Changing China's Strategic Calculations Over North Korea

North Korea’s test this past March of a new ICBM capable of reaching the U.S. – which may also be capable of carrying multiple warheads, evading our defenses – revealed a giant gap in U.S. national security strategy: We have no effective strategy for constraining North Korea’s nuclear missile program. 

But at the moment, China is in no mood to cooperate with us. It has assisted North Korea in evading the very U.N. sanctions that it approved – on coal exports, for example. Beijing has even hindered the preparation of the U.N. report monitoring U.N. sanctions against North Korea.

It is time to try something different. Something aimed not at economics but at national security sensitivities we know China has – one sensitivity in particular. In 2016 South Korea’s announced that it would deploy a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system to defend against North Korean missiles. It is not too much to say that China went ballistic.

South Korea’s recent election of Yoon Suk-yeol as its new President offers the Biden Administration an excellent opportunity to change China’s current calculus:  Yoon has advocated additional THAAD batteries to protect Seoul, and an enhanced security relationship with the U.S. and Japan.

The Biden administration should embrace President Yoon’s vision. In coordination with South Korea and Japan, the U.S. should announce a decision to install a perimeter of anti-missile defense systems around North Korea, stretching from South Korea through the Japanese islands to Guam, unless Pyongyang abandons its nuclear program. 

Japan already appears open to such a perimeter. It has announced preparations to install anti-ship and anti-aircraft missile batteries at Ishigaki — one of its islands near the Senkaku Islands that are also claimed by China. Tokyo's willingness to do this, despite the anticipated Chinese reaction, suggests that Japan would also cooperate in establishing a defensive perimeter to guard against North Korean missiles.

There are four obvious benefits to building this defensive perimeter:

First, the beauty of a defensive perimeter is that it is, by definition, defensive. America and its allies can hardly be faulted for protecting themselves from North Korean missiles, including ICBMs capable of striking the U.S. 

Second, an announcement of a credible commitment to install such a perimeter could immediately change Beijing’s calculus even before it is installed. After all, President Reagan's credible commitment to pursuing the Strategic Defense Initiative was enough to alter Soviet behavior. And President Nixon's anti-ballistic missile (ABM) treaty with the Soviet Union in 1972 was only made possible by Congress's authorization in 1969 of an ABM system, demonstrating our national intent to develop such systems.

Third, now is a critical time to halt this testing. ICBMs are complex systems that require constant testing during development in order to identify and correct design defects. We must implement an effective strategy to either neutralize the threat or pressure North Korea to abandon its nuclear missile program before it further tests and presumably improves its ICBMs. An unconstrained North Korean nuclear program would otherwise undermine the credibility of our alliance with South Korea. As H.R. McMaster has observed, the North Korean nuclear arsenal is designed to "make the United States think twice about ever coming to South Korea's aid in time of war." Wouldn't it be better for the U.S. to make North Korea think twice?

Fourth, if such an announcement does not result in effective pressure on North Korea, the accelerated installation of a defensive perimeter could be effective against North Korean missiles aimed at South Korea and Japan, and even against ICBMs. While intercepting an ICBM during its boost phase is difficult, that defense has a better prospect of success when the rocket is launched from a small geographic region, like North Korea. And, of course, the installation of a defensive perimeter would also give China second thoughts about invading Taiwan.

Finally, if China assists in pressuring North Korea to abandon its nuclear missile program in return for an agreement to limit the installation of an anti-missile perimeter, that negotiation could launch broader and unprecedented arms control talks between Washington and Beijing. 

So, there is much to gain from a coordinated announcement of an anti-missile defense perimeter against North Korea. And to those concerned that China might claim that such action is provocative, preparing to defend against nuclear provocation is not provocation. It is deterrence. Failing to defend against nuclear provocation is surrender.  

Daniel M. Kolkey was an associate justice on the California Court of Appeal (1998-2003) and legal affairs secretary and counsel to Gov. Pete Wilson (1995-1998). He is a partner in Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher and member of the board of the California-based Pacific Research Institute.