Lies, Damn Lies, and Newspaper Articles on NK’s HEU
by Richardson ~ March 1st, 2007. Filed under: Fiskings, Nuclear Proliferation, Six-Party Talks.The first paragraph of Glenn Kessler’s article in the Washington Post, “New Doubts On Nuclear Efforts by North Korea,” states:
The Bush administration is backing away from its long-held assertions that North Korea has an active clandestine program to enrich uranium, leading some experts to believe that the original U.S. intelligence that started the crisis over Pyongyang’s nuclear ambitions may have been flawed.
But the second from the last paragraph states:
. . .U.S. officials say [North Korea’s] suspected procurement activities have largely ceased in the past two years for unknown reasons. Some speculate that Pyongyang found a uranium program too difficult, especially since the plutonium facility was active. Others say DeTrani’s presentation spooked them and they either ended the purchases or became more discreet.(emphasis added)
The headline and tone of the article are misleading – dishonest actually – since they claim or suggest doubt in the original intelligence, when in reality there was a marked change in North Korea’s behavior leading to a reevaluation of the current state of North Korea’s highly enriched uranium (HEU) program or facilities, not that such program existed. Two very different things.
Kessler also claims:
The accusation about the alleged uranium program backfired, sparking a series of events that ultimately led to North Korea’s first nuclear test — using another material, plutonium — nearly five months ago.
[. . .]
The North Koreans were able to reprocess spent fuel rods – which had been monitored by U.N. inspectors under the 1994 agreement — to obtain the weapons-grade plutonium for a nuclear test last year. (emphasis added)
The veracity of this statement depends on a) a judgment on whether North Korea should have been called on activities that clearly violated the 1994 Agreed Framework or they should have been swept under the rug as in the previous administration, b) whether or not North Korea had nuclear weapons long before 2002, as estimates indicated, and c) what you know about HEU and the difference between that and plutonium.
The 1994 Agreed Framework references the 1992 Joint Declaration of the Denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula (DOC), states in item three; “The South and the North shall not possess nuclear reprocessing and uranium enrichment facilities.” Note that the mere possession of an HEU facility, operational or not, violates both agreements.
Did the U.S. accusation, “sparking a series of events that ultimately led to North Korea’s first nuclear test,” or did North Korea’s violating the 1992 and 1994 agreements do that? At what point does North Korea get blamed for its own actions? In this case the reporters terminology makes the judgment call for the reader but presents it as fact.
The context of the article would lead the average reader to believe that North Korea’s October 2006 nuclear test, which was a plutonium device, was constructed with plutonium enriched since October 2002. In reality there is no way to know this, and pre-2002 intelligence estimates indicate that North Korea probably had 1-2 plutonium based nuclear weapons.
What one knows about HEU vs. plutonium nuclear devices is important in determining what course of action is preferable, and what is a “backfire.” First, by most accounts North Korea’s test in October likely was a failure in the technical sense (but not strategically). Second (from the second to the last paragraph of the article), there is the possibility that U.S. confrontation, “spooked them and they either ended the purchases or became more discreet.” Thus the pros and cons of uranium and plutonium:
Nuclear weapons generally use one of two nuclear isotopes – Plutonium (Pu-239) or Uranium (U-235). Both have advantages and disadvantaged; Pu-239 is much cheaper and easier to reprocess, but requires a complicated detonation mechanism, while U-235 is relatively difficult and expensive to reprocess, but is extremely easy to ‘set off’ (scientists have been killed by accidentally dropping pieces of U-235 weighing only a few kilograms on each other and releasing large amounts of radiation).
A device based on HEU likely would have produced a much different result.
Kessler continues:
A uranium-enrichment program would have required Pyongyang to build a facility with thousands of uranium-spinning centrifuges to obtain the highly enriched uranium needed for a weapon. Iran’s nuclear program, which the United States alleges is intended for weapons, involves enriched uranium. (emphasis added)
That depends on the type of centrifuge. According to this Global Security page, a single uranium based weapon would have required approximately 850-1,000 centrifuges working one year, but the centrifuge type is not identified:
A single centrifuge might produce about 30 grams of HEU per year, about the equivalent of five Separative Work Unit (SWU). As as a general rule of thumb, a cascade of 850 to 1,000 centrifuges, each 1.5 meters long, operating continuously at 400 m/sec, would be able to produce about 20-25 kilograms of HEU in a year, enough for one weapon. One such bomb would require about 6,000 SWU.
