Posted on 04/28/2005 5:01:57 PM PDT by LibWhacker
WASHINGTON, April 28 - The head of the Defense Intelligence Agency said today that American intelligence agencies believe North Korea has mastered the technology for mounting a nuclear warhead on its missiles, an assessment that, if correct, means the country could build weapons to threaten Japan and perhaps the western United States.
The conclusion was part of a total reassessment of North Korea's capabilities that the D.I.A.'s chief, Vice Adm. Lowell E. Jacoby, said was still under way. While Admiral Jacoby said North Korea was judged to have the capability to put a nuclear weapon atop its missiles, he stopped well short of saying they have already done so, or even that they had assembled warheads small enough for the purpose. Nor did he give any evidence to back up his view during the public session of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
But he appeared to be putting a final conclusion on a study the intelligence community has had under way for at least two years. In 2003, the United States warned South Korea and Japan that satellite imagery had identified an advanced nuclear testing site in a remote corner of North Korea where equipment had been set up to test conventional explosives that, when detonated, could compress a plutonium core and set off a compact nuclear explosion.
Since then, American investigators have been pressing Pakistan for details of what kind of technology North Korean engineers might have been given in visits they made to Pakistani nuclear sites. North Korea supplied Pakistan with many of the missiles Pakistan uses for its own nuclear arsenal.
North Korea is considered one of the most opaque intelligence targets for American analysts, and the absence of reliable human spies had made it all the more difficult to understand the progress of its program.
But when asked by Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton in a hearing today whether "North Korea has the ability to arm a missile with a nuclear device," Admiral Jacoby responded, "The assessment is that they have the capability to do that, yes ma'am."
If President Bush accepts that judgment, it could significantly complicate choices he must make in the next several months. North Korea declared publicly for the first time in February that it had nuclear weapons. Earlier this month, American spy satellites detected that the country had shut down its nuclear power plant at Yongbyon and could be preparing to reprocess the plant's spent fuel, a move that could result in the production of enough plutonium to build up to two or three more nuclear bombs.
Admiral Jacoby said that the United States had increased its assessment of the current North Korean arsenal's size, but he gave no numbers.
Six-nation talks the United States is backing in an effort persuade Pyongyang to abandon its nuclear program have been stalled since last June. China, a neighbor and ally of communist North Korea, has been host to three inconclusive rounds of the negotiations, which involved the United States, North and South Korea, China, Japan and Russia.
Senator Clinton called Admiral Jacoby's testimony "troubling beyond words."
She added: "We have been locked into this six-party idea now for a number of years and all the while we've seen North Korea going about the business of acquiring nuclear weapons and the missile capacity to deliver those to the shores of the United States."
Admiral Jacoby also confirmed the assessment that North Korea has the ability to deploy a two-stage intercontinental missile that could reach portions of the continental United States, in addition to Hawaii and Alaska. He added that a formal assessment under way by United States intelligence agencies of North Korea's nuclear program would be completed next month.
Not necessarily true. Although delivery systems are based on origninal Chinese design, the North Koreans have developed their own deliverly payload (satellites? yeah right.) program. The Pakistan's have Ghauri-II and Iran's have the Shahab-3 based on NK's (and China) designs, and could have added their deadly input.
The miniaturization of nuclear weapons, both in size and weight is a huge complex task. The NKs have no way of doing this on their own. The have cruddy little missiles, and if they even have nukes they are the size of an SUV. The ChiComs don't have MIRV. Nuff said?
"North Korea able to mount warheads on missiles"
But, but the North Koreans are so short, I mean how do they reach.....?
Why would they waste the Plutonium on a fission bomb that they could use U-235 for? They will keep the Plutonium to use it to detonate a fusion bomb, which means two small Plutonium devices will be needed for each complete thermonuclear device.
In an interview on Thursday, Mrs. Clinton called Admiral Jacoby's statement "the first confirmation, publicly, by the administration that the North Koreans have the ability to arm a missile with a nuclear device that can reach the United States," adding, "Put simply, they couldn't do that when George Bush became president, and now they can." Source
You can use U235 for a fusion bomb too. The trick of the fusion bomb is to use a fission bomb (called the "primary") to initiate the compression of the deuterium or lithium fuel.
Plutonium is just easier to deal with in a bomb than U-235, since it doesn't have the nasty proclivity to detonate if you drop the unit the wrong way. U-235 will detonate spontaneously if enough of it is gathered in one place.
She's counting on the short memory of the American public to gloss over the fact that North Korea didn't even have uranium or nuclear reactors before Clinton was president, and by the end of his 8 years, they did.
Good point, MVPEL. The other advantage to Plutonium is it is the only element that will work as an implosion-detonated bomb. U-235 has to use the gun-barrel method.
Note to bitt---I think we discussed this a few days ago
"U-235 will detonate spontaneously"
Not my area, I mainly did the conventional side of explosives, but I beleive both deflagrate not detonate spontaneously. I beleive a nuclear event requires comprssion/containment.
best regards
"The S. Korean government is hopeless when it comes to dealing with the north."
It must seem different when the bulk of their population is in range of an insane amount of DPRK artillery, not to mention the nuke threat, 24-7. I don't disagree with you, but in a conflict, they may take a very big hit even if we 'win.'
As I understand it, the Little Boy bomb simply forcibly assembled multiple sub-critical masses of U235 into a supercritical mass.
"As I understand it, the Little Boy bomb simply forcibly assembled multiple sub-critical masses of U235 into a supercritical mass."
True but forcibly assembled means compressed and contained. There are lots of links on the requirements on the bright white flash, as the Sandia boys define it. That is a nuclear event not a radiological event.
An excellent reference is:
The Effects of Nuclear Weapons
Compiled and Edited by Samuel Gladsstone and Philip Dolan
Published by
United Stats Department of Defense\and the
Energy Research and Development Administration
my copy is not dated
You slam these componets together without the right stuff you get a rapid burn (deflagration) not a detonation. Granted decerning the two is hard on the receiving end.
No Mach Stem no detonation. Page 89 of cited text.
Not to say things will be not shitty. Just being correct.
Bottom line low order is not great but orders of magnitude beter than high order. Expolsive speak
regards
The North Koreans must have designed missles with anuses-they are experts at putting their head up their anus.
unhappily, yes we did...ms. clintoon and ms. albright make me puke.
When the 2008 election comes around, this will be a BIG deal if she starts trying to claim that this all happened during the Republican white house years.
Like it or not, she is going to have to answer for a lot of things Bubba (and his buddy Jimmah) did during their "leadership".
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