Does North Korea use nuclear sabre rattling as a foreign policy tool? John Wolfsthal, Director of Global Risk at the Federation of American Scientists, says, " Different leaders in North Korea have used the threat of either nuclear possession or nuclear use as a way to either cow the South Koreans or to intimidate or to deter invasion by the United States. And so the threat has evolved over the years, and particularly over the last decade or two as North Korea has achieved full nuclear capability. They see that asset as a way to influence American thinking, South Korean thinking, Chinese thinking on how to deal with North Korea."
This interview is from the FPA archives.