North Korea Announces That It Has Detonated First Hydrogen Bomb
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
It is frequently suggested that NK explosions are [half]failures because of low yields. Well, making low yield fission or fusion bomb is actually much harder then a powerful one and historically the pinnacle of nukes have been the low yield "neutron" ones. The low yield ones are also much more scarier as a weapon because they require lower threshold of craziness to use - i.e. sending a 1MT ballistic missile on a city even Kim III may be not ready to order while 0.5KT is just like that Chinese port explosion several month ago.
Anyway, giving the amount of tech assistance NK got in 199x from former Soviet researchers, one can only blame NK economy on why it has been taking them so long to join the club.
I don't know that "simple" is a good description. The key design concepts are known, yes; but the level of technical precision and skill required to build a fusion bomb that will work is much higher than what is required to build a basic fission bomb that will work.
http://www.mofa.go.jp/press/release/press3e_000001.html
By the way, CTBTO has a website: https://www.ctbto.org/
"At 01:30:00 (UTC) on 06 January 2016 the CTBTO's monitoring stations picked up an unusual seismic event in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). The location is very similar to the event our system registered on 12 February 2013. Our initial location estimate shows that the event took place in the area of the DPRK’s nuclear test site. The DPRK also claimed today that it has conducted yet another nuclear test, the fourth since 2006."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Korea_and_weapons_of_mas....
>On February 11, 2013, the U.S. Geological Survey detected a magnitude 5.1 seismic disturbance,[13] reported to be a third underground nuclear test.[14] North Korea has officially reported it as a successful nuclear test with a lighter warhead that delivers more force than before, but has not revealed the exact yield. Multiple South Korean sources estimate the yield at 6–9 kilotons, while the German Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources estimates the yield at 40 kilotons.[15][16][17]
Yeah, we should really up the level of fear and tension over the terrorists.
I'm not disagreeing that the paranoia around American<->Russian relations isn't massively overblown, but I think you underestimate the aspirations of the Russian ruling class, and the degree to which the working class would bend to those aspirations if called upon (forced to).
That said, such attack would obviously be a horrible thing, and reasonable preventive efforts are justified. The key word being reasonable.
What train of thought brings you to considering the destruction of a major city by a nuclear bomb a 'minor' event?
In no way I want to imply that such an event would not be absolutely horrible and an act of evil. But considering the actual damage that nukes do is what finally cured me of being scared shitless of nuke-wielding terrorists. And yes, I used to be really scared of that.
This sentiment comes to my mind quite frequently. Part of me can't believe that there hasn't been some sort of nuclear event already. Being only 25, I feel like such an event is inevitable in my life and have a really hard time convincing myself otherwise.
I don't know much about geopolitics so I could be very wrong.
The groups that would take control:
Japan: Likely already have this tech, ally of US
Korea: Likely already have this tech, ally of US
Russia: Already have this tech
China: Already have this tech
USA: Already have this tech
Or do you mean some minor group, rather than a state taking control of a failed NK?
People.
Imagine if you were given this scenario: "x" people will be killed tomorrow, you can't change that. There are three options for which people will be killed, either "well-off", "in poverty" or "random". You can choose one of the three, if you don't make a choice then one of the three will be randomly picked and the deaths still occur.
Would killing the people in poverty be better because you're wiping out more misery, would it be worse because you're letting financial state influence death?
And as much as ethically we want to think that all people are equal, let's not forget that most armys would be willing to kill 10 opponents to save the life of 1 colleague, and taking the US as an example I suspect (could be wrong..) a poll of the US would see most people willing to kill 10 North Koreans to save the life of 1 American, without having any other information about the 11 people who might die.
It depends WHY it falls. The existing system is almost completely military with a sorta civilian mostly hereditary aristocracy leading it. So if it falls because the military collapses it'll be nearly a wasteland, total anarchy, but if the military stays in total power then instead of hereditary civilian aristocracy they'll have a genuine combat soldier (or at least a semi-experienced general) in charge.
At the very tippy top the Chinese like their buffer states, and are not going to be happy with reunification with SK. Of course the same people said the same things about Eastern Germany.
The problem China does not want to have is a US ally at his border.
In the last decade or two, I doubt China wants a more dangerous North Korea. It could be that NK is attempting to play China like it plays the rest of the world. We always assume China is pulling all the strings but maybe NK knows some strings it can pull too
Getting to play in the south China sea at the expense of instability in east Asia is probably not the bargain they are after.
NK is to China what the sidekick is to the strongman. or the Capo to the Godfather. He's insufferable and creates you headaches, and provides diversion, but he's your sidekick... except if you go to far one day, it'll be goodbye.
It's Brick in the first Anchorman fight.
South Korea is used to it, in fact war never officially ended between NK and SK.
North Korea always had guns and South Koreans are prepared for the worst. The only way the NK regime could survive(international aid) is looking crazy, but not too much. Too much and they will be wiped from the face of earth. Too little and they won't get aid, and people will revolt against people in power.
