As Kathryn mentioned, I react to the North Korean test on today’s homepage . Meanwhile, there are reports that North Korea may be planning a second test.
A second test would be a way of saying, “We’ve got a whole bunch of these things,” which in turn would be a way of saying, “We’ll sell ‘em if we like.” Another message here would be, “So you made fun of us for flubbing our missile test. Well, looks like we’ve got technical know-how after all. In fact, you had better take us seriously right now, because you could find us in possession of multiple weaponized warheads and long-range missiles just as quickly and unexpectedly as we’ve tested these bombs.” And even if multiple nuke tests are in part a way of covering for the beginners failures of long-range missile tests, we would have to take that message seriously.