North Korea has been showing off its
latest range of ballistic missiles and
this map shows how far each one can go.
As you can see, it looks like most of the
United States is in range and it's got
people panicking. "The real fear is that
North Korea is getting closer to
having a missile that could reach the...
mainland United States, the west coast
united states Alaska and the west
coast. But a closer look reveals that
this map doesn't exactly tell the full
story... as of right now. The longest range
missile the one that's supposed to put
the US and danger, is the Taepodong-2.
it's an intercontinental ballistic
missile or ICBM. It's the kind of thing
that the US and Russia have thousands of
and had used as a threat against each
other during the Cold War. "Hold at the
ready never less than a thousand
missiles. North Korea has been working on
one of its own for quite a while, except
their version doesn't really work. North
Koreans have had nuclear bombs since 2006 and
they could certainly attack their
neighbors. But they've had no real way to
deliver them to a distant target. They
could try and drop one from an airplane
but it would be likely shot down well
before getting to the target. The most
effective way to use a nuclear bomb is
to attach it to a missile. Different
delivery systems determine how far the
target can be. North Korea already has a
huge arsenal of short and medium-range
missiles but it doesn't have a working
ICBM, which can hit a target 15,000
kilometers away because it's actually
four missiles in one. Stacked on top of
each other, each missile is used one by
one to push the warhead into space. Then
once it's over target, this fourth
section re-enters the atmosphere and
detonates.
This is a very hard thing to engineer
and it's exactly why North Korea doesn't
have a working Taepodong-2 yet. Under
the pretense of testing a rocket engine
the country has tested it five times and
it's failed three times. It's managed to
launch into space twice but it's never
made it close to the final and crucial
stage of reentry. Theoretically North
Korea has two other ICBMs: the KN-14 and
the KN-08 that are capable of reaching
the US west coast. But neither of these
have been tested yet. So in reality, North
Korea cannot hit the US with a nuclear
ICBM today. That's the good news. The bad
news is that they've been trying to
build one for more than a decade and
experts think they'll have an ICBM
before 2027. That's because the US
intelligence community believes North
Korea may have achieved one of the
hardest parts of building an ICBM; making
a nuclear bomb small enough to fit on
one. A smaller bomb will make the missile
lighter and more efficient, making this
range very possible for a functioning
Taepodong-2 or KN-14. So this begs
the question: what would happen if North
Korea gets a working an ICBM? It helps to
understand why they want one in the
first place. The North Koreans first got
nuclear technology in the 1950s when
their ally, the Soviet Union, helped them
build nuclear reactors for energy. At the
same time they were protected from their
enemies, South Korea in the US, by the
massive nuclear arsenal of the Soviet
Union. But in 1991 when the Soviet Union
collapsed that protection went away. So
North Korean dictator Kim jong-il took
matters into his own hands and started
using the nuclear reactors to make
weapons. The US didn't want an aggressive
rogue state to have nuclear weapons so
three consecutive US presidents all
tried different tactics to get North
Korea to stop. Clinton negotiated, Bush
suspended negotiations and threaten them,
and Obama simply tried to wait North
Korea out. But every single plan failed
to stop the nuclear program. And there's
a reason for that. The Kim dynasty
believes their only option for security
is to have proven nuclear capabilities.
They saw the US invade Iraq and topple
Saddam Hussein because they thought he
might have nukes. They also saw Libyan
dictator Moammar Gadhafi negotiate with
the US and give up his nuclear program.
Only to be killed by US-backed rebels. The
Kim dynasty is determined not to be next.
So they've gone on to build an arsenal
of missiles for their nuclear bombs. The
Nodong is functional today and has a
range of fifteen hundred kilometers.
North Korea's SCUD missiles are highly
effective within a thousand kilometers.
This puts North Korea's main enemies,
South Korea and Japan, within range. As
well as a sixty-two thousand US troops
stationed there. In fact North Korea
wants to make that loud and clear. And it
does so by successfully testing these
short-range missiles a lot. The tests
provide a chance for them to improve
their missiles, but more importantly they
send a political message. South Korea and
Japan wouldn't attack North Korea
because they've seen the missiles that
could devastate some of their largest
cities. Also they don't have nuclear
weapons of their own. So what's keeping
North Korea from attacking its enemies?
The US is. They've promised to protect
South Korea and Japan with the largest
nuclear arsenal in the world. This puts
North Korea at a disadvantage; it knows
the US can obliterate it but it can't
reach the US just yet. This is why the
US can safely cut off North Korean trade
and enact other punishments. And this
brings us back to why North Korea wants
an ICBM so badly; it's what they need to
tip the scales in their favor. Right now
North Korea can only attack US
allies. If it can successfully test the
Taepodong-2 it would be the same as
telling the US: if you nuke us, we'll
nuke you. If the US knows North Korea
can target an American city it'll be
less likely to come to the aid of South
Korea or Japan. This would effectively
break up the alliance that's designed to
keep North Korea in check. But the
implications of this would go far beyond
the Korean Peninsula. Suddenly in charge
of their own protection, South Korea and
Japan would potentially develop nuclear
weapons of their own. Something Donald
Trump once said he would be fine with.
This would trigger a process called a
nuclear proliferation, and it's exactly
what the US has been trying to prevent
since the Cold War. Right now there are
9 countries with nuclear weapons of
their own. 190 maintain a non-nuclear
status because of the non-proliferation
treaty. But the success of a North Korean
ICBM could change that. If South Korea
and Japan start looking to change their
nuclear status, it could encourage other
countries to do the same. So experts are
urging the US and take action now while
it still can.
President Trump is pressing China to
help. See China continues to trade and
have a diplomatic relationship with North
Korea, essentially keeping the regime
alive. So if Trump can get China to
leverage or cut off that support, North
Korea might not have enough resources to
keep pursuing an ICBM. But for now as
North Korea continues to test and parade
missiles, tensions continue to rise and
the push to keep them from having a
nuclear ICBM gets stronger; not because
of the danger it poses to the US alone,
but because of the repercussions that
could be so severe and so far reaching.