Stanford University

The Situation on the Korean Peninsula After North Korea's Latest Nuclear Test

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On Jan. 6, North Korea conducted its fourth test of a nuclear device, which it claimed was a “hydrogen bomb.” Despite the U.N. Security Council’s responding by approving the strongest sanctions ever against the country, Pyongyang has since only heightened its threats against the United States and South Korea, sparking fears of a possible crisis. A panel consisting of experts from South Korea’s Presidential Committee for Unification Preparation (PCUP) and Shorenstein APARC will discuss the latest situation on the Korean Peninsula, including economic and political developments in both North and South Korea and prospects for inter-Korean relations, as well as the American policy response.

Panelists:

  • Ambassador Chong Wook Chung, Vice Chairman, PCUP; former South Korean National Security Adviser and Ambassador to China
  • Joo Hyun Kim, Economy Subcommittee Chair, PCUP
  • Ihn Hwi Park, Foreign Affairs and National Security Subcommittee Member, PCUP
  • Thomas Fingar, Shorenstein APARC Distinguished Fellow
  • Ambassador Kathleen Stephens, William J. Perry Distinguished Fellow, Shorenstein APARC; former U.S. Ambassador to South Korea
  • David Straub (moderator), Associate Director, Korea Program, Shorenstein APARC

 

 

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Ambassador Chong Wook Chung is vice chairman of the Presidential Committee for Unification Preparation (PCUP), which was established by South Korean President Park Geun-hye in 2014 to make comprehensive and systemic preparations for the unification of the Korean Peninsula. He also chairs the Committee for the 70th anniversary of Korean Liberation. Previously, he served as the Senior Secretary for Foreign Policy and National Security to President Kim Young Sam (1993-95), Korean Ambassador to China (1996-98), and Professor of International Politics at Seoul National University (1977-93), where he is currently a professor emeritus. He was an assistant professor of International Studies at American University (1975-77), a visiting professor at George Washington University, a Freeman Foundation Visiting Professor at Claremont McKenna College, a Kim Koo Visiting Professor in the department of government at Harvard University (Spring 2011), and a visiting professor at the Nanyang Technological University in Singapore (2010-11). He is also a distinguished professor at Incheon University. He received a Bachelor of Arts in international relations from Seoul National University and a doctorate in political science from Yale University. His book-length English publications include Maoism and Development (Seoul National University Press, 1980) and Korean Options in a Changing International Order (co-editor, University of California Press, Berkeley, 1992). He received the Yale Alumni Award in 2007.

 

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Joo Hyun Kim is a senior advisor of the Hyundai Research Institute where he had been the president and CEO for 11 years (2004-14), and currently chairs the Economic Subcommittee of PCUP. He specializes in financial market and macroeconomics, and his current research interest includes development of North Korean economy and unified economy of Korean Peninsula.  He has also been active as an advisory committee member of the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and recently has become the inaugural director of the Future Korea Institute at Kookmin University. He received a doctorate in finance from Arizona State University.

 

park ihn hwi web
Ihn Hwi Park is a professor of international studies and vice president of international affairs at Ewha Womans University, and a member of PCUP's Foreign Affairs and National Security Subcommittee. His area of expertise includes international security, U.S. foreign policy and Northeast Asian international relations. He is also an advisory committee member of the Ministry of Unification, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and Ministry of National Defense. He has written numerous articles in leading journals including International Journal of Korean Unification Studies, Korea Journal of Defense Analysis, and Global Economic Review. He received a doctorate in international politics from Northwestern University.

 

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Korean Studies Colloquium Series

Making sense of the new North Korea crisis

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North Korea’s fourth test of a nuclear device on February 6 and its rocket launch four weeks later in defiance of UN Security Council resolutions have caused a new sense of crisis on the Korean Peninsula. As if the tests themselves weren’t sufficiently provocative, Pyongyang is now claiming to have a hydrogen bomb and is threatening, if challenged, to launch a nuclear attack on both the United States and its ally South Korea. Whatever the exact state of North Korea’s capabilities, the tests underlined two basic facts: Pyongyang’s apparent determination to continue its efforts until it can indeed one day credibly threaten the United States with nuclear attack, and the international community’s resolve never to accept North Korea as a nuclear weapons state.
 
The international community responded with unprecedentedly tough sanctions against Pyongyang. On March 2, the UN Security Council passed Resolution 2270. It targets the hard currency that Pyongyang desperately needs to realize its byeongjin strategy of simultaneously trying to grow its economy and continuing nuclear weapons development. In addition, a number of countries, including the United States and Japan, introduced their own new bilateral sanctions. Perhaps most dramatically, South Korea on February 10 effectively permanently closed its decade-long joint North-South industrial park in the city of Kaesong in North Korea. It was the last project putting significant amounts of South Korean cash into the hands of the North Korean leadership.
 
