy and the region, stay strong, 

but be willing to be engaged. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this hearing. 

Mr. YOHO. Thank you. Next, we will go to Mr. Joe Wilson from 

South Carolina. 

Mr. WILSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The totalitarian regime 

in North Korea continues to threaten the United States and our allies by testing nuclear capabilities and intermediate to long range 

intercontinental ballistic missiles. We will not and should not tolerate the escalation by this rogue regime in North Korea. 

8

I am encouraged by the leadership of President Donald Trump 

and Ambassador Nikki Haley, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, 

with Deputy Secretary of State, John Sullivan, for their commitment to demonstrating peace through strength, clearly expressing 

their commitment to keeping all options on the table when it comes 

to addressing the threat from North Korea, whether it be military, 

diplomatic or economic. We have a responsibility to protect families 

across the globe, but especially those of America, South Korea and 

Japan from this existential threat. 

As one of only two Members of Congress to have visited 

Pyongyang, I saw firsthand North Korea’s fragile economy. Buildings without electricity, highways that were virtually empty, inflammatory propaganda posters threatening death to South Koreans and Americans, and an international airport that was scarcely 

used. When contrasted with the vibrant capital of South Korea, it 

is clear that the communist regime of North Korea is fragile. This 

is why I believe the sanctions on North Korea promoted by President Trump have been successful, resulting in recent talks between 

North and South Korea and North Korea agreeing to attend the 

Winter Olympics for the first time since 2006. 

I am grateful that President Trump is heeding the advice of military leaders, led by Secretary of Defense James Mattis, in taking 

the threat from North Korea seriously. The United States is fully 

prepared to handle this threat. And with the leadership of President Trump, Ambassador Nikki Haley, House Republicans and 

Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Ed Royce, we will be even more 

prepared in the future. 

I yield back my time. 

Mr. YOHO. Thank you for those comments. Next we will go to 

Mrs. Ann Wagner from Missouri. 

Mrs. WAGNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank both 

chairmen for hosting this important hearing today. Despite international pressure and a host of new sanctions, North Korea continues to develop nuclear weapons, but this should not be our only 

focus. We know that North Korea is not only miniaturizing a nuclear warhead for placement on a ballistic missile that can reach 

the continental United States, but also developing offensive chemical and biological weapons. These weapons are agents of terror, 

and change how we approach strategies to confront the North Korean regime. 

Meanwhile, our partners in the west appear blind to the chemical weapons attacks by enemies of freedom across our globe. Just 

this past weekend, there were reports of a chemical gas attack in 

Syria that injured civilians. The United States must take a clear 

stand against the use of chemical and biological weapons and find 

pathways to disrupt North Korea’s weapons of development. I look 

forward to your testimony and the questions that will ensue. 

I thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I yield back. 

Mr. YOHO. Thank you. I appreciate your comments. Next we will 

go to Mr. Dan Donovan from New York. 

Mr. DONOVAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. With so much focus on 

North Korea’s growing nuclear weapons program, this hearing 

9

brings to light an alarming aspect of North Korea’s arsenal that is 

ignored in the public discourse. 

North Korea has a disquieting stockpile of conventional, chemical, and biological weapons which could proliferate to terror organizations and pose a threat to our homeland. I held a hearing on 

this topic just last month as chairman of the Homeland Security 

Subcommittee on Emergency Preparedness Response and Communications. So the information that we will gather here today will 

be enormously helpful for our ongoing Homeland Security activities. 

According to public documents and the Congressional Research 

Service, the U.S. may need to deploy up to 700,000 troops in the 

event of hostilities on the Korean Peninsula. That is several times 

more than the troop levels we deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan. 

Further, the Pentagon estimates that 20,000 civilians in South 

Korea alone could die each day of a war all before the use of nuclear weapons by North Korea. 

This is an incredibly dangerous situation, and that is why I am 

eager to learn from today’s hearing. What we hear today will be 

useful to foreign policy, military preparedness and homeland security. It is our role as Members of Congress to apply this knowledge 

to strengthen America’s defenses. And I thank the witnesses today 

for sharing their expertise with this panel and look forward to 

hearing your testimony. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. YOHO. Thank you for your comments. Mr. Garrett from Virginia. 

Mr. GARRETT. It is 2018, and we are shocked as a Nation to learn 

that slavery is still practiced in areas of the world, and yet, a player on the international stage and in the spotlight, North Korea is 

in the business, as it were, of literally selling its citizens into slavery. With this being the case, can we have any doubt that North 

Korea would engage and employ weapon systems that would wreak 

havoc upon civilian populations? In fact, by my understanding, the 

population of Seoul is roughly 8 million. The metro area is closer 

to 24 million. 

And having spent time as a fire supporter and understanding the 

proper employment of cannon rocket and missile fires, and understanding history and the fact that two-thirds of all combat casualties inflicted by the United States military since the Civil War 

were inflicted with indirect fire, 20,000 civilian casualties a day 

seems mild. 

And the question as to whether a regime that would sell its own 

people into slavery to line its thinly-lined pockets would use these 

weapons against foreign civilians seems not to be a question at all. 

But I think these very people who we seek to protect in the interest 

of humanity and human rights are the key, and I would look forward to hearing from you how the individuals who might employ 

these conventional weapon systems might be targeted so that we 

might see a better humanitarian circumstance and a safer world 

for all in Korea and beyond. Thank you. 

Mr. YOHO. Thank you for your comments. Mr. Dana Rohrabacher 

from California. 

10

Mr. ROHRABACHER. I have been listening to everyone’s comments. 

I had to grab a sandwich. That is all I’ve had all day. Let me just 

note just some reaction to some of my colleagues. 

With all due respect, we are talking about the worst, God-awful 

dictatorship in the world. And we are finding our time, however, 

our focus on attacking the President of the United States. Now, I 

don’t care. This guy is our President. Yeah, he has got some eccentricities. You think you are going to make war any less by attacking him instead of the enemy, instead of this guy who has murdered his own family and murdered countless people to maintain 

power in Korea? No. 

These insults to our President, we should know when to make 

them and when not to. This is not the hearing to make those, especially considering the fact that what we have now is this very same 

communist dictator in South Korea talking about how to cooperate 

at least with the Olympics. Seems to me, the President calling him 

‘‘rocket man’’ and ‘‘I have a bigger button to push than he does,’’ 

maybe had the positive impact, because that is what happens with 

gangsters. If you deal with them forcefully and you put them down, 

they will respond to that. 

Let me just note, the Democrat response when I first came here, 

which was a long time ago, during the Clinton administration, 

what was their response? Their response was to give $4 billion in 

order to curry favors with that dictatorship in North Korea. We 

gave them $4 billion worth of fuel. What do you think they used 

that $4 billion for? That is where they got the money to develop 

their nuclear weapon right now. 

Yeah, of course, people attacking our President even after the last President gave $150 billion to Iran. Oh, yeah. No, I am sorry. 

This was not the place to attack the President of the United States. 

And yes, we should be able to be critical of policy. But everybody 

knows his eccentricities and personality. You are not going to do 

any good for our country at the cause of peace in a situation like 

this, that will make sure that the dictatorship in North Korea 

knows that our President doesn’t have support. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. YOHO. Yes, sir. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. Given the fact that my friend from California 

just went way over time, I would ask 30 seconds to respond? 

Mr. YOHO. I would rather wait till the end. I would like to get 

to the witnesses for the respect of them. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. Well, the gentleman has said——

Mr. ROHRABACHER. I would request that he be given the extra 30 

seconds to refute me. He always does. 

Mr. YOHO. We will do 30 seconds. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. I thank my friend. 

Mr. YOHO. We need to get on for the——

Mr. CONNOLLY. I thank my friend. 

Mr. YOHO [continuing]. Benefit of the witnesses. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. I thank my friend. I find it ironic that in the 

midst of criticizing people for criticizing Mr. Trump, my colleague 

then goes on to criticize previous Presidents, all Democrats. 

I would simply assert that in a democracy, we get to criticize an 

administration. And thank God for that. That is a right not allowed 

11

in the North Korea regime. It is one still allowed here. And I, and 

my colleagues on this side of the aisle, intend to exercise it. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. YOHO. Thank you for pointing that out because around the 

world we see so many people don’t have that voice of dissension, 

and that is something we are blessed with in this country. 

Any other members seek recognition? 

Hearing none, we will go to our witnesses. Starting with the 

panel, Dr. Anthony Cordesman is the Arleigh A. Burke Chair in 

Strategy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. He 

previously served in the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the 

State Department. And we thank you for your long public service 

to this country. 

Mr. John Parachini. He is the director of Intelligence Policy Center at RAND Corporation. Previously, Mr. Parachini served as executive director of the Washington Office of the Monterey Institute 

of International Study Center for Nonproliferation Studies. I look 

forward to hearing from you and all the other ones. 

Mr. Anthony Ruggiero is the senior fellow at the Foundation of 

Defense for Democracies. Prior, Mr. Ruggiero was a foreign policy 

fellow for Senator Marco Rubio, served in the Department of Treasury and State. 

And Ambassador Bonnie Jenkins is the founder and the president of the Women of Color Advancing Peace, Security and Conflict 

Transformation. Ambassador Jenkins previously served as the Coordinator for Threat Reduction Programs in the Bureau of International Security and Nonproliferation at the State Department. 

I want to thank all of you for being here, for taking your time 

to educate us. And out of these meetings come policy recommendations and ideas that we have seen implemented. And so these are 

very important hearings. 

And with that, you guys, I think, have been here enough to know 

how the light system works. You got green, yellow and red. Push 

your button before you speak so the microphone is on and Dr. 

Cordesman, we will start with you. 

Thank you. 

STATEMENT OF ANTHONY CORDESMAN, PH.D., ARLEIGH A. 

BURKE CHAIR IN STRATEGY, CENTER FOR STRATEGIC AND 

INTERNATIONAL STUDIES 

Mr. CORDESMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, ranking members, 

members of the committee. We are talking about a range of threats 

which include two massive sets of conventional forces. Each of 

which is equipped to fight unconventional wars in very different 

ways and in unpredictable scenarios. 

