[RTS]

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea carried out its sixth and most powerful nuclear test in an extraordinary show of defiance against President Trump on Sunday, saying it had detonated a hydrogen bomb that could be mounted on an intercontinental ballistic missile.

The test, which the North called a “complete success,” was the first to clearly surpass the destructive power of the bombs dropped on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in World War II.

The announcement from North Korea came hours after the country declared that it had developed a hydrogen bomb that could fit into the warhead of an intercontinental ballistic missile.

Still, it was unclear whether the North had in fact detonated such a weapon, a far more powerful type of nuclear device than the atomic bombs it has tested in the past. And analysts were skeptical that Pyongyang had really developed the capability to mount one on an ICBM.

The United States Geological Survey estimated that the tremor set off by the blast, detected at 12:36 p.m. at the Punggye-ri underground test site in northwestern North Korea, had a magnitude of 6.3.

The South Korean Defense Ministry’s estimate was much lower, at 5.7, but even that would mean a blast “five to six times” as powerful as the North’s last nuclear test, a year ago, said Lee Mi-sun, a senior analyst at the South Korean Meteorological Administration.

North Korea Says It Tested a Hydrogen Bomb Meant for Missiles


At some point, North Korea is going to have to be addressed. I'm not sure what that will entail, but it's glaringly obvious Kim Jong-un is hellbent on pushing the envelope even more.