[Global NK Commentary] A Strategic Reinterpretation of the North Korean Nuclear Issue: A Failed Denuclearization or a Successful Active Management?

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1. Problem Statement: Structural Flaws in the Dominant Narrative

The dominant narrative surrounding the North Korean nuclear issue is straightforward: North Korea pursued nuclear development, and the United States attempted to prevent it but has failed. This narrative has dominated South Korea's security discourse for over 30 years, accepted as a self-evident premise by bureaucrats, experts, and academics alike.

Recently, voices calling for a change in nuclear policy toward North Korea have grown louder, extending this narrative. In his 2026 Foreign Affairs article, “North Korea as It Is: The Case for a Cold Peace,” Victor Cha expressed the recognition that realistically sustaining the denuclearization-first framework across seven administrations is virtually impossible, urging a shift to a “cold peace” strategy focused on deterrence, arms control, crisis management, and non-proliferation. His argument, however, still rests on the same premise: the change is in the prescription, not the premise. Because pursuing denuclearization has become difficult, the policy goals should be changed.

However, such arguments still sidestep a fundamental question: Was the ultimate goal and path of the North Korean nuclear policy chosen by the United States truly about denuclearization itself, or was it an element placed within a structural framework that prioritized China strategy above all else? Urging policy changes without properly verifying the premise itself is akin to questioning only the prescription without verifying the misdiagnosis. Unless the fundamental premise is questioned, there is a risk that so-called 'new' prescriptions will merely be an extension of the same structural error.

The dominant narrative suffers from a fundamental explanatory deficit. The premise that the sole superpower, in a period without any substantial strategic competitors after the collapse of the Soviet Union, could not prevent a nuclear development by the world's poorest nation, mired in extreme economic hardship and diplomatic isolation, for approximately 20 years, is counterintuitive in itself. Especially considering that in the 1990s, the U.S. clearly possessed the capability to strike North Korea's nuclear facilities at Yongbyon, and North Korea was not merely a weak state but was facing collapse without external support, the dominant narrative carries a significant explanatory burden.[1]Despite this, the narrative built on this premise is still accepted as self-evident and natural today.[2]Furthermore, the consistency in U.S. policy patterns toward North Korea is noteworthy. During that 20-year period, there is a tendency to emphasize only the superficial differences in approach among the Clinton, Bush, and Obama administrations. Clinton advocated engagement, Bush pushed for pressure, and Obama pursued strategic patience. However, despite these rhetorical differences and certain variations, all three administrations maintained a remarkably consistent policy spectrum.

Before the actual emergence of the North Korean nuclear issue, the policy options available to the United States were essentially limited to four. First is the acceptance of North Korea's nuclear armament as a fait accompli. Second is military resolution, meaning denuclearization through physical force, such as the destruction of nuclear facilities or regime change. Third is diplomatic resolution, implying voluntary denuclearization through guarantees of regime security and normalization of U.S.-North Korea relations, as demanded by North Korea. Fourth is the combination of carrots and sticks, employing sanctions and joint exercises alongside dialogue and aid. The three administrations consistently pursued only the fourth option.

The core difference among these options lies in the structural characteristic shared by the first three. Each of these options has a high probability of resolving the North Korean nuclear issue in the short term. However, precisely for this reason, these options conflict with securing the strategic time and posture necessary for China strategy. Accepting North Korea's nuclear armament would immediately weaken the security dependence of allies on the U.S. If a military option succeeded, the collapse of the North Korean regime or denuclearization would shake the division structure, potentially weakening or eliminating the rationale for the U.S. military presence in Korea. The option of normalizing relations with North Korea, thereby guaranteeing its regime security and integrating it into the international community, would also increase the possibility of the threat structure being resolved and the basis for U.S. military presence and alliance cohesion in the region weakening. In other words, the direction of these three policy options all carry the potential to undermine the core cornerstone of China strategy.

