Article

2006-10-10 China-Japan-Koreas

Belmont: Was North Korea testing a suitcase nuke?

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Posted by tipper 2006-10-10 00:00|| || Front Page|| [2 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 The Norkies may "want Seoul", as opposed to the unversal anarchy = "chaos" desired by Radical Islam, but the Norkies' Chicom masters want SOUTH KOREA + espec JAPAN. The Chicoms at last check have NOT given up their ambitions for Chinese-centric, Commie-centric East Asian-Pacific hegemony, nor to replace the USA in same - means China STILL wants Chinese-controlled/dominated PROXY-BUFFER STATES = OFFSHORE ECON/TRADE ZONES. Muslim reporters whom have interviewed Osama all claim that Osama does have "suitcase nukes" and other WMD devices, and more importantly intends to use them in attacks against the USA-West, espec the USA. MOVIE > based on a TRUE STORY? > Iff a HS? student can dev a WORKING, LIGHTWEIGHT, MAN-PORTABLE NUKE DEVICE CAPABLE OF THREATENING LOCAL TOWNS IN THE STATE OF PENNSYLVANIA/OHIO VALLEY, a SUITCASE NUKE then is a serious threat, espec given various Media-Net reports of Radical Iran = North Korea, etal. using AIRLINERS TO TRANSPORT NUKE TECHS/MATERIALS, EVEN WHOLE MISSLES.

Posted by JosephMendiola 2006-10-10 00:37|| 2006-10-10 00:37|| Front Page Top

#2 Good article on suitcase nukes.

Posted by phil_b 2006-10-10 00:56|| 2006-10-10 00:56|| Front Page Top

#3 This is probably the least likely of all scenarios.

Permit me to provide an analogy. In 1976, USSR pilot Viktor Belenko defected to Japan with his MIG-25 Foxbat jet fighter. When the CIA took apart the plane's avonics they found copies of our integrated circuits on the PCBs (Printed Circuit Boards). According to legend, closer examination revealed that the microprocessors (possibly an East German copy of Zilog's Z80 MCPU called the "ÊP1858ÂÌ1"), were a direct lift from American designs.

Even more important was the fact that all of the line widths (a critical dimension that defines conductor size on a given chip), on this chip copy were four times the size of the original. This permitted Soviet microelectronics designers to reverse engineer the existing design without having to achieve the rather daunting task of equaling its level of miniaturization.

Remember that a chip with larger transistors and overall structural geometry will consume much greater amounts of electrical power. Yes, the larger scale design is less sensitive to occluding defects on the lithography masks (the slide-like glass plates used for projecting patterns that image complex layer structures), but the device has a much lower chip-per-wafer yield and is power-hungry to boot. At the time, this did not matter to Soviet designers as their aircraft represented the triumph of brute force over sophistication. A pattern that persists even to this day.

The reason for mentioning this is that if the Soviet Union, with its far more advanced military-industrial complex, could not match the exacting tolerances required to build a microprocessor chip to correct scale, what are the chances of poorly developed North Korea being able to achieve the extremely challenging dimensional controls necessary to create components for a suitcase nuclear device?

This is no small issue. A suitcase nuclear bomb represents several different pinnacles in mechanical forming, electronic fabrication and systems integration. As mechanical and electronic component sizes shrink, the demands upon physical tolerances, needed power stability, device reliability and timing requirements all increase proportionately, if not geometrically.

It is doubtful in the extreme that resource-starved North Korea could possibly master all of the exceptionally demanding tasks needed to produce one of these highly miniaturized devices. As noted at the linked article:

"The idea of the Norks creating some sort of suitcase bomb is absurd. They don't have the technology and it's not what they want. In fact, they can't even miniaturize to achieve a somewhat easier goal, mating a bomb to a working missile. And they want that bomb to yield large, not small, results."

Furthermore, as the same article notes:

"North Korea wants a weapon that can knock out Hawaii, or Anchorage, or LA, so that they can have a free hand in attacking the South. It's an offshoot of the old chicom doctrine, "defending Taiwan isn't worth Los Angeles." People are confusing the Nork ideology with that of jihadists. Islamists want a bomb to generate damage, destruction, and casaulties. Their goal is chaos. The North's goal is Seoul.

As to our response? I still maintain that brief but decisive military intervention may be required. The situation is well-described by the article, too:

"Of course the idea that the Nokors are "working" on the city-killer raises issues of its own. If this is true, the longer America waits for Kim to set up the worse its position becomes. It's in some sense analogous to waiting for a hostile who has just had a misfire clear his weapon and reload -- except this time with a .458 Weatherby Magnum in place of .22 short.

Posted by Zenster">Zenster 2006-10-10 02:10|| 2006-10-10 02:10|| Front Page Top

#4 In yesterday's "Breaking News" thread about the first test somebody commented that these tests were demonstrations for a customer. I am more convinced of that than before. Kimmy has two exports, and two only: missiles and nuclear tech. The missiles go to Pakland; the nukes go to the highest bidder.

Posted by Jonathan">Jonathan 2006-10-10 09:43|| 2006-10-10 09:43|| Front Page Top

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