Investors Business Daily asks an important question:
What if North Korea just sells Iran a nuclear weapon?
If that question isn't chilling enough, try this one:
What if it North Korea already has?
Here's an excerpt from IBD:
Axis Of Evil: The West, distracted by current events and thinking there's still time, seems to have lost focus regarding Iran's nuclear and missile programs. But what if North Korea just sells Tehran a nuke?
Assistant Secretary of State Chris Hill has confirmed in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that Iranian observers — mainly scientists and engineers — witnessed the July 4 North Korean missile barrage, including a test of the intercontinental-range Taepodong-2C.
Asked if Iranians were present, Hill, who is chief U.S. negotiator with Pyongyang, replied: "Yes, that is my understanding." Then, in one of the great understatements of all time, he noted: "Our understanding is that North Korea has had a number of commercial relations in the Middle East with respect to missiles." Really.
In November 2002, U.S. intelligence began to track the So Sang, a vessel of unknown registry that had paid a visit to North Korea. Its journey to Yemen was interrupted by Spanish commandos, operating in conjunction with American authorities, who found 15 Scud-B missiles hidden under sacks of concrete.
The missiles were secretly purchased by the Yemeni government, part of North Korean missile trade estimated to bring in $500 million a year. Egypt, Libya and, yes, Syria, have been major customers of North Korean missile and related technology.
Some analysts said the July 4 failure of the Taepodong proved North Korean missile technology was overrated. But perhaps that launch was just a smoke screen, with the real test, for the Iranians' benefit, being of the ability to rapidly deploy and launch the shorter-range Scuds and Nodongs in a tactical combat environment that Tehran would face in a confrontation with the West.
IBD is right. Those who downplayed the threat from Iran by arguing that Iran could not possibly acquire nuclear weapons for another five or ten years are now demonstrably wrong, and those of us who argued in late 2005 that the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran was imminent, if not already realized, were right.
It is well within Iran's capability to purchase nuclear weapons from North Korea. In fact, Iran may already have done so.
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