North Korea Makes Progress on Missile Programs
U.S. intelligence did not correctly identify how quickly the nation could field a nuclear missile.

When the Soviet Union shocked the world by launching Sputnik in 1957 the reaction of national security and U.S. congressional officials as a whole came down to “how did they get there this fast?” In the intervening six decades, the phenomenon of a technological surprise followed by that phrase has unfolded more often than the U.S. intelligence community would like. But, in the case of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) and its missile program, there are those who saw the current threat to the U.S. and others coming some time ago.