South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol on Wednesday threatened that South Korea could obtain its own nuclear weapons if threats from the North grow, marking the first such comments from a South Korean leader in decades.
“It’s possible that the problem gets worse and our country will introduce tactical nuclear weapons or build them on our own,” Yoon said at a policy briefing with his foreign and defense ministers. “If that’s the case, we can have our own nuclear weapons pretty quickly, given our scientific and technological capabilities.”
Yoon’s warning comes as tensions are soaring on the Korean Peninsula, and the prospect of the South obtaining nukes will inflame tensions even more.
According to The New York Times, Yoon’s comments were the first time a South Korean leader officially mentioned arming the country with nuclear weapons since the US withdrew its nukes from the Korean Peninsula in 1991. Yoon added that he could ask the US to redeploy those weapons and said increasing military cooperation with Washington was another way he could deal with the growing threats from Pyongyang.
He also said that acquiring nuclear weapons was not yet an official government policy, but his office did not walk back his comments when asked to clarify them the following day.
“The most important part of his comments yesterday was that, as a realistic measure at the moment, it’s important to effectively strengthen extended deterrence within the security alliance between South Korea and the United States,” Yoon’s office said Thursday.
“However, when it comes to security, the worst-case scenario must always be taken into consideration, and from that perspective, he was making his commitment and determination ever clearer to protect the people as commander-in-chief against the escalating threat of North Korea’s nuclear weapons,” the office added.
South Korea is a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which bans non-nuclear armed states from acquiring nuclear weapons. Yoon’s office said that Seoul still abides by the NPT.
North Korea launched a record number of missile tests in 2022 as the US and South Korea resumed massive war games. North Korean Leader Kim Jong-un recently ordered his country to expand its nuclear arsenal, and Yoon said shortly after that he was in talks with the US on expanding military exercises to include US nuclear forces.
The Biden administration has made virtually no effort to defuse tensions on the peninsula, at least publicly, and has only ramped things up by deploying bombers to South Korea for the first time since 2017. The administration maintains it’s open to talks with Pyongyang but hasn’t offered any incentive to bring North Korea to the table.
Waiting on US/West/NATO is evil and Russia is super nice comments.
I knew you would understand… 😉
I think they would be stupid not to. Besides giving then leverage with North Korea, it also gives them leverage with China, Japan, US, and Russia.
On the world stage, having nukes talks, and talks loudly.
Well, it DOES seem that having ‘your own’ nukes gives you a much stronger position in this world as it really is. But I am dubious that everyone ‘nuking it up’ is a very good idea. I see a lot of idiots/sociopaths sitting upon a multitude of petty thrones. :-/
You are right EM, it is not a good idea but I can see situations where there is some benefit and I have been anti-nuke my whole life…
Sure, having nukes keeps the ones who don’t have them out of your hair, and lets you posture along with the growing list of other folks who have them. Maybe I could find a way to build one using Wikipedia. 😉
You have a good heart EM.
Thank you. I am not sure it is as ‘good’ as it could be. I get pretty angry at a lot of what I see…..
You have a good heart.
Can I ask you a question EM? If you don’t mind…
Are you by chance a writer? You have a very good way with words…
I write as little as possible. I am an historian. Writing things down causes trouble, haha.
How very interesting, a historian. I admire that much.
Does anyone remember the The Ungoverned? Vernor Vinge’s libertarian utopia where everyone had their home nukes? Somehow, some way humanity has to put a break on the devising and inevitably using increasing lethal weapons. If we don’t succeed, we all die. And we’ll deserve it.
Couldn’t stand Vinge’s SF!!!
Booooring . . .
Yeah, ain’t Washington DC a hoot?
When Pakistan has nukes, all civilized nations should have them!
Case closed!
If Iraq kept its nukes, the US & UK would have been unable to bomb Iraq from the No Fly Zones which they did after the Gulf War ended and before the Iraq War started. If Syria had nukes, there would be no war there and if Afghanistan had nukes, there would be no war there either. If Libya had nukes, the Coalition Forces would not be able to bomb it. Iran should have nukes to keep the US, UK, Israel, Saudi Arabia and many other nations out of its territory. It is a good thing North Korea has nukes so it can keep the US, Japan, South Korea and other enemies out of its territory.
It seems to be a surefire way to keep NATO from invading/conducting an overt regime change
That does not seem very “Antiwar.com” of you. LOL
It’s political reality. Compare the fate of Iraq and Libya with North Korea.