Conversely, only the fourth option fulfills this structural necessity. By maintaining the regional threat at a manageable level without eliminating or resolving it, it achieves three effects simultaneously: it structurally sustains the rationale for U.S. military presence and ROK-U.S.-Japan cooperation, it continues the engagement policy that deepens economic interdependence with China, and it secures strategic time to maintain a hedging posture that allows for flexible responses depending on China's strategic direction. This is why the fourth option was the only path. In fact, all three U.S. administrations consistently adopted only the last option. Conversely, this suggests that the range of policy choices toward North Korea has been consistently constrained within the structural framework of the U.S. strategy toward China.

Even setting aside the discussion of the possibilities and implications of this structural policy direction, it is clear that the policy's effectiveness toward 'denuclearization' has been repeatedly confirmed as limited. Nevertheless, if three different administrations persisted with the same option for 20 years, it would be more accurate to interpret this not as a series of repeated and accumulated judgment failures by each administration, but as the operation of structural constraints that converged their judgments in the same direction. If policy failures of a similar spectrum were repeated for 20 years, there should have been attempts to move beyond or fundamentally revise that spectrum at some point. However, this did not happen across the three administrations.

This paper starts from the structural limitations of the dominant narrative. By reinterpreting U.S. policy toward North Korea not as a simple 'denuclearization failure' but as a means of 'active management' within the framework of its China strategy—that is, by viewing it as a result of consistently choosing the fourth option within the structural logic that prioritizes China strategy—the past 30 years can be explained with a much more consistent logic. This is the core thesis of this paper.

2. The Explanatory Gaps in the Dominant Narrative

The narrative that 'the United States attempted to prevent North Korea's nuclear development but failed' has long been accepted as a self-evident premise. However, the perception of this narrative as self-evident is not the result of verification but of repetition and dissemination. In reality, this narrative harbors fundamental explanatory gaps when connected with strategic priorities, power differentials, and policy consistency.

First, it is difficult to explain why the U.S., which prioritizes its China strategy, would have consistently pursued North Korean denuclearization as its top priority for 20 years, a goal structurally incompatible with that strategy. Furthermore, from the perspective of power dynamics, the fact that the actor with overwhelming superior capability never employed a decisive measure against the world's poorest nation cannot be explained by simple policy failure. In terms of policy consistency, the fact that three different administrations chose the same option for 20 years, despite repeated confirmation of its ineffectiveness, cannot be dismissed as mere coincidence or incompetence.

Here, it is crucial how we interpret this consistency that transcends administrations. Interpreting it as a design established at a specific point in time being inherited by subsequent administrations is an unlikely hypothesis and difficult to prove. However, the core logic of the U.S. strategy toward China—namely, maintaining U.S. military presence in the region, strengthening ROK-U.S.-Japan cooperation, and avoiding burdens that directly target China—has been structurally maintained regardless of changes in administration. As long as this structure persists, the scope of available options in North Korea policy has been structurally constrained. In other words, it is highly probable that similar structural constraints have led to a convergence of policy judgments within a consistent spectrum.

The aforementioned explanatory gaps in the dominant narrative are significant individually, but cumulatively, they reveal that the prevailing narrative of 'failed denuclearization' is not a self-contained conclusion based on self-evident grounds. Moreover, it demonstrates a greater argumentative weakness compared to the 'successful active management' thesis. Nevertheless, the dominant narrative has circulated as a self-evident premise without confronting or examining these explanatory gaps.

The responses that the dominant narrative can offer to the aforementioned logical gaps are limited, and each carries serious logical flaws. First, regarding the military option, proponents of the dominant narrative often attempt to explain its limitations by citing "instability on the Korean Peninsula in case of North Korean collapse" or "concerns about damage to allies." However, this explanation actually weakens the dominant narrative. If concerns about North Korean collapse and Korean Peninsula instability existed, it implies a preference for maintaining the status quo over denuclearization. This aligns more closely with the core argument of the active management thesis.

