An unprecedented look inside North Korea’s nuclear facilities – Ep. 276

In the early 2000s, no one outside North Korea was quite sure about the extent of the country’s nuclear program, whether it had plutonium for an atomic bomb and if then-leader Kim Jong Il was willing to risk a nuclear test.

That changed in 2004, when North Korea invited Siegfried Hecker, longtime chief of the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, to tour its Yongbyon Nuclear Research Center. Hecker found a nascent but highly advanced nuclear program, driven by talented scientists who acutely understood the technological processes behind plutonium reprocessing.

This week, Hecker joins the NK News podcast to talk about his visits to Yongbyon and his new book exploring the DPRK’s nuclear program. He explains why North Korea might prefer plutonium bombs to uranium ones, how many bombs the DPRK likely possesses and why he believes the deal put on the table at the U.S.-DPRK summit in Hanoi was the best chance to stop North Korea’s nuclear program in decades.

Dr. Siegfried Hecker (@SiegfriedHecker) was the fifth director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory, the premier U.S. nuclear research facility. He is also a senior fellow and professor emeritus at Stanford University. His new book “Hinge Points: An Inside Look at North Korea’s Nuclear Program” is now available.

About the podcast: The North Korea News Podcast is a weekly podcast hosted by Jacco Zwetsloot (@JaccoZed) exclusively for NK News, covering all things DPRK — from news to extended interviews with leading experts and analysts in the field, along with insight from our very own journalists.