Summary
The Indo-Pacific region is on the cusp of a new missile age: inventories of short- to intermediate-range surface-to-surface missile systems are quickly growing in the region. Military planners and policymakers may view these capabilities as essential to preserving peace and maintaining deterrence, but this proliferation could intensify already complex security dilemmas, particularly related to North Korea and the Taiwan Strait, and heighten nuclear escalation risks. A new Carnegie report identifies the motivators of missile proliferation dynamics in Asia and offers recommendations for addressing the most salient risks.
Key Findings
Worsening threat perceptions and contemporary geopolitical dynamics, including U.S.-China competition, continue to drive substantial investments by Indo-Pacific states in a range of missile capabilities. Structural shifts have influenced proliferation as well. Notably, after years of alleging Russian noncompliance, the United States left the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty in 2019. Washington is now pursuing new ground-launched missiles, with a focus on Asia. Action-reaction dynamics between North Korea and South Korea have further accelerated missile proliferation trends.
- The primary pursuers of significant new missile capabilities in East Asia—Australia, China, Japan, North Korea, South Korea, Taiwan, and the United States—all perceive acute security challenges and see value in long-range strike capabilities for both deterrence and conventional warfighting.
- The most likely pathways to nuclear escalation in the Indo-Pacific begin with the outbreak of conventional war where at least one nuclear-armed state is implicated. The core risk stems from the possibility that intense conventional military operations—particularly those involving the large-scale use of missiles against military and national leadership targets—could be perceived by a nuclear-armed state as targeting its nuclear operations or capabilities, even when the intention behind such operations was more limited. The growing pursuit of conventional counterforce strategies presents serious escalation risks that are largely discounted by planners and policymakers.
- Formal arms control in the vein of the INF Treaty is unlikely to emerge in the Indo-Pacific in the short term. Today, the most effective interventions to reduce risks involve unilateral changes to how regional states posture their forces, communicate their intentions, and plan conventional military operations.
Recommendations
For the United States
- Maintain solely non-nuclear, theater-range, ground-launched missiles. To prevent new sources of ambiguity that could cause adversary misperception in a crisis, the United States should offer assurances that its long-term procurement plans do not include any new dual-capable, ground-launched missiles. It should regularly, including in future strategic reviews, reaffirm its intention not to deploy such missiles in Asia.
- Comprehensively assess missile capabilities and escalation risks in the Indo-Pacific. The U.S. secretary of defense should require a cross-departmental review of U.S. strike capabilities in the region, incorporating currently fielded capabilities and those that are expected to be fielded by 2030. Such a review should be centered within the Office of the Secretary of Defense and led by civilians reporting to the undersecretary of defense for policy.
- Study the implications of missile deployments and arms control. The U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Arms Control, Verification, and Compliance should commission a civilian-led expert group—with participation from officials in the department’s Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs and the Office of the Secretary of Defense—to study the implications of new U.S. capabilities and deployments in Asia on possible arms control with China and on diplomacy with North Korea.
For the United States and its allies Australia, Japan, and South Korea
- Address the role of allied strike capabilities in alliance consultations and dialogues. Working-level dialogues on extended deterrence need to address the role that U.S. allies’ improved strike capabilities play in deterring general war and possible escalation in a crisis. Where possible, the United States and its allies should hold bilateral and plurilateral tabletop exercises to explore such scenarios.
- Invest in passive defenses. The scope of passive defense techniques should include physical hardening, force dispersal, information operations, deception, camouflage, and the improvement of early warning of missile attacks.
- Improve U.S.–Japan–South Korea coordination on missile warning and tracking. The United States should begin prompt sharing of missile event assessments derived from its Space Based Infrared System with the two to the extent it does not already do so. Though Washington may be reluctant to share raw intelligence data, new protocols could enable the sharing of postlaunch assessments containing information on the numbers and types of missiles.
- Offer assurances against rotational missile deployments. If the prospect of permanent allied basing for U.S. ground-launched conventional missiles is expected to remain low for the foreseeable future—as appears to be the case—U.S. consultations with regional allies should clarify whether Washington will consider the temporary, rotational deployment of missiles in possible future crisis scenarios, a move that could be misperceived by adversaries as highly escalatory.
For other Indo-Pacific states
- Put missiles on the regional security agenda. Indo-Pacific states should seek to place missile proliferation issues on the agenda for discussion at prominent regional forums, particularly at those led by ASEAN. Such forums could allow regional states with prominent missile capabilities to offer assurances about the role these capabilities might play in wartime.
- Work toward an East Asia missile data exchange center. To improve transparency, build confidence, and reduce the odds of misperception, states should explore the feasibility of establishing a multilateral data exchange center focused on gathering information on long-range strike capabilities and missile launches in peacetime.