Insecurity is what drives a nation state to pursue a path of nuclear profileration. Only by promoting security, can the avenue to nuclear disarmament and peace be opened up. You cannot make an extremely insecure state feel more secure by piling pressure on them to get rid of their nuclear program, especially given that such pressure is interpreted as aggression and is the very means for starting the program in the first place! The means defy the end!
Therefore, when it comes to dealing with North Korea's nuclear profileration the United States have truly got it wrong. It seems somewhat beyond their comprehension as to why North Korea are pursuing a nuclear arms program in the first place. They just don't get it and doesn't seem like they're about to either. North Korea's nuclear weapons program is a disastrous consequence of American foreign policy in the 21st century, not just towards North Korea itself, but as a domino effect of it's interventionist crusades throughout the globe which have not dealt with, but rather have increased aggression towards the U.S and the west from political actors worldwide.
Now, North Korea is hardly the kind of system you want to endorse as a beacon of hope, example and progress in the world, it isn't. We have never said it is. Time has clearly left it behind, it is a draconian Stalinist model state typical of that found in the 1960s. As the rest of the surviving socialist world, China, Cuba, Vietnam have moved on and embraced reform and "opening up", North Korea has stood still in an avid attempt to resist as much change as possible, at seemingly whatever human cost it might bring. But why is this so? Why has North Korea not changed like the rest? What is holding it back?
The answer is, insecurity. Whilst all communist states feel insecure about their political status quo, North Korea is in a category of its own due to the unique experience it has faced in its origin. As stated in prior articles, North Korea is not a full country, it is a half country. Because it is "half a country", it does enjoy the title of being the undisputed, recognized and legitimate government of that "nation". Rather, it is competing for legitimacy and recognition against another government, South Korea and its main backer, the United States. North Korea is only half Korea, therefore the notion exists that "Korea" is more than it as a single state. This differs from other Communist Nations, the People's Republic of China is all of China, the socialist republic of Vietnam has been for 40 years all of Vietnam. They do not have a "rival" government of the same country who can swallow them up, who claims their territory.
This situation is made worse for North Korea because those opposed to it, the U.S, Japan and South Korea, do not diplomatically recognize its existence. They have not from the start. North Korea is denied international social recognition from its main enemies, creating a mentality from the beginning that it must fight and struggle as a state to survive against those who seek to "destroy it". This is further perpetuated from the fact the United States attempted to conquer North Korea in the Korean war, and additionally the war did not end with a permanent peace treaty. The Korean war, in the "mind" of North Korea as a country, has not ended. It is like PTSD, but on a national scale. It has constructed the United States as it's primary enemy and nothing has happened since that time to change those impressions. The result is that this state of mind has been built into the apparatus of the state and its social behaviour, creating a paranoid militaristic state. North Korea behaves under a constant state of threat, and this acts as a severe perversion against "normal" state behaviour, regime survival is their sole priority.
Thus this insecurity acts as the prime motive behind North Korea's nuclear weapons program. In a state's view, the existence of nuclear weaponry acts as the ultimate deterrent against those wanting to attack it. It is defensive, not offensive (and every country who has ever created nuclear weapons, from the Soviet Union to mighty the US of A, have done so for the same reason). Since the end of the Cold War and the demise of the Soviet Union, North Korea have felt the program is its only resort for protection. Whilst the US did reach a nuclear deal with North Korea in 1994, the US's behaviour since that time has led to the DPRK revoking the deal and resorting back to missile testing. Why? The invasion of Iraq and the intervention in Libya might provide good insights. Saddam Hussein and Colonel Gadaffi sought nuclear weapons, both willingly gave them up to the international community and later found their regimes removed from power by western interventions. Hardly an encouragement to North Korea is it?
Gaddafi and Saddam Huseein abandoned their nuclear weapons programs and complied with the international community but later found themselves violently removed from power
North Korea do not trust the United States, they have no reason to. The United States has aggressively imposed its will and political mindset on nations throughout the world (except the the dictatorships it is convenient for them to support). It chronically misunderstands the situation on the Korean peninsula and fails to realize how it itself has contributed to these problems. It treats the North Korean regime as some kind of rogue wanting to challenge "the mighty freedom and democracy" of America, an irrational actor, an evil one, which cannot ever have a serious perspective or opinion. Despite what North Korea may do, such assumptions are ignorant and typical of the American political pysche, who mislead the world into thinking its foreign policy is some kind of Marvel comic superhero battle against good and evil, it isn't. This situation is not black nor white, nor good or evil, it is a murky gray. The North Korean regime fights for its political survival in a hostile international situation, not to cause World War III and kill off "American freedomz". At its heart, it just wants America and its "partners" to leave it alone (so it can reconcile with the South). Just like the Vietnamese did and most of the people in the Middle East today.
Thus, pressuring or sanctioning Pyongyang is not and will never be the answer to this dilemma. The North Korean regime is not like Iran, it has an avid sense of its own sovereignty and determination and does not cave in to pressure. It interprets sanctions not as "punishments" but as aggression and assaults on its own sovereignty as a nation, acts of American imperialism against it even. It will be the ordinary people of North Korea who suffer as a result of measures inflicted against it, not the elite. Until North Korea feels secure, it will continue to dig its heels in and continue to resist change to the system. That includes both economic reform, individual freedoms and also nuclear disarmament.
North Korea's elite aren't the ones who are hurt by sanctions
Therefore, the strategies used to persuade North Korea to get rid of their nuclear weapons must change. It must be a more reasoned response, one which incorporates North Korea's actual point of view and takes it seriously. The United States must be prepared to grant full diplomatic recognition to North Korea, to create a formal peace treaty and a mutual security guarantee with North Korea and other regional actors. These are demands which North Korea have repeatedly fleshed out, does it hurt America's pride to actually consider them? Otherwise, it seems we are doomed to the endless cycle of nuclear tests, sanctions, threats and endless frustration.
