This video asks why North Korea has nuclear weapons, and what the regime hopes they will achieve. It traces the programme from its origins in the aftermath of the Korean War, when North Korea’s leaders concluded that only a powerful deterrent could protect their state from the United States and its allies, through decades of secret development to the first nuclear test in 2006 and the series of tests and missile launches that followed. The film explains how a poor and isolated country came to place such importance on the world’s most destructive weapons.
The programme explores the different explanations offered for the programme: regime survival, deterrence against invasion or attack, bargaining power in negotiations with the outside world, and prestige at home, where nuclear success is presented as proof of the leadership’s strength. It also looks at the costs, including international sanctions, diplomatic isolation and the diversion of scarce resources away from an economy that has struggled to feed its own people.
For readers interested in socialism’s history and present, North Korea’s nuclear weapons raise difficult questions about security, sovereignty and the legacy of the Cold War. The programme grew out of a conflict that never formally ended, and it continues to shape relations in East Asia and beyond. Understanding why Pyongyang pursued the bomb is essential to any serious discussion of the issue. The video below presents the full discussion.