Another possible response is that "each administration genuinely desired denuclearization, but repeatedly failed due to North Korea's brinkmanship and China's lack of cooperation." However, this explanation faces an unavoidable dilemma. First, the fact that China provides food and energy to North Korea has been public knowledge since the mid-1990s. Nevertheless, the absence of any decisive attempts by the U.S. to compel China to cease its support suggests that denuclearization was a lower priority than managing relations with China.

More decisively, if we admit that it was difficult for the U.S. to cut off aid to North Korea because engagement with China was more important in the long term, that admission itself supports the active management thesis. In other words, it confirms that China strategy was structurally prioritized over denuclearization. The explanation 'failed because of China' is ultimately no different from confessing 'relations with China were more important than denuclearization.' Whichever way you choose, the explanation that denuclearization was a substantive goal in itself for the U.S. does not hold.

Conversely, the strongest counterargument to the 'active management thesis' is the lack of direct evidence that the U.S. intentionally encouraged North Korea's nuclear armament. However, if this standard is applied consistently, all strategically concealed state actions become fundamentally unanalyzable. More crucially, when the dominant narrative fails to answer the preceding questions, the only remaining explanation is the 'active management thesis.' Presenting the absence of direct evidence as grounds for refutation is logically valid only when other explanations are at play.

Furthermore, demanding publicly available direct evidence for intentions that, if exposed, would lead to the collapse of the alliance system and the impossibility of achieving strategic objectives, may not be an appropriate standard. Strategy involves exposure when it serves the objective, concealment when it serves the objective, and acting in opposition to intentions when necessary. The absence of direct evidence does not prove the absence of intent. Therefore, the criterion for judgment should not be the presence or absence of direct evidence, but rather the extent to which available evidence converges more coherently with a particular hypothesis.

3. Analytical Framework: The North Korean Nuclear Issue is Not Confined to the Korean Peninsula

The starting point for strategic reinterpretation is an accurate understanding of the U.S.'s grand strategic priorities. The overarching goal that permeates U.S. foreign and security policy is not the prevention of nuclear proliferation or the spread of democracy, but rather (as realist international relations theories commonly point out) the deterrence of the rise of another potential hegemonic power besides the United States. In U.S. foreign policy, normative goals such as nuclear non-proliferation or human rights are subordinate to the overarching goal of deterring hegemonic competition.

The starting point for strategic reinterpretation is an accurate understanding of U.S. grand strategy priorities. The overarching goal that permeates U.S. foreign and security policy is not the prevention of nuclear proliferation or the promotion of democracy, but rather, as realist international relations theories commonly point out, the deterrence of the rise of another potential hegemonic power besides the United States. Normative goals such as preventing nuclear proliferation or promoting human rights are subordinate to the supreme goal of deterring hegemonic competition in U.S. foreign policy.

This is not an abstract assertion but a historically confirmed pattern. In the case of nuclear non-proliferation, the U.S. effectively condoned the nuclear development of the United Kingdom and France, judging it to contribute to the containment of the Soviet Union, and maintained a policy of "nuclear ambiguity" for decades, tacitly acknowledging Israel's nuclear armament without officially recognizing it.[3]Regarding Pakistan, the U.S. effectively allowed its nuclear development after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, citing its strategic value against the USSR, and in 2005, it post-facto recognized a nuclear state outside the NPT regime by signing a civilian nuclear cooperation agreement with India.[4]

The same applies to democracy. The U.S. has willingly cooperated with authoritarian regimes that align with its national interests, while not hesitating to overthrow democratically elected governments if they threaten its strategic interests. Cases such as Iran (1953), Guatemala (1954), and Chile (1973) demonstrate that democracy was not an end goal of U.S. foreign policy but a selectively utilized rhetoric. In short, nuclear non-proliferation and the spread of democracy were not objectives of U.S. foreign policy but means to maintain hegemony.

From this perspective, while the North Korean issue is the top strategic priority for South Korea, for the United States, the North Korean issue is a subordinate issue within its overarching strategic goal, namely, its China strategy. In other words, South Korea and the United States view North Korea from different levels. This implies that both South Korea and North Korea can function as means for the United States to pursue its top strategic goals.

