The Inside Straight

North Korea's Nuclear Test : Was it Related to Subsequent Earthquakes ?

I've decided to leave this post up: mostly as a reminder to myself that it is quite easy to reach false conclusions when working with limited evidence !

On Monday, October 9,2006, North Korea announced it had conducted an underground test of a nuclear device. This information was confirmed-in part-by seismographic measurements in the USA, Russia,and Japan.

On Tuesday, October 10,2006, there was a 6.0 magnitude earthquake off the east coast of Honshu,Japan : leading Japan to believe - at first - there had been a second North Korean test - because of the similar intensity.

There were two more earthquakes in this vicinity: Thursday, 10/12/06 (4.8 magnitude) and Friday , 10/13/06 (5.3 magnitude).

On Sunday, 10/15/06 , there was a smaller (4.8) event near Hokkaido,Japan.

On the same day (Sunday, 10/15/06) there was a 6.6 magnitude earthquake, centered 9 miles west of Kailua Kona, Hawaii.

On Monday, 10/16/06 , there were two widely-separated earthquakes: One, measuring 5.1 on the Richter scale in the vicinity of New Britain,Papua,New Guinea; the other - a 5.2 temblor - in the Kuril Islands.

On Tuesday, 10/17/06 , there have been ( so far ) two quakes : One - measuring 5.1 -in the Andaman Islands - near India ; the second , measuring 5.4,in New Britain,Papua,New Guinea.

All of the affected areas are situated on unstable tectonic plates - as is North Korea.

Could North Korea's underground nuclear test have created a "tectonic chain reaction" in the Pacific ?

                                  SIGH OF RELIEF TIME !!!

I have a much-better informed comment from a reader on another site, who says it is QUITE  UNLIKELY a nuke would produce such an effect. I'm awaiting his permission to copy his comments.

"I'm not a tectonic specialist, but I do know Hawaii is a hot spot, nowhere near a tectonic boundary. That said, I highly doubt a small, manmade event could have much or anything to do with earthquake events of much larger magnitudes (in terms of energy) elsewhere.

The comment about the earthquake in Japan triggering suspicion about a second nuclear test due to "their similar intensity" is crap-- the Richter scale is logarithmic and therefore a 6 (the Japan earthquake) and a ~4 (NK nuke test) have ground-movement magnitudes that are different from each other by a factor of roughly 100x. you'd also think that other such test by the US would've caused similar chains that we'd have heard about, especially considering that our tests were much,much stronger. Earthquakes happen, and they can happen in chains. However, it's more likely that this is just a case of statistical clustering, as there are millions of earthquakes per year."

I went by news reports generated at the time, as I'm a long way from being well-informed on tectonics ! Nonetheless, I'm glad to hear this was probably coincidence.

North Korean Nukes: Kim Jong Il's Chess Gambit

There were some sighs of relief when it was announced no "radioactive particles" had been detected in the atmosphere following North Korea's underground test of "an explosive device-said to be a nuke". Perhaps, some said, it was all a false alarm: another bluff by North Korea's Kim Jong Il.

Others were not quite so sanguine. One very knowledgeable source wrote:

" It depends on where and when the sample was taken, what the wind conditions were, and how much got out from inside the mountain.

Tunnel test facilities like that are pretty much cut off from the outside. It's done that way to prevent radiation from escaping and contaminating the surrounding areas.

Plus, most plutonium reaction products have short half-lives. So, unless the air sample was taken within, oh, 48 hours AND all of the fallout from the test got outside, then yeah, the results won't be much higher than background.

I'm not sure that there was anyone outside the mountain to take that sample, and since plutonium is primarily an alpha emitter, I don't believe much would have escaped the mountain.

I still believe it was (a nuke), based on the amount of TNT needed to cause a seismic event of >4.0."

(That amount would be 4.5 acre feet : enough TNT to cover 4.5 acres of ground to a depth of one foot.)

"4.5 Acre-feet of TNT is a crapload that isn't easily moved, stored, or intiated.

TNT is relatively stable and needs a good 'whack' to get it to detonate, especially in cast/pressed form."

In other words ( I suspect ) we are talking about a small nuclear device specifically designed to fit into some of North Korea's heavy-payload,intermediate -range missiles.

Continuing this line of speculation ,we are talking about missiles that could be used against an attacking fleet : missiles that would not require pinpoint accuracy,or even an exceptional nuclear yield to accomplish the goal of keeping that fleet so far removed ,its weapons, aircraft, and any invading troops could not be used against North Korea.

If North Korea could maintain stand-off capability against naval forces, it would be, to a large degree, protected against other air strikes by the close proximity of China - with which it has a near-feudal arrangement.It would not ,of course,be impregnable : no nation is - ever - but it would be safe to pursue its most immediate goal : the re-unification of Korea under Kim Jong Il's terms.

North Korea - logically -has no need to attack anybody - its southern "rival" included. South Korea , which has the food , industry, and worldwide markets the North desperately needs, would see the handwriting on the wall and come to terms rather quickly.

There is already considerable sentiment in the south for re-unification: primed by the memories of the last war, by some of the dictatorial regimes that have come to power; and nurtured by South Korea's increasingly influential Left wing : parts of which are distinguishable from the North Koreans only by geography.

The UN - although it has a South Korean as its Secretary General - is unlikely to do anything to deter North Korea's nuclear gambit , and the United States is equally unlikely to do more than scowl,yowl, engage in political finger-pointing ....and accept the fait accompli as it unfolds.

What will happen afterwards ? Unless we wish to see the rebirth of the old "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere" - with different players - we'd better start giving the matter some very serious thought !