N. Korean missile test may start new Asia crisis

News Analysis

updated 9:20 p.m. ET June 16, 2006

WASHINGTON - North Korea’s steps toward test-firing an intercontinental missile are bringing sudden attention to the most-neglected member of President Bush’s “axis of evil.” The test could jeopardize disarmament talks and create a new nuclear crisis in the region.

The United States on Friday warned North Korea against testing such a missile, saying it would be a “provocative act.”

While the Bush administration has focused most of its recent attention on Iran’s nuclear programs, many arms professionals insist the North Koreans pose a more immediate challenge.

“They probably increased their nuclear arsenal by six to eight weapons while President Bush has been in office,” said Michael O’Hanlon, a national security analyst at the Brookings Institution. “And, meanwhile, Iraq and Iran have made a grand total of zero weapons.”

Stepping up preparations
Officials in Japan and the U.S. have said that the North Korean government appears to be stepping up preparations to test a long-range Taepondong-2 missile — and that a test may be imminent. Such a missile could potentially reach parts of the United States.

North Korea tested an earlier version in 1998 and it caused a worldwide uproar.

That missile flew over Japan. But its third stage failed to ignite and pieces plunged into the northwestern Pacific Ocean. Now, Western experts fear North Korean engineers have improved the technology.

Bush famously linked North Korea, Iran and prewar Iraq as an “axis of evil” in his January 2002 State of the Union speech. But the weapons of mass destruction Bush claimed Saddam Hussein possessed were never found. And Iran is not believed to have any nuclear weapons, although its uranium enrichment program is the center of intense attention.

Iran insists its nuclear program is for generating electricity and not making weapons. North Korean officials, by contrast, boast they already have the atomic bomb.

Making it clear
State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Friday that the U.S. and its allies have “made clear to North Korea that a missile launch would be a provocative act that is not in their interests and will further isolate them from the world.”

Such a launch would be inconsistent with a moratorium on tests declared by North Korean President Kim Jong Il in 1999 and renewed in 2002, McCormack said. Still, North Korea has tested many short-range missiles, two as recently as March.

White House national security adviser Stephen Hadley said this week it would be a “bad idea” for North Korea to test a long-range missile and urged Pyongyang to return to arms negotiations.

But those talks — among North and South Korea, China, Japan, Russia and the United States — have been stalled for months. The most recent meeting was in November. A dispute over U.S. allegations of North Korean counterfeiting of U.S. currency is contributing to the impasse.

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