The failed launch today of North Korea's ‘earth observation satellite' completed a tragedy of Greek epic dimensions for the hermit kingdom's new young leader, Kim Jung-un. Act One ended on a highly optimistic note on 29 February, with a US-North Korea deal on suspending strategic weapons activity that seemed too good to be true. In Act Two 16 days later, North Korea confirmed that it was indeed too good to be true: the long-range missile test moratorium part of the deal came with an exception in newly inked fine print. Faced with nearly universal calls to desist, North Korea responded with hubris, inviting scores of journalists and experts to observe the launch. Act Three today ended a couple of minutes after lift-off when the Unha-3 rocket began to malfunction and soon fell into the ocean.
Befitting the tragic theme, Kim Jong-un thus incurs all of the negative consequences for having deceived Washington and violated United Nations Security Council mandates without reaping any of the intended benefits. The prospects for détente with the United States that appeared so promising on Leap Day were needlessly discarded. Instead, Pyongyang faces additional penalties. Although China, as usual, will prevent the UN from imposing sanctions on its North Korean ally, there are other ways the US can make Pyongyang pay a price. This does not just mean stopping the food aid that was promised on 29 February. Washington may also look at the kind of financial-sector sanctions that have proven so effective at harming Iran's economy. Back in 2005, a relatively small sanction that froze $26 million in North Korean bank accounts in the Macau-based Banco Delta Asia over money-laundering charges caused immense anguish in Pyongyang because it squeezed the leadership's personal slush fund.
North Korea had anticipated that the launch would pay both political and military dividends. Politically, the launch was to provide the crowning fireworks for the 100th anniversary celebration of founding father Kim Il-sung's birth. For years, Pyongyang has been proclaiming that the centenary would mark the arrival of North Korea as a ‘prosperous and powerful nation'. The failures of central planning mean that prosperity is nowhere in sight. But the ‘power' part of the slogan could be demonstrated by a three-stage rocket launch that put North Korea in the exclusive club of space-faring nations - or not, as it turns out.
Militarily, the test was intended to further North Korea's ambitions to develop an inter-continental ballistic missile. The nosecone held a satellite rather than a warhead, but otherwise the Unha-3 rocket employed the same features and technology that go into military missiles. One of these technologies that North Korea has yet to master involves three-stage separation. Its last three long-range missile tests, in 1998, 2006 and 2009, all failed at various stages. However, today's fourth failure was not without valuable military lessens for North Korea's rocket scientists. They will be poring over the launch data for additional clues as to what needs to be tweaked.
Failures are common early in the development stage of nearly any missile system, and are thus to be expected. Gi ven the high profile of this particular launch, however, scapegoats will need to be found, so there may be one or two fewer rocket scientists around to go back to the drawing board. Modified rockets will then be tested afresh. The next time, however, they might not choose to launch on a Friday the 13th.
