Talk:January 2016 North Korean nuclear test

Yield Estimates

I think we must remember that the current test has registered a seismic scale of 5.1.

This is similar (based on revised seismic scale of 5.1 in 2013) or even higher (based on original 4.9 seismic scale as in 2013).

Even the South Korean source have amended the test yield estimation to 6–9 kilotons using the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization’s calculation method.

Hence, there is higher chance that both 2013 and this nuclear test yield is at least about 7 to 9 kilotons, instead of 6 to 7 kilotons as claimed by this "expert" Joseph Cirincione.

It is very evident that the International Community is trying to media blackout the test yield so as to prevent North Korea from having the bargain chip in any possible future talks with the US if ever had. It is also clear that such information is hidden from public domain so that the North Koreans could not get much data apart of what they are currently capable of.

In summary, North Korea should have announced the yield and have the ability to measure the yield it tested so that International Community can acknowledge it as de facto nuclear state, just like what India and Pakistan is doing now.

---

CNN has reported a N.K. statement that the device was buried rather more deeply than for previous tests. I will add that modifications to the blast chamber perimeter could greatly mitigate seismic propagation and signature isotopic release. Also, the test—being only a test—may have deliberately undercharged a lithium deuteride secondary component so that a fusion 'burn' would be demonstrated, but unsubstantial. Not unlike running a car with only a few quarts of gasoline: the whole system is still shown to work.JohndanR (talk) 15:49, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

You will need Reliable Sources for any and all of the above ^ - no Original Research of your personal views. 98.67.190.54 (talk) 01:02, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

Emphasize skepticism re "hydrogen"

An hour ago, I had added this paragraph but wonder if that should be in the lede. Many experts doubt that this was a hydrogen explosion so perhaps the coverage of the skepticism should be discussed sooner in this article. ( Senior Defense Analyst Bruce W. Bennett of research organization RAND is also skeptical, telling the BBC that "The bang they should have gotten would have been 10 times greater than what they're claiming.... So Kim Jong-un is either lying, saying they did a hydrogen test when they didn't, they just used a little bit more efficient fission weapon - or the hydrogen part of the test really didn't work very well or the fission part didn't work very well."[15]) Peter K Burian (talk) 17:13, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

I changed the name of the test section to include skepticism. Peter K Burian (talk) 17:31, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

I see that User: AySz88 added more specifics about the skepticism to the lede with new citations. OK, although now, I am not so sure that is necessary. After renaming a section to include the word skepticism, I wonder if perhaps most of the commentary about skepticism should actually be moved to that section. Peter K Burian (talk) 19:00, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

There is a spectrum of designs all of which could be called a "hydrogen" bomb. Does the Korean language have a standard way of distinguishing between what we call in English a "thermonuclear" weapon (i.e. a multi-stage weapon typically having a yield significantly exceeding 100kT) and what we call a "boosted fission" weapon (i.e. a fission bomb with some deuterium and/or tritium gas injected into the core, typically having a yield under 100kT)? Exactly what Korean words were used?

No idea since I doubt that any of us can read Korean. But if your theory were correct, surely one of the major, international news agencies would have twigged to that. Peter K Burian (talk) 22:26, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

KCNA does put out reports in English, and they used the phrase an "H-bomb of justice".--Jack Upland (talk) 03:51, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

How do you draw a clear distinction between "fission" and "boosted fission" and "hydrogen" bombs? In Nuclear_weapon#Fusion_weapons it says a fusion weapons - as opposed to fission - "produces a large proportion of its energy in nuclear fusion reactions". But in Nuclear_weapon_design#Hydrogen_bombs we read correctly that in hydrogen bombs "uranium fission, as usual, [is] providing most of their energy". And also the explosion yield does not say much about the design used, as we see in the W80 (nuclear warhead) - with a variable yield between 5 and 150 kT. So the whole discussion if the test used a "real" H-bomb is more political. --Bernd.Brincken (talk) 07:46, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

The distinction is between atomic fission and fusion. It's basic atomic physics. The fission (splitting) of large atoms like uranium or plutonium produces energy. However, the fusion (joining) of the smallest atom, hydrogen, to produce a helium atom, produces even more energy. This is the energy that powers the sun. However, fusion bombs (the "H-bombs") use a fission bomb (the "A-bomb") to kick them off, because atomic fusion requires a lot of energy. To actually achieve a fusion bomb would be a massive advance for the DPRK. I think we should be sceptical of both sides. Don't forget that many "experts" denied the DPRK had an atomic bomb in the first place, and many still deny it has ICBMs.--Jack Upland (talk) 11:56, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

Not news

Editors should bear in mind that Wikipedia is not news. We don't necessarily need to know what the Australian government says about everything. The USA has conducted over a thousand nuclear tests, not including the "subcritical" tests which it is still conducting. We don't have an article for each of these tests.--Jack Upland (talk) 12:05, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

agreed. We have too much content with reactions from minor countries nowhere near Korea. Should we delete some of those? user:Peter K Burian 10:30, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Unfortunately, Google News is including this item as a news article.

