North Korea said it has test-fired its biggest-yet intercontinental ballistic missile under the orders of leader Kim Jong Un, who vowed to expand the North’s “nuclear war deterrent” while preparing for a “long-standing confrontation” with the United States.
The report by North Korean state media on Friday came a day after the militaries of South Korea and Japan said they detected the North launching an ICBM in its first long-range test since 2017.
The launch extended a barrage of weapons demonstrations this year that analysts say are aimed at forcing the US to accept the idea of North Korea as a nuclear power and remove crippling sanctions against its broken economy that has been further damaged by the pandemic.
The Hwasong-17, which was fired at a high angle to avoid the territorial waters of neighbours, reached a maximum altitude of 3,880 miles and travelled 680 miles during a 67-minute flight before landing in waters between North Korea and Japan, Pyongyang’s official Korean Central News Agency said.
KCNA claimed the launch met its technical objectives and proved the ICBM could be operated quickly during wartime conditions.
The South Korean and Japanese militaries had announced similar flight details, which analysts say suggested that the missile could reach targets 9,320 miles away when fired on normal trajectory with a warhead weighing less than a ton.
That would place the entire US mainland within striking distance.
Believed to be about 82ft long, the Hwasong-17 is the North’s longest-range weapon and, by some estimates, the world’s biggest road-mobile ballistic missile system.
North Korea revealed the missile in a military parade in October 2020 and Thursday’s launch was its first full-range test.
KCNA paraphrased Kim as saying that his new weapon would make the “whole world clearly aware” of the North’s bolstered nuclear forces.
He said his military would to acquire “formidable military and technical capabilities unperturbed by any military threat and blackmail and keep themselves fully ready for long-standing confrontation with the US imperialists”.
The agency published photos of the missile leaving a trail of orange flames as it soared from a launcher lorry on an airport runway near the capital, Pyongyang, and Kim smiling and clapping as he celebrated with military officials from an observation deck.
Other images showed Kim writing a memo ordering the Hwasong-17 test flight and approving the launch.
South Korea’s military responded to Thursday’s launch with live-fire drills of its own missiles launched from land, a fighter jet and a ship, underscoring a revival of tensions as diplomacy remains frozen.
It said it confirmed readiness to execute precision strikes against North Korea’s missile launch points as well as command and support facilities.
US secretary of defence Lloyd J. Austin held separate telephone conversations with his counterparts in South Korea and Japan where they discussed response measures to North Korean missile activities and vowed to strengthen defence co-operation, the US defence department said.
North Korea’s resumption of nuclear brinkmanship reflects a determination to cement its status as a nuclear power and wrest economic concessions from Washington and others from a position of strength, analysts say.
