North Korea's Nuclear Weapons Defiance Has not Taught the West Much about Iran's Intentions

The New York Times reports that new commercial satellite imagery shows that North Korea is expanding its main rocket-launching site and testing engines of what is believed to be its first road-mobile intercontinental ballistic missile. The NYT quoted a website, 38 North, affiliated with Johns Hopkins University's US-Korea Institute, that specializes in the North. The reported activities at the Sohae Satellite Launching Station in Tongchang-ri near North Korea’s western border with China come amid concerns that North Korea may be readying another nuclear test. In recent days, more activity has been reported at an underground nuclear test site in Punggye-ri in northeastern North Korea. The North also has recently conducted engine tests for an ICBM that could potentially deliver a nuclear warhead to the United States, 38 North said on Friday, including at least one engine test for the KN-08 missile in late March or early April, according to 38 North. These tests are the latest in a series of tests for a missile believed to have a range of more than 6,000 miles. Following the engine tests, the next stage for North Korea would be a test launch of the missile, according to the 38 North report : "As this effort progresses, the next technically logical step in the missile's development would be a flight test of the entire system." Commercial satellite imagery indicates movement and removal of missile stages and fuel tanks, as well as changes in the flame trench that could indicate that North Korea has conducted one or more tests in the two-week period from March 22, the report said. South Korea's defense ministry would not confirm the specifics of the report, citing intelligence policy, but said a long-range missile launch by the North could not be ruled out, according to ministry spokesman Kim Min-seok : "It's not easy to conduct a long-range rocket launch right after an engine test but they may have had other things prepared." ~~~~~ North Korea is believed to be developing a nuclear weapon and the technology to miniaturize a warhead to mount it on a long-range missile. In December 2012, it launched a long-range rocket that successfully put an object into space orbit. In February 2013, it conducted a third nuclear test. The report on the engine tests comes a week after 38 North reported heightened activities at the North's nuclear test site at Punggye-ri, indicating it was ready to conduct a fourth nuclear test. A South Korean government official said preparations for a nuclear test at Punggye-ri appeared to be complete, including the sealing of tunnels dug into the mountain range, and all that remained was for the North's leader Kim Jong Un to order it. Since 2006, the United Nations has imposed sanctions on North Korea for its nuclear and missile tests, but the North has pushed ahead with further tests, even disregarding warnings from its sole major ally, China. ~~~~~ BBC News published an update on North Korea's nuclear program ten days ago. The update confirms that the North technically has a nuclear bomb but not yet the means to deliver it via a missile. In 2006, 2009 and 2013, North Korea announced that it had conducted successful nuclear tests - the tests all came after the North was sanctioned by the UN for launching rockets. According to the BBC, analysts believe the first two tests used plutonium as the fissile material. The North is believed to possess enough weapons-grade plutonium for at least six bombs. Whether it used plutonium or uranium for the 2013 test is unclear, but it is an important detail. The US and South Korea have said that they believe the North has additional sites linked to a uranium-enrichment program. A test based on a uranium device would mean new dangers for monitoring and proliferation because weapons-grade plutonium enrichment requires large facilities that are easier to spot. Uranium enrichment uses many, possibly small, centrifuges that can be hidden away. While North Korea has depleted its stocks of "reactor-grade" plutonium needed to make the weapons-grade variety, the country has plentiful reserves of uranium ore. North Korea claims it has "miniaturised" a nuclear device, but experts are not certain whether this is a fact or propaganda. ~~~~~ Dear readers, the details about the North Korean nuclear weapons developmenr program and the efforts of the US, Russia, China and South Korea to bring it under control are eerily like the story of the Iranian nuclear development program - but a few years down the road to having a bomb and the capability to launch it mid-and-long range. The North has pledged several times to halt operations and even destroyed cooling tower in 2008 as part of a disarmament-for-aid deal. But in March 2013, after a war of words with the US and with new UN sanctions in place for the North's third nuclear test, it vowed to restart all facilities at Yongbyon. However, in tbe case of North Korea, the US never believed it was fully disclosing all of its nuclear facilities - a suspicion bolstered when North Korea unveiled a uranium enrichment facility at Yongbyon (purportedly for electricity generation) to US scientist Siegfried Hecker in 2010. Now, consider Iran. While there is every indication that Iran is pushing ahead with enrichment at concealed sites, the US and the UN seem more willing to believe Iran. Only Israel continues to speak out with warnings to the world about Iran's real goals. One would think that America and the UN would have learned their lesson from trying to deal with North Korea's rogue nuclear bomb program. But it seems that they are making the same mistake all over again.