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posted by martyb on Monday September 04 2017, @05:48AM   Printer-friendly
from the Marvin-the-Martian-had-no-comment dept.

We had three Soylentils submit stories about North Korea's claims it had detonated a hydrogen bomb and reports of seismic activity.

North Korea has Conducted a Major Nuclear Test.

North Korea said on Sunday it detonated a hydrogen bomb, possibly triggering an artificial earthquake and prompting immediate condemnation from its neighbors -- despite the rogue regime calling the test a "perfect success." http://www.foxnews.com/world/2017/09/03/quake-in-north-korea-may-have-been-nuclear-test.html

North Korea Claims Successful Hydrogen Bomb Test

North Korea claims to have successfully developed and tested a hydrogen bomb. Observers have detected tremors associated with a blast several times larger than previous underground nuclear bomb tests. North Korea also claimed to have developed a hydrogen bomb capable of being fitted on a missile:

North Korea carried out its most powerful nuclear test to date on Sunday, claiming to have developed an advanced hydrogen bomb that could sit atop an intercontinental ballistic missile.

The bomb used in the country's sixth-ever nuclear test sent tremors across the region that were 10 times more powerful than Pyongyang's previous test a year ago, Japanese officials said. While the type of bomb used and its size have not been independently verified, if true, the pariah state is a significant step closer to being able to fire a nuclear warhead to the US mainland, as it has repeatedly threatened it could if provoked.

[...] The device was more than eight times more powerful than the nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945, according to NORSAR, a Norway-based group that monitors nuclear tests. Based on the tremors that followed the test, NORSAR estimated it had an explosive yield of 120 kilotons. Hiroshima's had 15 kilotons. But South Korean officials gave a more modest estimation, saying that Sunday's bomb had a yield of 50 kilotons.

がんばれ! 你能行的!! 화이팅!!!

Also at BBC, Reuters, and NYT.

4.1 Magnitude Seismic Event in North Korea at a Low Depth

Earthquake News Today initially reported that a 5.1 magnitude event designated 2000aert had occurred near Sungjibaegam, North Korea at a depth of less than 1km at 03:30 UTC September 3.

Their updated report 2.5 hours later gave a magnitude of 4.1.

All reporting stations were in the USA.

NPR, formerly Nation Public Radio, subsequently reports

North Korea has claimed to have tested a hydrogen bomb

The blast was picked up by seismic stations all over the world, and it was big.

[...]North Korea's previous nuclear tests have been in the tens of kilotons range. That corresponds roughly to a weapon the size of the ones used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War II. It's believed that the North's earlier tests were of nuclear weapons that use uranium or plutonium (or both) for their explosive yield.

This time, the North claims to have mastered a far more powerful hydrogen weapon. Some early estimates are putting this test in the hundreds of kiloton range.

[...]Modern nuclear weapons of the sort possessed by the U.S. and Russia are almost all thermonuclear in nature. It allows the weapons to pack a huge punch while fitting in a warhead small enough to be delivered by a missile.


Original Submission #1Original Submission #2Original Submission #3

 
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  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 04 2017, @06:34AM (4 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 04 2017, @06:34AM (#563318)

    You probably didn't realize the irony of your post.

    The answer to your question is quite obvious. They tolerate this idiot because he has nukes. Same as Mexico and Canada have tolerated the various fruitcakes moving in and out of that tacky faux-classicist white building in Washington DC. Because they have nukes.

    The only country to have actually crossed the line of inhumanity and used nukes against humans. The only country that wittingly has brought and will continue to bring the world to the brink of total nuclear annihilation, simply because the narcissistic maniacs in charge consider themselves so exceptional that their strategic political and economic interests weigh more than the lives of eight billion people.

    I'm not generally a fan of preemptive military intervention, but if there was ever a good case for destroying someone's nuclear facilities, the USA are surely the poster child.

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    Everybody is somebody else's weirdo.

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  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by zocalo on Monday September 04 2017, @07:00AM (2 children)

    by zocalo (302) on Monday September 04 2017, @07:00AM (#563327)
    It's not just the nukes, or the buffer between them and the massive US military presence in South Korea which is the real reason China has historically supported the DPRK. As the DPRK's largest trading partner by far, China could quite easily cripple the DPRK by halting trade - they have enough other trading partners to pick up the slack whereas the DPRK does not, which could well precipitate some form of regime change. The problem for China with that idea is that if the DPRK does collapse, and regardless of whether or not the Kim family get usurped in the process, there is a very real risk of creating a massive humanitarian crises right on their doorstep, and that means a lot of desperate North Korean refugees attempting to cross the border into China, just like they did during the last major crop failure the DPRK suffered. China doesn't even come close to doing humanitarian aid on the scale of other world leaders, nor does the Beijing government have a particularly good track record with minorities already within their borders - e.g. the persecution of Tibetans, the Uighur and other Muslim groups, etc. - so the last thing they would want is a couple of million starving North Koreans heading north and setting up refugee camps in S.E. China.
    --
    UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
    • (Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 04 2017, @09:35AM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 04 2017, @09:35AM (#563378)

      The Chinese do not fear a humanitarian crisis from potential NK refugees. They fear the political and economic fallout from "containing" said refugees.

      For context, see the Cultural Revolution and the Great Leap Forward.

      China is about as humanitarian as Stalin's USSR. They just manage their economy better.

      • (Score: 3, Interesting) by zocalo on Monday September 04 2017, @12:58PM

        by zocalo (302) on Monday September 04 2017, @12:58PM (#563432)
        Exactly my point. They almost certainly don't give a crap about the cause (the humanitarian crisis) because they don't really do that, it's the repercussions of the most likely effect (a few million DPRK refugees heading to China) that they fear. Closing the border and letting them drown en masse while attempting to cross the Yalu river that forms much of their border with the DPRK, then deporting those that actually make it straight back to the DPRK's firing squads and gulags isn't going to be as viable an option if the world's media and recon satellites are watching.

        The Chinese might not be all that keen on doing the humanitarian thing, but they don't particularly like being called on it either.
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        UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 04 2017, @09:50AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 04 2017, @09:50AM (#563387)

    against humans. would have been one thing, but this was again civilian targets.