Korea: November 25, 2004

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The CIA reported they believe North Korea could soon be testing a ballistic missile with a nuclear warhead. These predictions are difficult to verify, as North Korea has never demonstrated that it has a nuclear weapon, and North Korea's ballistic missile tests have only shown that they can scale up the basic SCUD missile technology they got from the Russians. The SCUD itself is an upgraded version of the German World War II V-2 ballistic missile. So we're talking basic rocket science here. Many other countries have developed ballistic missiles, mostly using them to launch satellites. A larger mystery is how successful nations have been at producing the technology to produce a nuclear weapon that could fit in the warhead of a ballistic missile, and have the weapon work after being launched and plunging back to earth. Warhead technology is quite complex, and the United States and Russia have had lots of serious problems with warhead technology over the last five decades. The horror stories eventually come out. Building warheads that work is not easy, and the CIA reports do not come out an say that the northerners have succeeded in this department..

South Korea has banned the publication of a new American video game, Ghost Recon 2. The reason is that most of the scenarios in the game take place in a future North Korea. In the game, the government up north is still hostile and strange. North Korea has already denounced the game, and South Korea prefers to avoid any publicity about a war with the north. 

 

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