I think it's something to bear in mind. Other tests have had a test article and a reactions article. This seems a bit unnecessary for every test. This one is different, though, as it is a claimed H-bomb. The 2013 test also spawned a "2013 Korean crisis" article that ended up being merged into 2013 in North Korea. Part of the problem is the media runs these overblown story about the looming threat of war. There is not going to be a war. This is a "crisis" that has occurred every few years.--Jack Upland (talk) 21:41, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

As with everything North Korea does, it provokes a complete overreaction of Wikipedia:Recentism here, vast pages are created of an event that soon fades into obscurity as this inevitably will. Mztourist (talk) 04:45, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

I wonder if Wikipedia has a plan for dealing with these pieces of cyberspace junk that are launched in news storms like this, and then forgotten...--Jack Upland (talk) 08:31, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

Skepticism section is getting too long

It is an important section but it keeps getting longer ... with quotes re: speculation by yet another expert. If we added a quote from every expert who is being quoted in the media, this section would soon become excessively long.

Are the new quotes being added actually providing any new info? Let's keep that in mind before adding more and more. Peter K Burian (talk) 14:57, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

This section definitely needs some editing. The first 3 paragraphs are not about skepticism at all, and maybe should be in a new section. The rest of it is repetitive and rather confused.--Jack Upland (talk) 09:06, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Why was this moved

This was renamed from "2016 North Korean nuclear test" to "2016 North Korea nuclear test." The explanation for this change (the article should use the country's name and not a "demonym") does not make sense. The previous name was grammatically correct. "North Korean" is simply the adjective form of "North Korea" meaning, in this case "by North Korea." It does not refer to inhabitants of North Korea.

Should it be changed back? NPguy (talk) 02:19, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

How about if we create pages for all the tests done by United States? Would you name them "United States nuclear tests" or "American nuclear tests", same goes for France and Britain, "French nuclear tests" and "British nuclear tests". Most of the examples i have seen for Wikipedia pages where location or a country is involved, they are after the location/country name and do not use adjective. Also, if we analyze the sources in the page, most of the headlines say "North Korea nuclear tests" and less use the adjective hence WP:COMMONNAME! Sheriff | ☎ 911 | 02:32, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

The other nuclear tests are described as "North Korean", as are the missile tests. There is a page British nuclear tests at Maralinga. There are far more pages named "French..." than "France..." "United States" is different, as it acts as an adjective. Headlines are not reliable because headline-writers usually try to be as brief as possible. I think it should say "North Korean". Wikipedia uses "North Korean" a lot. It's not really a demonym because the people are not different in the North.--Jack Upland (talk) 03:00, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

SheriffIsInTown, please open WP:RM including British nuclear testing in the United States, 1995–96 French nuclear tests, 2013 North Korean nuclear test. Sawol (talk) 07:17, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

No infrastructure to produce lithium deuteride fuel?

Anyone know the source for the claim: "North Korea was not known to have the infrastructure to produce lithium deuteride fuel"? Unless one is talking about lithium-6 deuteride (and enrichment of ⁶Li), this doesn't seem like something that requires special infrastructure (producing deuterium is easy, and reacting it with Li is a simple chemical process). Prevalence (talk) 13:01, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

Lithium enrichment is required. Lithium deuteride for thermonuclear weapons uses Li-6. It's a source of tritium on the fly, based on nuclear reactions that include n + Li-6 --> He-4 + H-3 and H-2 + H-3 --> He-4 + n. NPguy (talk) 17:51, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

This probably should be deleted. It's not in the source cited, and neither is the claim about the site not being remote enough, as far as I can see.--Jack Upland (talk) 22:43, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

Didn't Castle Bravo show that Li-7 worked as well? Anyway, we still need a source for the claim, given the mass difference between Li-6 and Li-7, separation is much easier than for example U-235 from U-238. Prevalence (talk) 19:40, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

I've removed this. It seems to have been an editor's personal theory. None of that sentence was in the source given.--Jack Upland (talk) 23:44, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

International Reactions ...

