I think we get overly focused on missile capabilities due to our tendency to apply mirror analysis and assume our adversaries seek to fight the way we do. Even after the non-traditional attack on our homeland on 9/11 the military-industrial complex as shown little real progress in addressing increasingly dangerous non-conventional threats.

However, that doesn't mean we should ignore missile technology, it may or may not be a red herring in this case, but it still bears watching as these two articles point out. At the end of the day, our adversaries have nuclear weapons, and they can be utilized in various ways to achieve their ends to include with and without missiles.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/...g-on-n/?page=1

The miniaturization myth

The public is being misled by the White House, some so-called “experts” and mainstream media casting doubt on whether the Great Leader’s threat is real. They claim North Korea has not demonstrated sufficient “miniaturization” of a nuclear weapon to be delivered by a missile.
Technologically, “miniaturizing” a nuclear warhead is much easier than developing an atomic bomb or a multi-stage missile for orbiting satellites — as North Korea has already done.
On February 7, North Korea orbited a second satellite, the KSM-4, to join their KSM-3 satellite launched in December 2012.

Both satellites now are in south polar orbits, evading many U.S. missile defense radars and flying over the United States from the south, where our defenses are limited. Both satellites — if nuclear armed — could make an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) attack that could blackout the U.S. electric grid for months or years, thereby killing millions.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/...-kor/?page=all

Hyper-proliferation in North Korea
Help from China and Russia makes the situation all the more dangerous

After laying out how the author believes China and Russia are helping North Korea with their nuclear program, he ends with

Some of the implications of hyper-proliferation are that Russia and China are part of the problem, not part of the solution; that hyper-proliferation by these actors is a weapon in the New Cold War; and that we should
reassess the nuclear missile threat from other nations of concern — including Pakistan and Iran.
Peter Vincent Pry is executive director of the EMP Task Force on National and Homeland Security and served in the Congressional EMP Commission, the Congressional Strategic Posture Commission, the House Armed Services Committee and the CIA.