OPINION — The mutual defense pact that Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean Chairman Kim Jong Un signed on June 19, was a victory for Mr. Putin and a major component of his strategy for Eurasia.
As Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine continues for its third year, with significant Russian casualties, Mr. Putin took the war to a new level with the threat of using nuclear weapons. He moved tactical nuclear weapons into neighboring Belarus – into the Kaliningrad Peninsula – several hundred miles closer to NATO territory. To ensure clarity of his intent, Mr. Putin also provided Belarus with nuclear capable Iskander missiles.
Last year, Mr. Putin announced the suspension of Russia’s participation in the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START), the only nuclear arms control treaty with Russia.
It’s not just for the President anymore. Cipher Brief Subscriber+Members have access to their own Open Source Daily Brief, keeping you up to date on global events impacting national security. It pays to be a Subscriber+Member.
A heavily sanctioned Russian Federation, bogged down and likely to lose its war of aggression in Ukraine, viewed North Korea as a potential ally and supplier of weaponry. In May 2022, Russia, with the support of China, vetoed a U.S.-drafted resolution in the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), proposing to strengthen sanctions on North Korea for the dozens of ballistic missiles launched that year, all in violation of UNSC resolutions. This was the first time in fifteen years that Russia vetoed a UNSC resolution sanctioning North Korea. In March 2024, Russia vetoed – China abstained — a UNSC resolution renewing the mandate of the UN Panel of experts which monitors UN member states’ enforcement of UN sanctions on North Korea.
And in June 2024, after several high-level exchanges, Putin visits North Korea to memorialize a “comprehensive strategic partnership” with a mutual defense treaty that pledges mutual immediate “military and other assistance by all means at its disposal” in case of armed aggression on either of the parties. Mr. Kim described this new partnership as an “alliance”. The language in this new treaty is similar to the language in the 1961 Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance between the then Soviet Union and North Korea. That treaty was downgraded in the 1990s after the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
North Korea’s new strategic partnership with Russia is a game changer for the Korean Peninsula, Northeast Asia and the U.S. An emboldened North Korea will get Russian sophisticated technical assistance for its nuclear, ballistic missile and satellite programs. Currently, North Korea reportedly has 40 to 60 nuclear warheads and is capable of mating them to an impressive array of ballistic missiles, to include the Hwasong-18, a solid fuel intercontinental ballistic missile capable of targeting the whole of the U.S. Indeed, since Mr. Kim took over in 2011 when his father, Kim Jong il, died, North Korea conducted four nuclear tests, the latest in 2017 of an assessed thermonuclear device. He has launched hundreds of short, medium and long-range ballistic missiles, in addition to cruise, hypersonic and submarine-launched ballistic missiles. Although North Korea has a formidable nuclear and missile arsenal, technical help from Russia could upgrade all their weapons’ programs, to include their conventional weapons and satellite program.
Are you actively working in the national security space? Join the world’s leading national security experts from the public and private sectors at The Cipher Brief Threat Conference October 5-8 in Sea Island, GA. Apply for your seat at the table today.
Indeed, this new alliance with Russia must be of concern to South Korea, especially given the tension between Seoul and Pyongyang. North Korea’s new doctrine of the pre-emptive use of nuclear weapons, and their expressed hostility toward South Korea – and the U.S. – is troubling, given that an emboldened North Korea could act recklessly, as they did in 2010 with the sinking of the Cheonan frigate, killing 46 South Korean seamen. This time, however, developments could escalate quickly, with a North Korea that has threatened to use tactical nuclear weapons.
Russia knows this. Mr. Putin obviously calculated that it was in Russia’s interest to foment greater tension on the Korean Peninsula, knowing that the South Korean government of Yoon Suk Yeol would be upset with this Russia-North Korea alliance and would reconsider upgrading their military support to Ukraine, to include providing conventional weapons.
Russia also knows that North Korea has sold ballistic missiles to Iran, Syria and Libya and in fact was building a nuclear reactor in Al Kibar, Syria that Israel bombed in 2007. So, some of the technical military assistance North Korea expects to get from Russia may eventually find its way to other rogue states. This obviously is not of concern to Mr. Putin.
For these obvious reasons, this is the time for South Korea and Japan to work even more closely with the U.S., enhancing joint military exercises and the U.S. recommitting to the Washington Declaration and U.S. extended deterrence assurances to South Korea and Japan. Also, strengthening the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI), a global effort to ensure that North Korea does not traffic in weapons of mass destruction, their delivery systems and related materials.
Russia established this new alliance with North Korea, after participating in the Six Party Talks and encouraging North Korea to denuclearize, not only because Russia will receive the artillery shells and ballistic missiles it needs for its war of aggression in Ukraine, but because Mr. Putin wants to incite conflict and war in East Asia, as part of his Eurasia strategy – wars in Europe and in Asia.
Diplomatic engagement should be a major component of U.S. policy toward North Korean, in addition to containment and upgraded deterrence. We should continue to be resolute in our diplomatic and military support to our allies and partners, but don’t give up on North Korea and cede the playing field to Putin. North Korea wanted/wants normal relations with the U.S.
China should be concerned that an emboldened nuclear North Korea is now aligned with a revanchist Russian Federation, bent on fomenting instability on the Korean Peninsula and in Northeast Asia. This is not in China’s interest. North Korea should be aware Russia is using them as a pawn, and they eventually will abandon North Korea again, as they did in the 1990s when they downgraded their 1961 Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance with North Korea and ceased calling them an ally.
In 1950, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin convinced China’s Mao Zedong to provide troops to North Korea for their invasion of South Korea. On July 27, 1953, the Korean Armistice Agreement was signed, ending three bloody years of war, with significant casualties. Let’s ensure we don’t repeat the past.
This column by Cipher Brief Expert Ambassador Joseph DeTrani was first published in The Washington Times
