Why North Korea's missiles aren't a threat

>No. It will never be used. It will be used, however, to get the regime what it needs...
What kind of article is this?
Of course they're a threat. Their missiles will keep getting better and better after every failed attempt.
We must stay cautious of this aggressive nation.

The missiles aren't a threat (to us).


The numpties with their fingers on the buttons might be.

I think you missed the message of the article

If they work then they are a threat to our allies and thus destabilise the region.

Quick rundown then?

Rubbish article imo because it presupposes the only scenario that NK would use such weapons would be to attempt to win a war. Agreed it uses the system to get attention, but the mere threat of starting a war or killing millions of people in Seoul, China or Japam would be enough to have far reaching implications for the world economy. Would they ever do it? The leadership is unpredictable. I think he is capable of it, so I wouldnt rule it out and that is enough. If he was under threat then I doubt the leadership cares for anyone except itself.

Still doesn't mean they're a direct threat to us, and that if is pretty big in context.

Not sure I understand your point. How would they disrupt the world economy without using it within a war-like scenario?

By all accounts he is pretty unstable. He just had his brother murdered today. If at some stage his back was against the wall, then he has the power to order an attack irrespective of consequences or whether they could win a war. Destroying Seoul or a major city in Japan would be enough.

I don't understand why Kim would decide to do that tho. Like yeah, he's a dictator, but that doesn't make him crazy. He still values his own life, no?

The author of the article isn't particularly well-informed or knowledgeable about matters of rocketry, missiles and the like.

First, North Korea's long-range missile capability (ICBM-range that might be able to hit the United States) is, it's true, not particularly threatening. But that's not why the Western allies are concerned. The concern is about the threat to South Korea, Japan and to US installations at places like Guam, Atsugi Air Base and the like.

Second, the reason this recent test is particularly noteworthy is because they were testing a new (for them) technology called solid-fuel rocketry. The North Koreans have, in the past, used "liquid-fueled" rockets; these are rockets where you have to fill the rocket up with the rocket fuel before launching it. You can't just fill up a liquid-fueled rocket and leave it on the launchpad for years as the fuels are often quite volatile. The need to fuel the rocket before launch makes them quite unwieldy, and extremely vulnerable to counterstrike during the fueling process.

By contrast, solid-fuel rockets have an almost gunpowder-like substance in them. You can build a solid-fuel rocket and keep it ready for years on end, just waiting to launch. You don't need to fuel them; you simply build them. They're much more mobile so you can build a TEL (transporter-erector-launcher) vehicle that carries the rocket on its back to the launch site, then pushes the rocket with its nose in the air, then ejects the rocket into the air for a few seconds (called cold launch) and then the rocket engine starts when it's up in the air rather than still on the ground (which means the launch doesn't destroy the TEL vehicle). The mobility of these launch systems, along with their long "shelf-life", means in a wartime situation, you can send the TELs out from base into forests or other areas, and continue moving them around, which makes them much less vulnerable to enemy airpower.

Third, the current rocket tested can be launched from both submarine and from land. With the TEL and submarine-launch system, North Korea has created a weapons system that could be hard for the US and South Koreans to track, and which can be launched at very short notice.

Fourth, this current rocket system that was tested has the heft to carry a nuclear warhead, which means that when the rocket is mated to a warhead (which the North Koreans tested in their nuclear test late last year... with an estimated 30 kiloton yield), it creates a credible "second-strike" capability that would allow the North Koreans to disperse and hide these nuclear-armed rockets ready for a counter-strike if ever attacked by the US.

In short, this rocket system along with the nuclear warheads they have developed create, for the first time, a nuclear capability that is actually a credible weapons system (in the past they could create a nuclear device, but it was too large to actually place on a rocket, or they could build it small enough to put on a rocket but the yield was too small, and the liquid-fueled rockets too vulnerable). They've finally managed to develop all the different pieces (the rocket, the warhead, the basing scheme) to create a real and effective nuclear weapons system. We should indeed be concerned about the risk to our allies, the South Koreans and the Japanese, and to US forces in the Western pacific. See below a video of the launch; you can see the mobile TEL system and how handy and compact the rocket itself is. Launch part of the video starts around 25 seconds in. Particularly watch the close-up of the cold launch ejection system at around 39 seconds in.

[video="youtube;vBqo9eS4tSw"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBqo9eS4tSw[/video]

I don't think the article's questioning the technicalities and technological development of the nuclear development.. more its purpose, and consequently why it shouldn't be considered threatening.

The DPRK's missiles aren't a threat yet. But once they are able to fit a nuclear weapon onto a missile then that probably changes