Implications of the “Nuclear Forces Policy Act” on North Korea’s nuclear strategy

Since coming to power, North Korea's Kim Jong-un regime has been upgrading its nuclear forces through four nuclear weapons tests and hundreds of test launches of nuclear weapons delivery systems. The North Korean regime has pursued distinct actions to assert its status as a nuclear power following the acquisition of nuclear weapons. Notably, it first specified in the preamble to the amended Constitution in 2012 that it was a nuclear state, and then enacted the Nuclear Weapons States Act in 2013 to disclose its comprehensive nuclear strategy to the public. Afterwards, the regime declared the “completion of national nuclear forces” in 2017, and replaced the Nuclear Weapons States Act (2013) with the Nuclear Forces Policy Act in 2022. While the North Korean regime has been limited in its capacity to pursue nuclear retaliation against the United States, its redrafting of its nuclear legislation has signaled a fundamental change in its nuclear strategy as well as an active will to use nuclear weapons. The new enactment of the Nuclear Forces Policy Act (2022) presents a shift from a “no-first-use (NFU)” nuclear policy to a more aggressive stance that conditionally permits “first-use.” This change coincides with the recent focus of the Kim Jong-un regime on the development of tactical nuclear weapons. Therefore, it should be noted that the newly enacted Nuclear Forces Policy Act carries different implications from the traditional approaches of nuclear weapons states.