North Koreas Nuclear Weapons

NORTH KOREA 'S NUCLEAR WEAPONS

Introduction

The catastrophic aftermath of the nuclear bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 has shocked the world and caused it to consider and make all extra precautions to avoid another grievous mistake . About sixty years had passed with no nuclear attacks such efforts can considerably be said as successful . Or is it

The absence of explosions nowhere implies the absence of such weapons Today 's society is in greater risk of nuclear weapons than it was sixty years ago . The rapid spread of commerce , the

rise of technology , and greater availability of information , had all contributed to the increase of nuclear weapons development across different nations and interested groups . Sixty years ago , such capacity was almost limited only to the United States and Russia , especially during the Cold War . However , many developing countries felt the need to find sources of energy in to support its industries . Many countries had turned to nuclear energy as a primary source and consequently , became knowledgeable of uranium . This has also increased the probability of such countries to develop nuclear weapons . In addition to the five `nuclear weapons states (U .S , Russia U .K , France and China , other countries believed to be building nuclear weapons (but did not officially acknowledge ) include Israel and Iran . On the other hand , North Korea commanded world-wide attention when it claimed to own nuclear weapons

It is estimated that about 20 ,000 of such kind still existed around the world in 2002 and those that were reclassified as `decommissioned ' were not fully destroyed but shelved (Webster , 2003 . Although the figures were projected to decrease as much as 50 by last year , the danger of it falling on wrong hands such as terrorist groups , still placed the world in grave danger

North Korea became a potential risk when it refused to continue being a member of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT ) in 2003 . Although there are those who doubt North Korea to become a real source of nuclear threat , believing that such claim is a mere political scheme to compel the United States to conform to its demands . There could be no room though , for complacency

Presence of Nuclear Weapons in North Korea

Two power stations are already in existence , at the Yongbyon Nuclear Scientific Research Center . The second and larger of the two , which used to be responsible for supplying plutonium for UK 's nuclear weapons program , is believed to generate ten new bombs per year . As of 2003 , the second plant is yet to be finished . The smaller plant has already been producing materials enough to create one bomb every year . This was made possible when North Korea acquired a reactor from Russia although uranium mines were already in existence prior to this

They were able to build up the capacity of this reactor and by the `80s the North secretly started to channel its efforts in reprocessing such fuel to manufacturing nuclear weapons . Upon information obtained by US intelligence of another...