We have biological capabilities in North Korea. I would caution 

the committee that almost all of the open-source data on agents, 

quantities, manufacturer and delivery systems are extremely unreliable. And that you should consult intelligence sources because all 

of what you see is, shall we say, inventive, in ways that are perhaps discouraging. 

But certainly, North Korea is moving to the point where it can 

get biological weapons with nuclear lethalities. It can use infectious 

biological agents. The days in which you could control biological 

12

agents, I think, quite frankly are over. The Australia controls, 

which once were controls, are now more of a shopping list in a 

cookbook in an international environment where very small and 

dual facilities can be rapidly converted. 

Chemical weapons lethality is perhaps much more questionable 

than many people realize, but it is also something you can easily 

manufacture and deliver. Within the other areas, you have precision-guided ballistic weapons, unmanned aerial vehicles, and cruise 

missiles. These can be used to destroy critical infrastructure, critical movement capabilities and communications capabilities. And in 

Korea, this presents very special problems, both because Seoul and 

the greater Seoul area is so close to the DMZ and because this is 

such a fragile country in comparison with many other countries. 

There also is cyber and that, too, presents a problem. 

I think the point that I would make that the committee needs 

to consider, casualties and direct casualties are not a real measure 

of what war can be. What we have seen in Syria, Afghanistan, 

Yemen, and Iraq shows that war fighting can have massive human 

consequences without using weapons of mass destruction. 

In the case of Syria, you have seen it move something like a 

third of the population, losing its home, its businesses, casualties 

which we can’t count because of the number of people who have 

died. One of the members mentioned the population of Seoul. It is 

actually over 25 million in the greater Seoul area and over 10 million in the urban area. It is concentrated in areas near a massive 

set of artillery emplacements. The models I have seen generally 

only focus on two artillery. 

I have no idea where the lethality data come from. Quite frankly, 

they don’t make any sense, because there are multiple rocket 

launchers with far higher volumes of fire and they can, at least in 

theory, use chemical and biological weapons. When you fire into a 

city, remember people panic. They run and they go outside the city. 

And Korea is a mountainous area with none of the spread and surplus facilities to absorb people we are used to. 

There are five other urban cities which are critical targets. You 

are talking about essentially three major container ports. There are 

four major airports. Each of those is absolutely critical to a country 

which is dependent on imports, which cannot provide its own fuel 

and generate its own electricity without sustained traffic. And 

which bears no resemblance to the Korea of the Korean War. 

Unconventional wars that move into these areas, disrupt the 

economy, make people panic, create refugees and IDPs, are as 

much a risk as weapons of mass destruction. Losing food, water 

and power can have the same effect. This is a country with the 

largest rocket and missile force in unconventional war that we 

know of. And if those become precision-guided systems, its lethality 

and war-fighting capability changes much as the use of advanced 

biological weapons. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Cordesman follows:]

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Mr. YOHO. Thank you. I appreciate those grave warnings. Mr. 

Parachini. 

STATEMENT OF MR. JOHN PARACHINI, DIRECTOR, 

INTELLIGENCE POLICY CENTER, RAND CORPORATION 

Mr. PARACHINI. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I appreciate the 

committee holding this hearing on this topic. 

Examining chemical and biological weapons in this theater has 

not been done in an open hearing like this as much as it should 

be. Given the danger they pose, how they might be a catalyst to 

leading us to a nuclear precipice and indeed how wrong assessments of those capabilities may trigger the wrong response. 

There are some distressing parallels with the situation in Iraq. 

Old assessments get repeated about new information or there is no 

new information, there is considerable input from defectors, cooperating sources that are hard to validate. There are allied governments that face imminent threats and have reason to hedge 

against high consequence threats if capabilities exists and if they 

might be used. 

A key difference between the Iraq and North Korean case is that 

the North Koreans have demonstrated they have nuclear weapons 

and they are rapidly developing their ballistic missile capabilities. 

Another difference, though, is that we knew a lot about the past 

Iraqi capabilities, and then when we entered in 2003, we actually 

didn’t know that much of their current capabilities. With North 

Korea, we know little about their past and we have a very incomplete understanding of their current capabilities. 

But because most states with an industrial capability to produce 

pesticides have some capability probably to produce chemical weapons, we can be reasonably confident that North Korea has these capabilities and has tested and produced chemical weapons and has 

a stockpile. However, as Dr. Cordesman mentioned, the repeated 

assessments suggests that there is an arsenal of a range of agents 

and delivery systems. But these are the same numbers that get repeated over the last decade and a half. Means of delivery included 

artillery, rockets, missiles, aircraft and drones. But it begs the 

question that these same citations of capabilities have not been updated in the last decade and it makes you wonder about their currency. 

However, there is a new development, and that is the recent assassination of Kim Jong-nam. Other countries have used poison to 

assassinate regime enemies, but I think we can assess that this 

also could be a signal by this regime that we have nerve agent and 

we are willing to use it. 

Biological weapons capabilities in North Korea, the assessments 

range from a list of agents that might number in a dozen or more 

to a limited program within existing industrial infrastructure to 

mere research. The potential of these weapons is great. And so it 

bears paying very close attention to them, but, again, the evidence 

we have is indirect, circumstantial, based on third-party observations and South Korean Government information and some unclassified U.S. Government statements. 

I think the best we can say at this time is they have the industrial infrastructure for a biological weapons program. They probVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:29 Feb 06, 2018 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00051 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_TNT\011718\28334 SHIRL
46

ably have the know-how and they probably have done some basic 

R&D. The more disconcerting part that I think one of the members 

has mentioned is North Korea’s history as a proliferator. It helped 

with the construction of a reactor in Syria. It shipped chemical 

weapons defensive gear to Syria, and indeed, it has helped with 

their missile program with some reported allegations that they 

have helped Syria configure ballistic missiles to carry chemical 

agent. They have also been a supplier of conventional weaponry to 

Hamas and Hezbollah over the years. 

There is no information that they have transferred unconventional capabilities to terrorist groups, and indeed the empirical 

record does not show that any nation state has done so. However, 

this remains an enduring danger that we have to pay attention to. 

So what can be done? Well, there are four things. We can expand 

the dual-use biosurveillance in Korea that would be useful for 

catching things like SARS and MERS as well as an intentional biological attack. We can help other states enforce the robust set of 

sanctions that are out there. Many states don’t have the capabilities to enforce these sanctions. We can help them do that. We can 

expand defensive measures. Dr. Cordesman mentioned that. 

And finally, we can reinforce the taboo against chemical weapons 

and biological weapons by asking for a pledge from the North Koreans for no-first-use of these weapons. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I look forward to your questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Parachini follows:]

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Mr. YOHO. And I appreciate your comments. Mr. Ruggiero. 

STATEMENT OF MR. ANTHONY RUGGIERO, SENIOR FELLOW, 

FOUNDATION FOR DEFENSE OF DEMOCRACIES 

Mr. RUGGIERO. Thank you. Chairman Yoho, Ranking Members 

Sherman and Keating, and distinguished members of these subcommittees, thank you for the opportunity to address you today on 

this important issue. 

Before proceeding, it is important to state plainly, North Korean 

leader Kim Jong-un’s overarching long-term goal, namely the reunification of the Korean Peninsula under Kim family rule, while 

Pyongyang attempts to distract Washington and the Seoul from 

this hostile intention, Kim always has his eyes on dominating the 

peninsula. 

North Korea’s weapons, both nuclear and non-nuclear, are a 

means to an end, extorting concessions from Seoul and using nuclear weapons to limit Washington’s ability to defend South Korea 

from North Korea’s military provocations for fear of escalating the 

situation. 

Washington’s goal is and should remain the denuclearization of 

the Korean Peninsula. And the good news is that the United States 

can still act to counter Pyongyang’s weapons programs. A combination of deterrence and coercion should be used against North 

Korea. The strategy would acknowledge the limits of each of these 

options using them in combination to secure a denuclearization 

agreement or, failing that, to weaken Pyongyang in order to diminish the threat it poses. 

Deterrence is essential to an effective North Korea policy. Yet, 

American strength has not deterred North Korea from sharing its 

missile and WMD knowledge with other rogue states. Nor has it 

prevented Pyongyang’s race to expand illegal programs or engage 

in countless other provocations. 

The premise of the Trump administration’s maximum pressure 

policy is that coercion must complement deterrence to limit provocations and create leverage. That coercion should take the form of 

an aggressive and comprehensive sanctions campaign. The good 

news is U.S. sanctions have more than doubled since February 

2016, but the real test of a renewed and effective sanctions program is whether new sanctions are targeting Pyongyang’s overseas 

business network and the non-North Koreans that facilitate that 

sanctions of ASEAN. 

There is good news here, too. The Trump administration has 

sanctioned 103 persons since March 31st. Of whom 74 percent operate outside of North Korea and 25 percent are non-North Koreans who facilitate North Korea’s sanctions of ASEAN, namely Chinese and Russian nationals. As the maximum pressure campaign 

has begun to show results, Kim Jong-un went back to a well-worn 

tactic of trying to drive a wedge between Seoul and Washington. 

In 2017, the only thing the United States and North Korea 

agreed on was that China’s freeze-for-freeze proposal where 

Pyongyang would freeze its nuclear and missile tests in exchange 

for a freeze of U.S.-South Korea military exercises was a nonstarter. 

59

In fact, Washington clarified that military exercises were defensive. So there was no reason to freeze them, whereas Pyongyang’s 

programs entailed violations of numerous U.N. Security Council 

resolutions. 

But with one new year’s address, preying on South Korean President Moon Jae-in’s desire for an illusion of peace during the Olympics, Kim changed the narrative from freeze-to-freeze to delay-fornothing. For a mere promise of talks, Pyongyang received a delay 

of the aforementioned defensive military exercises. 

