Nuclear weapons proliferate to new countries due to several variables:
- long term strategic competition
(eg. India vs Pakistan, Russia vs US vs China, India vs China, Israel vs eventually Iran,
UK vs Russia, North Korea vs eventually South Korea)
- building up nuclear forces as an asymmetric measure to compensate for weaker conventional forces
: Pakistan with its much smaller conventional forces than India
: UK and France with much smaller conventional forces than Russia
- a mixture of prestige and/or being part of the top-table nuclear weapons owning club and/or regime
justification (parts of that mixture belong to all nuclear weapons powers)
- real or perceived current or future removal of extended deterrence/nuclear umbrella
: North Korea may perceive that it can no longer rely on China to protect it. In any case
China has invaded the Korean peninsula many times in history and China has
contingency plans to invade North Korea again. See Korea from 650 AD on.
: South Korea, then Japan and Taiwan feel less certain that the US under Trump would be
prepared to defend them with nuclear weapons
: all countries in East Asia, along with Australia, feel they are in closer range of North Korean nuclear missiles than the US while also having weaker anti-missile defences than the US
: Australia is mindful that South Korea then Japan may nuclear arm themselves (become
nuclear tipping points or part of a proliferation cascade). South Korean and Japanese
armament may occur in the next 10 - 20 years in reaction to North Korea nuclear and
the Trump initiated isolationist trend
North Korea and Trump's Surprises are unnerving the East Asian - Australian region towards a conclusion that Australia should nuclear arm itself. But how does Australia start? See part 3 of 5.
Pete
- long term strategic competition
(eg. India vs Pakistan, Russia vs US vs China, India vs China, Israel vs eventually Iran,
UK vs Russia, North Korea vs eventually South Korea)
- building up nuclear forces as an asymmetric measure to compensate for weaker conventional forces
: Pakistan with its much smaller conventional forces than India
: UK and France with much smaller conventional forces than Russia
- a mixture of prestige and/or being part of the top-table nuclear weapons owning club and/or regime
justification (parts of that mixture belong to all nuclear weapons powers)
- real or perceived current or future removal of extended deterrence/nuclear umbrella
: North Korea may perceive that it can no longer rely on China to protect it. In any case
China has invaded the Korean peninsula many times in history and China has
contingency plans to invade North Korea again. See Korea from 650 AD on.
: South Korea, then Japan and Taiwan feel less certain that the US under Trump would be
prepared to defend them with nuclear weapons
: all countries in East Asia, along with Australia, feel they are in closer range of North Korean nuclear missiles than the US while also having weaker anti-missile defences than the US
: Australia is mindful that South Korea then Japan may nuclear arm themselves (become
nuclear tipping points or part of a proliferation cascade). South Korean and Japanese
armament may occur in the next 10 - 20 years in reaction to North Korea nuclear and
the Trump initiated isolationist trend
North Korea and Trump's Surprises are unnerving the East Asian - Australian region towards a conclusion that Australia should nuclear arm itself. But how does Australia start? See part 3 of 5.
Pete
1 comment:
None of the those powers will ever make a nuclear weapon, with the possible exception of Japan. The Chinese will simply devastate their economies if they attempt to do so. The Japanese are sufficiently stuborn, close at hand, and capable of developing a nuclear weapon in ~six months that they might stage a break out. Australia and ROK never will hit this point.
Josh
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