Their Dear Leader Kim Jong Il

Not only did the country successfully send a communications satellite into orbit, KCNA said, but "it is sending to the Earth the melodies of the immortal revolutionary paeans 'Song of General Kim Il Sung' and 'Song of General Kim Jong Il.' "

According to the US military the top two stages of the North Korean rocket and its payload crashed into the Pacific ocean before reaching orbit, but who can argue with The Great Leader. Ordinary North Koreans will of course learn of their country’s historic achievement through the carefully controlled state media. The Taepodong 2 rocket used in Sunday's launch could in theory carry a nuclear warhead and reach the west coast of the US. But since it was apparently carrying a satellite it will be difficult to convince sceptics that the North Korea is in breach of existing UN resolutions. Americans say that it is not important what was the rocket carrying, Obama said that the launch "further isolated North Korea", and that the country must abandon its nuclear weapons programme. Meanwhile China, while officially disapproving of North Korea when it breaches international law, is unlikely to make a great deal of noise over its neighbour's activities. North Korea defied mounting international pressure when it launched a long-range rocket, with the move triggering an emergency meeting of the UN security council. The White House described the launch as a clear breach of UN resolution 1718, passed after long-range missile and nuclear tests in 2006, which demanded that North Korea suspend "all activities related to its ballistic missile programme". Tokyo had deployed warships and Patriot missile interceptors off its northern coast to shoot down any debris which might hit its territory. But, like the US, it had already said it would not intercept the device after Pyongyang warned that shooting it down would be an "act of war" and would prompt retaliation. No debris fell on Japan.

Some say that there was no satellite at all. North Korean scientists and engineers are known to have built several hundred short- and mid-range missiles as well as nuclear warheads, there's never been any sign of fabrication of a satellite. South Koreans say that North Koreans built a dummy satellite to save money. Anyway, North Korea can count the launch as a success. They shot a long-range missile farther than ever before, this one went approximately 2,000 miles, twice the distance of Taepodong-1 and nearly half the distance needed to deliver a warhead to Alaska or Hawaii.