Nuclear Notes

When a US service member made a mad dash to cross into North Korea while visiting the border, there were more questions than answers, and most took the form of “what was he thinking?”  Long-time North Korea watchers were rightly pessimistic about the chances of a swift and happy end to the story. North Korea…

There’s a first time for everything, and this is the first official post for North Korea Nuclear Update as it goes public. The purpose of North Korea Nuclear Update is to provide fact-based answers to the most pressing questions about North Korea and its nuclear weapons program. The website is a collaborative effort between the MIT Security…

“Russian President Vladimir Putin said this week that he welcomed “possibilities for increased military cooperation with North Korea. Here & Now’s Peter O’Dowd speaks with Jim Walsh, senior research associate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Security Studies Program.” Source: WBUR: What’s behind Kim Jong Un’s trip to Russia

The Kim-Putin Summit is a big deal. Kim does not travel out of the country very often, and the last time he ventured out to meet with President Trump in 2019, it went poorly.  Both countries are facing serious difficulties, and both have a limited group of friends and allies to turn to for their…

Officials and experts have been predicting a North Korean nuclear test for a while now. Some analysts expected a North Korean test soon after North Korea’s Kim gave his annual New Year’s speech on January 1, 2019. Then COVID hit, and Pyongyang essentially shuttered its border with the outside world. Since then there has been…