And we don’t know how many centrifuges North Korea has or had in operation, for how long.
Notes: An “SWU” is a Separative Work Unit. North Korea has P1 and P2 centrifuges obtained from Pakistan. Arms Control Wonk has data on those types and SWU, but time units are unclear. The “P” designation refers to equivalents of G1 and G2 Urenco designed centrifuges that A.Q. Khan stole while working in Europe.
The New York Times has a related article with similar content. At the tail end of it, DPRK apologist David Albright takes a propaganda pot shot:
In the North Korea case, intelligence analysts saw the tubes as ideal for centrifuges. But Mr. Albright said the relatively weak aluminum tubes were suitable only for stationary outer casings — not central rotors, which have to be very strong to keep from flying apart while spinning at tremendous speeds.
Blatantly false. North Korea obtained P1 and P2 centrifuges made to enrich uranium from Pakistan. Khan has admitted to it. North Korea has also at least attempted to obtain vast stores of equipment of the proper grade of material – with designs obtained from Pakistan – to produce more centrifuges:
However, the shipment of 214 6000-grade aluminum tubes that were intercepted on April 12, 2003, as a French ship sailed through the Suez Canal on their way to North Korea via China, seem to fit more closely dimensions of known centrifuges;37 in particular, if cut in half, the tubes are well-suited to be used as vacuum housings for the G2/P2 centrifuge design that Pakistan is known to have stolen from Urenco. The G2 is the designation of the original Urenco design for a supercritical centrifuge with two maraging-steel rotors; the P2 is Pakistan’s version of the G2. The P1 centrifuge is not based on Urenco’s G1 design, but rather on an earlier Urenco design with four aluminum rotors that is twice as tall as the G2, but less efficient due to its lower rotor speed. This finding in 2003 contradicted earlier evidence that Pakistan had only given North Korea an earlier, aluminum-based design.38 Reports indicate that the North Koreans had sought as many as 2000 tubes in 2002. Frequency converters were sought as early as 1999,39 while the dates on which North Korea sought cobalt are unknown. However, the number of frequency converters (two) sought in 1999 would indicate a very small testbed, while the number of tubes actually shipped in 2003 indicate a shift to a pilot facility. The uranium enrichment facility pictured in Figure 4.1 assumes a pilot-sized facility of 400 G2 centrifuges.
So;
• Is U.S. intelligence wrong?
• Is South Korea’s intelligence service also wrong?
• Did James Kelly lie?
• Did Musharraf and Khan make false confessions?
Or;
• Is North Korea hiding the truth?
March 1st, 2007 at 7:40 pm
[…] our suspicions about highly-enriched uranium all rest on slender aluminum tubes, see also, and see also also.]Ambassador Joseph DiTrani, formerly a member of Chris Hill’s negotiating team and now the […]
March 2nd, 2007 at 2:34 am
Great posting. Do you think these newspapers journalists are just incompentent or are intentionally distorting the truth?
March 2nd, 2007 at 3:11 am
[…] Great posting at DPRK Studies about how North Korea’s nuclear program is being dishonestly reported on in the US media. I’m not sure if it is due to just complete journalistic incompetence or planned demagoguery on the part of the journalist, but read it and you be the judge. […]
March 2nd, 2007 at 7:55 am
In general I’d say that there is a mix of both incompetence and outright dishonest reporting.
In the case above I put more weight on the reporter’s personal agenda since the article contains the other side of the story, but offers up his own interpretation that does not match with the facts. In many cases reporters simply omit facts that don’t conform with their agenda, however.
Most people probably won’t read the whole story with such a critical eye, and will miss the contradiction between the facts presented and the meaning given by the reporter.
In the DC metro area, both the Post and the Times print small papers with dumbed down stories that are distributed free on the Metro transit system – I don’t generally read those papers, but am willing to bet that the abbreviated story presented in the “Express” (the Post’s free paper) will not include all the facts and will strongly give the wrong impression.