As Seoul moves into a period of negotiation with North Korea on 

its Olympics participation, Washington’s policy should ensure that 

South Korean engagement in no way undermines the maximum 

pressure campaign. If there are signs that North Korea is only 

playing for time, the U.S. should urge an end to talks. 

Pyongyang and Beijing should not be allowed to violate U.N. and 

U.S. sanctions during inter-Korean talks. If at some point in 2018, 

a substantial improvement in Pyongyang’s behavior leads to the 

prospect of U.S.-North Korea negotiations, Washington should 

learn from its past mistakes and insist that Kim Jong-un commit 

to denuclearize before talks begin. 

The United States must not allow Moon’s desire for a deal and 

Washington’s inherent need to move beyond this crisis to get us 

into another set of flawed negotiations resulting in a dangerous 

deal that locks in North Korea’s weapons program. 

Thank you for inviting me to testify. And I look forward to your 

questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Ruggiero follows:]

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Mr. YOHO. Thank you for your comments. 

Ambassador Jenkins. 

STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE BONNIE JENKINS, FOUNDER AND PRESIDENT, WOMEN OF COLOR ADVANCING PEACE, 

SECURITY AND CONFLICT TRANSFORMATION (FORMER COORDINATOR FOR THREAT REDUCTION PROGRAMS, BUREAU 

OF INTERNATIONAL SECURITY AND NONPROLIFERATION, 

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE) 

Ms. JENKINS. Mr. Chairman, ranking members, ladies and gentlemen, I want to thank you for inviting me here today to speak 

about North Korea’s DPRKs threats outside those of nuclear weapons. It is understandable that with the exchanges between the U.S. 

and North Korea in the past few months that nuclear weapons are 

the focus of attention regarding the North Koreans military capabilities. 

However, one should not lose sight of the fact that there are 

other significant military threats from North Korea. Today you are 

hearing about some of these other threats. And they consist of 

North Korea’s chemical weapons, intentional biological weapons 

pursuits and the overwhelming conventional weapons. And we 

have on this panel today experts on the various non-nuclear 

threats emanating from North Korea, so I will move on to discussing some potential diplomatic mechanisms to meet those 

threats. 

Addressing the DPRKs threat is not a challenge that Washington 

should tackle alone. North Korean involvement in chemical and biological weapons programs are not in line with the international 

norms against development and use of those weapons and should 

be part of a global effort to address those programs. 

Few countries have any contact with the DPRK, which limits opportunities for diplomatic exchange. Working with countries that 

do have that type of relationship, for example, Sweden, can be part 

of a planned diplomatic effort to engage North Korea. Of course, 

the key to any negotiations on North Korea’s weapons will require 

North Korea to come to the table, which is a significant challenge. 

All of the following ideas had that caveat in mind. On chemical 

weapons, the general goal of the international community should 

be that the DPRK destroy any such weapons regardless of the fact 

that the DPRK is not a party to the CWC. Any discussions with 

the DPRK on such weapons would require the engagement of the 

organization for the prohibition of chemical weapons in regional 

states at a minimum. The DPRK should join the CWC as a state 

party and agree to destroy any potential weapons with verification. 

We have witnessed with the destruction of Syrian chemical 

weapons that the international community can come together to assist in that process. Regarding conventional weapons, the primary 

concern is the overwhelming number of such weapons possessed by 

North Korea. 

There should be a reduction in the conventional forces and more 

equality in the numbers and types of weapons with South Korea 

as a way to reduce tensions. 

In this respect, the two sides may negotiate an agreement similar to the Conventional Armed Forces in Europe treaty, and both 

73

sides can reduce their conventional weapons to an equal amount 

and types. Such an agreement would require a permanent and 

verifiable means of destruction. The CFE can provide some 

thoughts on a way forward. 

North Korea is already a party to the Biological Weapons Convention, and as a result, it should not be developing biological 

weapons. Any activities regarding a biological weapons program 

should stop. Since there is no verification regime of the BWC, a 

small number of the countries including those in the region may 

agree to a verification scheme. The Biological Weapons Convention 

Implementation Support Unit should be a part of any engagement 

with additional staff and funding for this particular purpose. 

These options lean heavy on the diplomatic effort and negotiations to address the North Korean military threats. Some rely on 

existing norms that reflect the agreement by a global community 

by just the possession and use of such weapons. 

South Hem conventions are initiatives that can serve as examples for engaging the North Koreans. However, any negotiation 

needs an element of trust amongst the parties. There must be some 

belief that the party on the other side wants to discuss the issues 

and has something to gain by doing so. 

If you want North Korea to come to the table, we must temper 

our threats with real possibilities for diplomacy. In this respect it 

would be extremely challenging to convince North Korea to relinquish the weapons it believes it needs for its defenses or its domestic purposes. Moving the DPRK to join the international community that has already moved away from the development and use 

of chemical and biological weapons, for example, will take time and 

it will need a continuous process. 

It is also essential that the international community walk the 

walk and talk the talk of actions that we want other countries to 

do, including North Korea. We also need to find a way to make any 

successful negotiation sustainable. We have seen in the case of negotiations with North Korea’s nuclear program through the years 

that what is considered an agreement continually fails. 

How do we make sure that North Korea does not go back to business as usual? In each situation there needs to be a mechanism to 

continue discussions and help verify that the North Koreans are 

living up to their agreements. In this respect, the North Koreans 

would need to be part of existing implementing bodies, treaty implementing bodies. There may be other options that we can do with 

North Korea assuming we can move them from being an adversary 

to essentially being a party. This will all take time and a lot of real 

diplomacy. 

Thank you, and I look forward to your questions. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Jenkins follows:]se

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Mr. YOHO. I would like to thank the panel for your expert testimony. I look forward to answering the questions. 

Dr. Cordesman, you pointed out the number that we know is exactly that. It is what we know. It is what we don’t know that really 

scares us. The unknown. And I guess that is part of—I don’t want 

to say terrorism, but that is part of a hand they play. You know, 

it is what you don’t know. 

Are there other techniques that we can do to get other countries 

to come on board? When I look at what is going on, you know, I 

have got information in here, that is out there, in August, shipments of 30,000, 30,000 North Korean produced rocket-propelled 

grenades were intercepted on their way to Egypt. How concerned 

should we be about Egypt’s secret arrangement to procure $23 million worth of weapons, number one, that is funding North Korea 

while they are an ally of ours. This is not a U.S. problem with what 

North Korea is doing. It is not a South Korean problem. It is a 

world problem. And if we have allies, especially ones that we are 

giving foreign aid to, to get them to the table, how do we find out 

more information and get everybody on the same page? Like we 

have to get a resolution to this peacefully and ideally. 

Do you have any thoughts on that? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. Mr. Chairman, I wish I had more optimistic 

conclusions, but a little over a month ago, I was in the Middle East 

at a time there was a supposed 40-country alliance of Arab states 

that was supposed to be cooperating and dealing with security 

issues. And quite frankly, I have never seen more hypocrisy at a 

given meeting than I saw there. I don’t think you have any choice 

unless you are willing to embarrass allies and put pressure on 

countries, unless you can threaten, not simply sanctions, but actually intercepting known shipments of arms and weapons. 

North Korea is going to do anything it can to find ways to export, 

to obtain technology, import, to do, if it can, simply exchanging the 

techniques of producing systems with other countries like Iran. 

Locking that is something we can sometimes do in detail, but it requires an extremely aggressive approach. 

And, yes, there are European allies, there are Asian allies that 

will work with us, but those are not the countries North Korea 

deals with. And I simply would not be optimistic about the prospects. 

Mr. YOHO. Okay. And I would like to get some response on this. 

The agreement to destroy the chemical weapons in Syria was supposedly carried out and certified 100 percent by the world community. We realize that is not true. You know, there was still some 

left over. In fact, we just heard reports that the Assad regime may 

have used chemical weapons, including VX gas. 

Does anybody have any information on—is that true? And to 

think they came out—is there any proof that—is there any information out there that they could have come out from North 

Korea—anybody want to comment on that? 

Mr. Parachini. 

Mr. PARACHINI. So we are better off that chemical weapons were 

eliminated from Syria with the understanding that they had the 

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moved, because that meant fewer weapons that they could use 

against——

Mr. YOHO. Do we know that they are making them, or are they 

getting them from North Korea? 

Mr. PARACHINI. So we don’t know—even if there are—if they are 

getting chemicals from North Korea, they are more in the precursor nature, and they could be making new agents. But, remember, a lot of what we have seen in Syria are attacks using chlorine. 

Mr. YOHO. Right, but just recently they said that could have been 

laced with VX gas. I don’t know how you do that or——

Mr. PARACHINI. So Syria—in the Syrian complex, VX has not appeared yet as an agent that has been used. Sarin——

Mr. YOHO. Sarin. I am sorry. 

Mr. PARACHINI. Sarin has been the nerve agent that has been 

used. But look at how they have used chlorine——

Mr. YOHO. Right. 

Mr. PARACHINI. Even after they agreed to eliminate their stockpile, they have used a widely available industrial chemical as a 

weapon of war. 

Mr. YOHO. And that is a terrible chemical. Just one more question. If North Korea is serious about earnest dialogue and coming 

to the table, would you recommend signing on to the CWC, the 

Chemical Weapons Convention? 

Mr. PARACHINI. So I will offer a comment and then Ambassador 

Jenkins may have some thoughts here. 

Mr. YOHO. Sure. 

Mr. PARACHINI. North Korea is the only member of the five-party 

talks—or the six-party talks that is not a member. 

Mr. YOHO. Right. 

Mr. PARACHINI. So it stands out. So it is to our advantage to 

press them on this issue, number one. And, number two, the global 

taboo on the use of these weapons has degraded since the Syrians 

have used chemical weapons. There is an opportunity to bolster 

that norm by pushing the North Koreans. 

Mr. YOHO. I think that is a good point. Ambassador Jenkins, do 

you have a comment? 

