Morell: N. Korea’s leader wants to show US cities at risk

Former CIA Deputy Director Michael Morell said Sunday that North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong Un, wants to show that he can put cities in the United States at risk of a nuclear attack.

“He wants to demonstrate his ability to put a U.S. city at risk of nuclear attack,” Morell told CBS’s “Face the Nation.”

{mosads}Morell explained that Kim wants to to improve his political prestige within North Korea, and to both deter and extort the United States.

Morell also dismissed descriptions of Kim as “crazy.”

“He’s not crazy. He’s very rational in his own world,” Morell said.

North Korean state television on Sunday said a test of a miniaturized hydrogen bomb capable of being placed on an intercontinental ballistic missile was successful. 

The development ratchets up tensions in the region and comes as a show of defiance against the Trump administration.