North Korea
Who can stop Who can stop him now?
Oct 12th 2006
From The Economist print edition
America, China and Russia must all make sacrifices to stop a nuclear arms race in Asia and the
Middle East
WITH the possible exception of South Africa, no country that has tested an atomic bomb has given its
nuclear weapons up. So no matter what the world now does to punish North Korea for its underground
test on October 8th, Kim Jong Il's hermit kingdom is likely to hang grimly on to its bomb. If you are the
paranoid dictator of a friendless state that is still technically at war with both South Korea and the United
States, a nuclear arsenal is your ultimate insurance policy.
To say this is not to say that North Korea should go unpunished. On the contrary, it must be punished
even if the punishment is unlikely to change its ways. That is because other would-be nuclear
proliferators, with Iran to the fore, ar