This is the script for my video posted on June 18, 2026. Watch it on TikTok.
If you look at a map of North Korea’s nuclear facilities, you might notice that they’re mostly clustered in the west-central part of the country, north of Pyongyang, and along the east coast. But if you look a little closer near the border with China and Russia, you’ll see some unique infrastructure, including a nuclear test site and several undeclared bases that operate intercontinental ballistic missiles. So why would North Korea be putting some of their most sensitive nuclear infrastructure so close to China and Russia?
For context, let’s take a closer look at North Korea’s nuclear industrial geography. There are roughly four clusters of nuclear facilities. The largest of these is sometimes called the nuclear heartland. It spans the west-central part of the country, north of Pyongyang, and it’s where most of the country’s fissile material gets enriched and reprocessed for use in nuclear weapons, though uranium ore is milled into yellowcake far to the south just 45km from the DMZ, so the fuel cycle literally runs the length of the country. The east coast, meanwhile, hosts production facilities for the solid fuel used in missiles, as well as submarine-launched ballistic missile launch sites.
But Punggye-ri is the site you might have heard of before. Located in the country’s northeast less than 100km from the Chinese border and 178km from Russia, Punggye-ri has been the site for all six of North Korea’s nuclear tests, from 2006 to 2017. It consists of tunnels bored deep into the 2200 meter granite of Mount Mantap, which provides natural blast containment, and South Korean intelligence assesses that despite North Korea’s performative demolition of several tunnel entrances in 2018, the site is fully ready for more testing at Kim Jong-un’s order.
China has also been uneasy about the band of at least three missile bases that North Korea operates roughly 25km from the border. Analysts assess that the base at Sinpung-dong alone likely houses a brigade-sized unit equipped with a total of about 6-9 nuclear-capable ICBMs and their associated launch equipment. North Korea has been building massive underground facilities to support this as well.
If you’re familiar with the relationship between China and North Korea, you might be wondering if the two are collaborating on this, or if China is providing some sort of guidance or direction. But the truth is that while China and North Korea do have close ties in some ways, the Chinese government has been extremely concerned about the placement of these facilities. Punggye-ri, for example, has caused major headaches because nuclear material could theoretically travel into China by wind after a test, and nuclear tests create dangerous seismic disturbances as well that have prompted panic and evacuations in Chinese border towns. Punggye-ri is an ideal location for nuclear testing though because it’s so far from the DMZ and consequently from any kind of US or South Korean intervention, while still being accessible to North Korea’s Soviet-era industrial, power, and rail infrastructure. The mountainous terrain also absorbs seismic activity and obscures facilities more effectively from foreign reconnaissance. In many ways, Punggye-ri’s proximity to China and Russia is just an unfortunate coincidence.
But the missile bases I mentioned are another story. These were deliberately placed close to China. Not only are they very far from US and South Korean forces, but their proximity creates the risk of escalation with China in the event of a war. Basically, it’s a strategic entanglement designed by North Korea as a deliberate deterrent against US strikes, because those countries would prefer that China simply reinforce its side of the border and stay out of a conflict. If attacks against North Korean facilities exposed Chinese populations to radiation or really any risk of harm, there’s a strong likelihood that China would intervene.
China does not want a new Korean war. The instability this would create ultimately does not serve its interests, and its main fear is that a collapse of the North Korean regime would create a flood of refugees, and there are already tens or hundreds of thousands of North Korean refugees living in China today, though China calls them illegal economic migrants. The PLA’s contingency planning has historically focused on creating and upholding a buffer zone and refugee camps, and on securing nuclear sites near the border. This is a burden China never asked for, and it causes genuine strain on their relationship.
Russia, meanwhile, has seen warming ties with North Korea in recent years. Realistically, it has less to lose from a war in Korea, and it has gained a lot from its friendship with Kim Jong-un. In June 2024 the two countries signed a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership treaty, and North Korea has sent a total of over 12m artillery shells and about 15000 troops to support Russia’s war in Ukraine, in exchange for Russia sharing its technology in areas like missile and space operations. This has complicated the dynamic even further.
Current estimates indicate that North Korea has at least 60 assembled nuclear warheads and enough fissile material to produce up to 30 more, and they’re accelerating the production of new fissile material. US intelligence estimates that they currently only have 10 or fewer operational ICBMs, but Russia’s active collaboration means that this too might accelerate. It seems that, at the moment, North Korea’s nuclear strategy is working in their favor.
Keep reading
- Why is the Yellow Sea so important?
- Is Pakistan now Saudi Arabia’s nuclear shield?
- How did Japan end up controlling China’s gateway to the Pacific?
I’m writing a book called Groundwork about the buried history beneath geopolitics. Join the waitlist to hear when it has a publisher, a cover, and a release date.