March 2nd, 2007 at 9:42 am
Also, leftist media with an agenda is part of the reason for the conservative backlash and the political polarization that we now see in the U.S. Anyone who claims there is no leftist bias in the media is either further left, or not paying attention.
March 2nd, 2007 at 12:42 pm
The backtrack on Uranium isn’t as complicated as you’re making it out to be. It’s a simple case of hyping the threat when NK headlined the Axis of Evil All-Stars, and then minimizing the same threat when Bush decided to cave.
Fix the intelligence to fit the scenario. Familiar game.
http://www.slate.com/id/2160958/pagenum/all/
March 2nd, 2007 at 12:47 pm
“Why are senior officials suddenly saying that North Korea might not have an enriched-uranium program? No new information has come to light on the issue. They are saying this for one reason: President Bush recently agreed to a nuclear deal with the North Koreans; the deal says nothing about enriched uranium (it requires them only to freeze their plutonium-bomb program); so, in order to stave off the flood of criticism from Bush’s conservative base, senior officials are saying that the enriched uranium was never a big deal to begin with.
It’s unclear whether it was, or is, a big deal or not. But President Bush and his aides consistently claimed it was a big deal from October 2002 until just this week. It was such a big deal to them that they cited it as justification for pulling out of President Clinton’s 1994 “Agreed Framework” accord, which had kept North Korea’s nuclear reactor under constant monitoring by international inspectors and its nuclear fuel rods kept under lock and key.
After Bush withdrew from the Agreed Framework, the North Koreans booted the inspectors, unlocked the fuel rods, reprocessed them into plutonium, and built at least one atomic bomb (they exploded it in a test last fall) and possibly a half-dozen or so more.
In October 2002, U.S. diplomats confronted North Korean officials with CIA evidence that North Korea had secretly obtained centrifuges from Pakistan and, with them, had started a program to enrich uranium. (If enough centrifuges are assembled in a certain way, they can enrich uranium into bomb-grade material.) The North Koreans confessed—though they later backpedaled and said they were misunderstood. (Even now, there are contradictory accounts of what happened.)
It is indisputable that North Koreans had centrifuges. It is not known—and has never been known—whether they’ve assembled these centrifuges into a cascade that could enrich uranium or, if they have, whether they’ve enriched any.
However, in October 2002, when Bush was looking for any excuse to back out of the Agreed Framework, senior officials said the evidence of enriched uranium was strong.
Now, four and a half years later, when Bush is looking for reasons to justify a deal that’s remarkably similar to the Agreed Framework (except it’s not quite as tight, and the North Koreans have since become a nuclear-armed nation), senior officials are saying the evidence of enriched uranium is weak.
The evidence has always been ambiguous. Before, they hyped it to justify what they wanted to do. Now, they’re downplaying it to justify what they’ve done.”
Once again, it’s the liberal media’s fault. After all, they were the ones that hyped the Uranium threat, folded to Kim Jong Il, and then decided Uranium wasn’t that big of a deal after all.
March 2nd, 2007 at 1:43 pm
I blogged about this (actually via a Korea Times article) and what I’ve been saying is the bigger picture for years.
http://usinkorea.org/blog1/?p=372
This is also why I’ve been saying I don’t expect anything good to come out of the recent new deal with NK.
I never under estimate the desire and ability of the intellectual elite (and their minions) to work against the real evil in the world - the United States government (and particularly under the power of the neocons).
March 2nd, 2007 at 1:46 pm
If North Korea reneges the way I think it will – by continuing to deny any part of a uranium program, at all, and refusing to cooperate further – it will be difficult to blame the U.S. (unless you’re Chomsky, Cumings, Albright, Beal, Harrison, et al). [Edit - no doubt the press will spin it, I just think it will be less effective due to the more clearly definable situation, reneging.]
March 2nd, 2007 at 2:31 pm
That’s not exactly what’s being said – they are saying that perhaps the program is not active, that it could be dormant. Two different things – and it was explained in the post you just commented to.
It was a material breach of the 1994 Agreed Framework to even have the facilities, period. Go read some related docs here;
http://www.dprkstudies.org/documents-archive
You can stop right there. North Korea, as you admit, had centrifuges for enriching HEU. You can try to spin that, but it was a breach of the agreement. Bush stopped oil shipments, but only North Korea formally withdrew from that agreement.
