Trump’s Return Could Weaken US Nuclear Response to North Korea: South

South Korea warned on Tuesday that if former President Donald Trump is reelected in November, Washington’s nuclear response to the nuke-capable North Korea could be weakened.

The remark was made by Seoul’s Principal Deputy National Security Adviser Kim Tae-hyo at a forum hosted by the Sejong Institute, an international diplomatic and security research institute in South Korea. He made reference to Trump’s claim that allies should pay their shares on defense.

South Korea is one of the three countries in the Indo-Pacific region, besides Japan and Australia, under the protection of the extended deterrence from the U.S., also known as “nuclear umbrella.”

The U.S. Air Force doctrine publication on nuclear operations, which last updated in December 2020, defines extended deterrence as “a commitment to deter and, if necessary, to respond across the spectrum of potential nuclear and non-nuclear scenarios in defense of allies and partners.”

It also obviates the need for allies and partners to develop or acquire and field nuclear weapons for themselves, serving as a nonproliferation tool. Last year, South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol suggested that his country might consider acquiring nukes if Pyongyang continued to provoke.

Last month, Yoon’s defense minister Shin Won-sik warned that pursuing a domestic nuclear arsenal could spell catastrophe, and its alliance with the U.S. would experience “a huge crack.”

However, Shin’s successor and defense minister nominee Kim Yong-hyun said on Monday that one of the options considered by the South was nuclear armament. A recent local survey showed that two-thirds of respondents supported Seoul developing an independent nuclear deterrent.

“It is not unlikely that he would suggest negotiating defense cost-sharing or the deployment of U.S. strategic assets from a cost perspective,” Kim said of Trump pursuing transactional benefits in the U.S.-South Korea alliance, which was formed in October 1953 under a mutual defense treaty.

The Biden administration has enhanced the deployment of its strategic assets in and around the Korean Peninsula. The USS Kentucky, a U.S. Navy submarine armed with nuclear ballistic missiles, visited South Korea in July 2023, showcasing Washington’s extended deterrence guarantee.

Newsweek has contacted the Trump campaign for comment by email.

In an interview with Elon Musk on X (formerly Twitter) last month, Trump said “nuclear warming” is the biggest threat and claimed that Kim Jong-un, the leader of North Korea, whom he has met three times, “got plenty of nuclear.”

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute estimated North Korea, which had conducted six nuclear explosive tests since 2006, possessed around 50 nuclear weapons as of January this year, but it also probably had “sufficient” fissile material for a total of up to 90 nuclear devices.

The U.S. has stored 100 nuclear gravity bombs on its mainland for potential use to support allies outside Europe, including Northeast Asia, according to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. As of September 2023, the U.S. had a total of 3,748 nuclear warheads, government data showed.

During his term in office from 2017 to 2021, Trump pushed for nuclear diplomacy by holding three in-person talks with the North Korean leader, but Pyongyang refused to give up its nuclear weapons and asserted itself as a global nuclear power, a status that was “final and irreversible.”