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The main theory that North Korea analysts have is that essentially Kim Jong-un is looking for deterrence, looking for protection, that he's seen what's happened to previous dictators, like Saddam Hussein and Colonel Gaddafi who did not have nuclear weapons-- and they met a very grisly end-- and has decided that the only thing that can ensure the survival of his regime is to have a nuclear weapon.
Now, of course, he already has some nuclear weapons, but the North Koreans are now pursuing the ultimate prize, which is a nuclear tipped intercontinental ballistic missile that could directly threaten the United States. And that would provide perhaps the ultimate insurance policy.
However, nobody can be entirely sure about what's in Kim Jong-un's mind. And the real fear among some in the United States is that he's not as rational as the deterrence theory suggests and that he might seek to perhaps blackmail the United States in some way or even perhaps use nuclear weapons as a first resort and not just as a form of protection.
South Korea is actually much more vulnerable than the United States because its capital, Seoul, is just some 30 kilometres from the North Korean border. And the fear is that if the US was to attack North Korea in an effort to take out its nuclear installations, there would immediately be a savage conventional armed reaction by North Korea, raining missiles down on Seoul and potentially costing hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions of lives. That's really the reason why the US has been unable to take on North Korea in a military fashion.
However, there is a division between South Korea and the United States that's opening up for a couple of reasons. Firstly, the South Koreans are scared that America might actually take preemptive action rather than accept that North Korea can develop a weapon that directly threatens the United States. And more broadly, there's a difference in political philosophy between the hawkish Trump administration in Washington and the current government in South Korea that's run by Moon Jae-in, which is more inclined to look towards negotiations and some kind of accommodation with North Korea and that was accused over the weekend by Donald Trump of appeasement towards North Korea.
I think for a couple of reasons. First of all, they're worried about destabilising North Korea because it might cause flows of refugees into China. They're also a little ambivalent about the idea of a collapse of North Korea leading to a unified Korea that might be an American ally and bring American troops right up to the Chinese border.
But I think the biggest Chinese reservation is that they worry that if the North Korean regime really was on the point of collapse, at that point then Kim Jong-un might be tempted to use his weapons, even his nuclear weapons, because the alternative would be to see his own downfall and probably his own death, as happened with Saddam Hussein in Iraq and Colonel Gaddafi in Libya. So the fear from China is that if you destabilise North Korea, then you really do get a dangerous crisis.
