The threat posed by North Korea is a holdover from another era. When the world was settling into a land grab between the western powers and the advance of Communism at the end of the second world war the carve-up of Korea resulted in the Kim family establishing their own little empire which was adept at playing off the rivalry between Russia and China.
The " Big Five " countries - America, Russia, Britain, France and China decided to restrict the atom bomb to their countries and put in place both threats and incentives to stop the rest of the world developing these weapons - with limited success. Both India and Pakistan have the bomb and it simply serves as the deterrent that makes war impossible between two rival religions. We know the Israeli's have a few nuclear warheads, but they play the numbers close to their chests - and a few other countries have advanced some of the way towards the technology needed to join the " nuclear club ".
The enigma has been North Korea. It tried to annex the entire Korean peninsula by direct invasion and this led to the Korean war, which ended in stalemate. The two sides are separated by a neutrality zone and the United States keeps a standing army in South Korea to maintain the peace. North Korea became the " hermit kingdom ", declining contact with the rest of the world and raising and equipping
one of the worlds biggest military forces. It derives an income by counterfeiting other countries money and by the illicit distribution of narcotics on the world scene.
The Kim family managed to create a dynasty and rule has passed through three generations and had clear intentions of becoming nuclear armed. They have successfully carried out a number of test firings and are well advanced on the development of delivery systems. They are able to fire missiles from submerged submarines and it seems inevitable that they will shortly test fire what can only be described as an ICBM capable of reaching targets anywhere in Europe or on the North American continent. They propose all out nuclear war if threatened.
It is not believed that North Korea has managed to achieve the technology breakthrough to go beyond the type of atomic device used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, nor is it fully certain that they have been able to miniaturise it to fit on a warhead, but eventually they will no doubt achieve the capability of building a hydrogen bomb. Their threat of making nuclear war on America has stayed the hands of presidents Bill Clinton, George Bush and Barak Obama and each time the North Korean capability to inflict damage on the rest of the world has become enhanced.
This latest US president - Donald rump - does not come from a dedicated school of diplomacy and he appears to take the North Korean threat at face value. He has made it clear to both Russia and China that he accepts the challenge and he has moved a carrier task force to where an American strike can be quickly delivered. There are no threats coming from China's leader, Xi Jinping and neither has Russia delivered any ultimatum.
North Korea is believed to have about nine operating nuclear weapons. There is a chance it can deliver death and destruction to a South Korean city such as Seoul and possibly an American base such as Guam but a full scale American nuclear strike would make that country virtually disappear. In the past, indecision has resulted in the North Korean arsenal expanding and achieving the capacity for greater destruction.
History tells us that both the first and second world wars might have been prevented had world leaders taken remedial action to prevent war becoming an eventuality. Just exactly the same scenario seems to have been developing for decades on the other side of the Korean demilitarised zone.
Far from being dangerous and provocative, perhaps Donald Trump is taking the action that may save the world from a far greater and more destructive cataclysm further down the time track.
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