Most of the regional actors have motive to studiously ignore it, though.

I have stated what I believe the American reaction would be to a NK nuke test previously.

President Roh in South Korea was elected by a small margin after repeatedly emphasizing that his views differed from America's, that he favors engagement with North Korea - a continuation of the Sunshine Policy. Many of the SK's who voted for him are younger, have no memory of the war or aftermath, and indeed believe that their North Korean cousins would never attack them, because they're all Koreans after all. Roh wouldn't be eager to upset the fantasy world of his electoral base.

Also extremely interesting is the timing of this announcement. Did the SK's get wind of this before it happened, and send a message? - me too! Japan's outlook would be different. Japan's goverment and populace is wary of the NK threat, especially after those Craaaaaazy Norks launched that missle right over Japan. However, due to its constitutional military situation and overall strategic posture, I beleive that the Japanese government would be content to follow the US lead. If Uncle Sam says: "mum's the word," then that will be the Tokyo's policy as well. Bush has made it clear to China that he holds them the most responsible for North Korea's behavior, and that he expects results from Beijing. North Korea has the most contacts with China, and China supplies one or two pipelines of oil or gas to North Korea for free - in practice if not in name. If a nuke went off and the US remains silent, China certainly isn't going to say anything about their. In fact, they'd probably be a little relieved that the US isn't making a public fuss about it. Beijing is well within missle range, after all. Russia is the only one I am unsure of. Russian navy exercises early this year indicated missle force has decayed so much that there are doubts that Moscow has a credible deterrent. I think it likely Russian early warning system has decayed very much as well. Combined with a negelct of the Russian Far East in general, I'm not sure they'd have the capacity to tell immediately. Strategically, Russia is focused on Central Asia and the Caucuses right now. Any developments in the Far East would be purely secondary in importance. If there was a nuke, I wouldn't expect an announcement from the Kremlin: "Formerly Weird Ally Turned Raving Lunatic Has the Bomb. Putin Powerless Here, Too." I think the forest fire quote from CIA is so absurd it raises serious questions. Still, we don't have any more data on this. So in the coming days I will watch for the following: 1) KCNA announcements. When they launched that Taepodong over Japan the Norks stayed quiet for a week or two before triumphantly announcing it. We'll see if they claim the completion of the "Juche Bomb" or some such. 2) Increased radiation readings from detectors surrounding Japanese and SK nuclear power plants. But again, the government might quietly ask TV and newspapers not to run these stories. 3) Aum Shinrikyo and Moonie activity. 4) Sudden military exercises by China, S. Korea, Japan, USA, maybe Russia 5) Hasty medium-high to high level diplomatic activity