North Korea's statement said the test was a 'perfect success.'
Seoul, South Korea: North Korea said Wednesday it had conducted a hydrogen bomb test, a defiant and surprising move that, if confirmed, would put Pyongyang a big step closer toward improving its still-limited nuclear arsenal.
A television anchor read a typically propaganda-heavy statement on state TV that said North Korea had tested a "miniaturized" hydrogen bomb, elevating the country's "nuclear might to the next level" and providing it with a weapon to defend against the United States and its other enemies.
The statement said the test was a "perfect success."
The test, if confirmed by outside experts, will lead to a strong push for new, tougher sanctions at the United Nations and further worsen already abysmal relations between Pyongyang and its neighbours.
Here is how and why a Hydrogen bomb is more dangerous and potent than a Nuclear bomb:
- A hydrogen bomb is much more powerful than an atomic bomb, it is also much harder to make.
- In a hydrogen bomb, radiation from a nuclear fission explosion sets off a fusion reaction responsible for a powerful blast and radioactivity.
- An atomic bomb is about fission. You're breaking up very large atoms (Uranium or Plutonium) in a super-critical chain reaction.
- A hydrogen bomb, or a thermonuclear bomb, uses fusion in a chain reaction. The requirement to start a fusion reaction, however is that it requires enormous energy levels (heat) in order to trigger it.
- The only way to generate energy for a Hydrogen bomb is with an atomic bomb.
- Therefore a hydrogen bomb includes an atomic bomb inside the core. The atomic bomb is the trigger. and when it explodes, it sets off fusion reactions in the nearby hydrogen isotopes.
- It is easier to make Hydrogen bombs in small size, so it is easier to place them in missiles.
