Out of all the nations that have nuclear weapons, North Korea (also known as the Democratic People's Republic of Korea) is the most secretive about its nuclear arsenal. The U.S. and N.K. entered into an agreement in the 1990s. The U.S. promised to provide N.K. with food and fuel in return for N.K. destroying the nuclear weapons technology that it had developed. Eventually the accord collapsed with both sides insisting that the other side had broken the agreement first. Following the ten year haitus, N.K. went back to working on nuclear weapons. There have several tests since then that indicate that N.K. now has the ability to build nuclear warheads.
N.K. has repeatedly threatened South Korea and neighboring states such as Japan with nuclear war. They have launched test missiles to prove that they have a delivery capability although it was believed that they were not yet able to make their nuclear warheads small enough to fit on the top of the missiles that they possess. They are especially angry about S.K. allowing the U.S. to maintain troops there. Military planners have stationed U.S. troops near the N.K. border because that would give the U.S. an excuse to become involved in a war with N.K. if it tried to invade S.K.
Nuclear experts in China now say that N.K. may have as many as twenty nuclear warheads. China also said that N.K. also may have the capability enrich enough uranium to create twenty more warheads in the next year. A top uranium enrichment from China presented this new estimate to U.S. nuclear experts.
U.S. experts had estimated that N.K. has between ten and sixteen warheads. The U.S.-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies released a study which detailed three possible scenarios for the growth of N.K. nuclear arsenal that projected that N.K could have twenty, fifty or a hundred nuclear warheads within five years depending on which scenario was chosen.
A U.S. nuclear expert was concerned about N.K. crossing a psychological threshold with respect to nuclear weapons. He said that if N.K. had a credible arsenal such as twenty warheads and the means to deliver they against other countries in the region, then this could make it much more difficult for other countries to convince N.K. to give up its nuclear weapons.
Recently, the commander of the U.S. Northern Command and North American Aerospace Defense Command stated that the U.S. military is convinced that N.K. has the technical capability to miniaturize a nuclear warhead to the point where it can be mounted on a ballistic missile. As far as we know there have been no test launches of N.K. ballistic missiles with miniature nuclear warheads.
There is speculation that since the death of Kim Jong-il, his son, Kim Jong -Ung has been struggling to maintain his control over the N.K. government. It is known that there are hardliners in his government that are prepared to start a war with S.K. The U.S, China, Russia, S.K., Japan have been negotiating with N.K. over its belligerent threats. In return for food and fuel, they want N.K. to give up its nuclear arsenal. Even if such negotiations result in N.K. giving up work on its nuclear arsenal for a only a decade, it would be well worth the effort.