North Korea’s response to the international community has included issuing even more threats, testing a series of new missiles, and sentencing an American college student to fifteen years’ imprisonment, allegedly for trying to filch a propaganda poster.
 
To help make sense of the new North Korea crisis, please stay tuned to this page for Korea Program Associate Director David Straub’s analysis and commentary. Straub is a former senior American diplomat whose thirty-year career focused on Korean affairs. His experiences include participation in the Six Party Talks and accompanying former President Clinton to Pyongyang in 2009 for a meeting with then-leader Kim Jong Il.
 
Latest Commentaries
In an interview with Radio Free Asia, Straub discusses the background and implications of the recent defections to South Korea of workers in North Korea's restaurants in China.
 
In a recent public lecture at Stanford, Straub explains why the critics of the Obama administration are wrong, and forecasts how the next U.S. administration is likely to approach the North Korea problem.
 
Straub tells NK News, a subscription-based website for the North Korea expert community, that the United States government may eventually have to further discourage or even ban American tourism to North Korea to protect citizens from arbitrary incarceration and prevent Pyongyang from blackmailing Washington for their release. 
 
In an interview with the University of Virgina's student newspaper, Straub discusses North Korea's imprisonment of UV student Otto Warmbier for allegedly attempting to steal a poster inscribed with the slogan "Let's firmly arm ourselves with Kim Jong-il patriotism!” Straub explains how the alleged offense fits in with the cult of personality surrounding the Kim Il Sung family dynasty.
 
Overall Situation
In the aftermath of North Korea’s latest nuclear test, Straub joined Stanford colleagues in analyzing its import and discussing possible policy responses, in an interview published by the Stanford Report.
 
In an interview with South Korean newspaper Segye Ilbo (in Korean) immediately following North Korea’s latest nuclear test, Straub argued that South Korea had the stature and ability to lead the international community in imposing greater costs on North Korea. His recommendations included considering closing the Kaesong industrial park.

Straub told the Washington Post that calls by some South Koreans for their country to develop its own nuclear weapons to counter the North were mostly a media phenomenon. Responsible South Korean leaders know that pursuing nuclear weapons would be disastrous for their country.

Sanctions
Straub told Voice of America’s Korea Service (in Korean) that the new UN Security Council sanctions reflected years of preparation by the Obama administration and would significantly increase the psychological pressure on North Korea’s leaders to abandon their pursuit of nuclear weapons.
 
Kaesong Closure
In an interview featured on the front page of Chosun Ilbo (in Korean), South Korea’s biggest newspaper, Straub supported South Korean President Park’s controversial decision to close the Kaesong industrial park in North Korea.
 
Peace Treaty Proposals
Straub told Associated Press that North Korea’s proposal for a peace treaty with the United States was a non-starter in Washington as long as Pyongyang continued to pursue nuclear weapons.
 
North Korea’s Incarceration of American Citizens
In the wake of North Korea's sentencing of University of Virginia student Otto Frederick Warmbier to fifteen years' imprisonment of hard labor for allegedly trying to steal a propaganda poster, Straub talked with a reporter from the University of Virginia's student newspaper about the case. Straub draws on his experience of leading the office of Korean affairs at the U.S. Department of State to discuss the conditions faced by Americans incarcerated in North Korea as well as North Korean intentions.
 
 
 
 
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A factory inside the Kaesong Industrial Zone. South Korea’s closure of the massive joint industrial park reflected its conclusion that much stronger international pressure is required to force Pyongyang to give up its nuclear weapons program.
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Stanford experts discuss Sino-American relations in wake of North Korea provocations

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Stanford experts from the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC) spoke with media in Asia and the United States about the dynamics on the Korean Peninsula following recent provocations by North Korea; a roundup of those citations is below.

The United Nations imposed a new set of sanctions against North Korea on March 2 in response to the country’s fourth nuclear test in January and subsequent rocket launch in February of this year. Shorenstein APARC Director Gi-Wook Shin offered his view in an interview with Dong-a Ilbo:

“The new sanctions are unprecedentedly strong and comprehensive, but the dominant view is pessimistic,” he said, emphasizing that the sanctions’ effectiveness stands largely on the shoulders of China, which is North Korea’s largest trading partner.

“Only if China doesn't fizzle out after a few months – but continuously enforces the sanctions – will we see any meaningful effect,” he said.

