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posted by cmn32480 on Saturday September 16 2017, @05:57AM   Printer-friendly
from the he-might-be-a-little-nuts-too dept.

North Korea's defiant pursuit of nuclear weapons capabilities, dramatised by last weekend's powerful underground test and a recent long-range ballistic missile launch over Japan, has been almost universally condemned as posing a grave, unilateral threat to international peace and security.

The growing North Korean menace also reflects the chronic failure of multilateral counter-proliferation efforts and, in particular, the long standing refusal of acknowledged nuclear-armed states such as the US and Britain to honour a legal commitment to reduce and eventually eliminate their arsenals.

In other words, the past and present leaders of the US, Russia, China, France and the UK, whose governments signed but have not fulfilled the terms of the 1970 nuclear non-proliferation treaty (NPT), have to some degree brought the North Korea crisis on themselves. Kim Jong-un's recklessness and bad faith is a product of their own.

The NPT, signed by 191 countries, is probably the most successful arms control treaty ever. When conceived in 1968, at the height of the cold war, the mass proliferation of nuclear weapons was considered a real possibility. Since its inception and prior to North Korea, only India, Pakistan and Israel are known to have joined the nuclear "club" in almost half a century.

To work fully, the NPT relies on keeping a crucial bargain: non-nuclear-armed states agree never to acquire the weapons, while nuclear-armed states agree to share the benefits of peaceful nuclear technology and pursue nuclear disarmament with the ultimate aim of eliminating them. This, in effect, was the guarantee offered to vulnerable, insecure outlier states such as North Korea. The guarantee was a dud, however, and the bargain has never been truly honoured.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/sep/05/nuclear-armed-nations-brought-the-north-korea-crisis-on-themselves


[Ed Note: Since this story was submitted there has been at least one additional ballistic missile test by North Korea.]

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  • (Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday September 16 2017, @12:17PM (8 children)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Saturday September 16 2017, @12:17PM (#568926) Journal
    The problem there is that three of the countries listed didn't actually have their own nuclear weapons. They had nuclear weapons installed in their territory by the USSR and were well bribed to relinquish any claim to those weapons. The last, South Africa never had a viable system and hence, didn't qualify as nuclear armed. As to the countries which didn't have nuclear weapons and thus, were never nuclear armed? They're not counterexamples to anything.

    Meanwhile we have nine countries known to have nuclear weapons capable of being used to blow something up. Not one has relinquished those weapons though we have seen substantial reductions in the US and Russia's arsenals.
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 16 2017, @12:56PM (7 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 16 2017, @12:56PM (#568937)

    The former Soviet republics had working nuclear bombs and missiles, but may not have had the codes with which to use them. One author says [nonproliferation.org] the Ukraine may have had the codes:

    Under traditional code procedure, the contents of the envelopes might also have been passed to Ukraine.

    What do you mean by "South Africa never had a viable system"? They had a few functional bombs, and bombers that could carry them, did they not?

    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday September 16 2017, @01:08PM (5 children)

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Saturday September 16 2017, @01:08PM (#568943) Journal

      What do you mean by "South Africa never had a viable system"? They had a few functional bombs, and bombers that could carry them, did they not?

      They never tested [wikipedia.org] the nukes (that right there rules out the viability of the device) and they never had a viable delivery system (the bombs were too big for the missiles they had and the airplanes, that could carry the devices, couldn't penetrate Russian-based anti-air defenses of their neighbors). It was just an expensive negotiation ploy at the end which is why it was so easy to negotiate away.

      • (Score: 3, Interesting) by Phoenix666 on Saturday September 16 2017, @04:18PM (2 children)

        by Phoenix666 (552) on Saturday September 16 2017, @04:18PM (#569004) Journal

        Those of us who read CIA whitepapers and sources like Jane's at the time were pretty certain that the South Africans tested nukes with Israel over the sea. South Africa gave up its nukes after Apartheid. Israel did not.

        It does raise the question why the US did not come down like a ton of bricks on Israel for its nukes. It is a dangerous country that has no compunction about invading its neighbors and using banned weapons like cluster bombs. It too should be under absolute international sanctions until it surrenders its nuclear weapons.

        --
        Washington DC delenda est.
        • (Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday September 16 2017, @10:20PM

          by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Saturday September 16 2017, @10:20PM (#569132) Journal

          Those of us who read CIA whitepapers and sources like Jane's at the time were pretty certain that the South Africans tested nukes with Israel over the sea.

          Then where's the fallout? That's the definitive proof of a nuclear explosion which can't be masked. I believe there's sufficient evidence to indicate that the CIA and other sources were confusing asteroid impacts with nuclear explosions.

        • (Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday September 16 2017, @10:31PM

          by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Saturday September 16 2017, @10:31PM (#569142) Journal
          I'll note also that since the end of apartheid, there has been ample opportunity to find evidence of these alleged tests. Where is it?
      • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 16 2017, @10:07PM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 16 2017, @10:07PM (#569125)

        They never tested [wikipedia.org] the nukes (that right there rules out the viability of the device)

        The gun-type design used in the Little Boy bomb was never tested until it was dropped on Hiroshima. Clearly that did not rule out the viability of the device.

        • (Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday September 16 2017, @10:29PM

          by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Saturday September 16 2017, @10:29PM (#569139) Journal

          The gun-type design used in the Little Boy bomb was never tested until it was dropped on Hiroshima. Clearly that did not rule out the viability of the device.

          You just wrote that the Little Boy was tested (and we're neglecting previous testing of other designs). At the least, the builders could point to the implosion detonation of the Trinity test to show that they were competent enough to design nuclear weapons. South Africa made six warheads with no practical demonstration that they or any other design made by the development group would work.

    • (Score: 2, Insightful) by maxwell demon on Saturday September 16 2017, @06:48PM

      by maxwell demon (1608) on Saturday September 16 2017, @06:48PM (#569074) Journal

      One author says [nonproliferation.org] the Ukraine may have had the codes

      And after the end of the USSR, the Ukraine gave the nukes back to Russia in exchange to Russia guaranteeing the Ukraine's territorial integrity. That didn't work out so well for the Ukraine …

      --
      The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.