Viewed through this analytical framework, a new interpretation of key phases related to the North Korean nuclear issue becomes possible. The author has already expressed views on the dominant narrative concerning the 1994 Yongbyon crisis. Additionally, declassified documents from the Bush administration in 1991-1992 show that while the State Department sought an exchange of denuclearization for normalized relations during the Geneva Agreed Framework negotiations, the Department of Defense sought to delete any mention of normalized relations. This aligns with the internal dynamics reconstructed by Sigal (1998) in Disarming Strangers. Although Gallucci was from the State Department, the substantive direction of the negotiations followed the framework of the Department of Defense.

The Department of Defense's focus on freezing additional fissile material production, rather than complete denuclearization, was intended to keep options open during a period of strategic uncertainty. In 1993, the U.S. was uncertain whether China would ultimately pursue hegemony. If China did not pursue hegemony, North Korea's nuclear armament would be unnecessary; however, if it did, it could serve as a key justification for U.S. military rearmament and the maintenance of the regional alliance system. The Geneva Agreed Framework was a structure to secure strategic time for preserving options during this period of strategic uncertainty. As China's rise accelerated and the U.S. increasingly viewed China as a potential hegemonic competitor, the more the contours of its China strategy became clear, the more this structural logic constrained policy choices toward North Korea in the same direction, regardless of changes in administration.

4. Structural Continuity and U.S. Strategy Toward North Korea as Shown by Official Documents

There is abundant official documentation to support this argument. Representative documents that directly illustrate how U.S. strategies toward North Korea and China were designed and implemented from 1991 to 2000 include NSR-28, commissioned by President Bush in 1991; the so-called 'Nye Report' released in February 1995; and the Armitage Report released in March 1999.

The first document, NSR-28 (National Security Review 28), was a directive from President Bush in 1991 to comprehensively review East Asia and Korean Peninsula policy in the immediate aftermath of the Cold War. The publicly released Terms of Reference indicate that this document was not merely a review of responses to the North Korean nuclear issue. The directive explicitly asked, "How does the issue of nuclear non-proliferation link with other major U.S. goals and interests in the region?" Denuclearization was set from the outset not as an independent goal but as a subordinate issue to overarching strategic goals. Furthermore, the question, "How much longer will South Korea wait before taking action?" reveals that allied South Korea was treated not as a partner but as a variable to be managed. Moreover, the request to evaluate North Korea's 'response' to pressure and incentives shows that the combination of carrots and sticks was designed as a policy option from the beginning. Finally, the question regarding cooperation with China, the Soviet Union, and Japan indicates that North Korean denuclearization was considered in conjunction with the new regional structure. This 1991 document can be seen as the origin point where the structural constraints that would shape the next 20 years were formed.

The second document is the 'Nye Report' (United States Security Strategy for the East Asia-Pacific Region), released in February 1995. The preface signed by Secretary of Defense Perry states: "The Department of Defense's strategic reports of 1990 and 1992 envisioned reductions in forward-deployed forces in the region. However, this year's report reaffirms the maintenance of a stable forward presence of approximately 100,000 troops."

The timing of this reversal is critical. In 1995, immediately following the 1994 Geneva Agreed Framework, the permanent forward deployment in the region was officially declared. As part of a comprehensive consideration of the role of a regional stabilizer to fill the power vacuum in East Asia after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the maintenance of the North Korean nuclear issue as a manageable threat, rather than its resolution, was structurally necessary to justify the U.S. presence in the region. The report explicitly identified the rise of China and the North Korean nuclear issue as the two main justifications for maintaining U.S. forward deployment in the region, formalizing the "engage while hedging" approach to China strategy.

