Machine generated contents note: ch. One Republic of Korea -- Pursuit of nuclear weapons in the 1970s -- Ambivalence about enrichment and reprocessing -- Capabilities -- What if? -- Non-proliferation policy and contrary public opinion -- Proliferation drivers -- Credibility of US extended deterrence -- Other potential proliferation triggers -- Constraints -- Assessment -- ch. Two Japan -- History -- Nuclear studies -- Policies -- Treaties and other international obligations -- Evolving defence policies -- Nuclear hedging -- Capabilities -- Closed fuel cycle -- US support for reprocessing -- Reprocessing plans -- Weapons usability of separated plutonium -- Rocket and other technologies -- Break-out timelines -- Potential motivations -- Korea -- China -- US commitment -- Constraints -- Societal opposition -- Economic and geographic constraints -- Security considerations -- Assessment -- ch. Three Taiwan -- History -- How far did Taiwan get? -- Nuclear latency -- Non-nuclear policy -- What if? -- Proliferation drivers -- Constraints -- Assessment -- Conclusions -- Non-proliferation role of extended deterrence
Summary
Under what conditions would the democracies in Northeast Asia seek to join the nuclear weapons club? Japan, South Korea and Taiwan are threshold nuclear powers by virtue of their robust civilian nuclear-energy programmes. All three once pursued nuclear weapons and all face nuclear-armed adversaries. Fitzpatrick's latest book analyses these past nuclear pursuits and current proliferation drivers. It considers how long it would take each to build a nuclear weapon if such a fateful decision were made but does not predict such a scenario. Unlike when each previously went down a nuclear path, democracy and a free press now prevail as barriers to building bombs in the basement. Reliance on US defence commitments is a better security alternative -- as long as such guarantees remain credible. But extended deterrence is not a barrier to proliferation of sensitive nuclear technologies. Nuclear hedging by its Northeast Asian partners will challenge Washington's nuclear diplomacy