North Korea’s rapid progress in developing nuclear weapons is likely thanks to help from Russia, China and Iran, according to retired Adm. James Stavridis, a former supreme allied commander for nato.

“[T]he idea that [North Korean leader Kim Jong-un] would simply be developing this on an indigenous basis within his own population of scientists simply seems unlikely given how fast it’s moving,” Stavridis said in an interview on December 3 with radio host John Catsimatidis.

“You’ve got to think that at least part of it is coming from either China or Russia,” he said. “It could also be cooperation between Iran and North Korea, which we do know has occurred in this nuclear space,” Stavridis said. He added that “it’s fair to say there is some level of outside engagement that has been helpful to [North Korea’s] program.”

Stavridis singled out China as the nation giving the most economic assistance to North Korea. “China is going to have to make a choice about whether or not it will continue to align with North Korea or if they will stand with the rest of the global community and stop this,” he said, adding that the best tool China has is “control over oil going to North Korea.”

China “could stop that [North Korean] economy in a heartbeat,” he said.

Meanwhile, news emerged on December 2 that Russia is increasing its oil exports to North Korea. Journalists with the Asia Press International news agency reported that “massive amounts” of fuel are coming from Russia through China and into the North Korean province of Ryanggang. The influx has been substantial enough to reduce the price of diesel oil sold in North Korea by 60 percent since early November. At the same time, the price of gasoline has fallen 25 percent.

This comes at a time when the United States and United Nations are calling for greater restrictions on fuel exports to the North. It shows that despite rhetoric and occasionally cooperative UN votes from Russia and China, the Kremlin and Beijing are not interested in helping to apply economic pressure on the rogue Kim regime.

On September 13, Trumpet editor in chief Gerald Flurry said the world should be more concerned about Russia and China than about North Korea because it is those two nations who allow the North to behave as it does. This analysis, he explained, is based on Bible prophecy.

He wrote:

The Bible’s prophecies show that, in a sense, the North Korea crisis is a massive distraction from the real threat posed by China and Russia. These powerful Asian nations are the only reason North Korea is able to operate so freely. And Bible prophecy shows that they pose a threat many times greater than the one from North Korea! Nevertheless, nuclear technology from North Korea could still play a major role in events during the time ahead ….

The prophecies that Mr. Flurry is referring to can be found mainly in Ezekiel 38 and 39, Daniel 11 and in Revelation. These passages show that Russia will lead a vastly powerful military bloc in the end time, with China in a position of secondary leadership. Smaller Asian nations such as North Korea will be assimilated into that Russian-led bloc and lend their military power to it, but they will not be instigators or major players.

Mr. Flurry has also written about the significance of North Korea’s nuclear cooperation with Iran. In his new booklet Nuclear Armageddon Is ‘At the Door,’ Mr. Flurry writes:

Kim Jong-un shares his nuclear power with Iran, the number one terrorist-sponsoring nation in the world—by far! And Iran has a religious leader that is even more “bizarre in the extreme” [than Kim Jong-un]. … He believes that a nuclear catastrophe would even hasten the coming of his messiah to rule the world! … These two men have changed the nuclear equation in this world. They relish the idea of a nuclear war! This is not a fantasy!

Mr. Flurry points to a Bible prophecy recorded in Matthew 24:21-22, which says a nuclear World War iii is coming soon: “For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be. And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake those days shall be shortened.”

To understand more about the significance of the rise of Russia, China and Iran, how near this Matthew 24:21 conflict is, and the way it will be shortened before it extinguishes all life from Earth, request a free copy of Mr. Flurry’s booklet Nuclear Armageddon Is ‘At the Door.’