Nork Nuke Test: Sizzle or Fizzle?
‘H-Bomb of Justice’
Late Tuesday night North Korea claimed to have the ‘H-Bomb of Justice.’
Under tutelage of Dictator Junior, Kim Jong-un, North Korean state media made the following announcement:
CNBC reported:
North Korea claimed it detonated a hydrogen bomb in a test Wednesday, a move that was condemned by the U.S., Britain, Japan and even China. It was the politically isolated country’s first nuclear weapons test explosion in three years.
Experts said the claim that the test involved a hydrogen bomb, which is more powerful than an atomic bomb, could not be confirmed. Determining what kind of device North Korea tested would take several days, U.S. government sources told Reuters.
The report on the state KCNA website came within hours of reports from various agencies that a large earthquake had been detected near a known North Korean nuclear test site.
According to KCNA, North Korea tested a miniaturized hydrogen nuclear bomb “in the most perfect manner,” putting it in possession of hydrogen bomb capability, which it described as “the most powerful nuclear deterrent.”
North Korea wanted what it called “the H-bomb of justice” as protection from the “ever-growing nuclear threat and blackmail by the U.S.-led hostile forces,” according to KCNA.
It would use the weapons only if its sovereignty were encroached upon, the statement on KCNA said, but would not roll back its nuclear development until the U.S. had dropped its “vicious, hostile” policy toward the isolated Communist state.
“The U.S. is a gang of cruel robbers which has worked hard to bring even a nuclear disaster to the DPRK [Democratic People’s Republic of Korean], not content with having imposed the thrice-cursed and unheard-of political isolation, economic blockade and military pressure on it for the mere reason that it has differing ideology and social system,” according to the statement.
North Korea’s nuclear arsenal braggadocio in 2006 garnered sanctions from the United Nations.
But not everyone is buying North Korea’s latest claims. NBC reports:
A successful hydrogen-bomb test would undoubtedly be a massive coup in Pyongyang’s quest to improve its still-limited nuclear arsenal.
However, Kim’s claims to even have a hydrogen bomb have been quickly shot down in the past. Senior U.S. defense and intelligence officials poured cold water over his announcement in December that Pyongyang had developed a hydrogen bomb. Similar doubts were raised almost immediately after North Korea boasted that “heaven and earth” was shaking with its test on Wednesday.
For starters, experts say North Korea has a tendency to exaggerate its nuclear prowess and lacks the technological capability to produce a hydrogen bomb.
Only the original nuclear powers — the U.S., Russia, U.K., France and China — have been able to develop true H-bombs. Other nuclear nations, such as India and Pakistan, don’t have the capability.
“I don’t believe they detonated a hydrogen bomb,” said Jin Canrong, an international relations expert based at Renmin University in Beijing.
He likened the seismic impact of the latest test to one in 2013 which involved an atomic weapon. “They might have detonated a miniature atomic bomb,” Canrong added.
Heisbourg too said he’d be “very surprised” if this was a true hydrogen bomb. More likely, he said, was that North Korea had tested a “boosted device” on Wednesday — something “halfway between an ordinary Hiroshima or Nagasaki-type atomic weapon” and an H-bomb.
“North Korea is not as broadly developed as, let’s say, India,” Heisbourg added. “It does not appear that they have the ability to do a fully-fledged H-bomb because you need a much more broadly-based industrial capability and technical capability than the one North Korea currently has.”
Even if it were a hydrogen bomb, North Korea would still have some ways to go before it was fully capable of using it in an attack. Hesibourg noted that the U.S. did “dozens” of tests before it gained the capability to put such weapons on rockets for operational delivery.
Meanwhile:
Dear Kim Jong-un,
That's a sock, not a hydrogen bomb. pic.twitter.com/1w8p6TWFN6
— Compendious News (@CompendiousNews) January 6, 2016
— Brad Thor (@BradThor) January 6, 2016
The Telegraph has a slide show featuring a few of Kim Jong-un’s stranger photo ops.
Follow Kemberlee on Twitter @kemberleekaye
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Comments
What’s with the pink color. Does North Korea have a school of journalism, where the color pink got chosen to be the recommendation?
There is an organization called Peace In North Korea. Perhaps using the color pink refers to its acronym.
It would appear Mr. Kim does not miss many meals.
I always wonder how many chickens for the proles each of these tests would buy?
Ah well, a crazy little dictator’s gotta do what he’s gotta do…
What is with the top picture? Did his nuclear scientists present him with a pair of socks?
Anyway – air sampling will confirm the explosion one way or the other. That is how we learned that the Soviets exploded their first A-bomb. And sampling air from the first Soviet H-Bomb explosion helped the US determine exactly how it was made. Which, in turn, caused us to completely redesign our own H-bombs from boxcar monstrosities into manageable, air droppable items.
No air sampling any more, now that tests are all done deep underground.
Are we supposed to feel better knowing that it wasn’t an H-bomb, just a “miniature atomic bomb” or a “boosted atomic bomb”? So what if it can’t be put on a missile, yet; it will still fit into the hold of a ship which can sail to any coastal location in the world. Thanks Jimmah and Bubba for this gift to our grandchildren.
You forgot to thank Bush, both of them.