 Hello and welcome to NewsClick. Today we are going to discuss about the situation in North Korea and to discuss the issue we are joined by Prabir, our editor in chief. So Prabir, after this entire hydrogen bomb issue, what changes are going to happen? What will be its implications? Well, hydrogen bomb is really a game changer because it has two elements to it. One is that the ability to have a much bigger explosion and therefore the ability to inflict much larger damage. Of course, when you talk of nuclear bombs, the scale of damage is not really the issue because any damage in the nuclear bomb is going to be horrific. So that is one part of it. But it does indicate that one bomb then can create much more devastation on whoever it is exploded on. The second part is that it allows also smaller bombs to be created which will have less explosive power than the big bomb but enough to cause again major devastation in any city. And if you can make it smaller, you can miniaturize it, then it is easy to put it as a warhead into the intercontinental ballistic missile or the intermediate range ballistic missiles which North Korea has been building. With the missile tests, one of which took place in July if you remember and that missile showed that it has the capability of reaching the western shores of the United States. Western shores means Los Angeles and Francisco are under the missile threat of North Korea if a war takes place. If they are able to create a warhead, then they are that much closer to be able to do what is called deterrence. Now, we will come to deterrence theory little later. But the point is that this makes it much easier for North Korea than to claim. They have the ability to inflict damage on the United States which will be unacceptable to the United States. The only thing that still people are discussing, do they have a heat shield or not? But for any country to gamble its future on a heat shield or its ability to survive a re-entry as being discussed now, I think is a long shot. I think we have come to a stage where we can argue that North Korean with their missile program and the hydrogen bomb have reached a stage of deterrence. Now, of course, deterrence theory is of course, completely bogus. There have been detailed examination that why deterrence theory does not work, has not worked and is extremely dangerous for the world. Without getting into it, we will only point to a recent article by one of the people who Kennedy had put in his core team to look at the Cuban missile crisis. And he has written a detailed two-part article recently which he also shows that any war game that they had done showed that deterrence does not work. Any attack by one bomb would be a blanket attack by the other side. So, any country which feels threatened, particularly with annihilation, is going to retaliate full-hawk. So, I think that part of it has to be taken into account that the military options that the United States had, if it had any, is really closing out. And the only possibility for them is to annihilate North Korea, take out half of South Korea as a consequence, take out parts of China, Russia and Japan who are all close to North Korea. So, that is the kind of scenario that the United States is in today. So, when you talk about these neighboring countries, China and Russia had been playing a role in negotiations, but now Putin has come out with a statement that solution is impossible. So, it is a change in the strategy in the plans. What has led to this change and what are these changes? You see, both Russia and China have been saying that North Korea needs to stop what it is doing because these are acts of provocation. Nuclear bombs, hydrogen bombs are not weapons of peace irrespective of what the world might talk about or the American, Western analysts might claim to their deterrence theory. They have been the major propounders of deterrence theories that these are not weapons of peace. So, North Korea also needs to exercise constraint, restraint, which it has not done. It is also looking at the United States reaction and the United States reactions or pro-actions whichever you call them have been a will continue to do military exercises which North Korea regards as serious possibility of innovation. We will do it as many times as you like. We will overfly their territories. We will have strategic bombers placed in Guam. We will have strategic bombers placed elsewhere. All of this is ratcheting up the pressure of North Korea along with it. They keep on threatening them with extinction that they will annihilate you completely. We will do this, we will do that and all the American demands are that you should step down. You should surrender your missile and nuclear bomb program. In return, we will not do anything. Now, that is what China and Russia are looking at. They have said repeatedly that there is a way forward for negotiations but both sides have to do something and both sides at the moment are not doing anything. It could be argued that North Korea has given signals that please if you negotiate then there are possibilities. We will halt our program provided you agree to negotiate and there is a possibility of surrendering our nuclear program which we had done earlier provided you also can give us durable peace. Now, this is couched in very different language but we have covered as you remember in news click. We have covered this that North Korea is not saying that we will never surrender our missile and nuclear option. They are saying it only under certain conditions and those certain conditions are really long-term peace in the Koreas. So, I think that is the reason that China and Russia are both started to feel that they this way forward of engagement, negotiations, resumption of what was the sixth party agreement on North Korea's program. All of this seems to be at the moment futile because neither North Korea is observing restraint nor is United States given any signal. They are willing to consider anything else except total surrender by North Korea. So, as you pointed out that both of the countries are not able not giving any signals. Do you think the danger of war looms over the two nuclear power countries and if no then what is the way ahead? Well, let us put it this way North Korea is now a fully fledged nuclear power. We have to recognize that the hydrogen bomb establishes their technological capability to make this bomb. Let us also accept that missile and bomb making capabilities are no longer what used to be. It is something which now with reasonably middle level country can actually do. So, one part of it it has also brought out that this whole issue of continuation of nuclear bombs by few countries is actually a destabilizing scenario for the world as a whole. So, that is one thing which is we need to put on the agenda which nobody is talking about that we need to register that this is dangerous for the world and it is not North Korea alone. We are seeing a continuous rap you know stepping up of nuclear powers. We have already have added India, Pakistan, Israel was a nuclear power before. We have now added North Korea to the mix. This is the destabilizing scenario that the world faces. Now, I think therefore we need to think about the nuclear bomb in a completely different context as well. Coming to the narrow issue of North Korea and America it is a very clear issue that North Korea still remembers that 1 in 3 or 1 in 5 people died during the Korean war and what they have till from carrying on from 1953 is a temporary truce called an armistice. There is no peace agreement that has ever been signed. So, effectively the two countries are still in the stage of war. So, I think that is something the United States will have to put on the table if it wants to any resolution of the North Korean problem as they call it. So, I think that is something that they have to take into account. I do not think a nuclear war is possible. I do believe that irrespective of all the madness and all the tweets that Trump has been putting forward annihilation, fire, fury everything that we do. I think it still means that they will have to then incinerate a good part of Korea, not just North Korea and also inflict enormous damage on the Asian economy, on the Asian people including of course Japan. I think this is a price even they know the world cannot pay. So, I am skeptical of a war breaking out as far as intentions go. But here is the writer that the first world war didn't start from anybody wanting a world war. It started by accident, by as people bluff each other and as the bluffs grow, a stage comes where a small mistake or a small accident somewhere in the case of the first world war, one lonely assassin shooting down R. Tew Ferdinand led to a world-wide conflagration. So, I think this is the risk we carry that when you stand eyeball to eyeball with nuclear weapons with other weapons, the trigger necessarily does not have to be intentional one. It could be an accidental one and therefore, we are standing though the intent may not be there. We are standing close to a possible exchange and this is certainly not a happy situation for all of us. Therefore, the world needs to be much more proactive. All the other countries effectively are now becoming bystanders. It's a future of the world that's at stake and it's time to speak up. Thanks a lot probably for giving us your time and I'm sure these things are going to proceed and as they approach it will be coming back to you on such issues. Thanks a lot.