Nuclear dangers in the Asia-Pacific region

When it comes to nuclear threats in the Asia-Pacific region, China faces the most daunting nuclear environment. The nuclear problem that China faces is not only confined to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea's nuclear program, but also includes the deployment of other strategic offensive and defensive capabilities that could damage the strategic stability among major nuclear-weapon states.

As far as the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue is concerned, three points are very important. First, the peninsula faced a nuclear problem even before the DPRK developed its nuclear capability. During the Cold War, the "nuclear umbrellas" of the Soviet Union and the United States covered both Koreas. Russia withdrew its umbrella over the DPRK after the end of the Cold War. The US did not, although it withdrew all the tactical nuclear weapons from the peninsula. The change in the power balance and labeling of the DPRK as one of the "rogue states" and "state sponsors of terrorism" that form an "axis of evil" instilled in Pyongyang a deep sense of insecurity, which in turn made it believe that only nuclear weapons can guarantee its national security.

The international community, including China, has made great efforts to persuade the DPRK to abandon its nuclear program, and some initial efforts were successful. But in the end, due to the deep-rooted hostilities between the DPRK and the US those efforts didn't yield the desired result. For the US, it is hard to accept the DPRK, let alone a nuclear-armed DPRK. The DPRK, on its part, is convinced that only by developing nuclear weapons can it deter the US from overthrowing the existing political order.