The third documents are Armitage's "A Comprehensive Approach to North Korea" (1999) and the Armitage-Nye joint report (The United States and Japan: Advancing Toward a Mature Partnership) (2000). The "Should Diplomacy Fail" section of the 1999 report is particularly noteworthy in relation to the argument of this paper. Armitage explicitly stated, "The one core element that continues in this construct, irrespective of North Korea's response, is strengthening U.S. leadership in maintaining stability and enhancing security in this critical region." This officially stated in a policy document that the goals of strengthening U.S. military presence in the region and deepening ROK-U.S. security cooperation would be pursued independently, regardless of the success or failure of denuclearization diplomacy. It means that a 'comprehensive approach' to North Korea would proceed 'irrespective of North Korea's response.'

The 2000 joint report urged a shift from "burden-sharing" to "power-sharing" in the U.S.-Japan alliance, extending this logic to the entire alliance structure. The fact that Armitage, Kelly, Wolfowitz, and Green, who participated in drafting the report, later held key positions in the Bush administration suggests that this logic was not merely a policy recommendation but was implemented as actual policy.

These documents show a consistent flow, indicating that the structural logic of prioritizing China strategy and maintaining North Korea as a manageable threat remained unshaken. The official documents demonstrate why each administration, while making independent judgments, inevitably converged on the same structural constraints.

Notably, the 1996 Taiwan Strait crisis served as a turning point that reinforced this structure. As China launched missiles in the Taiwan Strait and the U.S. dispatched an aircraft carrier group, the trend of officially designating China as a potential hegemonic competitor accelerated. Around the same time, as North Korea was on the verge of collapse due to the collapse of the Soviet Union and the 'Arduous March,' China began providing food and energy to prevent the loss of a 'strategic buffer zone.' From the U.S. perspective, this was a clear signal that China intended to use North Korea as a buffer against the U.S. in the future. This shift in perception led to the hardening of the Bush administration's policy toward North Korea, culminating in the breakdown of the Geneva Agreed Framework through Kelly's visit in 2002 and the persistent refusal of bilateral dialogue with North Korea.

Therefore, the simultaneous demonization and management of North Korea is not a contradiction. Rather, it most clearly reveals the core of the active management thesis. Demonizing North Korea, imposing sanctions, and strengthening joint exercises simultaneously achieve strategic effects: increasing allies' security dependence, reinforcing the rationale for U.S. military presence, and securing the legitimacy of the containment strategy against China. At the same time, by refraining from employing decisive measures to achieve denuclearization, it maintains the structure under which North Korea's nuclear development and capability enhancement proceed. Within the logic that prioritizes China strategy, these two pillars function not in contradiction but in mutual complementarity.

For this strategy to work, its true intentions must not be exposed. As the author pointed out in a previous commentary, "The U.S. pincer strategy worked only when its true intentions were not deciphered by both allies and adversaries." If allies like South Korea were to understand the U.S.'s real intentions, they would question the rationale for the U.S. military presence, and if North Korea grasped this, negotiation leverage would not be established. The outward actions pointing in opposite directions are a structural necessity of this strategy, and therefore, interpreting the absence of direct evidence as the absence of intent is logically unsound.

Consequently, the Clinton administration's eight years of policy toward North Korea operated in a direction that prevented North Korea's collapse. This was not due to mere humanitarian impulses. The Department of Defense's official declaration of permanent forward deployment in the region through the Nye Report immediately after the 1994 Geneva Agreed Framework precisely aligns with the structural logic that the U.S. military posture in the region is justified when North Korea is maintained as a 'manageable threat' without collapsing. Even when former Secretary of Defense Perry recommended comprehensive engagement with North Korea in his 1999 review report, the premise of that recommendation was the gradual management of the threat, not the immediate collapse of the North Korean regime or complete denuclearization.

The subsequent 16 years under the Bush and Obama administrations structurally maintained an environment where North Korea gradually acquired nuclear and missile capabilities to strike South Korea and Japan. In short, despite rhetorical differences between administrations, the substantive outcome of not collapsing North Korea and not completely denuclearizing it was consistently maintained. This was not a succession of a specific initial design but the result of the structural logic, which prioritized China strategy, constraining the policy choices toward North Korea in each administration in the same direction.