Ms. JENKINS. Yes, I would just agree and say that I think it 

would be good to have them part of the convention because then 

they can be part of the multilateral and international negotiations 

that go on on a regular basis. There are yearly meetings with the 

OPCW. There are activities that go on, and one way to help make 

sure that they are doing what they should be doing is have some 

kind of transparency and some kind of engagement. So I think that 

would be very helpful. 

Mr. YOHO. Thank you for your comments. 

We will go to the ranking member, Mr. Keating. 

Mr. KEATING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

It is clear that one thing we should do is maximize our soft 

power, that we could, and sometimes things appear, from the administration, to be disjointed. Let me give you an example. We had 

a new President—President Moon came to power. And one of the 

strengths we have, at least when I was there just a year ago, was 

the coalition we have with Japan, South Korea, and the U.S. It is 

at unprecedented levels. The cohesiveness was stronger than it 

80

ever has been. However, with a new President—our President 

threatened to pull apart the trade agreement with South Korea 

during that period. Now, how could that possibly do anything but 

hinder our ability and cohesiveness as a coalition together, as a 

fundamental coalition? And how damaging were those comments 

and the timing of those comments? Does anyone want to address 

that? 

Ms. JENKINS. I guess I would start with that. I would agree with 

you in what you are saying in terms of how those comments were 

probably received. I think one of the things that we seem to be 

lacking now is a much more coordinated approach in the way in 

which the U.S. Government is really handling a lot of these issues. 

There seems to be not as much attention for force coming from the 

Department of State and engagement of the Department of State 

and engagement of the expertise in discussing some issues before 

they are actually made and the policies before they are actually 

made and told to other countries. 

So I think that has created a bit of confusion with some of our 

countries out there, some of our allies out there. 

I know I often get questions regarding the way in which the U.S. 

Government is perceived regarding the State Department and what 

is coming out of the White House. And I think that we don’t have 

the coordinated message. That would be helpful. It is good to have 

soft and hard power, but I think you have to have a way in which 

it is coordinated and it is seen as a whole. 

So I think that when you have these kind of statements that are 

made in the middle of a situation where relationships are going 

very well, it does cause countries to take a step back and wonder 

what is going on. 

Mr. KEATING. Do any members of the panel think that was helpful, the timing and the effect of that? Thank you. 

Dr. Cordesman brought up a couple of important points, I think, 

takeaways that I had myself. We are focused on the nuclear issue 

and the missile capability. But every day on the border, there are 

scuffles, and there are potential conflicts that can escalate at any 

time. In fact, our own military leadership there has said that they 

spend an inordinate amount of their time just trying to tamp those 

down because of that fear. That is one point. 

The other point that might come along with those lines is, again, 

an important point looking down the road, and that is potential refugee problems, should they occur. 

So, Dr. Cordesman, do you want to just extend your comments 

on your perception of how really threatening those border issues 

are on a day-to-day basis? How they could escalate? And then, secondly, an interesting point that you did bring up in regards to if 

there is a conflict and there are refugee problems, that will affect 

China, and you know, are they factoring that in? Because generally 

China is not taking these issues as seriously as they should be, 

from our perspective, and that is one thing they should look at, at 

what happens to the peninsula. Doctor? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. I think we have—first, we need to be careful 

about the term ‘‘border.’’ We are talking about the DMZ, and the 

problem we have is it isn’t just the hardened artillery sides near 

the DMZ, which go all along the DMZ. They are not simply near 

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the center of Seoul. They are near an area with about 25 percent 

of the population or more of Korea just in the area around Seoul. 

So this is something where longer range rocket systems can have 

a major effect. And we are talking about depths of perhaps 50 to 

100 to 200 kilometers when we throw in unmanned aerial vehicles 

and cruise missiles, which are actually far better systems for delivering biological and chemical weapons than artillery is because 

they are slow fires and they disseminate in much more controllable 

ways. 

We also have some 25 tunnels. All of these things could produce 

a massive refugee population. And looking at Seoul and the greater 

Seoul area, there simply isn’t surplus capacity, and it is remarkably hard for them to even move south, not in the numbers that 

exist today. 

Mr. KEATING. Yeah. Thank you. 

And I yield back, but I will be following up with a written question, Chairman, you know, just dealing with a common thread of 

how we have to improve our intelligence in that region and how 

maybe working with the coalitions, that is something we should 

work on as well. 

I yield back, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. YOHO. Thank you, Mr. Keating. I appreciate your respecting 

people’s time, and if we have time for a second round, if you are 

still here, we will let you do that. 

I will next go to Mr. Joe Wilson, South Carolina. 

Mr. WILSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I was grateful in September to lead a delegation to South Korea. 

Of course, we visited the DMZ. We were there in Seoul. We visited, 

in particular, Camp Humphreys. And it was really incredible for 

me to know the strong relationship we have with the Republic of 

Korea and their investments—the American people need to know 

the hundreds of millions of dollars which have been spent to build 

a world class facility there at Camp Humphreys, truly indicating 

the bond that we have between the people of the United States and 

the people of Korea. 

Another issue to me, and I would be really interested in finding 

out from each of you what your view is, has there been any collaboration on nuclear weapon or missile development with the rogue regime in Iran, between—cooperation between Pyongyang and 

Tehran? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. There is very good evidence of cooperation on 

missile development. There are questions among experts as to how 

much cooperation there is in specific areas, how much they are 

sharing, but it has been clear for years that there is an exchange 

of technology. It is also clear that some of the technology that is 

coming from Russia and from China has spread into both North 

Korea and Iran and is affecting the engines and capabilities for 

missile development there. 

I don’t know of any evidence of cooperation in the development 

of nuclear weapons. There are reports of delegations being present 

from Iran at the test of North Korean nuclear weapons. Whether 

they are accurate or not, to be honest, one of the problems we have 

is a lot of media reporting sometimes claiming it is coming from 

North Korean—I am sorry—South Korean military sources that is 

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very unreliable. But to be honest, I am not sure you would detect 

cooperation in nuclear weapons design. It is not something where 

you would have to be public or there would be easily observable 

signals. 

Mr. RUGGIERO. I would say, on ballistic missiles, it is important 

to remember that, on the implementation day 2 years ago of the 

Iran nuclear deal, that the Obama administration issued sanctions 

against Iranians for their cooperation—or their missile cooperation 

with North Korea. It just shows you the sort of level that that cooperation was at. 

On the nuclear side, I think the concern here that I have always 

had is that what each side has fits really well in the sense that 

they both use very similar enrichment programs, enrichment centrifuges. And Iran, likely, has a desire for both the design and some 

of the testing information that North Korea has gotten from nuclear tests, and Iran, of course, could pay for that. So that is always the main concern between Iran and North Korea nuclear cooperation. 

Mr. WILSON. And wasn’t it proven that there was a direct relationship of North Korea with the nuclear development in Syria? 

But, fortunately, Israel took care of that and may have even dispatched some North Korean scientists on the side. So this is such 

a danger, the collaboration of totalitarian regimes. 

Another question I have for each of you, and it is really frustrating to me that China has benefited so much from trade with 

South Korea, tourism, investments by South Korea in developing 

business and industry and opportunity for the people of China. On 

the other hand, DPRK, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, 

is simply a dependency of the People’s Republic. Why would they 

maintain such a dependency when they can see the benefits of 

working with the Republic of Korea? 

Mr. RUGGIERO. Well, I think, you know, I think the relationship 

in that region is interesting. I would also add that the Chinese always criticize unilateral sanctions until they use them. And, of 

course, they used them against South Korea, really to their own 

detriment I think. I think that the Chinese did not win in that. I 

think the Chinese are realizing that. I think the record on sanctions is mixed. The Chinese are willing to go after North Koreans 

inside of China, but they still remain unwilling to go after their 

own nationals that are aiding North Korea. And that is really—and 

Russia does that, and it is the same thing with Russia as well on 

North Korea sanctions. So that is really the critical area that we 

need to get the Chinese to move toward. 

Mr. WILSON. Thank you very much. My time is up. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. YOHO. All right. Next, we have Mr. Gerald Connolly. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Isn’t my timing perfect? Yeah, perfect. And I have been watching and listening upstairs, so thank you. 

Ambassador Jenkins, you talked about using hard power and soft 

power. I was making the same point in my opening remarks. 

Could you elaborate a little bit? I mean, what is the soft power 

available to us that could be efficacious? 

83

Ms. JENKINS. Well, it is interesting you use the word ‘‘power’’ in 

the situation of North Korea because we are still limited in what 

we can do in terms of soft power. But I think there is a lot that 

we have not yet explored. I think, for the most part, the situation 

with North Korea in that region has been very much a bilateral relationship with the U.S. working directly with each country, and 

we have worked very much regionally in trying to resolve the 

issues there. 

I think there are other options or other possibilities for working 

with more countries to try to see if there are ways in which we 

could address some of these issues. All of the things we are talking 

about today, whether it is chemical weapons or biological weapons 

particularly, are issues that are of a concern to the international 

community. They are issues that, as we have said already—there 

is international norm against the use of those weapons and the development of those weapons. 

So I think that there are options to try to see how countries can 

start to work together to see how they can address the issues with 

North Korea. Of course, trying to make sure first of what they actually have, but also trying to see if there is a way that countries 

can work together on that issue. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. So one soft power would be sanctions, correct? 

Ms. JENKINS. Yeah. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. Mr. Ruggiero, Governor John Kasich wrote a—

Governor John Kasich wrote an op-ed piece in which he said we 

haven’t used all the soft power with respect to sanctions that we 

could have. And he cited things like, you know, more indepth banking, ties and relationships getting really tough on that. He talked 

about insurance for Merchant Marine fleets, so that shipping suddenly becomes vulnerable because we are denying them insurance, 

if they are going back and forth to North Korea and the like. 

Do you believe we still have leverage that is meaningful that 

could persuade the North Koreans it is worth pausing, if not rolling 

back, their nuclear development program, because that is really the 

object here? 