Pakistan has gotten a lot of international prestige and soft power from their nukes as well. And it was their nuke free neighbor Afghanistan where superpowers went to die, I mean fight, not Pakustan.
Antiwar does not equal being a doormat.
I completely agree with you. 🙂
Nuke it up!
Israel bombed Iran and killed Iranian scientists in order to prevent Iran develop the nukes. So we have a precedent. North Korea can do the same.
South Korea has been start/stop on this path many times over many years. Each time, it stops because the US insists, and because the US repeats its promises to make US nukes available against the North if it comes to that.
It is hard to see what has changed in that calculus. South Korea could spend an awful lot to get far less than what it already has from the US — unless it now somehow does not trust that.
There is no doubt nuclear weapons are big; Even so they are close to being technology from a century ago. North Korea is seeking blockbuster strength to save itself from the US at war with Russia and prodding war with China and Iran.
The US is a totalitarian military empire with very little imagination. It is at this time turning inward for war against it’s own citizens. South Korea will do much better looking to the future rather than joining with Japan as slaves in a proxy war against China that is similar to the US engineered slaughter in Ukraine.
“that is similar to the US engineered slaughter in Ukraine” So you are blaming/crediting the US for Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. Question: Does the US control Putin?
You ask a strange question based on the unceasing Hollywood and Wall Street propaganda that this is Putin’s war. Well washed brains are going to be groping for reality on a slippery soaped slope as the story of unprovoked Russian attack unravels.
Harper is deliberately obtuse. It’s his stage trick.
lol.
Why is that a strange question? You claim that US engineered the slaughter in Ukraine. But that “slaughter” going on right now requires the present of Russia troops in Ukraine which was order by Putin. My questions is how did the US get Putin to send in the his troops?
There was 30+ years of provocations that preceded Russia’s invasion that you willfully ignore. So why do you keep asking?
There is always a benefit to looking at the cause and effect scenario.
The US gets the credit for Vietnam, Serbia, Libya, Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan, among others.
Try reading up on some history. I think even Mr Peabody’s improbable history would help you.
One of the main deterrents of nuclear war for the past 75 years has been Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD). Can this also be the case on the Korean peninsula?
Could it be true for Iran vis a vis Israel
India and Pakistan?
Japan and China?
Oh dear, this could go and on… 😉
Not indefinitely. That’s the problem.
My latest nuclear abolition plan is for the US to withdraw from S. Korea while that country builds its own nuclear arsenal and then we maneuver the two Koreas into mutual annihilation, which probably wouldn’t be that hard. Even Republicans and Democrats would be able to see the downside of nuclear war. Admittedly it’s not the most ethical of plans but it’s at least more realistic than expecting humanity to come to its senses by way of simple reason, and if an end ever justified a means this one does. Assuming a nuclear exchange is eventually going to happen, we very much need to try to make it as small and contained as possible, and it isn’t going to just happen that way on its own. Orchestrating a small scale nuclear war may be the only realistic way to prevent a much larger nuclear war which would effectively end civilization. Let’s get on this.
Sarcasm at it best.
Maybe I’m just too convincing but I’m increasingly leaving sarcasm behind on this. Nuclear war is coming and we need to get ahead of it, and if all the sweet reason kumbaya business was going to work it would have by now. Humanity was and remains a bunch of hateful, hierarchical monkeys that will not as a group respond to reason. It can only be controlled by immediate, concrete fear. Generate some and you get things done. Otherwise you’re just a discussion group, and we’re running out of time for talk.
Once nukes became a thing, nuclear war was always coming. It’s just a question of when.
And that most people don’t seem able to get this supports my hateful hierarchical monkey thesis. We either slow burn nuclear war or risk it fast burning. Either way, the clock started ticking in 1945.
I haven’t given up all hope, just yet but I very much see that having open discourses to keep the discussion going, is beneficial to us all………..
You were serious with that comment about starting a nuclear war in Korea?
Not necessarily Korea. Pakistan and India are another possibility, or if another country in the ME deploys nuclear weapons then an exchange between it and Israel wouldn’t be too hard to get going, indeed the challenge would be to get the second country nuclear capable before Israel hit it.
How did you find out Israel has nukes, Ted? I thought that was a state secret.
It seems to have gone from open secret to widely acknowledged secret. I think the only people not allowed to talk about it are the press.
Not sarcasm. Effective risk management. Small nuclear war that derails the current momentum for a much larger one.
You can always be counted on to support plans and ideas that maximize the odds of death and destruction happening in the US.
