Learning to Live With a Nuclear North Korea

Most discussions on U.S. policy toward North Korea follow a predictable pattern, expressing alarm about current developments and acknowledging Washington's policy failure, but insisting that nothing can be done other than repeat the process. More than seven decades after an armistice ended the Korean War, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK)--North Korea's formal name--remains as hostile as ever. A plethora of U.S.-led sanctions have impaired an already decrepit collectivist economy but failed to prevent Pyongyang from pursuing an aggressive agenda of military preparation, including the development of nuclear weapons and intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). Indeed, Nikkei reported in January that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un had recently set "the launch of three new spy satellites as well as the building of drones and strengthening of the country's nuclear weaponry as goals for this year."