The Indo-Pacific Has Changed. Time for US North Korea Policy to Change as Well.

Concerted efforts to temper North Korea’s military ambitions through both carrots and sticks over the years have not had the desired result. Far from pulling back from building up its military capabilities, Pyongyang has enhanced both the quantity and quality of its arsenal. Not only that, Pyongyang has hardly shied away from demonstrating its build-up, and has actually touted its capabilities as a means to stop being sidelined from the international stage. In fact, North Korea stepped up efforts to demonstrate its capabilities to the world in recent months, with January recording the highest number of missile tests to date. In that month alone, North Korea conducted at least seven launches, which included testing new hypersonic missiles as well as the test of an intermediate-range ballistic missile. Clearly, North Korea’s capabilities for destruction have only increased since then-U.S. President Donald Trump first embarked on a summit meeting with Kim Jong Un in 2018.

Yet over three years since that direct engagement with Pyongyang, there is little to show for the time and effort invested in cultivating relations with the regime. Indeed, the trilateral meeting between the foreign ministers of the United States, South Korea, and Japan in Hawai’i in February was more an indication of the lack of progress in an attempt to temper North Korea than a meeting to build upon past achievements. What has changed instead, though, are the political and economic realities in which the region finds itself. In reassessing a collective approach in dealing with Kim Jong Un, this should also be the time to go back to basics and understand how wide the divide is between the U.S. allies and North Korea when it comes to understanding what the exact threats to regional stability are. Without reaching a shared vision and end goal, the impasse may be increasingly challenging to resolve.

For example, much has been said about shared values, from fair trade to the transparency that comes with abiding by the rule of law, acting as a uniting force even among disparate nations. As Washington, Tokyo, and Seoul ramp up efforts to refocus on the North Korea conundrum even as much of the United States’ attention is being pulled elsewhere, most notably by Russia over Ukraine, the need to have a better grasp of where commonalities lie is greater than ever.

There is, for instance, a fundamental difference between various stakeholders in assessing nuclear risks. For the United States, the fact that the nation was on the brink of war with the Soviet Union over Cuba remains a cultural touchstone as much as a defining moment in shaping U.S. perceptions of the risks of nuclear collision. North Korea, on the other hand, has no such focus. Meanwhile, Japan’s policies concerning nuclear capabilities cannot be understood without reverting to the country’s history as the world’s only country to suffer nuclear attacks. Without shared experience and history, the risks of nuclear ambitions will invariably be seen through a different light.

The meeting in Hawai’i between the United States, South Korea, and Japan provided an opportunity for a rethink, not only in reassessing the strategy in reaching out to North Korea and preventing it from building up its arsenal still further, but also in reassessing North Korea’s end goal. It is clear that even as its missile tests increased not only in number but also in capability, global media attention on Pyongyang’s actions has actually decreased. The sense of urgency to deal with the threat that North Korea poses has been pushed down since the Trump presidency as well, not least because of the flaring Ukraine crisis.

Yet this can also be a time for a reset. A realignment, if not an actual reset, of the regional order, is currently in play. Violating rules and treaties established by international organizations has become less and less a factor that provokes alarm and outrage as rules become increasing fluid and paths to enforce them become less clear. There is a reorganization underway, too, of alliances and partnerships that reflect the new reality of a rising China and a less domineering United States. While the Quad ostensibly adds to the existing networks of alliances rather than taking away from the fabric, it also demonstrates the fact that in dealing with the immediate threat of China, no single country can tackle that task, even the United States.

Such a reality could not have seemed possible a decade ago. Yet the shifts in the regional order, coupled with the changes in the economic and political realities of the region, have required a rethink in U.S. engagement and strategy in the region. That reassessment of U.S. ambitions in the Indo-Pacific can also be an opportune time to reimagine relations with North Korea and the nuclear landscape of the Indo-Pacific.