Jeffrey LewisTaepodong Model

Yeah, that’s a Taepodong model. Geoff Forden and I have been making different sorts of models of the TD-1 and TD-2, but that is another story.

(Hat tip to reader RH.)

Update The Robot Economist is a sick, funny bastard.

Comments

  1. Haninah (History)

    [Sound of jaw dropping. Again.] So, how long till some Bushie straps six magic markers around the outside of the thing, labels them “Nodong,” and claims what he has is a model of the TD-2?

  2. stevev (History)

    I know what’s going to be on my Christmas list this year!

  3. Victoria (History)

    Wow, the North Koreans really will sell anything to anyone!

  4. Yu Rong

    By the way, the caption on the top of the box in the picture seems to read “Nodong No.1”, not Taepodong.

  5. JimO (History)

    Man, that sure is some no-joke DONG!!![I had to be the first to head for the gutter]

  6. Allen Thomson (History)

    > By the way, the caption on the top of the box in the picture seems to read “Nodong No.1”

    Can you make out what the text just below that says? It’s faint and I can’t be sure, but it seems also to be in Chinese, rather than the Korean at the bottom.

  7. Tom

    Do we know who manufactures the thing and where to order it? If manufactured in North Korea, why would these folks use the western designation “Nodong” (if not for export purposes…)

  8. Geoff Forden (History)

    Does anyone else notice a remarkable similarity between the diagram on the front of the box and Charles Vick’s drawing of the Taepo-Dong 2 (the one labeled Mockup 1994 on the globalsecurity website:

    http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/dprk/images/nkir-missile-overview.jpg ).

    If you ask me, not only is North Korea counterfeiting US money, but they are infringing on Vick’s copyrights.

  9. François

    >Does anyone else notice a remarkable similarity between the diagram on the front of the box and Charles Vick’s drawing of the Taepo-Dong 2 (the one labeled Mockup 1994 on the globalsecurity website:http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/dprk/images/nkir-missile-overview.jpg ).

    >If you ask me, not only is North Korea counterfeiting US money, but they are infringing on Vick’s copyrights.

    You’d think they could at least send us a couple of those model kits for the trouble.

    Why those ungrateful little…

  10. Gilman (History)

    > By the way, the caption on the top of the box in the picture seems to read “Nodong No.1”

    Can you make out what the text just below that says? It’s faint and I can’t be sure, but it seems also to be in Chinese, rather than the Korean at the bottom.

    About the title – although the second character is definitly ‘dong’ I can’t find that first character in any dictionary, everybody in my office here in Shenzhen says it isn’t a Chinese word (they also say I should get back to work, but that’s another story.

    According to Wikipedia in Hanja (the Korean version of Chinese script) Nodong is written 蘆洞and Taipodong is written 大浦洞, although this looks like a phonic translation. This doesn’t look like either of those – does anybody actually recognise that character? Or is this a new miniature NorK superweapon that we are yet to learn about?(come crrroser Mr. Brrrix, much crrroser!)

    As for the writing underneath, it is definitely Korean and not Chinese.

  11. Yu

    Well, I asked our Korean friend to read the characters, and he said the big Chinese-looking characters are “Nodong No.1”, and these are actually Korean version of Chinese characters, not a hundred percent Chinese. 蘆洞shares the pronunciation, but is actually another word. The text underneath seems to be in Korean rather than Chinese, but anyway, it’s just too faint to tell.BTW, according to our Korean friend, the Korean characters at the bottom reads: Hooray to our dear leader Kim Jung Il.