One nuclear backpack makes Seoul sea of fire; NK residents
The Korea Times - 12-15-2010 15:24

North Korean soldiers and residents have mentioned the possibility that nuclear weapons may be used against South Korea amid the recent radical claims of “nuclear war on the Korean Peninsula” by the North, Open Radio for North Korea reported Tuesday.

Earlier, Nodong Sinmun, a mouthpiece paper of North Korea’s Workers’ Party, reported that “the betrayal of South Korea has heightened the tension between the North and South and created dark cloud of nuclear war on the Korean Peninsula.”

“We will make Seoul a sea of fire without fail if anyone invade our territory, airspace and waters even by 0.001 millimeter,” Uriminzok, the Internet site of North Korea’s Commission for Peaceful Unification of the Fatherland, also said on Nov. 28

According to the radio, an inside source of North Korea said that there are rumors spreading among North Korean residents that “Seoul could be a sea of fire when we detonate a nuclear bomb brought in a backpack and then immediately South Korea surrenders.”

A man, who participated in the military drill at the Samjiyeon Airport on Nov. 25, said an Air Force officer had also made a similar remark. “We can win with only one nuclear weapon.”

Such a remark came when several soldiers questioned during the drill, “Isn’t it problem that (fighter jets) could not be used due to lack of fuel.”

“Why do you say such a thing although you know all?” an officer said. “We don’t need good jets. Nuclear weapons are all. We can win (with nuclear weapons) when our General is with us.”

There are mixed opinions about the existence of nuclear backpacks in the North. Most of experts have the opinion that North Korea has no technology to make the nuclear weapons to the smaller size of backpack as it has yet to make the nuclear head smaller for missiles.

However, some have presumed that 48 of the 132 nuclear backpacks were lost when the Soviet Union got disbanded and several of them seemed to come into the North. As a result, they claimed that they could not rule out the possibility of the North to use the nuclear backpacks.

The nuclear backpack is officially called “special atomic demolition munitions” which commandos carry on their back to penetrate deep into the enemy’s rear area to hit air force bases, dams and other important buildings.

The backpack weighs about 30 kilograms, ranging in power fro 10 tons of TNT to 1 kiloton. The nuclear bomb, which exploded in Hiroshima, Japan, during the second World War, was equivalent to 12 kilotons of TNT in destruction power.

The radio said it has become apparent that the North could threaten a nuclear war against the South although it is hard to conclude that the North may actually use the nuclear weapons, when all the recent inside information is taken into account.