Newt Gingrich and others on the right assert we should have destroyed the North Korean rocket before or was launched or shortly thereafter. Let's be clear:
That would be an unprovoked Act of War.
The President declared the North Koreans to be "rule breakers," which may be true. But which "rule" are we talking about? Their rocket launch certainly was not an Act of War in itself. At worst, it was a provocative act which violated UN resolutions.
- Was North Korea party to those resolutions?
- Has the UN censured or otherwise declared that North Korea is in violation of one or more resolutions?
If we had attacked their rocket, either on the ground or shortly after launch, it would be we who are in the wrong. The Japanese did threaten to shoot the rocket down if it threatened Japanese territory. But where would they be had they attempted to do so and had failed?
And where would we have been had we failed? And failure is a real possibility with the Patriot anti-missile system. During the first Gulf War, reliable estimates of successful shoot-downs of Iraqi missiles were at 10%. Improvements have presumably been made to the Patriot system since then, but this missile was not a single state SCUD, but rather a 3-stage vehicle potentially capable of far greater range and speed and potentially far more difficult to intercept.
The Imaginary Threat
Newt Gingrich and others on the right raise the possibility that this rocket could potentially deliver a nuclear weapon to Hawaii or further, to the West Coast of America. They threaten us with the possibility that such a weapon could produce an ElectroMagnetic Pulse (EMP) powerful enough to disable virtually all electrical devices over a third of America, in an instant turning back the clock of our 21st century civilization to pre-industrial.
Clearly, this is an attempt to frighten. It is an "over the top" extreme scenario, a flight of imagination, the worst possibility. What does it imply?
First, in order for that to be true, the rocket would have to carry a large nuclear device into space, for only in space does detonation of a nuclear device produce a large EMP. How large would the device have to be? The greatest estimates of the payload for the Korean rocket, the Taepodong-2, are 500 Kg, 1100 pounds.
Is that large enough? Almost certainly not. The minimum size reported for a nuclear device is 51 pounds for a so-called "suite case" bomb, capable of 1 Kton yield, enough to demolish a large building. Only the US and The Soviet Union have ever been reported to be capable of producing such a weapon. Miniaturizing an atom bomb is a formidable project. Recall that our B29's were able to carry only one atom bomb at a time. And a bomb powerful enough to produce this large scale effect would be at least 100,000 times as powerful as a suitcase bomb.
The Real Threat
The only significant threat from a North Korean ICBM at this time and for the forseeable future is not a massive nuclear weapon. There is little question about this.
They could create a payload with high level nuclear waste, which on impact would amount to a dirty bomb. That would transiently disable the activities of relatively local area until the fallout producing material was cleaned up.
The could create a payload carrying a biological or chemical weapon if they have those types of weapons in their arsenal. Again the effects of the attack would be relatively local to the area of impact.
Update: Russians Test Fire ICBM - Apr 10, 2009
Reuters reported that the Russians successfully test fired one of their RT-2PM (Nato SS-25 Sickle) mobile launch ICBM's. http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE5391A320090410
This vehicle is reportedly capable of carrying a singe 550 KTon warhead 6,000 miles. Its payload is in the neighborhood of 1100+ pounds : http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/russia/rt-2pm.htm
References:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suitcase_bomb
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taepodong-2
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_pulse
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