Arms control withered further last August when Trump withdrew from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty with Russia. Like Obama before him, he accused Russia of covertly developing and deploying a banned intermediate-range cruise missile that could threaten both Europe and Asia, a charge Russia denied. Congress later authorized $10 million for tactical nuclear warheads to be mounted on intermediate-range ballistic missiles capable of reaching Russia after being launched from submarines in the region.57
The Defense and Energy appropriations bills signed into law in December provided the Trump administration with $30.8 billion to maintain and modernize the military’s nuclear arsenal and to pay for new nuclear-armed missiles, missile-launching submarines and long-range bombers.58
In what arms control advocates considered a hopeful sign, Putin announced late last year that he was ready to extend New START until 2026. Trump, however, refused to commit to its extension, citing his preference for a treaty that would include China.
In the end, 2019 came to a close with the future of New START, North Korea’s denuclearization and Iran’s nuclear program under clouds of uncertainty.
Current Situation
Korean Diplomacy Fizzles
Many analysts believe North Korean leader Kim is embarking upon a defiant path for 2020 with his year-end policy speech announcing he no longer feels bound by his self-imposed moratorium on missile tests. Kim cited President Trump’s failure to reciprocate with any relief from sanctions that have hobbled North Korea’s economy.
“If the U.S. persists in its hostile policy toward the DPRK, there will never be the denuclearization on the Korean Peninsula, and the DPRK will steadily develop necessary and prerequisite strategic weapons for the security of the state until the U.S. rolls back its hostile policy,” Kim said, using the initials of his country’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.59
Nevertheless, Trump continues to believe his personal rapport with Kim holds the promise for an historic agreement that would see the communist nation give up its nuclear weapons.
“Look, he likes me, I like him, we get along,” Trump said about his relationship with Kim while speaking to reporters on New Year’s Eve at his Mar-a-Lago resort. “But he did sign a contract, he did sign an agreement talking about denuclearization. … I think he’s a man of his word, so we’re going to find out.”60
In his speech, Kim appeared to leave the door open to further diplomacy by saying the nuclear tests would resume if Washington refused to drop its demands that North Korea first fully denuclearize. Further complicating any future negotiations is North Korea’s definition of denuclearization, which includes the removal of all U.S. nuclear forces from South Korea.
Since then, there has been no sign that Trump has softened his position. But Trump sent Kim birthday greetings in early January in a gesture that analysts said was aimed at defusing tensions and preparing the ground for another summit. In a response, carried by the official Korean Central News Agency, North Korean Foreign Ministry adviser Kim Kye Gwan said it would be “stupid” to expect that Kim’s personal relationship with Trump would be enough to restart negotiations.61
U.S. President Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev shake hands after signing the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) in 2010 in Prague. The pact committed the two nations to major nuclear arms cuts.
JOE KLAMAR/AFP via Getty Images
Talks will resume, he said, when Washington agrees to the proposal Kim put forward at his Hanoi summit with Trump last June: That North Korea would dismantle its principal nuclear facility at Yongbyon in exchange for the partial lifting of U.N. sanctions on North Korea. “There is no need for us to be present in such talks, in which there is only unilateral pressure,” Kim Kye Gwan said, “and we have no desire to barter something for other things at the talks, like traders.”62
On Capitol Hill, the eight Democratic senators who wrote to Trump in December urged him to come up with a comprehensive strategy to advance denuclearization talks, including a “phased process to verifiably dismantle the Yongbyon nuclear complex and other nuclear facilities.”63
But Kori Schake, who has served in senior policy positions at the Pentagon, State Department and National Security Council in both Democratic and Republican administrations, says the prospects for any progress toward North Korea’s denuclearization appear slim. “The Trump administration doesn’t appear to think that agreements require any compromise from them,” says Schake. “Most negotiations work better when your position isn’t ‘Give me everything first, and then I’ll give you something.’ They’re not invested in a process that builds confidence as it builds momentum.”
According to several independent experts who closely follow North Korean issues, the administration’s position has thwarted Stephen Biegun, Trump’s top North Korea negotiator, who has been unable to persuade Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to adopt a step-by-step negotiating process.
In an appearance on ABC’s “This Week” just before the new year, Robert O’Brien, Trump’s fourth national security adviser, echoed the president’s hard line, warning the United States will respond if North Korea resumes nuclear weapons and long-range ballistic missile tests.
At Issue
Is limited nuclear war a viable battlefield option?
Yes
John D. Maurer
Jeane Kirkpatrick Fellow, American Enterprise Institute
Written for CQ Researcher, February 2020
The most viable way to prevent a limited nuclear war is to be ready to fight one. As such, the United States must modernize its arsenal of tactical or so-called low-yield nuclear weapons, whose explosive power can range from the equivalent of 20 tons of TNT to as high as a Hiroshima-sized bomb, which was 16,000 tons. Fielding such weapons will ensure that U.S. leaders have options short of all-out war to respond to nuclear provocation and will signal to adversaries that they cannot hope to escalate their way out of a losing conventional battle. By closing off options for escalation, low-yield U.S. weapons will help deter adversaries from embarking on militarized crises in the first place. Furthermore, improving and expanding U.S. low-yield capabilities will create an incentive for rivals to take seriously proposals to eliminate such weapons.
Those who oppose the United States developing tactical nuclear weapons argue that they are destabilizing because the collateral damage they cause is small enough that decision-makers might be tempted to use them in a crisis. But nuclear war is only likely to occur against the backdrop of a major conventional war between the great powers. If one of those powers fears defeat on the conventional battlefield, it will face strong pressures to use nuclear weapons to stave off that loss.
The escalatory pressure emerges not from the character of the nuclear weapons themselves, but from the looming threat of conventional military humiliation. If the losing great power has low-yield weapons that it can use without fear of reprisal, nuclear war is all but assured. Only the threat of a proportional nuclear response would deter adversaries from using such weapons to stave off defeat.