Contending Perspectives on Managing Insecurity 309economic sanctions. In addition, signatories of the NPT that already possess nuclear
weapons are expected to reduce their stockpiles, but they have proven reluctant, in most
cases, to do so very quickly.
The end of the Cold War and the dismemberment of the Soviet Union resulted in
major new arms control agreements. More arms control agreements between the United
States and Rus sia and its successor states are likely as the latter are forced by economic
imperatives to reduce their military expenditures. Yet the logic of arms control agree-
ments is not impeccable. Arms control does not eliminate the security dilemma. You
can still feel insecure if your enemy has a bigger or better rock than you do. And, as
realists would argue, state policy toward such agreements is never assured. Verification
is spotty and difficult to implement. For example, in 1994, the United States and North
Korea signed the Agreed Framework: North Korea agreed to stop its nuclear weapons
program in exchange for a U.S. package deal of energy supplies, light- water reactors,
and security guarantees. The framework collapsed in 2002, when North Korea
announced it was pulling out of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty in response to U.S.
decisions to halt shipments of fuel oil supporting North Korea’s electric grid. On North
Korea’s restarting of the Yongbyon nuclear reactor, used to pro cess weapons- grade
nuclear material, the United States and Japan halted aid shipments.
In 2003, North Korea publicly admitted that it was engaged in a nuclear- weapons
program; it has subsequently tested both long- and short- range missiles, causing great
consternation in the region and in the United States. Is North Korea advancing a
nuclear weapons program to enhance its own security? Or is North Korea simply bar-
gaining for more aid in return for promising to halt its nuclear- weapons program? The
agreement brokered in 2007 as a result of negotiations conducted among six parties—
North Korea, China, Japan, the United States, South Korea, and Russia— directed
that North Korea would close its main nuclear reactor in exchange for a package of
fuel, food, and other aid. The agreement has proven highly unstable, however. In
2008, North Korea’s leader, the late Kim Jong- Il, threatened to resume weapons devel-
opment because the promised aid package was too small and had arrived too slowly.
Later that year, further pro gress was stalled by rumors that Kim was near death. Kim
reappeared in 2009, after which North Korea exploded a nuclear device underground,
to widespread dismay and condemnation. Little pro gress has been made since that
time. North Korea tested again in 2013 and in 2016, and in 2014, it tested a new long-
range missile, capable, it claimed, of striking targets as far away as Japan.
Given how risky such a scheme would be, the complete disarmament envisioned
by liberal thinkers is unlikely. Unilateral disarmament would place disarmed states
in a highly insecure position, and cheaters could be rewarded. But incremental
disarmament—as outlined in the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), which
bans the development, production, and stockpiling of chemical weapons— remains a
possibility. However, the increasing sophistication and miniaturization of chemical