NORTH KOREA’S NUCLEAR FUTURES SERIES - US-KOREA INSTITUTE AT SAIS - North Korea’s Evolving Nuclear Strategy

The Nuclear Chemical Defense Bureau, an organ of the Ministry of People’s Armed Forces that reports directly to the supreme leader, was thought by some to have been responsible for managing the nuclear inventory.21 As late as 2009, however, the International Crisis Group (ICG) assessed that the weapons still had not been transferred to the Korean People’s Army. [...] It states: [Nuclear weapons] serve the purpose of deterring and repelling the aggression and attack of the enemy against the DPRK and dealing deadly retaliatory blows at the strongholds of aggression…29 Kim Jong Un expounded on the strategic rationale in a speech before the SPA Law was issued, when he stated: When one is firmly equipped with the capability to make precision strikes with nuclear we. [...] Indeed, the SPA Law envisions an expanded arsenal and role for nuclear weapons in the future that goes beyond deterring high-end attacks to also deter and repel lower levels of aggression: The DPRK shall take practical steps to bolster up the nuclear deterrence and nuclear retaliatory strike power both in quality and quantity to cope with the gravity of the escalating danger of the hostile forces’. [...] Indeed, the WPK Central Committee released a report one day before the SPA Law was adopted, recommending that the military begin such planning: The People’s Army should perfect the war method and operation in the direction of raising the pivotal role of the nuclear armed forces in all aspects concerning the war deterrence and the war strategy, and the nuclear armed forces should always round off t. [...] North Korea’s Evolving Nuclear Strategy? What’s Next for North Korea? If Pyongyang follows the trajectory sketched above, we would likely see North Korea, in the words of Kim Jong Un: “increase the production of precision and miniaturized nuclear weapons and the means of their delivery and ceaselessly develop nuclear weapons technology to actively develop more powerful and advanced nuclear weapons.