Mr. RUGGIERO. Right, I do. I think this administration has gone 

after China, whether it is firms or banks or individuals, seven 

times last year, but they are still pulling back. They are pulling 

their punches. And I think part of that is because they likely fear 

Chinese retaliation. When it comes to North Korea, you know, I 

take your question as, you know, how can you affect the revenue 

flows? And the good news here is that it looks like, from the examples we have more recently, a lot of this revenue is inside of China, 

so you can start to affect that. And then North Korea uses that for 

what I like to call three purposes, military, and obviously the security sources, the weapons programs, and their elites. And right now 

they get to rank those one A, B, and C. From my perspective what 

we have to do is rank them 1, 2, and 3 because all of them are key 

to Kim’s survival. And we are not talking about regime change, but 

we are talking about changing the calculus here. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. Right. 

Mr. RUGGIERO. And I think, you know, going after Chinese 

banks, not cutting them off from the U.S. financial system or sancVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:29 Feb 06, 2018 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00089 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_TNT\011718\28334 SHIRL
84

tioning—or freezing their assets, but using regulatory fines, like we 

did against European banks in the Iran sanctions context. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. Which is a model. I mean, that worked. 

Mr. RUGGIERO. Right. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. Apparently that worked. Mr. Cordesman and Mr. 

Parachini, and I have got a limited amount of time, but what is 

your take on how much leverage we really have with respect to 

Chinese behavior? Can we really bring the Chinese to cooperate 

with us in a meaningful way? I mean, we talked about soft power, 

but for example, there are North Korean restaurants and businesses, that is to say, businesses and restaurants run by North Koreans who remit profits back to China, I mean, back to North 

Korea from China. They open—they are operating with impunity; 

it is not like it is a secret. So is there more room, and what is the 

point of leverage we have over the Chinese to cooperate? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. I think there is more room, but I think we need 

to be very careful. They will not take steps which threaten the existence of the regime in North Korea or its status as a buffer. They 

do not have the same strategic interests we do. And the cooperation 

can never be enough to by itself probably force North Korea to 

change. 

Mr. YOHO. Go ahead. I will let you finish up. 

Mr. PARACHINI. So I would add that the Chinese are very concerned about refugee flow from North Korea to them. And I have 

met with Chinese from right over the border, and they are very 

concerned about that. And that may be an area of collaboration between the United States and China, but we have to be very careful 

about how we manage that because, should there be a collapse of 

the regime, China is going to be very eager to move first and make 

sure that we and South Korea do not move very far north. 

Mr. YOHO. Thank you. 

Next, we will go to Mr. Tom Marino from Pennsylvania. 

Mr. MARINO. Thank you, Chairman. 

Mr. Parachini, am I pronouncing that correctly? That is Italian? 

Mr. PARACHINI. Parachini. 

Mr. MARINO. Parachini. 

Mr. PARACHINI. Rhymes with zucchini, which is a good vegetable. 

Mr. MARINO. Okay. You answered my first question that I wanted to ask, and let’s expand on that a little bit. My question was—

it is going to be, and I believe this is so because I am of member 

of NATO Parliamentary Assembly, and we discuss these issues—

that China is very concerned about the North Koreans flowing into 

China because they do not want to have to take care of them. And 

North Korea is a buffer between the democracy of South Korea and 

the United States and China. Is that a fairly good assumption to 

make? 

Mr. PARACHINI. I think it is. And there is a longstanding relationship between China and North Korea and between China and 

Myanmar. And there is a special relationship there between those 

three countries that is hard to overcome given historical ties. 

Mr. MARINO. Do you think at any point—and I don’t believe this, 

but if anyone on the panel believes that North Korea would get 

into serious discussions with the U.S., do you think that is possible? Anyone? 

85

Mr. PARACHINI. So I would add, we need to think about this as 

a long-term game. 

Mr. MARINO. It has been a long term game. 

Mr. PARACHINI. NATO was in place until the Soviet Union fell 

for a long time. And I think, unfortunately, on the Korean Peninsula, we are in the same type of game. So the question is how to 

make sure it doesn’t come unraveled; we don’t have a hot conflict. 

As we have seen, the North Korean leaders do pass on. So we have 

to hope for moderated change. 

Mr. MARINO. No. 

Mr. PARACHINI. I don’t think we should be thinking that they are 

going to negotiate and change. That leopard is not going to change 

its spots. 

Mr. MARINO. No. 

Mr. PARACHINI. So we have got to figure out some way to navigate with them over a long term. 

Mr. RUGGIERO. I mean, I would just say I guess I am the optimist here, which is kind of surprising for someone who supports 

sanctions. But the optimist here that, you know, when it came to 

Iran, we could have conversations about the nuclear deal, but I 

think even critics and supporters of the deal agree that sanctions 

brought them to the table. 

Mr. MARINO. Yeah, but nobody was there protecting Iran per se. 

Iran—the sanctions—the economic sanctions were doing well until 

we gave them $150 billion. 

Mr. RUGGIERO. Right. 

Mr. MARINO. Aside from that, I don’t think anyone else would 

have been coming to Iran’s aid concerning sanctions. 

Mr. RUGGIERO. Well, I mean, I would say—I also worked on 

Iran’s sanctions when I was in the government, and I remember 

conversations about we couldn’t go after their oil revenue, and of 

course, that is what happened. So I think we are talking about the 

Iran sanctions model with North Korea. North Korea—and, frankly, China—has never really faced what the Treasury Department 

could do with North Korea sanctions, you know, back to the prior 

question. 

So I think it is, from my perspective, too, we also have to have 

a conversation of what would those negotiations look like, because 

my main concern is that those who support diplomacy fall back to 

the—well, we could get a freeze, and then we could go through extended negotiations, and North Korea will eventually denuclearize. 

I think you have to flip that on its head and insist that North 

Korea be committed to denuclearize upfront, not denuclearize, but 

be committed to do that upfront. 

Mr. MARINO. Okay. Doctor. 

Mr. CORDESMAN. I think the committee should ask where North 

Korea will be in 5 to 10 years in its nuclear programs, its precision 

strike programs, and its biological capabilities. You mentioned a 

long-term game, in each case, they can edge around an awful lot 

of negotiating constraints and agreements. And instead of just looking at what you can do that might work, I think you need to take 

a harder look at what will happen with the existing way that 

North Korea is proliferating and developing its weapons and technology. 

86

Mr. MARINO. I happen to agree with you. I think that is the first 

issue that we should tackle in any situation like this. 

Ambassador, did you have anything—comment? 

Ms. JENKINS. No, I would just—just thinking that we heard a little bit about some of the uncertainties about what North Korea 

really does have in terms of chemical and biological. I think it is 

a good time to think about what we can do now to try to get ahead 

of what we may or may not know about what they have. If in fact 

they are not at the point of having a biological weapon, for example, what can we do to try to work through that problem and that 

situation now? 

Mr. MARINO. Quickly, in 2 seconds, do any of you believe that 

China will take out the ruling family in North Korea? 

Let the record reflect that no one responded to that they think 

they will take out the ruling family. 

I yield back. Thank you. 

Mr. YOHO. Thank you for your questions. 

Next, we will go to ranking member of the Asia and the Pacific 

Subcommittee, Mr. Brad Sherman from California. 

Mr. SHERMAN. Public sources have estimated that North Korea 

has between 2,500 and 5,000 tons of chemical agents. Does anyone 

on the panel think that a different number has more credibility? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. I think that number does not have credibility——

Mr. SHERMAN. Because it is too low, it is too high, or you just 

have——

Mr. CORDESMAN. Because it is simply a set of round numbers 

that somebody thought up at a point of time some years back. 

Mr. SHERMAN. Does anybody on the panel have any different estimate? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. Would you like 12? 

Mr. SHERMAN. Any guesstimate that it is an estimate rather 

than—okay. 

If China were to end all banking and all trade, except food and 

medicine, that is to say, exporting food and medicine to North 

Korea, how big of an effect would that have on the regime? 

Mr. Ruggiero. 

Mr. RUGGIERO. Well, I mean, the issue here is that they seem to 

be willing to do that for North Koreans, but if they are not willing 

to do that for their own nationals, aiding North Korea’s sanctions 

evasion, then it will not have the impact——

Mr. SHERMAN. I am saying that if China used all of its devices 

to make sure that there wasn’t a single dollar’s worth of goods exported from North Korea to China, no coal, no whatever, no labor 

services, and actually enforced it, what effect would that have on 

the North Korean regime? 

Mr. RUGGIERO. I think it would have a substantial impact. I 

mean, the point I made earlier is that some of these examples we 

are seeing is a ledger system between China and North Korea 

where the money resides in China. And so what you are going to 

have is North Korea not have the ability to even go to another 

country for those items that they need. 

87

Mr. SHERMAN. Should we be more strong in our statements to 

Poland and others that have accepted North Korean workers, to 

use a euphemism? 

Mr. Parachini. 

Mr. PARACHINI. So I think getting China to change on this is 

going to be an enduring challenge, but——

Mr. SHERMAN. It is not an enduring challenge. You just put a 50-

percent tariff on all their exports to the United States, and you will 

get their attention. But the enduring challenge is summoning the 

political will to do that in a system in which there—obviously, that 

would have an effect, but if you threaten to do it, they would concede. The reason we haven’t threatened to do it is because of the 

tremendous power of corporations that—on issues of national security. But, please continue. 

Mr. PARACHINI. I think there are costs and benefits of that type 

of economic pressure. 

Mr. SHERMAN. There are only benefits if China blinks. 

Mr. PARACHINI. But I think there is the opportunity to help other 

countries enforce the sanction network that is out there that can 

be—and Poland——

Mr. SHERMAN. Trim around the edges, yes. But Poland continues 

to have North Korean workers and insists upon doing that for another year and says that is a local rather than a national decision. 

Whether that is a violation of section 5 of the NATO agreement in 

spirit, I don’t know; probably, technically, it is a violation of section 

5 de jure. 

