North Korea: A pariah state, its secret nuclear programme - and a new crisis for Bush

It is a tale of fathers and sons: of a reclusive dynasty in an impoverished country in Asia, where the son, like the father, has lavished its few assets on building a terrifying array of weaponry; and of an American presidential dynasty, in which the father began a war in Iraq the son now wants to finish.

With North Korea's stunning admission that it has a secret nuclear weapons programme, in breach of its international undertakings, the parallel ambitions of George Bush and Kim Jong Il have become entangled in a crisis which could trigger a new upheaval in Asia, and which seems bound to complicate US efforts to win international support for a preventive military strike against Baghdad.

Yesterday, senior State Department officials began a hasty tour of east Asia to forge a concerted strategy. As James Kelly, the assistant Secretary of State, and the Under Secretary, John Bolton, arrived in Beijing, en route for Tokyo and Seoul, Mr Bush described the admission as "troubling and sobering". Washington has demanded that North Korea fulfil its obligations and abandon its nuclear programme.

Japan and South Korea said yesterday they would continue to seek improved relations with North Korea. But the development can only confirm their worst suspicions about their reclusive Communist neighbour. It also signifies the effective end of the 1994 nuclear control agreement between Pyongyang and Washington.

Here, and in capitals around the world, diplomats and government leaders are puzzling over the motives and the impact of the disclosure. Washington's uncertainty is reflected in the long delay between Mr Kelly being told of the programme when he visited the North from 3 to 5 October, and the announcement by the State Department on Wednesday, almost a fortnight later.

The immediate fears in Washington are twofold: first, that a new crisis might erupt on the divided and heavily armed Korean peninsula, where 35,000 US troops are stationed. It has been described as "the most dangerous place on Earth". The second worry is that the restrained US reaction will lead to accusations that America operates double standards in its dealings with Iraq and North Korea, making the search for a tough United Nations resolution against Saddam Hussein even trickier.

Insisting that it wanted to settle the dispute with Pyongyang peacefully, the White House said the cases of Iraq and North Korea were different, although both belong to President Bush's "axis of evil", and North Korea appears to be well ahead of Iraq in its pursuit of nuclear weapons.

Iraq, Mr Bush never misses a chance to proclaim, represents a "unique" threat, by combining support for terrorism with weapons of mass destruction, with a leader who has a track record of aggression and has not hesitated to use those weapons against neighbouring states and his people.

But Iraq, it transpires, may not be unique. In the eight years since the agreement with the Clinton administration, which essentially bartered US economic aid for the dismantlement of North Korea's nuclear programme, Pyongyang appears to have mounted a secret one, based on enriched uranium.

Unlike the plutonium technology mothballed in 1994, reactors are not needed in this process. But it does require centrifuges, precisely the technology Washington claims the Iraqis are trying to assemble in their own pursuit of a bomb.

Under the old plutonium-based programme, the North Koreans acknowledged they possessed 100 grams of the deadly material. But the CIA always believed the stock was much more, enough to produce one or two atomic weapons. It is unclear whether North Korea has produced a weapon from the enriched uranium programme. "We're not certain it has been weaponised yet," a senior official told The New York Times yesterday.

But that may be small comfort. Scarcely less alarming was Pyongyang's claim, reported by US officials with Mr Kelly at the start of the month, that it had unspecified "more powerful" weapons. This is being taken as confirmation that North Korea already has chemical and biological arms, as all its neighbours and most weapons proliferation specialists have long believed.

Perhaps the most baffling aspect of the revelation is its timing. The truculence of North Korea is an apparent contrast to the recent overtures of its leader, Kim Jong Il, to its old foe Japan, the gradual thaw in relations with the South, and the country's cautious embrace of capitalist economic reforms.

Only a month ago, at a summit with Junichiro Koizumi, Mr Kim asked the Japanese Prime Minister to convey a message to Mr Bush stressing North Korea's desire to improve relations with the US. So what is the eternally mysterious North really up to?

Not surprisingly, reactions are sharply divided. Hardliners believe the North has burnt its bridges with the West, and the moves towards normalisation with Japan and South Korea were a feint. They believe all relations with Pyongyang should be severed, saying North Korea now represents a nuclear proliferation threat that must be confronted head-on.

Another school holds that the admission – however belligerently delivered – is another step along North Korea's tortuous path towards rejoining the outside world, and an implicit recognition that rapprochement is impossible without coming clean about its nuclear programme. "This is a signal they want to be treated with respect," said Donald Gregg, chairman of the Korea society in New York, and a former US ambassador to Seoul.

The decision to admit to Mr Koizumi the kidnapping of Japanese citizens in the 1970s and 1980s was psychologically much harder. "What they did with the Americans was much easier," Mr Gregg said. "North Korea has a growing sense of our satellite surveillance capacity. So they think, why fool around? They are hoping for better dialogue and engagement." Korea-watchers note the admission of a secret programme also fits the hard- nosed, backs-to-the-wall style of bargaining the North has perfected in crises past.

Selig Harrison, director of the national security programme at the Centre for International Policy in Washington, said: "This is the North's answer to the Bush administration's threat of preventative action." With the US failure to deliver the proliferation-proof reactors to replace the plutonium reactors for electric power generation, Mr Harrison believes: "This is a warning, saying, 'If you don't live up to the 1994 agreement, the agreement will unravel'." In that sense, Iraq and North Korea really are different.

Kim Jong Il has a leverage President Saddam can only dream of. Both regimes may be pariahs, but North Korea, with or without a nuclear capability, represents a special threat. Mr Bush appears to be the latest US president to conclude that an attack on North Korea, bristling with weapons, would almost certainly entail a new Korean war, and devastation for America's ally, South Korea.

THE RACE FOR NUCLEAR ARMS

In addition to the five declared nuclear powers, the following countries have clandestinely acquired, or are working to acquire, a nuclear capability.

NORTH KOREA: In 1994 it agreed to mothball and eventually eliminate its weapons programme but has admitted to a project using highly enriched uranium. The US has not said whether Pyongyang has produced a nuclear weapon.

INDIA: Tested a missile with a range of 150 miles, which could carry a nuclear payload, in 1988. Its first nuclear test was in 1994. India decided to build a nuclear bomb after China had done so in the 1960s, and has an estimated 60 weapons.

PAKISTAN: In 1989, Pakistan test-fired a ballistic missile with a range of up to 60 miles that could carry a nuclear payload. Pakistan started its nuclear programme after war with India in 1971. Its first nuclear test was in 1998. It is believed to have 10 nuclear warheads.

ISRAEL: Activated a nuclear weapons programme from the days following its creation. Estimates of its nuclear stockpile range from 75 to 400 weapons.

IRAQ:Continued work on a nuclear weapon despite the Israeli bombing of its French-built nuclear reactor in 1982. UN inspectors in the 1990s in effect eliminated the nuclear weapons programme, but the US fears it has been restarted.

IRAN: The US is concerned at Russian co-operation with Iran, which is thought to have a nuclear weapons programme.