5. Implications for South Korean Security Discourse

Joel S. Wit, in his insider account of 30 years of U.S. nuclear diplomacy with North Korea, diagnoses the failure as stemming from the U.S.'s genuine desire for denuclearization. In a review of this book, Gallucci posed the question: "How could the world's most powerful superpower fail to prevent one of the world's poorest nations from acquiring nuclear weapons for 30 years?" This paper seeks the answer to this question in the structural constraints of China strategy.

Returning to Victor Cha's recent argument mentioned at the outset, he acknowledges the failure of the denuclearization framework across seven administrations and calls for a transition to "cold peace." However, if the thesis of this paper is correct, his prescription signifies not a shift in strategy but the continuation of a sustained strategy into its next phase. If denuclearization was not the substantive top priority from the beginning, then the argument to abandon it and shift to deterrence and management is, from the U.S. perspective, merely formalizing what has already been practiced. When the premise changes, the meaning of the prescription also changes.

Depending on which interpretation is correct, South Korea's task fundamentally changes. If the reinterpretation of this paper is correct, South Korea's security discourse regarding North Korea requires fundamental re-examination. South Korean security discourse has operated under the premise that "the U.S. attempted to prevent North Korea's nuclear development together with South Korea." If this premise is correct, South Korea's task is to help the U.S. do better next time. However, if, as the thesis of this paper suggests, the U.S. has pursued its strategy from an asymmetrical position, prioritizing China strategy above all else and thus prioritizing North Korea within that strategy, then South Korea's future strategy must change.

Continuing to define North Korea simply as a 'threat' and assuming that the strategic objectives of the U.S. and South Korea are identical may allow South Korea to be instrumentalized within the larger framework of strategically utilizing that threat. As long as South Korea perceives North Korea solely as a threat, it will inevitably rely on the framework for managing that threat. And South Korea is not the designer of that framework.

Therefore, South Korean security discourse must begin by facing the differences in strategic interests that major powers construct through the medium of the North Korean nuclear issue, moving beyond merely considering North Korea as a threat. By directly confronting questions such as what structural and functional meaning North Korea and its nuclear weapons hold for major powers, and how each country's strategy pursued through the medium of the North Korean nuclear issue differs from others, without being obscured by ideology, it will be possible to derive optimal North Korea and regional strategies for South Korea. Just as facing the asymmetry of the alliance does not equate to its negation, raising these questions does not weaken South Korea's security. Rather, it is the starting point for substantially securing the foundation upon which South Korea can pursue its security and diplomacy with its own eyes.

In conclusion, South Korea's defense strategy must begin by facing the structural asymmetry of the alliance. Moving beyond a passive perception and attitude of being blindly mobilized for the U.S. China strategy, South Korea must redefine strategic flexibility of U.S. Forces Korea, alliance modernization, and wartime operational control issues from the perspective of South Korean national interest. Furthermore, the transition to a parallel command structure to institutionally support such strategic autonomy will be a key variable determining the stability and sustainability of the ROK-U.S. alliance in the future. ■Distinguishes the period from North Korea's second nuclear test in 2009 as a turning point when North Korea secured a significant nuclear warhead yield.

[2] For North Korea's economic vulnerability in the 1990s, see Noland, Marcus, Sherman Robinson, and Tao Wang, "Famine in North Korea: Causes and Cures," Economic Development and Cultural Change 49(4), 2001, pp. 741–767. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union and the sharp decline in energy and food aid, North Korea was effectively unable to survive without external assistance.

[3] For Israel's policy of nuclear ambiguity and U.S. acquiescence, see Cohen, Avner, The Bomb that Never Was: The Making of Israel's Nuclear Policy (New York: Columbia University Press, 1998); Hersh, Seymour M., The Samson Option: Israel's Nuclear Arsenal and American Foreign Policy (New York: Random House, 1991). For the U.S. acceptance of British and French nuclear development within the context of Soviet containment strategy, see Gavin, Francis J., Nuclear Statecraft: History and Strategy in America's Atomic Age (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2012), pp. 40–75.

