US Policy Towards North Korea with Respect to Ballistic Missiles

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US Policy Towards North Korea with Respect to Ballistic Missiles

A. A. Perkins

North Korea's emerging long-range ballistic missile capability has created debate on whether the U.S. foreign policy toward North Korea is effective or is actually encouraging its ballistic missile programs. North Korea's ballistic missile program is critical to sustain the existence of the North Korean regime and its ballistic missile exports total about $1 billion a year. North Korea is the world's largest exporter of ballistic missiles yet it is the largest recipient of foreign aid in the Asia-Pacific region from the U.S. . These North Korean weapons are not viewed as operational weapons of war, but primarily as strategic weapons of deterrence and coercive diplomacy. The full development of this capability would give North Korea a potent diplomatic card in influencing U.S. foreign policy toward North Korea, in the region and even beyond. The implication of a mature North Korean long-range ballistic missile capability presents new policy challenges to the U.S.. The most effective U.S. policy towards the North Korea ballistic missile threat in the near to midterm is to selectively engage North Korea, while maintaining credible conventional and nuclear deterrents and concurrently pursuing an effective National Missile Defense (NMD) system.