Analysis | Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

A post-launch examination of the Unha-2

David Wright — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 12:09:29 -0700

North Korea tested a launch vehicle called the Unha-2 from its Musudan-ri launch site in North Hamgyong province on April 5 local time (April 4, 10:30 p.m. Eastern Standard Time). Using information that has become available since the test and information from previous tests, we have conducted a technical analysis that leads to a compelling description of the Unha-2 launcher. This analysis suggests both challenges and potential opportunities.

Will the Senate support new nuclear arms reductions?

John Isaacs — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 08:19:30 -0700

President Barack Obama has an ambitious agenda on nuclear weapons issues that will take a long time to implement. For example, the earliest the Senate is likely to vote again on the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) is 2010. Likewise, a Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty is at least three years away. Ditto for the president's goal of safeguarding all vulnerable nuclear weapons and nuclear materials worldwide. And then there is his most ambitious goal of all--a nuclear-weapon-free world, which even he has suggested probably won't take place in his lifetime.

The demise of the pebble bed modular reactor

Steve Thomas — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 07:22:43 -0700

In February 2009, Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (PBMR) Ltd., an eponymously named South African company announced a major change of strategy. After 10 years of development it said it was abandoning plans to build a full-size 165-megawatt-electric demonstration plant. Furthermore, PBMR Ltd. said it will try to redirect its future plans for the reactor from electricity generation toward thermal applications, such as coal gasification and water desalination. With government funding set to run out next year, the company will have to close if new funding is not found.

Assessing North Korea's uranium enrichment capabilities

Hui Zhang — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 12:31:35 -0700

As retaliation against tighter U.N. sanctions, on Saturday North Korea defiantly threatened to expand its nuclear arsenal and begin a program of uranium enrichment--a threat it first made in response to U.N. condemnation of its early April rocket launch. Compared to North Korea's well-known plutonium production program, the nature of Pyongyang's highly enriched uranium (HEU) program is less clear.

The North Korean nuclear test: Seoul goes on the defensive

Jungmin Kang — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 07:38:12 -0700

On May 25, two years and seven months after its first nuclear test, North Korea conducted its second nuclear test at Phunggye-ri, in the northeastern part of the country, which is close to the East Sea and about 375 kilometers northeast of Pyongyang. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, the second test took place about 6 kilometers west of the 2006 test.

The North Korean nuclear test: The South Korean reaction

Kiho Yi — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 08:32:26 -0700

In South Korea last week, not even North Korea's nuclear test and its subsequent missile launches could overshadow the sad news of former President Roh Moo-hyun's death. In fact, South Koreans spent most of last week grieving, not angry at Pyongyang for its latest provocation. Such a reaction is the product of a decade's worth of reconciliation and cooperation between Seoul and Pyongyang that has helped develop a perception in the South that the North is no longer the enemy.

Whither Pakistan? A five-year forecast

Pervez Hoodbhoy — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 12:11:39 -0700

First, the bottom line: Pakistan will not break up; there will not be another military coup; the Taliban will not seize the presidency; Pakistan's nuclear weapons will not go astray; and the Islamic sharia will not become the law of the land.

That's the good news. It conflicts with opinions in the mainstream U.S. press, as well as with some in the Obama administration. For example, in March, David Kilcullen, a top adviser to Gen. David Petraeus, declared that state collapse could occur within six months. This is highly improbable.

The North Korean nuclear test: The Chinese reaction

Hui Zhang — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 07:46:55 -0700

On the morning of May 25, many schools in northeast China were evacuated because of the earthquake caused by the North Korea nuclear test. The epicenter of the earthquake, registering 4.5 on the Richter scale, was just 180 kilometers away from those schools.

The North Korean nuclear test: The Japanese reaction

Masako Toki — Wed, 27 May 2009 09:56:59 -0700

Only 50 days ago, Japan called on the U.N. Security Council to condemn North Korea's long-range missile launch. On May 25, Tokyo once again appealed to the Security Council for an emergency meeting to condemn Pyongyang--this time for its second nuclear test and its subsequent launch of three short-range missiles.

The North Korean nuclear test: What the seismic data says

Jeffrey Park — Tue, 26 May 2009 12:05:19 -0700

According to early reports, Monday's North Korea event certainly seems like a deliberate explosion in the right place. However, it was too small to be a successful Hiroshima-class crude explosive device, by a factor of three or four. The reported estimates of Richter magnitude spread from 4.5-5, and the standard conversions to explosive yield suggest a yield of 2-6 kiloton-equivalents of TNT. Most of the latest Richter magnitude estimates have come in the low half of the 4.5-5 range, so it seems likely that the yield was 4 kilotons or smaller.

