There have been a couple of recent articles in the British press about Kim’s failing health, and the possibility that he underwent heart bypass surgery last month. Kim has certainly pushed the envelope for relentless high living for years. He has often been said to suffer from diabetes, liver problems, and a heart condition, so the current reports of cardiac bypass surgery are not outlandish, though an article in today’s Asia Times reads the tea leaves differently. For sure, Kim will not be starring in any health and fitness videos any time soon, and should he make an abrupt departure from this plane of existence, the chaos generated by the ensuing struggle for power in the DPRK could push an already dangerous situation into war. No wonder Chris HIll is showing signs of having gone over the boarder into the state of high anxiety.

The N test in October ’06 was a ‘fizzle’ yield, which means that the explosives used to trigger the nuclear chain reaction failed to work. The bomb was made from plutonium, which requires that the bomb be spherically shaped. The softball-sized piece of p-239 sits in the middle, and the explosive ‘jacket’ goes off at once, slightly compressing the p-239. This is enough to push the heavy atoms closer together, and get them moving around enough to release more neutrons than usual. These neutrons zing around and hit other atoms, knocking out other neurtons. This is the nuclear chain reaction, where atoms break apart.

When electrons get knocked around it’s no big deal, they are held in place by ‘the weak force’. Lightning bolts are strictly caused by moving electrons, the weak force. But when the core of the atom gets knocked apart, it releases a lot of energy (and neutrons), and the neutrons hit the cores of other atoms really hard and knock them apart (releasing the ‘strong force’). Boom!

This only works with p-239, at 80% purity or higher. P-240 has so many spontaneous neutrons colliding it’s unstable, it could blow up before you get the bomb built. P-238 has not enough spontaneous neutron collisions, and it won’t work for a bomb. You make a plutonium bomb by running a reactor, and removing the p-239 at intervals, when its ready. If you wait until the end of the nuclear cycle, the p-239 is mixed in with too much p-240 and p-238, it’s not pure enough, and it would be hugely expensive to purify it.

‘Mr Il’ only had end-of cycle plutonium, less than 80% p-239. His engineers must have known it would not work, but to save their own lives, they tried it. It fizzled, probably because they couldn’t start a nuclear chain reaction.

This seems to be what happened (and I’m sure Condi and US experts know exactly what happened). This would mean that N. Korea is nowhere near a functioning weapon. The only way to make bombs is with uranium-235, and Kim has very little, or p-239, and they would have to restart the nuclear fuel cycle in a reactor to make 80% pure p-239. This would take quite a while.

This may explain why Condi is dithering, fiddling, and taking her time. As for ‘Mr. Il’, with his heart condition (which can cause erectile dysfunction), he may be impotent in two ways. If we’re lucky, he may soon be dead.

Albright carried a Michael Jordan
autographed basketball. That didn’t work either.

Mozart any one?

cs