Featured Image Credit: The Infographics Show via YouTube
Topics: North Korea, Politics, US News
Emily Brown
Topics: North Korea, Politics, US News
A detailed simulation has laid out what might happen if North Korea were to launch a nuclear ballistic missile towards the United States.
The threat of nuclear war is one that continues to hover amid political tensions, with nine countries currently known to possess nuclear weapons.
Those countries include the US, the UK, France, Israel, Pakistan, India and China, as well as Russia and North Korea.
In 2022, The Infographics Show put together a video explaining what might happen if North Korea were to utilize a weapon known as Hwasong-15; a two-stage missile with a wide nose cone that could carry a heavy nuclear warhead on its tip.
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The simulation details how North Korea could revert to a 'primitive telephone technology' to ensure their conversation about a launch isn't being spied on, and speculates how the country's leader could give the go-ahead for launch on the missile.
While the initial plans may come as a surprise, defensive measures in place by the US could detect the thermal plume of the missile, issuing an emergency alert and prompting authorities on the ground in the US to verify the threat.
Once verified, an alert would go to the White House where the president would head to the situation room to analyze real-time tracking data, while the Secret Service begins preparations to move the POTUS to a secure and 'highly classified' location.
"If the missile is aimed at the White House, the president has less than 40 minutes to vacate," the video explains.
US warships are equipped with missiles which could be used for short-range intercepts just outside the Earth's atmosphere, but they would require the target to be in its descent stage in order to adequately target it.
On dry land, the US Northern Command would begin to activate the US' homeland defences, including the ground-based mid-course defence system which has a collection of intercepters with a far greater range, designed to intercept the missile mid-course.
The video notes that while North Korea does have missiles capable of reaching America's east coast, attacks would be less precise than they would be on the west coast.
US army ships would move into position in an attempt to protect the major population centers, while so-called 'doomsday' airplanes would take off and fly high enough to avoid any destruction on the ground, with the president likely on board Air Force One.
Nuclear-capable aircraft would undergo preparations for a possible nuclear mission, while the American nuclear ballistic missile submarine fleet would make its own preparations to attack on command.
Once American supercomputers are able to calculate the trajectory, altitude, and speed of the North Korean missile, they would come up with a firing solution for the interceptors and, ideally, successfully destroy the missile.
Meanwhile, the president could ask the United States Congress for a formal declaration of war with North Korea, meaning the attack is only the beginning.