The North Korean nuclear test: A perilous path back to the negotiating table

Jeffrey Goldstein — Tue, 26 May 2009 10:18:39 -0700

North Korea's nuclear test is an escalation of Pyongyang's familiar tactic. When it feels it is being ignored, North Korea often seeks to focus attention on itself by behaving provocatively. This tactic has been successful in the past. For example, when Pyongyang threatened to withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1993, it brought the Clinton administration to the negotiating table. Similarly, Pyongyang's first nuclear test in 2006 resulted in the Bush administration taking the Six-Party Talks much more seriously.

The security of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal

Lawrence J. Korb — Tue, 19 May 2009 11:26:09 -0700

During the last week of April, I visited four cities in Pakistan (Islamabad, Rawalpindi, Lahore, and Karachi). The purpose of the trip was to discuss a December 2008 Center for American Progress report that I coauthored, Partnership for Progress: Advancing a New Strategy for Prosperity and Stability in Pakistan and the Region.

Eastern Europe's nuclear dilemma

Miles A. Pomper — Fri, 15 May 2009 09:08:25 -0700

In order to join the European Union (EU), several Eastern European states agreed to phase out their Soviet-era nuclear reactors, which other EU members--still haunted by the 1986 Chernobyl accident--thought were too dangerous to operate. But such closures have made these countries even more dependent on Russian natural gas supplies. This dependency caused a near-crisis last year when a pricing dispute led to the shutoff of Russian natural gas to Europe in the middle of winter.

The risks of North Korea's nuclear restart

Siegfried S. Hecker — Tue, 12 May 2009 11:54:17 -0700

On April 13, the U.N. Security Council condemned North Korea's rocket launch earlier in the month. Within nine hours, North Korea denounced and rejected the Security Council statement; expelled international inspectors and the U.S.

Possible Indian reaction to U.S. ratification of the CTBT

Amandeep Gill — Tue, 05 May 2009 10:17:48 -0700

During his recent speech in Prague regarding U.S. nuclear policy, President Barack Obama said that his administration would "immediately" and "aggressively" pursue U.S. ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) to achieve a global ban on nuclear testing.

Who will succeed ElBaradei?

Fred McGoldrick — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 08:21:19 -0700

As International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director-General Mohamed ElBaradei prepares to step down at the end of November, the task of finding his replacement is heating up. Two candidates, Yukiya Amano of Japan and Abdul Samad Minty of South Africa, both IAEA ambassadors from their respective countries, failed to garner the necessary two-thirds majority in successive rounds of secret balloting by the IAEA's 35-member Board of Governors in March.

A strategy for achieving Senate approval of the CTBT

John Isaacs — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 13:35:01 -0700

On April 5, speaking in Prague, President Barack Obama delivered his first public commitment to seek the Senate's advice and consent for ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. He told his audience: "To achieve a global ban on nuclear testing, my administration will immediately and aggressively pursue U.S. ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty [CTBT]." He added, "After more than five decades of talks, it is time for the testing of nuclear weapons to finally be banned."

Japan's response to the North Korean satellite launch

Masako Toki — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 15:03:06 -0700

Japan has responded to North Korea's announcement that it intends to launch a communication satellite between April 4 and April 8, by mobilizing its missile defense system for the first time in the country's history. Although North Korea maintains it will launch a Kwangmyongsong-2 satellite into orbit, the United States, Japan, and South Korea suspect the launch is a cover story for a Taepodong-2 long-range ballistic missile test.

Examining North Korea's satellite launch vehicle

David Wright — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 12:56:31 -0700

North Korea's announcement that it will attempt to launch a satellite into orbit in early April begs the obvious questions of what launcher it will use and what capability that launcher could give if used as a ballistic missile. The easy answer is that no one in the West knows.

But we can examine North Korea's past missile efforts and the path that other countries such as China have taken to develop satellite launchers and ballistic missiles to understand the range of possibilities for the upcoming launch.¹

Thirty years after TMI: Five lessons learned

Larry Foulke — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 10:02:00 -0700

When I ask my students at the University of Pittsburgh if they know what "TMI" stands for, they respond with, "Too much information." They can be excused; they were born long after the 1979 accident at Three Mile Island.