North Korea Has Been Fearful Of A U.S. Nuclear Attack For Decades

Can Hope Replace North Korea's Fears? -- Christian Science Monitor

The escalation of fear between North Korea and the US reveals the danger of relying too much on fear of retaliatory nuclear attacks as a strategy for defense. The difficult task of replacing North Korea's fears with hopes of peace and prosperity must continue.

Those Americans who may be fearful of North Korea’s verbal threats and its missile-launch preparations should take note: Its leaders have long expressed a fear of an American nuclear attack.

This fear by three successive leaders from the Kim family in Pyongyang helped pushed them to develop atomic bombs. Now the regime’s threat to attack the United States defies the very logic of the nuclear age – namely, that states with nuclear weapons would always act rationally because of the risk of massive retaliation, or “assured destruction.”

As historian Ward Wilson points out in a new book, “Five Myths About Nuclear Weapons,” atomic bombs “were born out of fear, nurtured in and sustained by fear.” Their power to devastate requires a mutual fear to avoid their use.

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My Comment: I think they are more fearful of their own people than what the U.S. may (or may not) do. After-all .... they certainly do not want to end up like Gaddafi, Saddam Hussein, etc..