Shin also called upon South Korea to play a leadership role in dealing with North Korea because the United States has only limited interest in solving the nuclear problem, and China, will not change its approach and continue to move according to its own interests.

Shin relayed a similar message in an interview with Maeil Shinmun last December. South Korea must break from its own perception that it is the “balancer” between China and the United States. South Korea, often described as a “shrimp among whales,” should instead strive to play a larger role as a “dolphin,” he said.

Furthermore, Shin told Maeil that the U.S.-Korea relationship and the U.S.-China relationship are very different from each other, and should be viewed as they are. He pointed out that the U.S.-Korea relationship is an alliance where the two countries act accordingly as one body, whereas the China-Korea relationship is a strategic partnership insofar as the two countries cooperate on selective issues of mutual interest.

In a separate interview with the Associated Press, David Straub, associate director of the Korea Program, was asked about the possibility of peace talks with North Korea as an alternative to or parallel with the U.N. sanctions. Straub said “it would not make sense” and that “there is no support for such an approach in Washington” because of the strategic partnership between China and North Korea. He also told Voice of America that the new sanctions will significantly increase the political, diplomatic, and psychological pressures on North Korea's leaders to rethink their pursuit of nuclear weapons.

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The U.N. Security Council unanimously adopts resolution 2270, imposing additional sanctions on North Korea in response to that country’s continued pursuit of a nuclear weapons and ballistic missile program, March 2, 2016.
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16th Korea-U.S. West Coast Strategic Forum

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The sixteenth session of the Strategic Forum brings together distinguished South Korean and U.S. West Coast-based American scholars, experts, and former officials to discuss the U.S.-South Korean alliance, North Korea, and regional dynamics in Northeast Asia. The session is hosted by the Korea Program in association with The Sejong Institute, a top South Korean think tank.

 
Conferences

Globalization, Innovation, and Culture in Korea

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The 8th Annual Koret Workshop

South Korea has become an economic powerhouse, but faces multiple challenges. The conference will focus on four areas that South Korea needs to turn its attention to: 1) the higher education and development; 2) entrepreneurship and innovation; 3) global competitiveness; and 4) demographic changes and immigration policy.

During the conference, a keynote speech is open to the public. Please click here for more information about the public keynote.

The Koret Workshop is made possible through the generous support of the Koret Foundation.

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5th annual writing prize in Korean studies

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The Korea Program Prize for Writing in Korean Studies recognizes and rewards outstanding examples of writing in an essay, term paper, or thesis produced during the current academic year in any discipline within the area of Korean studies, broadly defined. This competition is open to both undergraduate and graduate students. The prize will be awarded at a special ceremony in the fall, and the winning essays will be published in the Stanford Journal of East Asian Affairs. The first place winner will receive a certificate, a copy of the Stanford Journal of East Asian Affairs, and $1,000; Honorable mention winner(s) will receive a certificate and a copy of the Stanford Journal of East Asian Affairs.

Application Deadline: Thursday, June 6, 2016
Eligible Students: All currently-enrolled Stanford students
Application Instructions: Submit the following items by email to John Groschwitz, CEAS Associate Director.

  • Current CV
  • One Korean Studies paper/essay (minimum 20 pages double-spaced, Times 12pt., 1″ margins)
  • One recommendation letter from a Stanford professor (emailed by the professor directly to John Groschwitz)

 

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Responding to North Korea's fourth nuclear test

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In a recent interview with Yonhap News, David Straub, associate director of the Korea Program, says "Although the United States and the PRC certainly have differences [in dealing with the North Korean nuclear issue], they pale in copmarison to U.S.-Soviet differences."

Yonhap News article in English (February 12, 2016)

 

Straub also offers, in an extended interview with South Korea's Segye Ilbo newspaper, his thoughts on Pyongyang's motivations for pursuing nuclear weapons. He argues that the appropriate policy response is to continue to increase pressure on the regime to convince it that nuclear weapons will bring more costs than benefits, while holding open the door to good-faith negotiations to resolve peninsular issues. 

Segye Ilbo article in Korean (January 8, 2016)

 

 

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15th Korea-U.S. West Coast Strategic Forum

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In this fifteenth session of the Strategic Forum, former senior American and South Korean government officials and other leading experts will discuss current developments in the Korean Peninsula and North Korea policy, the future of the U.S.-South Korean alliance, and a strategic vision for Northeast Asia. The session is hosted by the Korea Program in association with The Sejong Institute, a top South Korean think tank.

 

Seoul, Republic of Korea

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