“The greatest and most urgent threat comes not from a North Korean nuke being able to reach the U.S., but rather what they have already,” he said. Specifically, Mr. Hecker wrote in a recent article, the North is now probably able “to put nuclear weapons on target anywhere in South Korea and Japan and even on some U.S. assets in the Pacific.”
Worse yet, he wrote, North Korea may have developed a “false sense of confidence” from a recent spate of successful nuclear and missile tests — one that could lead it to grave errors of judgment.
By the end of this year, Mr. Hecker estimated, the country is likely to have enough fissile material for about 20 bombs. The danger would be exacerbated if the North decided “to field tactical nuclear weapons as its arsenal expands and its confidence in its nuclear arsenal grows.”
In short, Mr. Hecker said, more and better bombs make a catastrophic miscalculation by North Korea more likely.
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