What North Korea wants to achieve with nuclear tests, assassinations
Pyongyang’s logic may appear hard to fathom, but its actions are driven by five major strategies
When an action is repeated time and again by any state, its logic must appear compelling and hard to resist, whatever the risk. Thus it is with the strategy of North Korea.
Launching missiles forms part of the crucible of Pyongyang’s strategy, alongside the nuclear tests that get ever larger in tonnage, and the morbid killing spree of its own dissidents that extends even to the family members of leader Kim Jong-un.
North Korea has carried out more than two dozen missile tests since Kim Jong-un came to power in December 2012.
And the world is waiting for its sixth nuclear test with bated breath, given its previous tests increased from 0.6 kilotons to 2.5 kilotons last year. If the tonnage gets any greater, it will demonstrate just how ready North Korea is for any future armed conflict.
Meanwhile, research by the Korean intelligence agencies, according to former US Ambassador Christopher Hill, suggests some 300 North Koreans have been killed by Kim Jong-un.
