U.S. wary as Kim’s talk turns bellicose
WASHINGTON — North Korean leader Kim Jong Un could take some form of lethal military action against South Korea in the coming months after having shifted to a policy of open hostility, U.S. officials say.
The officials have assessed Kim’s recent harder line is part of a pattern of provocations, but added his declarations have been more aggressive than previous statements and should be taken seriously.
While the officials said they did not see an imminent risk of a full-scale war on the Korean Peninsula, Kim could carry out strikes in a way he thinks would avoid rapid escalation.
They pointed to North Korea’s shelling of a South Korean island in 2010 as an example. The two sides exchanged artillery fire, resulting in the reported deaths of troops on both sides as well as civilians in the South, but both militaries soon stopped.
Jonathan Finer, the White House deputy national security adviser, said at an Asia Society forum in Washington on Thursday that North Korea had “chosen to continue going down a very negative path.”
Kim’s more aggressive posture has been evident through a series of actions this month. On Wednesday, the North fired several cruise missiles from its west coast into the sea, the South Korean military said. Kim’s government announced Jan. 14 it had tested a new solid-fuel intermediate-range missile tipped with a hypersonic warhead.
And Jan. 5, his military fired hundreds of artillery shells into waters near South Korean islands, forcing some residents to seek shelter.
At the same time, Kim has decided to formally abandon a longtime official goal of peaceful reunification with South Korea, the North Korean state news media announced Jan. 16. Kim had signaled the move for months and said in a speech the day before conciliatory references to unity with the Republic of Korea, as the South is officially known, must be removed from the constitution.
“We can specify in our constitution the issue of completely occupying, subjugating and reclaiming the ROK and annexing it as a part of the territory of our republic in case a war breaks out on the Korean Peninsula,” Kim said.
The confluence of Kim’s policy shift and the projectile firings has caught the attention of U.S. officials who monitor North Korea, which has a nuclear weapons program and is under harsh United Nations sanctions.
Kim’s moves also appear to be shutting the door, for now, on any chance of diplomacy with the United States, which he has shunned since his face-to-face talks with former President Donald Trump failed in 2019.
And U.S. officials say the North Korean leader is likely feeling emboldened because of his growing partnership with Russia.
“The statements and policy changes are part of a broader strategy to destabilize and create anxiety,” said Jean H. Lee, a fellow at the East-West Center in Honolulu.
She added she thought Kim could take military action in an area like the West Sea or Yellow Sea, where there are South Korean islands — including one Kim’s father ordered shelled in 2010 — and where the North disputes a maritime border.
Two North Korea experts argued in an article this month the situation on the Korean Peninsula “is more dangerous than it has been at any time since early June 1950,” when Kim’s grandfather decided to invade the South.
But so far, U.S. agencies have not detected concrete signs North Korea is gearing up for combat or a major war, according to U.S. officials interviewed for this article, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence and diplomatic matters.
One official said North Korea’s decision to send large numbers of older artillery shells and smaller numbers of more modern ballistic missiles to Russia for its war in Ukraine showed Kim was not preparing for a prolonged conflict with the South. A leader planning for a major military operation would hoard his stocks of missiles and artillery shells, the official said.
A missile and artillery barrage of South Korea or a land invasion would almost certainly mean war with the United States. The U.S. military defended South Korea during the Korean War, which never officially ended but halted when an armistice was signed in 1953. Nearly 30,000 U.S. troops are based in South Korea.