nuclear-news

If the outside world knows the technical details of the reactor, it is possible to guess its total plutonium output, from when the reactor became operational. Analysts believe that North Korea’s nuclear reactors have produced between 30 and 50 kilograms of weapons-grade plutonium (enough for five to 10 nuclear bombs)……

In North Korea, the plutonium program began in the 1960s. However, North Korea’s nuclear reactors were shut down in the 1990s. North Korea does not currently produce plutonium.

It seems that North Korea began to advance its HEU production program in the late 1990s, if not earlier. The existence of the program became known to the United States and was the major factor which triggered the 2002 diplomatic crisis……..

For a while, North Koreans denied the existence of the program, but in November 2010, they showed large HEU production facilities to a visiting US delegation. Siegfried Hecker, former director of the Los Alamos Laboratories, was proudly shown around North Korea’s new state-of-the-art facilities, seemingly with as many as 2,000 centrifuges.

He was not allowed to stay long enough to ascertain whether the facilities were fully functional, therefore the actual scale may be significantly smaller than Dr. Hecker’s hosts implied. But it might just be larger, too: an HEU program is very easy to decentralize and there is no reason why the North might not have more facilities elsewhere.

Experts agree that it is sometimes possible to distinguish between a uranium and plutonium test. At this stage, we cannot be certain which materials the North might use. If they test another plutonium device, it could be seen merely as a provocative waste of valuable resources. The test would amount to a waste of 5 kilograms of precious plutonium, which is not in abundant supply and no longer produced locally.

The political effect of a uranium test would be rather different. The implications of such a test are that the North is able to produce uranium in sufficient quantities to make nuclear devices. Uranium being so much easier to make secretly, this will produce a far more negative international reaction.

This is exactly what the North Korean leadership wants. Like the nuclear and missile program in general, the test is designed to achieve two strategic objectives. First, it should demonstrate North Korea’s nuclear capability, in order to deter hostile powers. Second, it should provide a serious incentive to foreign powers to negotiate with the North about dismantling and/or freezing the program in exchange for a large fee.
Indeed it is possible that from before its inception, the HEU program was made to be sold. The North is likely to freeze and even dismantle it, on the condition of a big pay off and if they are allowed to maintain their existing stock piles of weapons-grade plutonium (thus ensuring that they will have enough leverage for diplomatic blackmail as well as sufficient power of deterrence).

So, will it be uranium or plutonium? We may well know the answer soon.http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2012/05/304_110408.html