Instead, strengthening cohesion within the U.S.-South Korean alliance through non-nuclear means offers a viable - and safer - path to address regional challenges from North Korea and China. Moreover, alliance credibility problems have not reached a magnitude that calls for such a drastic measure. South Korean nuclear weapons would likely make the regional security situation more precarious. political support.Īlthough the U.S.-South Korean alliance does face significant geopolitical challenges, nuclear proliferation would be an ill-advised solution. The best course to resolve these dilemmas, according to Lind and Press, might be a South Korean nuclear arsenal, one they argue should enjoy U.S. commitments to come to Seoul’s aid in an inter-Korean conflict. cities with nuclear weapons challenges the credibility of U.S. Moreover, the authors suggest North Korea’s improving ability to target U.S. demands to more effectively counterbalance China could threaten the reliability of U.S.
Lind and Press posit that South Korea is stuck between a rock and hard place, “pulled apart by powerful geopolitical forces.” For Seoul, joining U.S.-led regional security initiatives risks alienating China, South Korea’s closest trade partner. In contrast, we believe that South Korean nuclear acquisition would be counterproductive and dangerous, leaving both the alliance and South Korean security worse off.
Arguing for allied proliferation is a highly unusual policy prescription. These views found support from two American academics, Jennifer Lind and Daryl Press, who contend in a provocative Washington Post op-ed that South Korean nuclear weapons may be “the only way” to save the alliance. Some have even argued that South Korea should “independently seek nuclear armament” if the United States does not agree to redeploy. Are nuclear weapons the answer to Seoul’s security challenges? Amidst a flurry of North Korean nuclear-capable missile testing and persistent stresses in the U.S.-South Korean security alliance, conservative candidates in South Korea’s presidential primaries have called on the United States to redeploy tactical nuclear weapons to the Korean Peninsula.
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