Also, I'm glad you brought up the point about a neighbor with the gun. When somebody has a gun, you're not likely to walk over and screw with them. Nuclear weapons have lead to a great peace between nation-states.
But, I think its an open (and rather scary) question as to whether MAD will continue to work with multiple parties some of whom are batshit crazy and have demonstrated utter disregard for the safety and well-being of their populace.
Is their leadership insane enough to sit in a well-stocked bunker while setting off an H-Bomb in South Korea or elsewhere.... umm yeah, I think so.
Let's not forget about the millions North Koreans who would die as a result. They're people, and the number of them who are culpable for their regime's madness is a rounding error.
I've always felt that the best strategy against NK is to simply wait for the regime to collapse on its own (along with sanctions that isolate them, FWIW). This is fine as long as they don't try to invade South Korea, leading to swift US-backed retaliation. But perhaps now as they continue to develop and "show off" their nukes, they'll feel emboldened to "try something" before their time runs out?
Such horrible lives.
China should be ashamed for perpetuating this.
Was hoping to see within my lifetime a re-unification like Germany but that's basically never going to happen.
Unless they find oil in Korea, unlike Iran we are never going to give a damn, politically, morally or otherwise.
Disagree, the US troops and mines have been there for a long time. South Korea is doing well exactly because the world cared and the US in particular continues to.
So we are not doing it because Iran is a threat. Occidental countries are technically more threatening (http://www.globalresearch.ca/we-re-going-to-take-out-7-count...), we just don't see it because we don't threaten each other. We are doing it for other reasons.
They got oil and a strategic position in the middlewest, There is probably a lot more to know to understand the motivation to make it the number one enemy.
Bottom line, we are not good doers, and attacking NK doesn't bring anything to our table, so we won't do it.
Certainly the people of North Korea need liberators, even if it takes them a few generations to appreciate it.
South Koreans don't need to be saved, North Koreans do.
However the entire world should be doing the liberation, not just the USA. In fact for once maybe they can leave us out of it and just tell China "end this" or we'll destroy your economy by not buying anything from you for as long as we can.
But hell, look at Syria and the refugee crisis. Imagine if Assad had nuclear weapons.
I just want to make sure we're on the same page.
What moral ground has anyone to deny NK its sovereign right to do the same ?
We are in violent agreement.
In WWII: Over 60 million people were killed, which was about 3% of the 1940 world population (est. 2.3 billion).
The US ended the war in the pacific with those bombs(129,000–246,000+ killed), who knows how many more would have died with an invasion of Japan. The second would not have been dropped if the Japanese had surrounded and ended the war. BTW, the US did not start the war. I'm not saying I support it, I'm just saying stop Monday morning quarterbacking.
The argument that the Bombs "ended the war" is patent bs, and it keeps being repeated unchallenged as a justification for what was effectively a war crime.
It is debatable where it was necessary to drop the bombs on populated areas as opposed to Tokyo Bay, but it is without a doubt that the nuclear bomb and subsequent further threat ended the conflict.
The bombings were geopolitical stage props.
Civilians were dying at a rate of something like a quarter million per month in all the various Japanese-occupied areas at this point in the war. If the atomic bombings sped up the surrender by just three weeks they were a net win in terms of lives. (And yeah, I know how morally difficult that calculation is, but that's war.)
It is interesting to theorize what would've happened after the war if the U.S. had not developed the bomb or if the U.S. had developed it but chose not to use it.
Pretty sure Iran is quite fine with its proxy wars and regional destabilisation. They are getting pretty good at it and causing far more headaches for the West.
As far as U.S. presidential politics goes, meh, it's 10 months from the election, we don't even know who the candidates will be for either (especially the GOP), and the only people who should be sweating are S. Korea and Japan.
It's far more of an issue for the region.
Hispanics don't vote in large numbers and Chicanos -- the only category Trump might be especially unpopular with -- overwhelmingly don't live in swing states or turn out to vote. Muslims don't make up a large voting block and already are overwhelmingly Democrats.
I'm not predicting a Trump victory, but you are far too sanguine about his chances and the underlying demographic realities.
I guess the newspaper articles claiming you need certain percentage of Hispanics to win the presidency have lied. I will not debate you on this point since I'm no expert. Add to the fact that he has pissed off more people than just Latinos and his chances appear slimmer. But maybe I'm just misinformed.
For those of you who apparently missed the "American Politics" course in your higher education, Democrats have been better at resolving domestic challenges while Republicans have done better on international issues.
Si tacuisses, philosophus mansisses.
Fusion bombs work by setting off a fission primary stage inside a closed container, which ignites fusion in a deuterium secondary stage. But the devil is in the details. The energy from the primary (in the form of either neutrons, heat, or X-rays; which one it is is highly classified) needs to be focused through an interstage (the details of which are, again, classified) into some sort of styrofoam (really) medium which turns into plasma. This somehow starts fusing the deuterium inside it, which involves the use of a fissile "spark plug" to produce more neutrons. And deuterium isn't that easy to come by. The whole process is so tricky that the British couldn't get it to work for a long time after the Americans gave them plans.
So, yeah, I don't believe it.