Korea: North Korea´s nuclear taunts

Economist ^ | 01/22/04

[TigerLikesRooster]

Nothing new but still very true.

[TigerLikesRooster]

Ping!

[endthematrix]

re: So why not simply let North Korea know that to use its bomb would be to invite obliteration from America?

I'm sure NK is quite versed in what our response would be. Funny no mention of Pakistan or Lybia.

[JasonC]

And what will our response be if they just sell one to Bin Laden and company? Will we know where it came from? Will we prove it? Will Powell give a speech to the security counsel? Will Dems and Frenchies believe him? How about China, when they lose a client over an allegation?

If they even think they can get away with it, it is not a risk worth running...

[TigerLikesRooster]

Economist is not what it used to be. They now have some mush brains there. They once ran an article about German public education collapsing academically. They could not figure out why, even though I did in a second. Militant lefties took over the school system, turning it into a giant feel-good brainwashing camp. The chief culprit: Daniel Cohn-Bendit, one of the ring leaders of '68 student rebellion.

[clee1]

Paraphrasing JFK:

It shall be the policy of this Nation, that if any WMD device created in N. Korea is used by any Nation or individual, it will be considered an attack upon the US by N. Korea and will result in a full retaliatory strike.

[endthematrix]

"If they even think they can get away with it, it is not a risk worth running..."

If we wish to point fingers, we should point at Clinton and Albright. Then Congress of the 1950's who should have told the UN to shove it then and taken NK (and a good chunk of China) off the planet.

What happened to good old MacArthur? "That is our military objective -- to repel attack and to restore peace." Truman not once said the US goal was to WIN!

[JasonC]

But I don't wish to point fingers. I wish for New York to remain where it is, instead of drifting eastward with the prevailing winds through the stratosphere. Eye on the ball, people. This is not about politics, politics is about this.

[observer5]

And the former terrorist, who is now germany's foreign minister, doesn't help euro-american relations...

[TigerLikesRooster]

Yeah, he says he repented. And it is politically correct in Germany to take his words at face value. If you want to be an upstanding citizen of Deutschland these days, you should forgive him.

[LibertarianInExile]

Let me know when you figure out how exactly to tell which country completely obliterated a whole city with nukes not launched by missile or sub or plane from foreign territory. Suitcases generally don't have all that legible luggage tags after they're been vaporized.

North Korea is where we should be instead of Iraq or Afghanistan, because sooner or later the kleptocracy that is North Korea is going to get one of these bombs smuggled out and sold to a terrorist organization, and that will be that for New York or more likely, some other port city situated closer to a Central American staging area, say, New Orleans. We should have bombed those f-wits until they glowed. Now the 'we negotiate with terrorists' tone is set for every terrorist group with a big enough threat. At least Bush isn't folding too much...yet.

If there is one group of people who should be publicly shamed until they die, shamed by all who hear them speak, it is Albright and Clinton and their cronies, who gave us 'peace in our time' in Korea and assured a war WILL happen in our time there barring the unlikely collapse of its regime. Kim 'Bucks-for-bombs' Dae Jung's Sunshine Policy only served to pay those commies off, and we can now safely assume that most South Koreans, who want it continued, have no real interest in opposing North Korea in the long term. Thus, we should start the USFK withdrawal back to U.S. territory or places that appreciate our presence.

[AmericanInTokyo]

Thanks again for these kinds of articles.

[ASA Vet]

[clee1]

Let me know when you figure out how exactly to tell which country completely obliterated a whole city with nukes not launched by missile or sub or plane from foreign territory. Suitcases generally don't have all that legible luggage tags after they're been vaporized.

Every nuke is made w/ enriched uranium and/or plutonium. In multi-stage (or thermonuclear/hydrogen bombs) tritium is also used to boost the warhead yield. Examples from each reactor is maintained by the IAEA and the USNRC and each is as individual as a fingerprint or DNA.

We can analyze the fallout/residue of the blast and determine which reactor produced the fissile material it contained.

If a NK reactor is implicated in a nuke attack, I say we nuke them flat and glassy.

[LibertarianInExile]

Only for those facilities under IAEA safeguard, which excludes the five official nuclear powers and nonsignatories to the NPT, as well as facilities outside the scope of IAEA monitoring, say, NORTH KOREA.

I doubt North Korea has given the IAEA any such samples, Agreed Framework or no. The IAEA is toothless. It's not even certain whether the sampling method you prescribe will work, simply because it's never been tested. And the site will of course be emitting high radiation, too, so testing for those elements will be a little tougher.

If we're going to state that pre-emptive is how we play the game now, we KNOW that North Korea WILL sell nukes, as it has sold every technology it could. There is a country that we should have been sitting in NOW. But we are too gutless to acknowledge that every day we wait is a day in Kim Jong Il's favor and merely postpones the inevitable.

[endthematrix]

This map makes me feel good! Thanks!

[endthematrix]

re: Tritium. I asked on this board about USA current production status since 9/11 and someone scolded me (for national security concerns, of course) for asking. Any insight?

[af_vet_1981]

The only safe way to deal with North Korea´s claimed nuclear weapons is to get rid of its capacity to make them, “completely, verifiably and irreversibly”, as America has insisted. If North Korea refuses, it should face isolation from all.

More than isolation

Retribution and justice

Remember the Pueblo !

[clee1]

While it is true that many reactors do not have samples filed w/ the IAEA, there are characteristics of processed fissile material that are indicative of the location of mining of the raw ore, the type of reactor, etc. etc.

Even the knowledge that the material is not from a "known source" is valuable - and other indicators will give away the manufacturer of it anyway. Were not talking about evidence in a US court; just enough reliable factors that would allow the US government to retaliate for an attack.

It's not even certain whether the sampling method you prescribe will work, simply because it's never been tested.

It has been tested - many, many times. It is a standard part of the training of US Nuclear Emergency Response Teams. They can tell where samples of fissile material and minute residue were manufactured, often naming the specific year and reactor involved, i.e. Hanford 2, 1981, used in Pantex Series XX warheads..... A member of my extended family is a former NERT member - their capabilities are amazing. They can gather analyzable samples by flying specially equipped aircraft through the fallout path of a radiological device.

We have already stated that preemptive strikes on terrorists, state sponsors, and rogue regimes w/ WMD capabilities is the policy of this Nation, i.e., the "Bush Doctrine". I'm with you: we should already have dealt w/ Kim Jong-il.

[clee1]

re: Tritium. I asked on this board about USA current production status since 9/11 and someone scolded me (for national security concerns, of course) for asking. Any insight?

Sometimes people on this board get a little carried away w/ the "loose lips" crap. Who do they think their fooling? There are no secrets in physics: your average machinist and copier repair tech could collaborate to fashion a multi-stage nuclear device, assuming the availability of fissile material. THAT is the expensive/difficult part.

While I have NO specific knowledge, (good old legal disclaimer) of US tritium production since 9/11, I will hazzard an educated guess to say that we have been producing tritium steadily. As you may know, tritium is a very unstable isotope, and multi-stage weapons require the replacement of their tritium every 5-7 years, to keep the weapon from being a "fizzle", or fractional-yield.

Tom Clancey's Sum of All Fears gives an almost totally technically correct explanation of this process.