N. Korea Preparing For Another Nuke Test?
U.S. Intelligence Suggests North Koreans Might Test Again
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Play CBS Video Video Nuclear Test Confirmed Air samples gathered by an Air Force plane confirmed that North Korea set off a nuclear device. There are signs that the rogue nation could commence with another test. David Martin reports.
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Video North Korea's Wary Neighbors While China and South Korea support financial and weapons sanctions on North Korea, they have been careful not to disrupt the status quo with their neighbor. Allen Pizzey has more details.
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A protester in front of the government complex building in Seoul, South Korea, Oct. 17, 2006, holds a poster denouncing North Korea's nuclear weapons test. (AP)
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U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill (right) discussed the North Korean situation Oct. 16, 2006, in Tokyo with Kenichiro Sasae, the Japanese foreign ministry's director-general for Asian and Oceania Affairs. (AP)
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Seoul, South Korea, Oct. 16, 2006: a demonstration of the right way to put on gas masks, at a civil defense drill - routine, but feeling more real against the backdrop of the recent nuclear test in North Korea. (AP)
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Pedestrians rush to a shelter during a civil defense drill in Seoul, South Korea, Monday, Oct. 16, 2006. The exercise Monday was a routine drill, a monthly reminder to South Korea that it still remains technically in a state of war. (AP)
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North Korea's nuclear weapons program was at the top of the agenda Oct. 17, 2006, for South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun (right) and Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov as they met in Seoul. (AP Photo/Pool)
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Interactive N. Korea: Tests And Threats Follow recent events and learn about this secretive nation's nuclear capabilities.
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Interactive Nuclear Armed World The world's nuclear weapons powers, missile defense and a history of the nuclear weapons age.
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Fast Facts North Korea Learn about the people, economy and history.
"We're watching it, obviously, and discussing it with other parties, as well," said Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. "I think it goes to say that it would further deepen the isolation of North Korea and I hope they would not take such a provocative act."
South Korea is aware of signs related to possible preparations for an additional North Korea nuclear test, Yonhap news agency reported, citing unnamed government officials. One official said various intelligence reports were coming in about a possible test, but that it was unclear how reliable they were.
Meanwhile, National Intelligence Director John Negroponte's office confirmed that North Korea conducted an underground nuclear explosion. In a short statement posted on its Web site, Negroponte's office confirmed that the size of the explosion was less than 1 kiloton, a comparatively small nuclear explosion. Each kiloton is equal to the force produced by 1,000 tons of TNT.
That's less than one-tenth the size of the atomic bomb the U.S. dropped on the Japanese city of Hiroshima in 1945, CBS News White House correspondent Mark Knoller reports. That could indicate that North Korea was unable to produce a bigger yield from its weapon.
"Analysis of air samples collected on October 11, 2006, detected radioactive debris which confirms that North Korea conducted an underground nuclear explosion in the vicinity of P'unggye on October 9, 2006," the statement said.
On Friday, a senior Bush administration official told The Associated Press that one test conducted on samples gathered after the detonation found a radioactive gas consistent with a nuclear explosion. At the time, however, U.S. intelligence was not ready to confirm that a nuclear test actually had taken place.
The statement from Negroponte's office provides the first official confirmation from the United States that a nuclear detonation took place, as Pyongyang has claimed.
Meanwhile, North Korea appeared to slip further into isolation, as China — under intense pressure to enforce new U.N. sanctions — inspected cargo trucks bound for its communist ally and stepped up construction of a border fence.
Japan — once a major trading partner with the North Korea — said it was considering further sanctions, and Australia banned the North's ships from its ports.
The Chinese inspections at a border crossing with the North came amid concerns that Beijing would ignore the new U.N. sanctions leveled against the reclusive communist country for its proclaimed nuclear test. China is a major trader with North Korea and its support is key to the success of the new U.N. measures, which call for nations to check cargo leaving and arriving from North Korea.
"Chinese action on cargo inspection appears to have been prompted as much by a fear of reprisal after the U.N. vote as it is by the mandate of the resolution itself," said CBS News foreign affairs analyst Pamela Falk.
"Chinese diplomats have made clear that they don't expect to participate in inspection of ship cargo, either as part of the voluntary U.N. provision, or as part of the U.S.-sponsored Proliferation Security Initiative," Falk reports, "but the inspection of land-based cargo has been occurring for some time as part of routine security and may increase."
