News Release
RAND Stanton Research Fellows Publish New Studies Examining Nuclear Security Issues
Oct 2, 2012
The security community generally believes that North Korea has a relatively sophisticated guided ballistic missile program. This report questions this view and seeks to better characterize the North Korean missile threat. The author compares the available data on the North Korean missile program against five hypotheses about the program's origins, sophistication, and scale, highlighting inconsistencies.
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The security community generally believes that North Korea acquired Soviet guided ballistic missiles from Egypt in the 1980s, reverse engineered them, and has indigenously produced and deployed in North Korea perhaps 1,000 ballistic missiles of various types. This report questions this common view and seeks to better characterize the North Korean missile threat. The author compares the available data on the North Korean missile program against five hypotheses about the program's origins, sophistication, and scale, highlighting inconsistencies. The author finds that the most plausible characterization of the North Korean missile program is what he terms the "Bluff" hypothesis: The main purpose of the program is political — to create the impression of a serious missile threat and thereby gain strategic leverage, fortify the North Korean regime's domestic power, and deter other countries, particularly the Republic of Korea and the United States, from military action. The author maintains that the North Korean missile program's operational readiness seems to be secondary, and that therefore the threat posed by it has been exaggerated.
Chapter One
Introduction
Chapter Two
Missile Basics
Chapter Three
The Problem
Chapter Four
Defining Five Hypotheses About the North Korean Program
Chapter Five
What We Know
Chapter Six
Consistency Check
Chapter Seven
Discussion
Chapter Eight
What We Would Like to Know
Chapter Nine
Conclusions
Appendix
Details on What We Know
The research described in this report was supported by the Stanton Foundation.
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