The Institute for Far Eastern Studies, Kyungnam University (Director Kwan-Sei Lee) held the 8th Samcheong Forum on Thursday, May 16. Bruce W. Bennett (Senior Defence Analyst, RAND Corporation) gave a presentation on the topic of “Responding to South Korea's Security Challenges.”

“North Korea will not give up its nuclear weapons program, which is Kim Jong-Un's sole achievement,” Bennett said in his presentation, adding that “North Korea's nuclear development has accelerated while the US, South Korea, and the international community have stood idly by, and Kim Jong-un has ordered an exponential increase in its nuclear warhead stockpile.” In Bennett’s view, South Korea must prepare for North Korea's future nuclear capability. “North Korea's Kim Jong Un wants to disrupt the US-South Korea alliance, and nuclear weapons are a prerequisite for that,” he said, adding that “North Korea cannot gain superiority over the South with conventional weapons, so it will have no choice but to use nuclear weapons if it invades the South. . . . We must have a strong deterrent force against North Korea.”

He said that nuclear nonproliferation is a fundamental US position, and it is difficult for South Korea to build its own nuclear arsenal due to concerns about the reaction of neighboring countries such as China, resistance from the public in South Korea, and lack of self-sufficiency of the raw uranium. He argued that the US and South Korea should consider “starting to modernize nuclear weapons storage facilities in South Korea if North Korea does not freeze its nuclear program” as an option that could be pursued. Bennett also suggested that the United States and South Korea could conduct information operations against North Korea, such as mass distribution of USBs containing K-pop and K-dramas to North Korea, which would have a significant effect even if only 5 percent of the North Korean population were to receive them. The United States and South Korea could also consider intensifying their cultural offensive against North Korea by inviting top graduate students from North Korea to study at US universities and expanding opportunities for overseas cultural contacts.