North Korea tested three Nodong ballistic missiles, which means I am going to be treated to three days of the same penis joke on Twitter. No. Dong. I get it. The thing is, “Nodong” is our name for their missile. That’s right…
North Korea has now tested what appears to be a two-stage, solid-fueled ballistic missile capable of delivering a nuclear weapon to more than 1,000 km, probably much more. I would have thought that would garner some attention. North Korea’s new…
We spend a lot of time reading North Korean propaganda. One interesting thing the North Koreans do is try to obscure the location and purpose of certain facilities. There are a small number of facilities in DPRK propaganda that are…
A few weeks ago, some colleagues new to satellite imagery analysis claimed that China had drastically reduced trade with North Korea to punish Pyongyang for its most recent nuclear test. They made this judgment on the basis of a small number…
A joint post by Catherine Dill, Jeffrey Lewis, Melissa Hanham and David Schmerler Two years ago, on 17 July 2014, someone shot down Malaysia Airlines Flight Number 17 (MH17) over an area of Ukraine held by Russian-backed separatists, killing all…
Last week, a piece of debris from North Korea’s Kwangmyongsong rocket washed up in Japan. Images of the debris show it is the smaller half of the fairing that covers the satellite during launch. The larger half was recovered in…
Or, geolocating Kim Jong Un by his (somewhat questionable) fashion choices. A joint post with Dave Schmerler. Surely, you remember this image, notable because it shows a mock-up of a compact nuclear warhead and Kim Jong Un in a ridiculous…
Edward Geist has created a Python library of nuclear weapons effects, including Soviet models. If there was ever a reason for this blog to exist, announcing something like this is pretty much it. Introducing GLASSTONE—a Python library for modeling nuclear…
Yesterday, Melissa Hanham and I gave a talk to a meeting of US and Russian experts about North Korea’s growing nuclear and missile programs. The presentation is part of a high-level dialogue that seeks to resume US-Russian cooperation on nonproliferation,…
Melissa Hanham, Catherine Dill and I have acquired a satellite image from 15 February 2015 that shows Iran is preparing to launch a rocket from the Imam Khomeini Space Center. We anticipate that Iran will attempt the launch between 1-2 March 2016. Here…
