The current landmine incident in the Demilitarized Zone of the Korean Peninsula could escalate into conflict on the Korean Peninsula.
South Korea and the United Nations Command said North Korea violated the Korean War armistice following a landmine blast on September 21 in the South Korean side of the DMZ, injuring three South Korean soldiers, two severely.
Kim Yo Jong, the sister of North Korean leader Jim Jong Un, dismissed South Korea’s allegations, saying they were a “conspiratorial farce”, threatening immediate and merciless retaliation if South Korean troops open fire on North Korean workers. She accused South Korea of fabricating a “self-directed farce”, creating groundless claims to create a pretext for political and military provocations.
South Korean President Lee Jae Myung on October 1, in an Armed Forces Day speech, said: “I hope that the North joins us now on the path of restoring trust and resuming dialogue, following a long interruption… and consistently pursue practical measures to reduce military tensions between the two Koreas.”
Hopefully, this incident doesn’t devolve into an August 18, 1976, incident when U.S. and South Korean personnel were pruning a tree in the Joint Security Area of the DMZ when North Korean guards, claiming the tree could not be cut, attacked with axes and clubs, killing U.S. Army Captain Arthur Bonifas and First Lieutenant Mark Barrett and wounding several others.
The U.S. response was quick and powerful, mobilizing troops, attack helicopters and B-52 bombers. Given this U.S. response, North Korean leader Kim il Sung issued an unprecedented statement of regret regarding the killings of two U.S. personnel.
The current situation is markedly different than 1976. North Korea is now a nuclear weapons state, with formidable ballistic missiles, while maintaining a conventional military force of nearly 6,000 conventional artillery systems and thousands of rocket launchers within striking distance of Seoul. Estimates of close to 200,000 special operations personnel are tasked with infiltration via tunnels and aircraft to disrupt South Korean command centers. Moreover, North Korea is now closely aligned with Russia, with a mutual defense treaty.
Given the progress North Korea has made building an arsenal of reportedly 60 to 100 nuclear warheads, and the ballistic missiles to deliver them, in addition to a mutual defense treaty with Russia, it would be fair to assume that Mr. Kim is more confident than his grandfather, Kim il Sung, in 1976.
Mr. Kim announced in January 2021 that North Korea had miniaturized nuclear warheads that can be used for tactical battlefield use. And in 2022, North Korean media confirmed that in 2022 they simulated tactical nuclear strikes to “wipe out” targets in South Korea.
Indeed, in September 2022, North Korea enacted a new nuclear law that declared that their nuclear weapons status was irreversible, authorizing preemptive nuclear strikes if their leadership or command systems is threatened. In March 2026, North Korea reportedly amended its constitution to mandate an automatic and immediate nuclear retaliatory strike if Mr. Kim is assassinated or if the country’s command-and-control system is threatened.
Ever since Mr. Lee, representing the liberal Democratic Party, was elected president of South Korea in June 2025, following the impeachment and removal of former president Yoon Suk Yeol of the conservative People Power Party, he has advocated for a resumption of dialogue with North Korea. Indeed, this inter-Korean dialogue ended in June 2020 when North Koea blew up the inter-Korean Liaison Office in Kaesong, claiming that this was in response to activists in South Korea floating balloons across the border carrying anti-regime propaganda pamphlets critical of the leadership in North Korea.
In the absence of dialogue between the two Koreas, with North Korea revising its constitution to say South Korea is a hostile state and their principal enemy, eliminating any reference to peaceful reunification and national unity, any incident like the landmine blast could escalate quickly.
An emboldened leadership in Pyongyang can seize on an incident of this type to escalate tension with South Korea, devolving into conflict, with the potential for another war on the Korean Peninsula.
Resuming an unconditional dialogue with North Korea should be our primary goal.
This article was originally published in The Washington Times.
The author is the former associate director of national intelligence. All statements of fact, opinion or analysis expressed are those of the author and do not reflect the official positions or views of the U.S. government.The Cipher Brief is committed to publishing a range of perspectives on national security issues submitted by deeply experienced national security professionals. Opinions expressed are those of the author and do not represent the views or opinions of The Cipher Brief.
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