South Korea Weighs The Pros And Cons Of Nuclear Armament
As U.S. allies fear President Trump may begin to cut age-old ties, South Korea comes back around to the idea of becoming a nuclear power for the sake of self-protection.
U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance’s recent speech at the Munich Security Conference raised concerns among NATO allies that the United States might abandon Europe. However, Europeans are not alone in their abandonment fears; many in South Korea share this anxiety, in part due to the first Trump administration’s focus on negotiating with North Korea and reducing the U.S. military presence on the Korean Peninsula.
As a result, South Korea’s elite and public opinion have turned increasingly toward developing nuclear weapons. Developments in Europe could accelerate that.
Nuclear Weapons And South Korea: A History
In the past, South Korea first attempted self-nuclearization in response to the fears of abandonment prompted by former President Richard Nixon. In July 1969, Nixon announced his “Guam Doctrine,” stating that the U.S. would not intervene in the event of a North Korean attack on the South unless nuclear weapons were used.
Eight months later, in March 1971, Nixon withdrew 20,000 of 63,000 U.S. soldiers stationed on South Korean soil. This withdrawal stimulated President Park Chung-hee to pursue an independent national defense strategy that concentrated on developing nuclear weapons to deter a North Korean attack.
In July 1974, however, the U.S. became aware of South Korea’s nuclear weapons development plan and pressed Seoul to terminate the program. South Korea ratified the Non-Proliferation Treaty in March 1975 to placate the United States while working to expedite the acquisition of a Heavy Water Reactor from Canada and a reprocessing plant from France to produce the necessary fissile material.
Ultimately the U.S. and South Korea reached an agreement to end the contract with France, in January 1976. South Korea then halted its nuclear weapon development plan but shifted focus to completing the nuclear fuel cycle by adopting a concept of “pre-nuclear option policy.”
South Koreans Wary Of Trump-Kim Ties
Likewise, South Korea’s next self-nuclearization attempt could be triggered again by Trump’s exorbitant pressure on South Korea regarding cost-sharing for U.S. troops. U.S. strategist Hal Brands has noted that a potential withdrawal of U.S. troops is the most serious concern for South Korea, and it could lead to South Korea’s nuclear self-help, severely devastating the global non-proliferation regime.
Furthermore, many South Koreans are seriously concerned about a “Big Deal,” the possibility of Trump’s nuclear disarmament deal with Kim Jong-un, which may acknowledge North Korea as a de-facto nuclear-weapon state. Moreover, many South Koreans fear that Trump might nullify the Washington Declaration, a Biden-era effort to reaffirm U.S. extended nuclear deterrence and discard the U.S.-ROK Nuclear Consultative Group and its guidelines.
Nevertheless, South Korea’s advocates of self-nuclearization view Trump’s return as a silver lining for securing nuclear latency: a new name for something quite like the past “pre-nuclear option policy.”
They argue that South Korea could secure nuclear latency by revising the U.S.-South Korea nuclear cooperation agreement as a trade-off for increasing payments for U.S. ground troops in South Korea. Further claiming that developing South Korea’s enrichment and reprocessing capabilities, now limited under a bilateral civil nuclear cooperation framework agreement, will contribute to reducing reliance on Russian nuclear fuel and thus enhance energy security for the U.S. and its allies by adding South Korea as a nuclear fuel exporter.
Currently, Russia and China now own forty-four percent and fifteen percent of the world’s enriched uranium capacity, respectively.
If Seoul Pursued Nuclear Weapons, What Would Happen?
History shows that South Korea formulated a self-nuclearization plan in the past but dropped the effort under U.S. pressure. Would the Trump administration respond with the same level of pressure that the U.S. applied in 1974 and 1975 if South Korea seeks nuclear latency in exchange for increasing its host nation’s support for U.S. troops?
Or Trump administration would instead encourage South Korea to secure nuclear latency if not nuclear weapons?
The global security landscape is facing a highly volatile moment with Trump’s return. Fears of political abandonment are amplified among the U.S. allies, leading some to consider nuclear armament more seriously. South Korea increasingly views this moment as an opportunity to secure nuclear latency, one step short of self-nuclearization.
Once South Korea completes a nuclear fuel cycle by securing rights of enrichment and reprocessing from the U.S., Seoul could in theory transfer the full package of nuclear technologies to emerging countries in the Global South, further widening pathways to a multipolar nuclear world.
Now is a critical time to prevent the potential fall of a new “nuclear domino” in Seoul.
About the Author: Sang-Gil Park
Sang-Gil Park is an advisor at Lee & Ko Attorneys, where he specializes in the field of energy technology, including nuclear and hydrogen. His views do not represent those of his employers.
Image: Wikimedia Commons.