CFR picks North Korea as one of the main threats of 2012

Pink-colored nations signify the Tier-1 threats

Posted a few days ago, Council on Foreign Relations(CFR) published Preventive Priorities Survey 2012, outlining the following :
- The Preventive Priorities Survey (PPS) is intended to help inform the U.S. policy community about the relative urgency and importance of competing conflict prevention demands. The Center for Preventive Action asked a targeted group of government officials, academics, and experts to comment confidentially on a list of contingencies that could plausibly occur in 2012.


The threats were categorized into tier 1, 2 and 3 in the descending order or urgency. North Korea was right up there in Tier 1, for the following reasons : 
- a severe North Korean crisis (e.g., armed provocations, internal political instability, advances in nuclear weapons/ICBM capability)


Read the rest of the survey here. It entails a lot of interesting factors, such as the Euro-zone dangers and domestic threats in the US.