North Korea's latest missile test was even scarier than it seemed

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Θέμα: North Korea's latest missile test was even scarier than it seemed
Ημ/νία: Κυρ, Δεκ 3, 2017 00:26

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The experts were wrong: Earlier this week, analysts thought North Korea's latest missile test proved their Hwasong-14 could strike anywhere in the continental US—as long as the ICBM wasn't loaded down with a (big, heavy, range-shrinking) nuclear warhead. But, as security reporter Lily Hay Newman explains, Tuesday's test missile wasn't actually the Hwasong-14. It was a bigger and more powerful Hwasong-15, which can likely carry a North Korean warhead anywhere Kim Jong-un pleases.

The news gets worse. The hurdles North Korea still faces—real-world-tested reentry vehicles, precision targeting, and reliability—are all within easy reach. And reliability may not be such a big deal to the Supreme Leader: "What normally happens in other countries is, after you've got four or five tests under your belt, you start doing tests under a variety of conditions and that usually takes a dozen to two dozen flight tests," 38 North's Michael Elleman says. "But North Korea can probably live with 'it succeeds more often than it fails.' "

Which means it's time for a new North Korea strategy. "The US has always had limited options in dealing with the Hermit Kingdom," Barrett writes. "But getting North Korea to agree to a weapons development freeze is no longer one of them."

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weapons

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