The use and utility of hybrid warfare on the Korean Peninsula

Abstract

This article uses hybrid warfare as a framework for examining North Korean operations on the Korean Peninsula and the South Korean reaction to such operations. It argues that North Korea has long employed a hybrid approach to achieve a wide number of political and strategic objectives. However, the deterrence-based strategic reality on the Korean Peninsula in combination with North Korea’s increasing relative weaknesses has rendered this approach self-defeating.

Keywords:

• North Korea
• South Korea
• hybrid warfare
• cyber warfare
• insurgency

Acknowledgments

I would like thank the editors of this special issue, Professor Chiyuki Aoi and Professor Madoka Futamura for their comments. I would also like to thank the members of the Asian Security Studies Centre at the Norwegian Institute of Defence Studies for their feedback.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 Opinion polls in South Korea suggest a hardening of attitudes towards North Korea. One finding was that South Korean’s entering adulthood at the time of the sinking of the Cheonan and the shelling of Yeonpyeong-do were more likely to view North Korea as an enemy. See: Kim, Friedhoff, Kang, and Lee (2015). Asan Public Opinion Report: South Korean Attitudes toward North Korea and Reunification. Seoul: The Asan Institute for Policy Studies.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ian Bowers

Dr Ian Bowers is an Associate Professor at the Centre for Asian Security Studies at the Norwegian Institute for Defence Studies. He holds a PhD in War Studies from King’s College London. His main research focuses on East Asian security, the Korean Peninsula, naval operations and military change. He has recently published on deterrence in the South China Sea and escalation at sea and his monograph on the modernization of the South Korean Navy will be published in late 2018 with Palgrave MacMillan.