After a highly expensive but failed attempt to launch a satellite onto space, North Korea has once again shown itself as a nation with nuclear power aspirations. It seems that North Korea wanted to show that they could be a potential adversary to the western world. Experts believe that even though the missile fell onto the sea, it should be seen as a major step toward military nuclear weaponry.
The launching had led to a widespread rebuke by President Obama and other world leaders, and prompted a United Nations Security Council to go into an emergency session.
Other nations that pose a threat to the western democracies, like Iran, seem to have had better luck with their missiles.
“It is not unusual to have a series of failures at the beginning of a missile program,” Jeffrey G. Lewis, an arms control specialist at the new America Foundation, a research group in Washington, said in an interview. “But they don’t test enough to develop confidence that they are getting over the problems.”
Dr. Lewis added that in a 1998 report from former Secretary of State, Donald Rumsfeld, argued that North Korean rockets might be good enough to pose a threat to the United States.
Now, the Obama Administration has started talking to its allies to launch a series of agreements and sanctions that could hopefully lead to disarmament of nuclear weapons.
The launching had led to a widespread rebuke by President Obama and other world leaders, and prompted a United Nations Security Council to go into an emergency session.
Other nations that pose a threat to the western democracies, like Iran, seem to have had better luck with their missiles.
“It is not unusual to have a series of failures at the beginning of a missile program,” Jeffrey G. Lewis, an arms control specialist at the new America Foundation, a research group in Washington, said in an interview. “But they don’t test enough to develop confidence that they are getting over the problems.”
Dr. Lewis added that in a 1998 report from former Secretary of State, Donald Rumsfeld, argued that North Korean rockets might be good enough to pose a threat to the United States.
Now, the Obama Administration has started talking to its allies to launch a series of agreements and sanctions that could hopefully lead to disarmament of nuclear weapons.
3 comments:
This was President Obama's first global security crisis. I read in an article in the New York Times that "the rocket’s failure might “open a window of opportunity” for the Obama administration to engage the North Koreans in disarmament talks." Also Obama stated that “In a strange turn of history, the threat of global nuclear war has gone down, but the risk of a nuclear attack has gone up." Obama said that his administration would “reduce the role of nuclear weapons” in its national security strategy, and would urge other countries to do the same. Hopefully Obama's plans will go well because i think nuclear weapons are a major problem that need attention.
Like Isabel I think that nukes are a threat that should be one of those "oops" minutes because we have ignored the threat for more immediate and pressing conflicts. That's why I think it's important that Obama does, at the very least, start talking about how to shut down the nuclear trade system and begin a closer regulation of nukes worldwide in an attempt to get a majority of them off the black market, or maybe make it more difficult for anybody to obtain nukes. I realize that money is the ultimate persuasion so there will always be buyers and sellers, and/or that in so doing we might cause an evolution of sorts of the black market, but I think it's perhaps not something we are obligated to do, but something that since we as a nation have the potential to better the world, we should try.
Yeah, N. Korea might be a threat in a few decades or something but not anytime soon. I mean, there is rampant malnutrition in the country and severe paranoia and to expect these people to get something a nuclear missle up and running is really pushing it. I mean, I just read an article about North Korean refugees who suffer from severe post traumatic stress while also being completly unable to trust others and feeling incredibly guilty about the family left behind
Post a Comment