(UnitedVoice.com) – North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has ramped up ballistic missile tests over the last several months. The authoritarian leader has also made a number of threats against the US and South Korea. President Joe Biden has now responded to the increasing threats.
On Wednesday, April 26, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and Biden met one another at the White House. The two signed an agreement, called the Washington Declaration, that will allow the US to dock nuclear submarines in South Korea. If North Korea attacks its neighbor, America could respond with nuclear weapons.
According to The Hill, Biden warned that any attack against the US or its allies by Pyongyang would “result in the end of whatever regime were to take such an action.”
In 1991, the US removed all of its nuclear weapons from the Korean Peninsula. The next year, North and South Korea signed an agreement that pledged neither one of the nations would “test, manufacture, produce, receive, possess, store, deploy or use nuclear weapons.” However, the North has repeatedly violated that agreement. It’ll be the first time a nuclear-capable submarine is docked on the Korean peninsula since the 1980s.
The Associated Press reported there are no plans for the Biden Administration actually to deploy nuclear weapons to South Korea. Instead, it will use the submarines and arm them with ballistic missiles. Additionally, the US military is going to increase the deployment of aircraft carriers, submarines, and bombers.
The agreement between the two countries also included a provision that they would hold more joint training exercises. South Korea also reaffirmed its commitment to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, a pledge to stop the spread of nuclear weapons.
Biden said the US is going to make an “effort to consult with” its allies if it needs to. “There’s even closer cooperation, closer consultation” with South Korea.
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