Why the “Satellite” Launch Will Be Successful – and Why That Should Worry Us

Well, that was fast.

Barely two weeks after what seemed to be a good first step in the right direction, the North Koreans announced that they would test-fire a satellite launching rocket sometime in mid-April.

Having taken a course called “Outer Space and Security” in grad school many moons ago (where my final term paper was coincidentally on the North Korean ballistic missile program), I happen to know a little bit about the vagaries of ballistic missile technology. As reported en masse over the weekend, ballistic missiles/space rockets happen to fall in the same “dual use” quandary as nuclear energy. Namely, that the same technologies that can help a country send a satellite into space can also help a country strike another country, such as the United States, thousands of miles away.

So really, what are the North Koreans thinking?

US-DPRK Deal: Instant Reaction

Only a couple of months after his ascension, Kim Jong Un and Associates^TM have managed to wrangle a preliminary deal with the Americans.  In exchange for 240,000 tons of aid, the North Koreans have agreed to stop testing nukes and ballistic missiles, halt uranium enrichment, and allow the IAEA back into Yongbyon. Judging from what the 240,000 tons will do to North Korea’s food deficit, not too shabby. After all, the North Koreans haven’t exactly given up anything – they’ve just agreed to stop what they’ve been doing.