“No one can ignore us from now.â€
These few words, spoken by a North Korean citizen, Jo Chang-ho, in this report by the South Korean international TV broadcaster, Arirang, said so much.
Mr. Jo was referring to the successful launch by his country of a long-range rocket on Wednesday that put a 200-pound, or 90-kilogram, earth surveillance satellite into orbit. The international community believes the launch is a test run for ballistic missile technology that, if perfected, could one day carry nuclear warheads across Asia and across the Pacific to the United States.
As well as joining the elite group of nine nations with nuclear weapons, North Korea also joins a small club of just 10 nations that can launch a satellite on their own. All of which threatens to shift the balance of power in Northeast Asia, said some South Korean commentators.
Most immediately, putting into orbit the Kwangmyongsong-3, or Shining Star-3, satellite, has dramatically boosted the image and authority of Kim Jung-un, the young North Korean leader, my colleague in Seoul, Choe Sung-han, reported.
“In the insular world of North Korea, the country's ability to send a rocket hurtling hundreds of miles on roughly the course it set is a fulfillment of promises that have kept people loyal to the Kim dynasty for decades,†Sung-han wrote. “Under that mythology, the launching was a sign that the so-called arduous march - soldiering on despite isolation and sanctions - was paying off, building a nuclear deterrent that would keep imperialist powers at bay.â€
In terms of North Korea's international image, too, it's a turnaround for the chubby, 29-year-old Mr. Kim, whose father, Kim Jong-il, ruled befo re him, and whose grandfather, Kim Il-sung, founded the state in 1948.
Mr. Kim was the butt of headlines around the world late last month after The Onion, an American satirical publication and Web site, named him “Sexiest Man Alive for 2012,†and the People's Daily, the official mouthpiece of China's Communist Party, apparently took the award seriously.
The Onion had another try at levity over Wednesday's launch, “reporting†that Mr. Kim's glamorous wife had escaped on the missile.
The truth of course is very different.
Today, Northeast Asia is scrambling to deal with the fallout of the launch and speculation is growing North Korea may next carry out a nuclear test, Reuters reports.
North Korea's test also threatens to spark a wider arms race in a region already unsettled by an increasingly aggressive territorial dispute between China and Japan over uninhabited islands in the East China Sea.
The launch came a day before a Chinese marine surveillance plane crossed into what Japan considers its airspace around the islands, causing Japan to scramble fighter jets for the first time in the dispute.
And it came a week before presidential elections in South Korea.
As The Korea Herald, a South Korean English-language newspaper, wrote, North Korea was now in a “psychologically superior position†to South Korea with this latest step towards gaining high-level nuclear weapons capability.
“As North Korea inches toward its goal of de facto nuclear power status, its fledgling leadership is expected to pursue a more aggressive, bolder external policy,†the newspaper wrote.
A commentary in the People's Daily appealed for calm.
“Rational thinking tells us†that “the more critical the situation the more need to maintain calm,†ran the article in Chinese signed by the pseudonymous Zhong Sheng, whose name is believed to stand for “the voice of the center.â€
“The Korean peninsula cannot sustain vicious cycles, this is the basic thinking that one should have when discussing the security situation,†Zhong Sheng wrote.
So while China, North Korea's longtime ally, has officially voiced “regret†at the lau nch â€" something that was noted in Washington â€" it also offered support, saying North Korea “is entitled to the peaceful use of outer space,†the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman, Hong Lei, said on Wednesday.
For its part, the United States and its allies are talking of stronger international sanctions against North Korea, as my colleagues David E. Sanger and William J. Broad wrote.
But there is considerable doubt about how far China would join in efforts to increase, say, the strict embargoes on goods going in and out of North Korea. Why?
“Beijing's biggest fear has always been destabilizing North Korea, and setting off a collapse that could put South Korean forces, and perhaps their American allies, on China's border,†write David and Bill.