We have sanctioned one small bank, Bank of Dandong. We 

haven’t sanctioned any of the major Chinese banks because the economic powers in this country say we shouldn’t do it. Last September, Chairman Royce identified several Chinese banks, including the China Merchants Bank and a state-owned bank, the Agricultural Bank of China, as doing sanctionable business with North 

Korea. Chairman Yoho and I wrote to the Treasury Department deriding several Chinese banks, including the Industrial Commercial 

Bank of China, the largest bank in the world, and the Bank of 

Communications, one of the largest banks in the world. The executive branch has failed to pull the trigger. 

How—the question is, why have we put preserving the $500 billion or $400 billion trade deficit with China and all the profits that 

generates above our national security? How do we get the administration to get serious with the big banks? Does someone have a—

yes. 

Mr. RUGGIERO. Right. I mean, I would say, you know, there was 

a narrative that North Korean financial activity was going through 

small Chinese banks and that these medium and large banks were 

just a conduit. But FinCEN, an element of the Treasury Department, put out an advisory last year, and said some of these accounts are actually at major Chinese financial institutions. So how 

do you do it? You do it with the regulatory fines. You know, I 

would also piggyback on the answer——

Mr. SHERMAN. You can do it, but how do you summon the political will to do it? 

Mr. RUGGIERO. That is the thing. I mean, these are mandatory 

sanctions passed by Congress, the same as with——

88

Mr. SHERMAN. Nothing is illegal if 50 major businesses all decide 

it is the right policy. And just because we pass laws doesn’t mean 

that the executive branch will follow them. 

Mr. RUGGIERO. Right. I think this is stuck in a narrative—not 

this narrative—but a narrative about whether to do it between 

doing nothing and freezing their access to New York when there 

is this interim—what we talked about in terms of Iran sanctions, 

using fines. 

Mr. SHERMAN. I don’t think—if you only do the level of economic 

effect that we had with Iran, this is a much more closed society, 

and a regime that cares even less about its own people. I think you 

are going to have to have much tougher sanctions if you are going 

to get even a freeze of their nuclear program, let alone the unrealistic goals that we at least claim that we are trying to achieve. 

I yield back. 

Mr. YOHO. Thank for your comments. That is why tomorrow we 

are going to do the special order on China to draw out some these 

things, these inequities that they are doing, so that the American 

people know this and Members of Congress. 

Next, we will go to Adam Kinzinger from Illinois. 

Mr. KINZINGER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, thanks for your leadership on this issue. 

Thank you all for being here for this very important subject. I 

think back, and I don’t know if it is a good comparison—I think it 

is—to Neville Chamberlain coming back from his negotiations with 

Chancellor Hitler in a very difficult time, frankly, in Europe, understanding that they just came out of a major war, chewed up a 

generation with this prospect of another. They were understandably excited to talk about peace in our time. But I think, looking 

back at that moment, it is not Neville Chamberlain that we celebrated as the hero of that era. It is a guy like Churchill, who saw 

the gathering storm clouds. My hope is this does not turn into a 

kinetic exercise between the United States and North Korea. There 

is no doubt we would win, but nobody wants to go there. 

But I think what is important to note in all of this is that this 

is a real threat. In 1994, I think it was around then when President Clinton was actually looking at options to bomb North Korea 

because of this. Jimmy Carter pops up in Pyongyang and says he 

has an agreement, and we are all excited. We take a nice sigh of 

relief, and we fixed the problem. And here we are today in 2018 

looking down the barrel, frankly, of a gun. 

And I actually give the President a lot of props for having really 

brought this to the forefront. I know it makes people nervous. 

North Korea should make people nervous. This is a regime that is 

dead set on destabilizing our allies in the region, all in the goal of 

maintaining power. But I think it is—we are going to have some 

very tough decisions to make here. 

I think if we go to a posture of saying we are going to just simply 

accept a nuclear North Korea, which is what some people, frankly, 

have advocated for, especially in the prior administration, and said 

we just need to build interceptors that can exceed their ability to 

launch nuclear weapons, I think that spells, in effect, the end of 

the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty for the world. How are you 

ever going to confront Iran’s nuclear ambitions if we just allowed 

89

North Korea? What is going to happen to every other rogue regime 

that decides they want nuclear weapons? We don’t have the moral 

ability to confront them in this, simply because we didn’t with 

North Korea. 

So I think we have to take this extremely seriously. I think people that say the military option is absolutely off the table are doing 

very major damage to our diplomatic effort. As we all understand 

instruments of power, the diplomatic instrument of power against 

an adversary does not work without the military instrument of 

power there to back it up. Otherwise, we can do all the sanctions 

we want, but if they don’t think there is a stick, the carrot has no 

effect. 

Let me ask Mr. Parachini, I hope I said your name right. Given 

this threat, I think we are all clear-eyed to the fact that North 

Korea has the potential to sell WMDs to the highest bidder. That 

could be a rogue regime like Syria—obviously, Assad has shown his 

desire to kill his own people—or even a terrorist group like alQaeda or ISIS. And it is no secret that North Korea provided assistance to Syria in building their nuclear reactor, which was destroyed in 2007. Given the situation in Syria now, I can’t fathom 

how much worse it would be if Syria was a nuclear weapons state. 

Just because we haven’t heard much about North Korea proliferation of other countries doesn’t mean they still aren’t interested in 

it. Can you speak to the level of interaction and potential WMD assistance that the Kim regime currently provides or is willing to 

provide to rogue regimes and non-state actors? What is their moral 

driver to prevent them from doing it, if in fact that is the answer? 

And which countries or groups seeking WMD assistance from 

North Korea should concern us the most? 

Mr. PARACHINI. Congressman, I think there has been a special 

relationship between North Korea and Syria for quite some time, 

which I think in part explains that relationship. Since the fall of 

the Soviet Union, which provided a lot of financing for Syrian purchases of conventional weapons and other capabilities, Iran has 

stepped in to kind of be that bank account. And the close relationship between Iran, Syria, and North Korea I think does explain 

some of the Assad regime’s weapons purchases over the last decade 

and, indeed, some of the collaboration on either its missile program, the reactor that you referred to that was destroyed, as well 

as chemical defenses. 

On non-state actors, there again, North Korea is in the trenches 

with Iran and Syria. That is, they see themselves as aligned to 

support Hamas and Hezbollah, but there is not evidence that they 

have actually transferred unconventional capabilities to non-state 

actors. Conventional weapons, yes. Assistance and guidance on tunneling, yes. But in terms of jumping the taboo that is on about 

states not transferring that, we have not seen that yet. 

Mr. KINZINGER. Do you have a fear that it could happen potentially? 

Mr. PARACHINI. There is always that possibility. Given the power 

of these weapons, states are very reluctant to let them get out of 

control in that way. We feared that with Saddam Hussein, and in 

the end, it proved not to be the case. Is there a zero possibility? 

No. There is some possibility, but I think it is very low. 

90

Mr. KINZINGER. Thank you. Since my time is up, I will just say 

this without asking it. I think it is important that we look at utilizing the potential of boost phase intercept as well. I know this is 

something that has been discussed. It is inexpensive. Boost phase 

is the slowest launch phase of an ICBM, and I think it is imperative on the administration to also explore the idea of boost phase 

intercept as well. 

With that, Mr. Chairman, I thank you for your hospitality and 

thank you for being here, and I yield back. 

Mr. YOHO. I appreciate your line of questioning. That has 

brought up some great points. 

Next, we will go to Ms. Dina Titus of Nevada. 

Ms. TITUS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, ranking members, for holding this hearing today. With all due respect to my colleagues across the aisle, I think we do have to be concerned about 

the President’s conflicting messages. One minute he is talking and 

bragging about having a bigger button than North Korea, and the 

next minute he is trying to take credit for bringing North Korea 

and South Korea together to talk about the Olympics. We just don’t 

know what is coming out of the White House. 

He just now, a little while ago, gave an interview to Reuters in 

respect to the preemptive strike or the preemptive attack on North 

Korea, and this was his quote: ‘‘We are playing a very, very hard 

game of poker, and you don’t want to reveal your hand.’’

Well, this isn’t a game. And I am from Nevada. We know something about playing poker. There is also a tell when you play poker, 

and his tell is some of this braggadocio that he is always talking 

about when he is going to back down or not. 

I think most of the questions and the attention has been on the 

nuclear threat, but I am glad that we are talking about the nonnuclear threat as well. This is especially important in light of the 

Vancouver meeting and the false ballistic missile warning that 

kind of terrorized Hawaii just recently. 

So let me ask you, Ambassador Jenkins, during your time at the 

State Department when you were the Coordinator for Threat Reduction Programs, what were your office’s greatest assets? What 

were you able to do to prevent some of the terrorism that we are 

talking about that is non-nuclear? And would you go on to say and 

tell us, now that that position is vacant—even though North Korea 

is such a big threat, they haven’t bothered to fill that position—

how are we going to address this? 

Ms. JENKINS. Thank you for your question. The work that I was 

doing at the Department of State was really focusing on how to 

prevent WMD terrorism, and I worked closely with colleagues who 

were working on the nuclear issues. But my portfolio really did 

cover CBRN, chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear Issues. And 

most of the focus was on working amongst countries on how to deal 

with this issue. Putting funds into all types of programs that would 

prevent WMD terrorism, whether it was nuclear security, whether 

it was biological security, whether it was border security issues, 

whether it was security culture issues with the scientists. So we 

really worked hard on those issues. 

The thing that is important is that the type of programs that I 

worked on, you would have to be working with a country that is 

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open to those type of activities. So the type of activities that I was 

working on would not be useful for, let’s say, for North Korea right 

now because they are not a country that would be open to those 

kind of things. It is something that would happen later. 

But we were able to do quite a bit to reduce the chances of WMD 

terrorism around the world because it is a global issue. It is a global problem, and we have quite a few countries that are working on 

it. 

Ms. TITUS. I think you also mentioned the cyber threat that 

North Korea poses. Maybe you could address that. I think there 

was a bulletin from DHS in June 2017 that North Korea was targeting the U.S., targeting media, aerospace, financial. We don’t 

know the level of sophistication. Do you think there is any possibility they could, like the Russians, target elections? 

