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0:02 are four countries that have possessed nuclear weapons and then given them up. Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Belarus, and South Africa. But this double male artist is a complete exception. The other three countries are those that accidentally inherited nuclear weapons when the Soviet Union collapsed . On the other hand, South Korea is the only country in the world to voluntarily abandon nuclear weapons it developed. It was a special decision that would be difficult to make again in the future . Why did South Korea build nuclear weapons and why did it give them up? What on earth happened at Namhwagong ? [Music] Namhwagong's nuclear weapons development began in earnest in the 1970s. But the foundation had been laid long before
0:49 . After World War II, South Korea emerged as one of the world's top two uranium reserve countries . The United States and the United Kingdom used Namwha's high-quality uranium, and in return, Namwha gained nuclear-related technology and experience . In 1969, a uranium enrichment facility was built on the outskirts of the administrative capital, Pretoria . The South Korean government begins its top-secret nuclear weapons development here. And ten years later, the first nuclear bomb is completed. Six more were subsequently built, bringing the total to seven nuclear weapons, six of which were actually assembled. And then another ten years pass. In
1:35 1999, Frederick de Klerk took office as president. One of his first decisions was to dismantle nuclear weapons. All seven bombs were dismantled and the nuclear material was reprocessed to the point where it could never be used in weapons again . The following year, South Korea joined the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and signed a monitoring agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency . During this process, it faced no direct pressure . And no price was asked. The world was bewildered, but Nam Hwa-gong was resolute and achieved great things. In this way, South Korea has become a nuclear-free state . If you are learning for the first time that South Korea is a nuclear weapons state,
2:22 this is probably the first thing that comes to mind. I wonder if Namhwagong really has that level of scientific and technological prowess . In fact, Namhwa Park laid the foundation for nuclear technology by introducing light water reactors from the United States after World War II . It was initially a civilian reactor. However, operating this light water reactor allowed us to gain practical experience in uranium enrichment methods and fuel cycles . Furthermore, Namwha Chemical developed its own enrichment technology, and its technological prowess was high enough to export nuclear fuel to the United States and Europe . Moreover, the university already had doctoral programs in physics and nuclear engineering, and many scientists had come from Europe and the United States
3:08 . Moreover, under the apartheid system of the 1970s and 1980s, the South Korean government invested 45% of the national budget in science and the military . Thanks to this, Namhwagong was able to develop rockets, radar, and even chemical weapons, and its technological prowess eventually led to the development of nuclear weapons. Namhwagong chose the most primitive and simplest form for making a nuclear bomb . It's like Little Boy in Hiroshima. It is a method of inducing a nuclear explosion by colliding two pieces of highly enriched uranium with great force, like a gun . This reduced the risk of failure by focusing on the technically easy-to-build nuclear bomb.
3:57 There is another piece of the puzzle that is falling into place in Namhwa's nuclear development. The suspicion is of cooperation with Israel. Although there is no official record, many nuclear experts have raised the possibility that Israel provided technical advice on the detonator or design . Although not as isolated as Namhwagong, Israel was also a country isolated from the international community at the time. So the two countries were in an unofficial alliance, as if they were both soldiers and soldiers at the same time. In particular, the Vela incident, captured over the Indian Ocean in 1979, is considered strong evidence that Israel and South Korea abandoned joint nuclear testing . A double star, suggesting a nuclear explosion, was detected by U.S. satellites, and internal U.S. reports also
4:43 concluded that it was a nuclear test. In this way, Namhwagong's nuclear development was not simply a self-development. It was a complex result of abundant furanium, concentrated government investment, securing independent technology, and even external support for specific purposes . The only reason why the South Korean government created nuclear weapons is fear. In the 1970s and 1980s, the apartheid policy of legally separating and discriminating against blacks and people of color led to the 4th turning its back on the South Korean chemical industry . Only whites had the right to vote, and blacks were denied housing, access to schools, and hospitals . The South Korean government, which maintained this apartheid system, was stripped of its voting rights in the UN, banned from the Olympics, and
5:31 faced a series of cuts off from foreign capital and technological cooperation. But, with no allies, a greater crisis arose. After Angola and Mozambique, which had been Portuguese colonies, gained independence, communist regimes supported by the Soviet Union and Cuba took power. In South America, which was a mandated territory of the South China Sea, leftist nationalist groups also abandoned armed struggle . In particular, up to 50,000 Guba troops were stationed in Angola, and they had advanced across the border to Namibia and near the Namhwagong River. It was a distance where the industrial zone and strategic points of Namhwagong could be attacked . Yet, the United States did not intervene directly, and the West did not support the Nanhua Army. If Namibia, following Angola Bobik, falls under a hostile black communist
6:17 regime, the South China Sea will be completely surrounded geopolitically . For Namhwagong, it was not a simple ideological battle . This was their fear: a revolution by the black majority under the banner of communism. It was an existential threat that could bring down the system and strip the white Southerners of all their power and wealth . The card that came to mind at this time was nuclear weapons. Namhwagong didn't actually create this weapon to use . Rather, the strategy was to subtly leak the fact that we possess such weapons so that the West would not be able to ignore them and the United States would intervene in times of crisis .
