North Korea won’t escalate—clear bright lines and neither side stands to benefit

Dan Reiter, "Analysis," Washington Post, 5-24-2018, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2018/01/11/should-you-worry-about-a-u-s-war-with-north-korea-not-really/-- 嘉玮

The U.S.-North Korean relationship is actually far more stable than most people think. Both sides understand that there is a very wide, bright line separating begrudgingly acceptable behavior from truly unacceptable behavior — the type of actions that might justify escalation to war:

Acceptable (if undesirable): North Korean missile and nuclear tests, U.S.-South Korean war games, espionage, minor military actions against South Korea, limited naval clashes, tourist abuse, cyberattacks, belligerent rhetoric and economic sanctions.

Unacceptable: U.S. airstrikes on or invasion of North Korea, or North Korean missile attacks on South Korea, Japan or any U.S. territory. Each side knows that as long as it stays on the acceptable side of the line, the other will be unmotivated to take the hugely costly step of launching a war.

One side might preempt if it thought the other side was about to take an unacceptable action. However, each side knows that the unacceptable options remain unappealing to the other side, reducing motives to preempt. For instance, the United States considered attacking nascent North Korean nuclear facilities in 1994, an unacceptable action, but concluded that such actions would be hugely costly. These options are far less attractive today, as North Korea likely has dozens of concealed nuclear weapons.

Four paths to a strategic miscalculation over North Korea

For North Korea, unacceptable actions like attacks on South Korea, Japan or America don’t offer much in the way of benefits. Those attacks won’t begin to scratch American military power, won’t allow them to conquer South Korea and of course would invite massive retaliation that would destroy the regime of Kim Jong Un.