Ms. JENKINS. Well, I am not an expert in cyber, so I can’t really 

say with any authority whether they could do it or not, but apparently North Korea does have some capabilities when it comes to 

cyber. So whether they could actually do what we are finding out 

the Russians have done, I am not sure, but they obviously are in 

the process of trying to strengthen their cyber capabilities. 

Ms. TITUS. Can anybody else address that? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. I think that to have anything as broad as a 

major election would be beyond their current capabilities. But they 

have used cyber, at least in one case, to attack part of the power 

grid, or tried to, in South Korea. They have conducted offensive 

cyber operations, and their capabilities are improving. But whether 

they would take on anything as broad as the U.S., I think that certainly is beyond their current capabilities. 

Mr. RUGGIERO. I mean, I would just say that we shouldn’t underestimate North Korea’s cyber capabilities. It was only 4 years ago 

that they attacked Sony Pictures. And I think it is also easy to forget that when certain theaters said they were going to show the 

movie anyway, then North Korea threatened a 9/11 style attack 

against the United States. 

So North Korea has advanced its cyber capabilities. Now, whether they would want to impact an election, I think is more of a—

that is not what they are going for. I think they are going for the 

ability to use cyber in a pre- and wartime environment. And you 

look at some of their activities in South Korea, and that is clear, 

but also to steal money to blunt the sanctions impact. 

Ms. TITUS. Thank you. 

Mr. YOHO. Thank you for your questions. 

Next, we will go to Mrs. Ann Wagner from Missouri. 

Mrs. WAGNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And thank you all for being witnesses today. I appreciate your 

testimony. 

Mr. Cordesman, I really appreciated your thorough review of 

North Korea’s weapon activities. It was very useful to the committee. Do you know to what extent U.S. bases in Northeast Asia 

have security measures in place to combat infectious or lethal 

agents? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. I think you would have to get a briefing on detection at a different level because it is really, more than anything 

else now, the ability to characterize an attack that becomes the 

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most critical issue. Your other problem is that when it comes down 

to what is the attack, there are so many different agents and so 

many different ways you can attack, that there are at least some 

agents which, in an island context, an infectious agent or so on, 

where it would be extremely difficult for anyone to conduct a defensive measure other than treatment. And in that case, detecting the 

way in which the weapon was developed would be critical, because 

if it is altered to have a slow gestation period, which is now possible, it becomes a very difficult problem. I am sure this issue is 

one that is being examined as part of a broader effort, but I think 

you are touching on some very sensitive issues. 

Mrs. WAGNER. Mr. Ruggiero, I appreciated your summary of how 

President Trump’s diplomatic pressure has caused other countries 

to end relationships with North Korea. Are there countries 

partnering with North Korea that stand out to you as needing special attention from the administration? 

Mr. RUGGIERO. Well, beyond China and Russia, and, you know, 

it was mentioned earlier, Poland, there are certainly still countries 

in Africa I am concerned about. Even though Singapore has said 

that it will cut off its trade relationship with North Korea, I am 

still concerned about the actual implementation of that. Malaysia 

has been an issue in the past. I think the question here is whether 

the administration is willing to use sanctions authorities to go after 

companies in friendly countries to show an impact. I think if they 

did that perhaps once or twice, that it could have an exponential 

impact. 

Mrs. WAGNER. I agree. Ambassador Jenkins, can you speak about 

the outcomes of yesterday’s U.S./Canada meeting in Vancouver on 

North Korea’s illicit transfer of materials and equipment? 

Ms. JENKINS. The one thing that I was able to pick up, but I 

need to get more information, is that there was an agreement by 

Canada to provide some funding to the U.S. to help with sanctions 

against North Korea. There was a pledge of $325 million—$3.25 

million to help the U.S. with the sanctions, to help other countries 

with strengthening sanctions. 

So I don’t think there was a lot of—I don’t know how much success there was in terms of bringing North Korea to the table, which 

is one of the things they wanted to do and, obviously, there is—

thinking that by continuing the pressure on North Korea, that will 

bring them to the table and this is another way to try to do that. 

But there was a lot of discussion on the sanctions and how to enforce the sanctions. 

Mrs. WAGNER. Great. Thank you. It seems that U.S. policy 

prioritizes the challenge of the nuclear threat over the challenge of 

the chemical and biological weapons threat. Mr. Parachini, do you 

believe the U.S. Government should work to change its what I will 

call cost-benefit analysis and better prioritize the chemical and biological threats? And how do you think we begin to do that, sir? 

Mr. PARACHINI. So I think a focus on the nuclear threat is appropriate. It is a demonstrated capability that they have now also 

demonstrated a ballistic missile capability. So it is generally—it is 

in a category in and of itself where their chemical and biological 

weapons capabilities are at different thresholds. We don’t have a 

good sense of what those thresholds may be. They are a greater 

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threat, I think, in both South Korea and the Asian theater than 

they are to the homeland, but I think that naturally leads you to 

prioritize nuclear first. 

Their chemical capabilities are probably more robust based on 

what we know and based on the ease of producing those types of 

weapons. And their biological weapons are probably least available 

for use, and we know less about them, so I think I would prioritize 

those less. I would say if there are ways to do dual-use things for 

detection and addressing any infectious diseases, that is desirable 

to deal with I think the least probable of these threats. 

Mrs. WAGNER. Great. Thank you. 

Mr. Chairman, my time has expired. I thank you. 

Mr. YOHO. Thank you. 

Next, we will go to Ms. Tulsi Gabbard from the State of Hawaii. 

Ms. GABBARD. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

You know, at this point, I think no one more viscerally appreciates the seriousness of the threat that we face at this moment 

than the people of Hawaii who just went through a terrifying experience on Saturday morning, receiving this alert on their cell phone 

that a ballistic missile was incoming, take shelter immediately, this 

is not a drill. Now, obviously, we know now this turned out to be 

colossal error on the part of the State officials responsible for this. 

But it really served as a wake-up call to the country and to the 

people in Washington about the imminent nature of the threat that 

we face and the need for urgent and effective action to ultimately 

remove this threat from our country. 

So, Mr. Ruggiero, you were talking about sanctions and through 

a lot of the different questions, I think you gave responses coming 

at different angles. It is clear, though, that none of the sanctions 

that have been put in place over the last few decades against North 

Korea have proven effective, which is why we are sitting in this position, nor are they anywhere near—nor have they reached anywhere near the effectiveness of the sanctions in Iran that caused 

the nuclear deal to occur. 

Can you label maybe the top most effective changes to current 

sanctions that would actually prove this sanctions regime to be effective to create this leverage? 

Mr. RUGGIERO. Well, I can give you three. We talked about the 

China financial, so we don’t have to go into much detail about that. 

We talked about the fines, and that would be useful. I would say 

the other benefit of the Vancouver meeting is something that I testified before this committee last year about, which is the public nature of a like-minded group. And we had that on Iran, and it looks 

like we now have that with Vancouver. And I think that one of the 

things in the statement was that they are going to meet more 

often, so that is the second thing. And the third, which is related 

to that, is shipping. You know, our research indicates that there 

are at least double, if not triple, of the number of North Korean 

linked vessels that can be and really should be sanctioned. And 

then also we have already seen the South Korean stop two—or excuse me—freeze or impound two vessels with regard to ship-to-ship 

transfers. That is an area that is going to need more work, and I 

think a lot of people don’t want to interdict vessels, but we need 

to remember the value of just doing training exercises with regard 

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to interdicting vessels as well. Doing those in a more public way 

to increase the costs for some of these vessels that may not know 

they are involved with North Korea. 

Ms. GABBARD. Anyone else? With regard to—there has been some 

conversation, especially lately, about the possibility of a ‘‘preventative or preemptive strike,’’ and I am wondering what actual defense 

treaties are in place between China and North Korea, and Russia 

and North Korea, respectively, and what you believe their responses would be from the spectrum of a surgical strike that some 

are advocating for all the way to an overwhelming military strike 

coming from the United States? How would China and Russia react 

to that? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. There is no automatic treaty relationship between China and North Korea, but there is a broad security relationship and treaty or agreement. I think that when you talk about 

how China would react, any kind of bolt from the blue, just preemptive attack without a cause, would almost force China to react, 

at least diplomatically, and take a very strong political stand. I 

doubt very much if it would lead to immediate military action, but 

it would be extremely hard to predict. I think——

Ms. GABBARD. Would you agree that North Korea would respond 

with military action in that instance? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. I think that certainly it would respond with 

some kind of military action, but whether that action would be 

something that would offset the impact of a really well-targeted 

preventative strike, a lot would depend on how well we can actually target preventively and locate and destroy their nuclear capabilities, and how many other things we would do to restrict their 

retaliatory capability. There is a very wide range between simply 

trying to strike their nuclear weapons and what could be a major 

conflict. 

Ms. GABBARD. Thank you. 

Mr. PARACHINI. I might add that it is very dangerous to think 

about decapitation because you don’t know whether or not this is 

a regime that has the dead-hand doctrine; that is, when the leadership goes out, some other parts of the military know that it is time 

for them to go in. And indeed that was a Soviet doctrine. It is a 

reasonable worry that North Korea may have a similar one. So any 

type of decapitation attempt, successful or not, might launch something that we really would not like to have occur. 

Ms. GABBARD. Yeah. Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. YOHO. I thank you for your questioning. 

Next, we will go to Mr. Tom Garrett from Virginia. 

Mr. GARRETT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I want to start with Ambassador Jenkins, Mr. Chairman, because I don’t know if you are aware but Ambassador Jenkins went 

to our Nation’s premiere flagship public university, the University 

of Virginia, for one of her degrees, so I know she is going to have 

a good answer here. 

To your knowledge, Ambassador Jenkins, is there any other nation on the face of the planet circa 2018 that literally sells workers 

to do work in foreign countries and then has their salaries remitted 

to the government of that nation? 

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Ms. JENKINS. I am taking my time with this one just to think. 

I don’t think so. 