Why is the response of Cuba, Belarus, Syria and Zimbabwe not mentioned ?

@31.48.177.149: Don't know. Feel free to add them if mentioned by a reliable source. – Zumoarirodoka_(talk)^(email) 13:26, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Split

Oppose - A "Reactions" article would take the "Skepticism" section as well as the "International reactions" section. There would be little left of this. This is repeating the mistakes of the past when multiple articles were created for each test. This is recentism run rampant.--Jack Upland (talk) 08:53, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

Oppose It's easier to keep everything together as a coherent whole, and I've seen no good reason to for the proposed split. NPguy (talk) 01:11, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

In fact, the splittist has not put forward a justification.--Jack Upland (talk) 06:19, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

I went ahead and closed it, as there has been no reasoning given to split the articles, nor has there been any support for such a move. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 06:00, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

And now a page has been created despite the consensus against it.--Jack Upland (talk) 03:11, 1 October 2016 (UTC)

What will this be titled if there are more 2016 tests?

The subject line kind of says it all. If there's another test in 2016 as is widely expected [1], what will this one be renamed to? - Brianhe (talk) 09:09, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

I would suggest this be retitled "...tests". We don't need yet another article.--Jack Upland (talk) 09:28, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

If the new test gets sufficient coverage to be notable (which it probably will), I'd support renaming this January 2016 North Korean nuclear test and having an article of its own for the new one. There is no need to squeeze in both in one article; any commonalities should be discussed in Nuclear program of North Korea. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 19:52, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

I'm concerned about the recentism here. If NK keeps conducting tests, do we need to have an article for each test?--Jack Upland (talk) 00:43, 10 May 2016 (UTC)

Recentism comes in many flavors. I look at it as a content-in-context issue; the article on North Korea should not be littered with information about nuclear and missile tests from the 2010s. I'm not saying that information must be put somewhere, either, but we should recognize if it's notable or not (and events like that tend to be). It's also a topic that tends to get coverage that actually says something (both political and technical analysis); the present article is not a stub but a healthy article that reflects the good coverage of its sources. The same can perhaps not be said about the many missile tests that have occurred this year, hence they don't have articles (In brute notability terms they probably could have. There are plenty of news about).

North Korea suffers from one of the worst lack of articles qua systemic bias in the whole of Wikipedia. We shouldn't perpetuate that, particularly when notability of topics is not an issue. We've already done ourselves a disservice by e.g. merging Nuclear program of North Korea and Biological weapons program of North Korea into North Korea and weapons of mass destruction, an article which serves neither highly notable and differentiated topic well. Its broad scope but lack of detail only (perhaps unknowingly) replicates U.S. foreign policy positions from the early 2000s; "We don’t negotiate with evil, we defeat evil" is even a redirect to the article! – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 01:09, 10 May 2016 (UTC)

Well, it looks like this has happened...--Jack Upland (talk) 01:46, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

Yes indeed, and someone had already started a page for it. The question now remains, should we just put these two (or more...) articles together cause they're in the same year, or should they remain separate? --AsianHippie (talk) 04:48, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

The question isn't whether articles should be merged because the tests occurred in the same year, but how many of these articles do we want? Sure, there's coverage, but do we need to document the Australian government's opinion on every test??? Fundamentally, to respond to Finnusertop's point above, the problem is media coverage of North Korea, which Wikipedia is just reflecting. Multiplying articles about the hot button issues doesn't really address the overall lack of coverage. But there's no way of solving this problem in Wikipedia, as far as I can see. Restricting the number of articles about nuclear tests would not improve the History of North Korea article, which was a shambles for years (for example). In the end, the issue is undue weight. We are increasing the number of articles about North Korea, but they are about nuclear tests (and the Australian government's subsequent outrage). We could equally expand North Korean coverage by an article about Kim Jong Un's hair, girth, or alleged addiction to Swiss cheese. In the end this is a problem for Wikipedia. Does it create vast swathes of cyberspace junk, inactive for years and never visited, or create a useful encyclopedia? I think the mentality of many editors is akin to Pokemon Go players. They believe they are collecting points in some game, and they do not care whether anyone ever reads the articles.--Jack Upland (talk) 09:45, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

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