North Korean leader Kim Jong-un “led a combined tactical exercise simulating a nuclear counterattack involving very large multiple rocket launchers”, declared Tuesday, April 23, the North Korean state agency KCNA. According to her, the projectiles “equipped with simulated nuclear warheads” reached their target located 352 km from the launch point. The leader expressed “his great satisfaction with the result of the exercise”added the agency.
The South Korean army announced on Monday that the North had fired a salvo of short-range ballistic missiles, which Japan had confirmed. According to Seoul, the missiles were launched from the Pyongyang region and landed in the waters east of the Korean peninsula.
According to KCNA, this simulation is a response to the annual US-South Korean air training which has been taking place since April 12 at the Kunsan base in South Korea. Exercises that North Korea judges “extremely provocative and aggressive” and openly directed against her, the agency said.
Pyongyang takes a dim view of the joint military maneuvers that the United States, South Korea and Japan regularly organize in the region, seeing them as general rehearsals before an invasion of its territory or an overthrow of its regime.
Strengthened ties with Moscow
After a record missile test in 2023, North Korea has carried out several launches since the start of the year. The North Korean regime notably claimed in early April to have tested a new medium-to-long-range solid-fueled hypersonic missile. On Friday, he announced the trial of a “very large warhead” designed for a strategic cruise missile.
Since 2006, Pyongyang has been the subject of a series of UN sanctions which have been reinforced several times subsequently, and which notably prohibit it from developing ballistic missiles and nuclear weapons. The Kim Jong-un regime nevertheless continued its banned military programs and, in 2022, declared “irreversible” its status as a nuclear power. He also considerably toughened his tone against South Korea, now described as“main enemy” with whom any prospect of reunification is in vain.
In March, Russia vetoed in the Security Council a draft resolution extending for one year the mandate of the committee of experts responsible for monitoring the implementation of these sanctions. North Korea has recently strengthened its ties with Mosou, its traditional ally isolated since the start of the war in Ukraine. Washington and Seoul accuse Pyongyang of supplying weapons to Russia in exchange for military technologies.