Mr. GARRETT. I don’t either. And I just—I point that out, not because it is directly on point, but because I think it is relevant for 

those who are trying to understand the nature of this regime. In 

my opening statement, Mr. Chair, I tried to illustrate that any regime that would sell its very own people into slavery might be willing to utilize weapons of any variety, be they conventional, nuclear, 

biological or chemical against not only foreigners, but their own 

citizens. And I also think it is worthy of note that the history in 

the region indicates hostilities inherent over intergenerational periods between not just the north and the south but also the Japanese 

and the Koreans, the Chinese and the Koreans, et cetera, and I 

think most Americans fail to understand that. 

Moving somewhat, Dr. Cordesman, dual-purpose improved conventional munitions, submunitions, bomblets, do we know whether 

or not the North Korean regime employs artillery, canon, rocket, or 

missile systems that might employ submunitions? I mean, I know 

the answer, but——

Mr. CORDESMAN. I have not heard that they have extensive 

stocks of advanced submunitions, but I think that from some of the 

literature I have seen from Jane’s and others, there are indications 

they have at least some capabilities in these areas. 

Mr. GARRETT. And unclassified documentation indicates that a 

launcher loader worth of dual-purpose improved conventional munitions on the proper mathematical firing solutions would be able 

to essentially impact every single unprotected target in a single 

square kilometer. So, again, these references to 20,000 dead in 1 

day, I would submit, rhetorically, are probably low, particularly 

when you consider populations not hardened, densely compacted in 

civilian areas. 

Now, does the United States employ Dual-Purpose Improved 

Conventional Munitions by doctrine? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. We have a range of advanced artillery rounds, 

yes. 

Mr. GARRETT. But did we not remove ourselves voluntarily from 

the——

Mr. CORDESMAN. Yes. 

Mr. GARRETT. And that would have been circa 2015? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. Right. 

Mr. GARRETT. And so also we have made reference to, and you 

made reference to hardened artillery emplacements, essentially, in 

theory, these artillery emplacements might roll out from underneath a protective overhead cover, et cetera, fire and then move 

back in. Does that accurately characterize some of our understanding in the North Korean indirect fire capability? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. They vary sharply according to the terrain. 

Some do that. Some can fire and do fire from fixed positions. 

Mr. GARRETT. And so we voluntarily stop using scatterable submunitions that might counter these in a counter battery scenario. 

How about area-denial munitions, RAMS and ADAMS, artilleryfired area-denial munitions? Do we have those in our capability? 

And do we have those in our inventory in the United States? 

96

Mr. CORDESMAN. I know we have them in our capability and had 

them in our capability. Quite frankly, I do not know the inventories 

involved. 

Mr. GARRETT. In fact, we voluntarily removed ourselves from the 

realm of nations that would employ scatterable area-denial munitions. Have the North Koreans done this? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. No. 

Mr. GARRETT. And so might these withdrawals of the United 

States from the arena of cutting-edge weaponry put us at a competitive disadvantage with the regime that hasn’t honored the 

same commitments that we have made? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. If I may make two points. First, we have basically gone to using the equivalent of Earth penetrators rather than 

submunitions because of the blast doors on the hearts. That is a 

very restricted capability, but it requires you to penetrate a much 

more serious barrier than the artillery rounds we then had. 

Mr. GARRETT. So, specifically, in a case of a hardened target, the 

Earth penetrator might be a preferred method. However, if you are 

trying to deny a roll-in roll-out artillery system, the scatterable 

mines might be something that would work best. 

Let me continue, because I have about 20 seconds remaining. It 

strikes me that the people who entered this country into these 

agreements probably never did comprehensive fire-risk planning 

for offensive or defensive operations. And it strikes me, and I apologize again, with all due respect, sir, and I have an immense 

amount for yourself and other members of this panel, that we endanger the very lives of the young women and men who have 

signed on a dotted line to potentially sacrifice everything that they 

have or ever will have for the freedom of this Nation and defense 

of the innocent people, not only of South Korea, but the world. 

And so I take this opportunity, Mr. Chairman, and I will conclude shortly, to submit that we might relook some of the treaties 

into which we entered and some of the actions we unilaterally engaged in in light of the very real circumstances in which we find 

ourselves 24 years post a North Korean nuclear deal that was to, 

in the words of the President who shouted from the mountaintops 

of success, ‘‘rid the Korean Peninsula of a nuclear threat.’’

It is indeed existential to the young men and women in our uniforms and to the people, not only of the region, but of the world. 

Thank you. 

Mr. YOHO. Well spoken. I appreciate your words. 

Next, Ms. Norma Torres from California. 

Mrs. TORRES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this hearing. 

Mr. Ruggiero—I hoped I pronounced your name correctly—last 

year, I introduced H.R. 3261, the North Korea Follow the Money 

Act. It is a simple bipartisan bill that requires a national intelligence estimate on North Korea’s revenue sources. 

How much do we know about how North Korea is funding its 

chemical weapons programs? 

Mr. RUGGIERO. I would just say that a lot of our understanding 

of North Korea’s finances is very anecdotal partially because North 

Korea does not report its own trade statistics, partially because 

some trade statistics that are reported as North Korea are actually 

97

South Korea, and then also because the Chinese report what they 

want to report. 

And to perhaps the question of, you know, whether having an assessment of that type, of the budget and the usefulness of that, I 

would say, you know, sanctions are now being used more and more 

often, especially when it comes to North Korea. And I think it 

would be valuable, at least internally within the U.S. Government, 

to have a common understanding of where North Korea is now and 

what are the levers that can be used to affect different revenue 

streams. 

Mrs. TORRES. Specifically, if we want to be very specific and target certain people versus an entire country, correct? 

Mr. RUGGIERO. Well, the issue here, there has always been this 

narrative of leadership assets overseas. That is certainly something 

that I know that the government has focused on before. And as I 

noted earlier, the North Koreans’ use their revenue really in three 

ways, military, weapons, and for the elites. And I think if we had 

an understanding of what the budget is like, but it will always be 

imprecise, but a way to target the sanctions to go in certain areas 

and to not harm the people, I think is the first order there. 

Mrs. TORRES. Absolutely. That is why I think it is critical for us 

to, at the very least, Mr. Chairman, try to get a hearing on this 

bill, once again, H.R. 3261. 

I am also very concerned about an incident that occurred June 

2017, a cyber attack that shut down our Nation’s ports. The Port 

of Los Angeles was impacted. That is a concern to me because the 

livelihood of my constituents is dependent on the activities at the 

ports. 

Do you think that North Korea has the capability to carry out 

cyber attacks against our ports and other critical infrastructure? 

Mr. RUGGIERO. Well, I would say that if they don’t have the capability now, they are going to certainly work toward getting it. I 

think what we see in South Korea over the last 5 to 6 years where 

North Korea used cyber to attack U.S. Forces, Korea, and our 

South Korean counterparts in a wide approach, and then learned 

from that and was more specific. In other words, going after 20 

Web sites the first time, and then the second time, going after only 

2. 

So I think that is part of it. The wartime environment, using it 

in a wartime environment, but then using it—what we like to call 

cyber-enabled economic warfare, to try and harm the United States 

as these sanctions increase. And then the third way is to make 

money to blunt the impact of those sanctions. 

Mrs. TORRES. Go ahead, Ms. Jenkins. 

Ms. JENKINS. Yes, I would just add that I think the more effective the international community is in terms of sanctions, in terms 

of interdiction, illicit trafficking of materials and equipment, the 

more likely North Korea will rely on cyber to raise the funds that 

they need to do what they need to do. And in doing that, they will 

develop a capability to use it for other things. 

So there is a connection between the effectiveness of activities to 

prevent them from doing what they are doing and to prevent them 

from raising the money that they want to raise and their use of 

this other tool to raise that money. 

98

Mrs. TORRES. So either stealing from us, directly from us, or 

shutting down our commerce. 

What can we do to protect ourselves? Yes, sir. 

Mr. CORDESMAN. I think that really is a key question. An awful 

lot of the problem we face is the failure basically to provide basic 

defenses, reduce cyber vulnerability, set standards that do not 

allow ease of attack. When countries like North Korea can attack 

a critical infrastructure function, the question is, why is it vulnerable in the first place? 

Mrs. TORRES. Thank you. I ran out of time. 

Mr. Chairman, I yield back. 

Mr. YOHO. I appreciate your participation and your questions. 

And the panel, I thank you for your endurance, your information 

that you have given us. 

What I see is the continuing evolution of the North Korean saga, 

going from the Korean War to where we are at today. And we have 

seen past administrations, both Republican and Democrats use the 

carrot and stick. And at each point, the Koreans got stronger as far 

as their development. 

I have a hard time believing they did this on their own. I feel 

there was a lot of help, whether it was from Pakistan in the beginning, to Russia, to China, to other actors. And they are used as a 

proxy state in a lot of these ventures, but now they are at a point 

where they are today. And I think you just brought up a point 

about defensive mechanisms. And I look at the THAAD system 

South Korea put in that was so warranted at the time, but I saw 

China retaliate against South Korea. South Korea was doing that 

just for their protection. And I think they were very warranted to 

bring in the other ones. And again, at the dismay and dissatisfaction of China. But I think it is very important. 

And I think we, as a Nation, should make sure that that offer 

stands on the table as something that South Korea can use to 

make sure that they have the defensive mechanisms. But this is, 

of course, up to the South Koreans. And we are at a different point 

now with the talks that are going on between the two Koreas. We 

can just hope that with the efforts of the world community coming 

together, putting pressure on all partners that are trading with 

North Korea, that this will come to a peaceful resolution. 

I can’t thank you enough for being here. Do you have any further 

comments you want to say or you feel pretty confident with what 

has gone on? 

Hearing no other comments, I want to thank the witnesses. I 

want to thank the members, and I want to thank Judge Poe for 

calling this important meeting jointly together with the Asia-Pacific Subcommittee. In his absence, I would like to end it with, ‘‘and 

that is the way it is.’’

This meeting is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 4:09 p.m., the subcommittees were adjourned.] 

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