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China-Japan-Koreas
Nork Uranium Enrichment Facility 'a Ploy'
2010-12-14
North Korea's unveiling of a uranium enrichment facility to a U.S. expert "may be a ploy designed to threaten the international community," according to a senior North Korean defector who was involved in the North's nuclear and missile development programs.

The North showed what it said was a large uranium enrichment facility to Siegfried Hecker, a nuclear expert and co-director of the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University.

"If Pyongyang had really succeeded in making highly enriched uranium and producing nuclear weapons, it would have hidden it rather than making it public," the defector said Monday.
Unless the reason is to convince the ROK and US that they dare not retaliate against Nork provocations, in which case it makes perfect sense to show some of the real goods. The Norks know we have very capable analysts so showing a fake facility isn't going to work.
He interpreted the unveiling as a ploy to get the North out of dire straits caused by a botched currency reform late last year and an exhausted treasury due to the expensive power transfer to leader Kim Jong-il's son. The North is getting desperate and trying to win concessions from the international community by ratcheting up the nuclear threat, he said.
That and ratcheting up the provocations. It's worked in the past.
The North in 2002 started making centrifuges for uranium enrichment by obtaining blueprints from Pakistan. "Under the command of the General Bureau of Atomic Energy, the country's top scientists were mobilized then to manufacture centrifuges," the defector said. But the regime's hopes came to naught since a centrifuge needs to rotate 70,000 times per minute to function properly but the North managed only 30,000 rotations per minute.

Claims that the North has more than 1,000 centrifuges are also unconvincing. "Core components have to be bought from Japan and Europe, so it would have been practically impossible under severe surveillance by the international community," he said.
There are plenty of ways the West would let this happen. Just involves money, gullible westerners and Nork duplicity. I can find all three out there in the world ...
Posted by:Steve White

#1  IMO the only real reason for Pyongyang to publicly reveal its new NucFac is that is losing its ability to control Famine + other serious national econ problems.

Again, Pyongyang is well aware that China won't think twice about sending the PLA iff it thought that the DPRK was getting too potent vee China's interests.IOW, REGARDLESS OF HOW SUCCESSFUL THE DPRK NUCPROGS ARE, THE SAME HAS A VESTED INTEREST IN MAKING SURE THAT CHINA = BEIJING DOESN'T FIND OUT ABOUT IT, OR IN ALTER THAT SUCH INNOVATIVE, EVOLUTIONARY, "PROGRESSIVE + "DECISIVE" + "GAME-CHANGING", ETC. TECHS IS NEVER FORMALLY USED OUTSIDE OF THE LABORATORY OR CLASSROOM BY THE DPRK GOVT. UNTIL SUCH TIME BEIJING APPROVES OF ITS USE.

Beijing's priority is to make sure that the DPRK, etal. does not turn its Nucweaps agz China, or in the altern that the DPRK will not emerge militarily victorious agz China even iff it did.

* PEOPLES DAILY FORUM > EXPERTS WARN OF KOREAN ESCALATION. New ROK-only drills + DPRK Counter-drills NOT GOOD FOR THE CABBAGE.

* SAME > PLA GENERAL [GEN. Luo Yuan] WANTS FUTURE CHINA TO BE "TOUGH + MILITARISTIC".

ARTIC > WEALTH alone is insufficient to make China a GREAT NATION - IT MUST HAVE MARTIAL SPIRIT + ATTITUDE, + also ABUNDANT RESOURCES + HEALTHY LEGAL, POLITICAL SYSTEM.

* SAME > HOW CHINA'S JETS THREATEN RUSSIA!?

* SAME > VLADIVOSTOK: A "TICKING TIME BOMB" IN SINO-RUSSIAN RELATIONS?
Posted by: JosephMendiola   2010-12-14 01:24  

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