U.S. Officials Warn of North Korean Nuclear Weapon Test

U.S. officials have said North Korea might be preparing a nuclear test explosion, ABC News reported yesterday (see GSN, Aug. 16).

“It is the view of the intelligence community that a test is a real possibility,” said a senior State Department official.

A U.S. intelligence agency has recently seen “suspicious vehicle movement” and unloading of large cable reels outside the underground P’unggye-yok site in northeast North Korea, said a top U.S. military official. Such cables could link an underground test facility to above-ground observation equipment, ABC reported.

The White House received the intelligence last week.

There has been growing concern in Washington that Pyongyang wants to test a nuclear weapon to remove any doubt that it possesses a nuclear arsenal, according to ABC News.

That could lead Japan and South Korea to seek their own atomic arsenal, according to U.S. officials.

“A nuclear test is going to be alarming and troubling for everyone and would cause a very strong reaction I think from all of North Korea’s neighbors,” said former National Security Council official Michael Green, now with the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

The United States detected similar activity at suspected test sites in North Korea last year. Nothing came of that work.  Officials said North Korea could be seeking attention or creating a diversion while it prepares for a test in a different location.

“It is the view of most in the [U.S. intelligence] community that there is a 50-50 chance North Korea will conduct a nuclear test by the end of the year,” said one analyst.

Washington would respond to a test by seeking “to hermetically seal the hermit kingdom,” a senior U.S. official told ABC News. That would mean a rapid campaign for international sanctions and possibly a naval blockade of the country, the official said (Jonathan Karl, ABC News, Aug. 17).

The White House said yesterday that a nuclear test would be “extremely provocative,” the Associated Press reported.

However, two U.S. officials said there was no indication of an imminent test, according to AP (Associated Press I/USA Today, Aug. 18).

The Russian Foreign Ministry said Moscow has not collected any intelligence that would support the ABC report, Agence France-Presse reported today.

“Such information appears regularly in the foreign media but so far no reports of this kind have been confirmed,” a spokesman told AFP (Agence France-Presse, Aug. 18).

South Korea also said it lacked strong evidence of a potential test, AP reported.

“I haven’t heard that we have confirmed clear evidence that North Korea is pursuing a nuclear test,” said Unification Minister Lee Jong-seok. “We are closely monitoring North Korea’s activities related to the nuclear program and missiles” (Bo-Mi Lim, Associated Press II/Washington Post, Aug. 18).

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