Kim’s Nukes Aren’t a Bargaining Chip. They’re an Insurance Policy

Climb into the North Korean dictator’s mind, and you can see that his aim isn’t to destroy Los Angeles but to save his regime.

North Korea looks pretty scary at the moment, firing off missile after missile, threatening to target Guam, and, on Sept. 3, testing what the regime claims was its first hydrogen bomb. And the country’s dictator, Kim Jong Un—so ruthless he may have had members of his own family murdered—might be just crazy enough to push the button to initiate a catastrophic war.

Or maybe not. Look deeper, and you’ll find a North Korea that isn’t as much of an immediate danger to the U.S. as the headlines and rhetoric suggest. That’s because Pyongyang isn’t very likely to use its nukes and missiles against the U.S.—or anyone else.