China's customs agency and its commerce and foreign ministries refused to say whether the cargo checks were prompted by U.N. sanctions, but a top U.S. diplomat said the inspections were promising.
R. Nicholas Burns, undersecretary of state for political affairs, said there will be "enormous pressure on China to live up to their responsibility" in enforcing United Nations punishment of its ally, North Korea. "We are all banking on that."
But former State Department official Jack Pritchard says the sanctions so far are not enough to make the North Koreans regret testing, reports Martin.
"It's going to require some other measure of intervention to get the North Koreans to stop from what they're doing," Pritchard told Martin. Sanctions alone are certainly not going to work."
©MMVI, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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Actually, a trade war does not rebuild US infrastructure wasted by NAFTA. And the PRC holds a title to the US money market, as well. Paul Volker is pessimistic about this situation and attributes the problem, not to the Chinese, but to intoxicating influence of lobby and campaign money on our congress, which refuses to rouse itself for anything but its own reelection campaigns.
Volker says the US is indeed in trouble because of its imbalance in payments, rendering us a debtor nation failing to produce even as much as it consumes. This attitude has become institutionalized, he says, by an administration which has no more concern for overspending than the Democrats it once condemned. Pointedly, Clinton left office with a budget surplus and Bush simply wasted it, compounding the deficit he created with reckless "tax cuts" for the upper five percent which did not jump start the economy. Under Bush, the US economy toys with a condition not seen since the days of staglation.
"So the fact, that they hate us-----REALLY DOES NOT SAY MUCH!!!!!"
I can really see why the world is closer to obliteration than ever before.
No one cares what people think about Americans, so it is as if this gives America the right to push everybody else around because, well, they already hate us, so what difference does it make ...
That is except to "other" everybody and everything, to make it easier to hate, no one cares: you are either a liberal, a conservative, a Democrat, a Republican, evil, saintly, ally, axis, for the terrorists, against the terrorists, a this, a that ... the list is endless.
Such a childish attitude.
No one is allowed to be objective anymore.
You know nothing, except the few cubic inches inside you skull - and even that is questionable.
with dealing with China in trade...
We were pretty stupid allowing our enemies to make all of our products.
But SELECTIVE sanctions may work.
And I think that`s a good sign!
I`m writing this from Japan, where I live
and I have a real interest in this issue because
we may have a war...here in Japan.
I essentially agree more or less with everybody on this site anyway...
DO SOMETHING about China.
I really doubt that China will do anything constructive..so maybe the sanctions should be placed on China as well...
Time to stand up and deal with North Korea before they test another bomb...and perhaps
sanctions that will really matter will only come through sanctions on China which is feeding the North Koreans...with food and oil!
If china will put pressure on the North Koreans we may be able to solve this problem without a war.
If it gets any worse however I predict a war within 6 months to 2 years...after North Korea tests their next bomb.
We definitely need to do something...
overt or covert...
Do it some time, EVERYTHING you buy, from parts in your car, stereos, tv sets, computers, consumer goods, clothes etc you will find the "Made in China" labels.
Coat I bought from LL Bean and hat- Made in China, EVERYTHIN I bought at Wal-mart a month ago- MADE IN CHINA.
If we boycott China the shelves would be bare.
CHances are good they have stockpiled a LOT, knowing full well once they revealed they had the bomb we would do sanctions, knowing that would come they almost certainly stockpiled as much material as they could for more bombs. SO the upshot is while BUSH and his regime hit the WRONG country- Iraq and pittered away half a trillion dollars and our military resources, NK has been building nukes, now it's TOO LATE to do a dam thing about it cauise sanctions wont work and BUSH refuses to talk to them.
Get ready for WW111
So, to think that sanctions are going to chnage anything is utter naivete.
Hill says "I think this nuclear test has brought China much closer to us". Yeah right!!
Sure the Chinese will lift a few truck tarps and open a few tailgates but wait a few days.. it will be back to business as usual.
Sanctions won't do much. It is time the Americans stop thinking that the Muslims and North Koreans are irrational beasts who should be killed like vermin. They are humans like us who just want what is their due in this world. Engaging in dialog that respects the other nations' citizens sovereign rights is what will end all the lunacy in the world.
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