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Did North Korea Really Test A Hydrogen Bomb?

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A characteristic mushroom-shaped cloud begins formation after the first H-Bomb explosion (U.S.) at Eniwetok Atoll in the Pacific, on Nov. 6 1952. (Three Lions/Getty Images)
A characteristic mushroom-shaped cloud begins formation after the first H-Bomb explosion (U.S.) at Eniwetok Atoll in the Pacific, on Nov. 6 1952. (Three Lions/Getty Images)

North Korea is calling the nuclear bomb it tested, its fourth in a decade, the "H-bomb of justice." Crowds in the capital Pyongyang cheered the news. But experts doubt that North Korea really detonated a hydrogen bomb, the type of bomb that's far more powerful than the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Joe Cirincione, president of the global security foundation Ploughshares Fund, tells Here & Now's Jeremy Hobson that it's certain North Korea tested a nuclear bomb, but he does not believe the country has succeeded yet in building an H-bomb, the type of bomb that currently only the U.S. and Russia have.

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This segment aired on January 6, 2016.

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