You think starting a nuclear war is a good idea? I guess you forgot that nuclear fallout does not care about political boundaries. I don’t think Russia or China would be too happy with radiation landing in their countries. That limited nuclear war that Ted proposed would spread quickly into a full exchange. If Ted was serious he is nuts and if you believe it a good idea you are also nuts.
No, Russia or China wouldn’t be too happy about radiation spreading to their countries, but detonating more nukes won’t stop it, and maybe they’ll get serious about keeping it from happening again. A nuclear war is coming eventually and if, as you say, it’s bound to “spread quickly into a full exchange” then we clearly need to get ahead of this dynamic and try to proactively shape the outcome and not just passively wait for the inevitable. Get with the program, Kenneth.
“Get with the program” The program is not set off nuclear warheads like you proposed.
No, it’s to keep on slouching along until it all chaotically and catastrophically hits the fan. Is that what you want? Are you one of those end timers? Or do you just expect everything to be cost free? Ever make an omelette, snowflake?
There is a difference in 20 total nukes going off, and thousands. If the Koreas went at it, then just for the reasons you detailed, Japan, Vietnam, China, and Russia would strongly intervene to stop the madness before it became real. And if nukes started flying anyways, 20 would not result in nuclear winter
No one can stand up to either China, Russia, or US going at it with nukes. The current indifference and loose lips about US and Russia exchanging nukes is disconcerting.
About 10 years ago military.com and other high profile US defense publications approvingly discussed launching a nuclear first strike against Russia with the idea that we would be able to absorb the return strike. This was the time that US leaders repeatedly made clear that NOTHING IS OFF THE TABLE. That definitely also included a possible full spectrum Shock and Awe attack on China.
With that in mind, I very much prefer other nations to take care of their own defense needs. Ukraine would be much better off if they had accepted the original Russian demands back in early February of last year, and rejected the advice of Boris Johnson to fight.
” Japan, Vietnam, China, and Russia would strongly intervene to stop the madness before it became real.” You willing to take that chance? I’m not.
I think you raise some very interesting points…
Now I’m really worried.
We should all be worried…
Amazing how so many wish to destroy Asians —– Korean Buddhist monks gave the world the earliest block–form of printing.
Caucasians of various sorts gave the world the internet but fine, I’m victim agnostic on this so if you have another sacrificial group you think would work better I’m not hard over on the Koreans, I just think they have a number of pluses.
How about China vs Russia? Is your crazy idea OK with that group?
China and Russia are bigger than we want. We need countries with relatively small nuclear arsenals, your N. Koreas, Pakistans, Israels, that size. And is “crazy” supposed to be a criticism?
Yes crazy is supposed be a criticism. I heard many dumb ideas in my life so I can’t say this is the stupidest, but it in the top 10. I do think you are joking. And if you are not joking, you got problems.
Smile when you say crazy. Besides which, nuclear weapons are crazy, the nuclear arms race is crazy, and global thermonuclear holocaust is crazy to beat the band. Your wantonly hurled adjective is in fact entirely consistent with the paradigm at issue, but should you nonetheless persist in considering it somehow an opposing argument you need to come up with another and less wildly abstract one, which I notice you haven’t.
It will reduce their reliance in the US,and quiet the loony to the north.If Ukraine had kept a few nukes and their TU-22’s,they would not be undergoing macerization.
Yawn. Who cares? The more small states have nukes, the less likely the aholes in DC will be inclined to mess with them.
As long as we already have aholes like Biden and Blinken running the show, we might as well see the entire planet armed to the teeth. It would certainly become a more honest world, as no one would be forced to act as though they look up to us.
Highly cynical OB1!
Well I notice we haven’t attacked North Korea…
Thankfully OB1, thankfully….
Absolutely!!!
Taiwan, Japan and South Korea should have nuclear weapons for defense against the CCP and the crazoid Kim Yo–Yo, the real evil mind behind the evil mind of Un (his sister)!
Had Trump had some brains on board he would have moved to immediately form a strong union among Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, Malaysia and bring Thailand back towards the West awah from China’s massive influence (I’m ignorant on the Philippines so cannot comment) —- instead he squandered and wasted the time in the White House, appointing the worst of the worst in Barr, Wray, Milley, Gilday, McMaster et al., while being manipulated to rid himself of his two most intrepid anticommunists, Gen. Spalding and Steve Bannon!!!
And those globalist/WEFers played Trump and played him and played him!!!
And the Twitter Files show just how involved Barr was with the 2020 election fraud and — in a subtle fashion —- the Russiagate Hoax!!!
And with Manchurian Joe, we are all in jeopardy . . .
Well said Sgt.