North Korea ultimately wants more nuclear weapons to use against US troops in South Korea and Japan in the event of an invasion, according to a professor at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies.
Professor Jeffrey Lewis of arms control said North Korea currently has the ability to use a small number of nuclear weapons against the United States.
“They have some sort of deterrence, but what I think North Korea really wants, is basically the ability to use a much larger number of nuclear weapons against American forces there,” he told CNBC. Korea and Japan if they think an invasion is going on. “Squawk Box Asia” in Monday.
“This is part of [an] … The alarming change in the way they approach nuclear weapons, and that change is really giving them the ability to use nuclear weapons first if they think they are about to be invaded,” he said. .
His opinion comes later North Korea conducts another missile test on Sunday.
State news agency KCNA reported that Kim had “gave important instructions on further strengthening the country’s nuclear warfare and defense capabilities.”
“The North Koreans are really committed to changing their nuclear policy,” Lewis said.
He said the missile looked like “another variant” of the short-range missile and it was “more like” North Korea’s – but it was “still quite unwelcome.”
Nuclear weapons testing?
According to Lewis, North Korea is now moving towards a nuclear weapons test, more than four years since the last one in 2017.
“In a sense, the gloves were off,” he said. “They don’t really feel constrained by any of the commitments they made in 2018 when the diplomatic era began, and we’re seeing a lot of activity at the nuclear test site as well.”
During his presidency, the President of the United States Donald Trump hold two summits with Kim to discuss the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula. The second event, in Hanoi, ended abruptly when The two sides were unable to agree on the lifting of sanctions.
Mr. Lewis said that North Korea closed the entrances to the nuclear test tunnels in 2018, but it most likely reopened them.
Satellite images taken in March show built at the site where North Korea has conducted all its previous nuclear testsReuters reported.
The professor said Kim will now decide when he wants to test nuclear weapons.
“If we know one thing, we know that there will be a nuclear test when Kim Jong Un feels like it,” he added.