[4] For the U.S. strategic neglect of Pakistan's nuclear development, see National Security Archive, "The United States and Pakistan's Quest for the Bomb," Electronic Briefing Book, 2010. For the strategic implications of the U.S.-India Civil Nuclear Agreement in 2005, see Perkovich, George, "Faulty Promises: The U.S.-India Nuclear Deal," Carnegie Endowment Policy Outlook, September 2005.

References

Korean Language References

Kwon Young-geun. 『The Hidden Truth of North Korea's Nuclear Armament』. Seoul: Sidae Publishing, 2023.

Jeon Jae-woo. "Strategic Reinterpretation of the 1994 Yongbyon Crisis." GlobalNK Commentary, East Asia Institute, 2026.

English Language References

Allison, Graham. Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides's Trap? Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2017.

Armitage, Richard L. A Comprehensive Approach to North Korea. INSS Strategic Forum No. 159. Washington: National Defense University, March 1999.

Armitage, Richard L., and Joseph S. Nye. The United States and Japan: Advancing Toward a Mature Partnership. INSS Special Report. Washington: National Defense University, October 2000.

Blum, William. Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA Interventions since World War II. Monroe: Common Courage Press, 2004.

Cha, Victor. "North Korea as It Is: The Case for a Cold Peace." Foreign Affairs, May/June 2026.

Cohen, Avner. The Bomb that Never Was: The Making of Israel's Nuclear Policy. New York: Columbia University Press, 1998.

DePetris, Daniel. "Newly Declassified Documents Prove America's North Korea Strategy Has Failed." The National Interest, November 22, 2017.

Gavin, Francis J. Nuclear Statecraft: History and Strategy in America's Atomic Age. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2012.

Hersh, Seymour M. The Samson Option: Israel's Nuclear Arsenal and American Foreign Policy. New York: Random House, 1991.

Kinzer, Stephen. Overthrow: America's Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq. New York: Times Books, 2006.

Mann, James. About Face: A History of America's Curious Relationship with China, from Nixon to Clinton. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1999.

Noland, Marcus, Sherman Robinson, and Tao Wang. "Famine in North Korea: Causes and Cures." Economic Development and Cultural Change 49(4), 2001.

Nye, Joseph S. "East Asian Security: The Case for Deep Engagement." Foreign Affairs 74(4), July/August 1995.

Oberdorfer, Don, and Robert Carlin. The Two Koreas: A Contemporary History. 3rd ed.. New York: Basic Books, 2014.

Perkovich, George. "Faulty Promises: The U.S.-India Nuclear Deal." Carnegie Endowment Policy Outlook, September 2005.

Perry, William J. Review of United States Policy toward North Korea: Findings and Recommendations. Department of Defense, 1999.

Ross, Robert S. "The 1995–96 Taiwan Strait Confrontation: Coercion, Credibility, and Use of Force." International Security 25(2), Fall 2000.

Sigal, Leon V. Disarming Strangers: Nuclear Diplomacy with North Korea. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998.

Sigal, Leon V. "North Korea Is No Iraq: Pyongyang's Negotiating Strategy." Arms Control Today, December 2002.

Wit, Joel S. Fallout: The Inside Story of America's Failure to Disarm North Korea. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2025.

Wit, Joel S., Daniel B. Poneman, and Robert L. Gallucci. Going Critical: The First North Korean Nuclear Crisis. Washington: Brookings Institution Press, 2004.

Archival Document

National Security Archive. "North Korea and the United States: Declassified Documents from the Bush I and Clinton Administrations." Electronic Briefing Book No. 164, 2005.

National Security Review 28 (NSR-28). George Bush Presidential Library, 1991.

U.S. Department of Defense. United States Security Strategy for the East Asia-Pacific Region (Nye Report). Washington: DoD, 1995.

■ Jeon Jae-woo_Senior Fellow, Korea Institute for Defense Analyses (KIDA).

■ Editor: Lee Sang-jun_EAI Fellow; Oh In-hwan_EAI Senior Fellow

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