If you’re going to attempt basing the withdraw on some action that broke the agreement rather than a formal application, then that would be North Korea.
Either way, your statement is factually in error.
Moot. Such facilities were verboten and broke the agreement.
The evidence of illegal per agreement facilities has never been ambiguous. Evidence of enrichment has. Once again, two different things. As your statement isn’t qualified, once again factually wrong.
That seems to be at least partially correct, judging from the morons parroting back that drivel.
Reading comments from the officials dealing with this, rather than relying on summaries provided by what has shown to be less than accurate press in many cases, would show your assertion to be off the mark.
March 4th, 2007 at 10:17 am
Kim Jong Il would be proud of your “moderating” anyone that disagrees with you.
[edited]
March 4th, 2007 at 2:29 pm
It’s not disagreeing that gets you moderated. This is my house; be civil or don’t, but that’s the choice you have to make to leave a comment here.
If you used a real email address that could have been explianed.
March 5th, 2007 at 7:08 am
[…] appease. Those calls will reliably be based on the most superficial of analyses, and will disregard most of the case on which your concerns, no matter how legitimate, are based. This effectively rewards the most […]
March 5th, 2007 at 8:42 pm
[…] […] • The Comfort Women Issue, Again 4 Richardson, Mark, Red Forman […] • Lies, Damn Lies, and Newspaper Articles on NK’s HEU 10 Richardson, iheartblueballs, Richardson […] • Idiots and Political […]
March 7th, 2007 at 7:56 am
[…] in the deal’s text, no doubt, we would not have had David Albright and a following of hack journalists trying to pretend that the evidence for that program does not exist. Their demand was no less […]
March 7th, 2007 at 9:46 am
[…] […] • The Comfort Women Issue, Again 4 Richardson, Mark, Red Forman […] • Lies, Damn Lies, and Newspaper Articles on NK’s HEU 10 Richardson, iheartblueballs, Richardson […] • Idiots and Political […]
March 7th, 2007 at 10:51 am
This is mostly a media phuck-up:
Saturday March 3 Statement by Ambassador Joseph DeTrani, North Korea Mission Manager,
“There has been considerable misinterpretation of the Intelligence Community’s view of North Korean efforts to
pursue a uranium enrichment capability.
“The intelligence in 2002 was high quality information that made possible a high confidence judgment about
North Korea’s efforts to acquire a uranium enrichment capability. The Intelligence Community had then, and
continues to have, high confidence in its assessment that North Korea has pursued that capability.
“We have continued to assess efforts by North Korea since 2002. All Intelligence Community agencies have at
least moderate confidence that North Korea’s past efforts to acquire a uranium enrichment capability continue
today.” (END STATEMENT)
The doubts are limited to what the Norkers are doing now.
March 7th, 2007 at 5:47 pm
Right, and the media’s desire to muck it up is a sign of how they will work to undermine the effort to get tough with North Korea if/when this new deal starts to unravel. And I do believe it is honestly a result of the desire not to want to agree with the likes of Bush - something shared by the media and some of the think-tank crowd.
I believe if Clinton had been president and called for 6 party talks instead of one-on-one, you would have seen a very different result in the media coverage and what they quoted experts saying.
(I will add, if Clinton had been president and called for the above, you would have had a fair chance that republicans would have called for 1-on-1 — and so goes politics….)
So, I am saying, the media and others will not be able to overcome their habit of wanting to see what a Bush-led government does as flawed and misguided when the new deal goes in the crapper —- and part of the process in seeing it as misguided is letting NK off the hook by giving it enough room to manuevre, and places like SK enough cover to ship in more fertilizer, other material aid, money, and possibly another Summit.
In short, I see this as — the Bush administration held out for a long time against not just NK resistance and pressure, but domestic media pressure too. And it slowly got the screws turned up on NK to the point it looked like they were starting to show results…
…but this new deal has open the door to the critics and to others who needed more cover for their support of Pyongyang.
March 22nd, 2007 at 12:33 pm
[…] the true extent of that threat remains a daunting task. For now, though, despite a good deal of circumstantial evidence that suggests North Korean duplicity, hard evidence of plant construction, operation, or enrichment […]