 Questions raised by North Korea's nuclear test Paris (AFP) Sept 9, 2016 - North Korea said Friday it has successfully tested a miniature nuclear warhead that could be put on a missile, raising concern about how close it is to having a credible weapon. Here are four questions about the North's fifth nuclear test, which at an estimated 10 kilotons is its most powerful to date. - How big? - With a force of 10 kilotons, or the equivalent of 10,000 tons of TNT according to South Korea's meteorological agency, the blast was smaller than the atomic bomb that destroyed Hiroshima in August 1945. That bomb had a force of around 15 kilotons and killed 140,000 people, half of whom died immediately. A November 2011 study funded by the US government determined that the Severe Damage Zone (SDZ) from a 10-kiloton warhead over Washington would measure almost a mile (1.6 kilometres) in diameter. Within that space, few buildings would remain standing, "and few people would survive." IHS Janes analyst Karl Dewey noted that such a warhead would "be capable of ripping the heart out of a city." - How small is miniature? - Miniature refers here to the size of a warhead small enough to fit on a ballistic missile, making it a much more dangerous threat. North Korea says it has now succeeded in doing just that, but the claim has not been confirmed by an outside source. The technological challenge is huge, but Pyongyang seems determined to meet it, at which point it could conceivably arm ballistic missiles able to reach neighbours in Asia and possibly the United States. - The difference between 'A' and 'H' - Atomic or "A-bombs" work on the principle of nuclear fission, where energy is released by splitting atoms of enriched uranium or plutonium encased in the warhead. Hiroshima was destroyed by one A-bomb with a uranium-fuel warhead. Nagasaki was destroyed three days later by a plutonium A-bomb of similar power, 17 kilotons. The United States and the Soviet Union then designed much more powerful warheads dubbed hydrogen or "H-bombs." Also known as thermonuclear bombs, they work on the principle of fusion of two nuclei, and generate temperatures similar to those found at the sun's core. When an H-bomb is detonated, chemical, nuclear and thermonuclear explosions succeed each other within milliseconds. The nuclear explosion triggers a huge increase in temperature that in turn provokes the nuclear fusion. The largest such blast took place in October 1961 when the Soviet "Tsar Bomba" exploded in the Arctic with a force of 57 megatons, or 57,000 kilotons. Unlike its last test in early January, North Korea's state media did not speak this time of a hydrogen warhead. While no H-bomb has been used in a conflict so far, the world's nuclear arsenals are comprised for the most part of such weapons. "Most of the thermonuclear warheads in service today have so-called 'dial-a-yield' options that allow for low explosive yields (less than 10 kilotons)," notes Shannon Kile of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). - Who has nuclear weapons? - Britain, France, China, Russia and the United States, the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, officially have nuclear weapons. India and Pakistan also have operational nuclear weapons, while Israel maintains a policy of nuclear ambiguity. North Korea appears to be close.
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North Korea's nuclear threat has grown significantly following its latest and largest nuclear test and a series of missile launches, analysts say, with some South Korean newspapers even theorising about an atomic attack on Seoul.
The South Korean capital stayed calm Saturday, with residents immune to near-daily threats from their neighbour, but newspapers and analysts saw Friday's test as a game-changer.
With a force of 10 kilotons, the blast was two-thirds the size of the atomic bomb that destroyed Hiroshima in August 1945. It took place just eight months after the previous detonation.
More importantly, the North claimed it had successfully tested a nuclear warhead that could be mounted on a missile.
The nuclear programme has been accompanied by a series of ballistic missile launches, including from a submarine.
Given that Friday's test was the most powerful in terms of yield and that the time lapse from the previous test was shortened, "the North's nuclear capability is believed to have been sophisticated to a considerable degree and being developed at an increasingly faster pace," South Korean Foreign Minister Yun Byung-Se told senior ministry officials.
The world must now "cautiously accept the reality" that the North could launch a nuclear attack by missile, said analyst Jeung Young-Tae of the Korea Institute for National Unification (KINU), although the range of such a nuclear-tipped missile remained unclear.
The North's announcement of its test indicated they had tested the bomb that would arm their missile units, said Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey.
"And that's a big deal," he wrote in an article entitled "North Korea's nuke program is way more sophisticated than you think", for the website of Foreign Policy magazine.
"In the past, we've treated North Korean nuclear tests as temper tantrums or political demonstrations."
- 'Not completely insane' -
The North is believed to have succeeded in making nuclear warheads small enough to arm Scud missiles to hit South Korea or Rodong middle-range missiles to attack Japan, Professor Yang Moo-Jin of the University of North Korean Studies told AFP.
"But it has not yet completed the re-entry technology needed to develop an ICBM (inter-continental ballistic missile) that could hit Hawaii or the United States mainland," Yang said.
Given the enormous prestige and resources devoted to the nuclear programme, Yang doubts it would vanish even with regime change.
"Having witnessed with alarm what happened to Libya's Moamer Kadhafi and Iraq's Saddam Hussein, North Korea is deadly serious in believing its nuclear weapons are the only guarantee that can ensure its survival against an invasion by the US," he said.
"The nuclear arsenal gives Kim the halo as the country's top military commander and helps tighten his grip on power, both over the party and the military as well," Yang said.
"The North would never give up its nuclear arsenal unless it is guaranteed security, even if the Kim Jong-Un regime collapses and someone else took over."
But Kim is not a madman and is not about to launch a pre-emptive strike, Jeung of KINU told AFP.
"The sole purpose of Kim Jong-Un's regime is survival of the regime but nothing more. So they must know very well that any pre-emptive nuclear strike will immediately prompt counter-attacks on North Korea, which will seriously jeopardise the regime.
"They may be reckless but they are not completely insane," Jeung said.
Some South Korean newspapers still flirted with doomsday scenarios.
Up to 235,000 would be killed if a nuclear blast of 10 kilotons occurred in Seoul, Yonhap news agency said, citing research in 2010 by the US think tank RAND Corp.
Top-selling Chosun daily also warned of "total destruction" and compared potential damage to the World War II bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
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