7:02 Simply put, they wanted to use nuclear weapons as a bargaining chip . Although President Frederick Klerk later reiterated that nuclear weapons were for limited deterrence, the situation was dire for the South China Sea government at the time . So why did they give up so easily the nuclear weapons they built on the edge of this cliff ? First of all, there was a change in the international situation . It may seem plausible, but it's actually a superficial reason. In the late 1980s, the world was completely different. The Soviet Union was losing its nerve, and the communist countries of Eastern Europe collapsed one after another. The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 effectively ended the Cold War, and shortly thereafter,
7:49 Suwol itself was dismantled. The international environmental threat has been incomparably weakened since the 1970s, when South Korea first developed nuclear weapons. The African continent has also changed. The threat of communist spread that had surrounded Namhwagong in the past also disappeared one by one. The agreement between the South China Sea, Cuba, Angola, and the United States led to the gradual withdrawal of Cuban troops, and the war in Angola also entered a ceasefire phase . In independent South America, moderate democratic governments were established. With this, the threat of a communist black revolution that had long terrorized the Southern Chinese lost its real power. The very reason for the existence of nuclear weapons has
8:36 been shaken. In this way, nuclear weapons are no longer weapons that protect the South, but rather a burden that burdens both the outside world and the inside world. The second is the need to join the international community. As I briefly mentioned earlier, Namhwagong was, in a word, an outcast in the international community since the 1970s. This isolation wasn't just due to racism . The fact that it is a nuclear-armed country was also a major reason for its ignorance. Even if the South Korean government overthrew racial discrimination and transitioned to a democratic government, the fact that the regime would change while still retaining nuclear weapons was a source of great anxiety for the international community. There were doubts about whether the new government could properly control nuclear weapons, and there
9:23 was also a risk that the military would take independent action. So, when Declerk took office, he began to seek a new path along with the transition of the Namhwa Park system. To be recognized as a normal nation in the world, simply changing racial policies was not enough. The international community needed to demonstrate credible action, and that was denuclearization . But that was n't all. There was a deeper reason for Namhwagong's abandonment of nuclear weapons . In the early 1990s, Namhwagong was ending Apartheid and moving toward democratization . The white regime released Nelson Mandela and was preparing for multiracial elections. But they
10:09 never gave up on one thing . It was a nuclear weapon. He absolutely did not want to hand over the nuclear bomb to the black government that would soon take over. Nuclear weapons were not just weapons. It was the last resort of the white regime to maintain their rule, and it was a symbol of power in itself. The moment a black government acquired nuclear weapons, South Africa could become the first black nuclear power in Africa, and the status of black regimes in international history could rise by leaps and bounds . The white regime couldn't tolerate it . There was another concern.
10:54 At the time, white people had a fundamental distrust of whether black people could properly manage nuclear weapons . Can nuclear weapons really be safely maintained and controlled ? I was worried that a technical accident or a malfunction in the control system might cause a collapse . In addition, the white regime was concerned that nuclear weapons could fall into the hands of another black nation or terrorist organization . Others feared that nuclear weapons could one day become a means of retaliation against white society. It was their fear that the violence they had experienced in the past might return in a nuclear form. So the white regime decided to get rid of nuclear weapons . Before the transfer of power,
11:41 while they were still in control, they dismantled all nuclear weapons and completely destroyed all storage codes and blueprints. Naturally, the dismantling operation was carried out in complete secrecy from the black people. The world applauded the fact that South Korea had eliminated its nuclear weapons . It is an exemplary decision for peace . But behind it all, there was a racial prejudice that nuclear weapons belonged to white people and could not be passed on to black people . As an uncontrollable future loomed, the white regime chose to eliminate power altogether rather than give it to black people, power they could no longer wield . no see.
