And the world comes a tumbling down

Well, this puts the final nail in the coffin of whether or not Iraq or North Korea was the most dangerous. I think the article drastically understates the "worst case" scenario. Let's pain a picture.

North Korea continues to insist they're going to test.
Japan publicly states their intention to begin a nuclear program.
China informs North Korea that if they test their weapons they will no longer have the protection of China.
Russia moves troops to the area.
South Korea withdraws economic support for North Korea.
North Korea, now isolated and lead by a parnoid lunatic, decides that a good test would be to test nuclear weapons against Japan and the US military base in South Korea. Concurrently they cross the DMZ, relying on a poorly positioned America and a now savaged Japanese Army to provide little opposition.

That's not a scenario that I would consider likely but it's certainly a scenario that I consider "possible".

Also, note the implication that North Korea considers that sanctions are a reason why their considering this test. Any country that thinks that economic sanctions are somehow proportional to a nuclear attack is insane in the extreme. Frankly, that might be the scariest sentence in the whole article.