Tag Archives: Ballisitic Missile

North Korea says intercontinental ballistic missile test successful

A man watches a TV broadcast of a news report on North Korea's ballistic missile test, at a railway station in Seoul, South Korea, July 4, 2017. REUTERS/Kim Hong-Ji

By Christine Kim and Jack Kim

SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korea said on Tuesday it successfully test-launched an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) for the first time, which flew a trajectory that experts said could allow a weapon to hit the U.S. state of Alaska.

The launch came days before leaders from the Group of 20 nations were due to discuss steps to rein in North Korea’s weapons program, which it has pursued in defiance of U.N. Security Council sanctions.

The launch, which North Korea’s state media said was ordered and supervised by leader Kim Jong Un, sent the rocket 933 km (580 miles) reaching an altitude of 2,802 km over a flight time of 39 minutes.

North Korea has said it wants to develop a missile mounted with a nuclear warhead capable of striking the U.S. mainland.

To do that it would need an ICBM with a range of 8,000 km (4,800 miles) or more, a warhead small enough to be mounted on it and technology to ensure its stable re-entry into the atmosphere.

Some analysts said the flight details on Tuesday suggested the new missile had a range of more than 8,000 km, underscoring major advances in its program. Other analysts said they believed its range was not so far.

Officials from South Korea, Japan and the United States said the missile landed in the sea in Japan’s Exclusive Economic Zone after being launched on a high trajectory from near an airfield northwest of the North’s capital, Pyongyang.

“The test launch was conducted at the sharpest angle possible and did not have any negative effect on neighboring countries,” North Korea’s state media said in a statement.

The North said its missiles were now capable of striking anywhere in the world.

“It appears the test was successful. If launched on a standard angle, the missile could have a range of more than 8,000 km,” said Kim Dong-yub, a military expert at Kyungnam University’s Institute of Far Eastern Studies in Seoul.

“But we have to see more details of the new missile to determine if North Korea has acquired ICBM technology.”

South Korean President Moon Jae-in, who convened a national security council meeting, said earlier the missile was believed to be an intermediate-range type, but the military was looking into the possibility it was an ICBM.

‘HEAVY MOVE’

U.S. President Donald Trump wrote on Twitter: “North Korea has just launched another missile. Does this guy have anything better to do with his life?” in an apparent reference to North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

“Hard to believe South Korea and Japan will put up with this much longer. Perhaps China will put a heavy move on North Korea and end this nonsense once and for all!”, Trump said in a series of tweets.

Stock markets in both South Korea and Japan fell, with the Kospi ending down 0.6 percent and Japan’s Nikkei share average ending down 0.1 percent.

Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said he would ask the presidents of China and Russia to play more constructive roles in efforts to stop Pyongyang’s arms program.

“Leaders of the world will gather at the G20 meeting. I would like to strongly call for solidarity of the international community on the North Korean issue,” Abe told reporters.

Japan said on Monday the United States, South Korea and Japan would have a trilateral summit on North Korea at the G20. Chinese President Xi Jinping will also be at the July 7-8 meeting in Hamburg, Germany.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang called for calm and restraint, and reiterated China’s opposition to North Korea’s violation of U.N. resolutions on missile tests.

Responding to Trump’s tweet, Geng said China had for a long time been working hard to resolve the North Korean nuclear issue.

“China’s contribution is obvious to all. China’s role is indispensable,” he told a daily news briefing.

China would continue to work hard and also hoped other parties would work hard too, Geng said.

“We hope all sides can meet each other half way.”

North Korea says it needs to develop its weapons in the face of what it sees as U.S. aggression.

It has conducted five nuclear tests, two since the beginning of last year, and numerous missile tests over the past year.

It often times its tests to show its defiance and to raise the stakes when it sees regional powers getting ready for talks or sanctions, analysts say.

The launch took place hours before the Independence Day celebrations in the United States. North Korea has in the past fired missiles around this time.

LAST CHANCE FOR TALKS?

Despite the unprecedented pace of tests since the start of last year, analysts have said they believed North Korea was years away from having a nuclear-tipped ICBM capable of hitting the United States.

North Korea is also trying to develop intermediate-range missiles capable of hitting U.S. bases in the Pacific. The last North Korean launches before Tuesday were of land-to-sea cruise missiles on June 8.

David Wright, co-director of the Global Security Program at the U.S.-based Union of Concerned Scientists, said the assessments of the Tuesday flight time and distance suggested the missile might was launched on a “very highly lofted” trajectory of more than 2,800 km.

The same missile could reach a maximum range of roughly 6,700 km on a standard trajectory, Wright said in a blog post.

“That range would not be enough to reach the lower 48 states or the large islands of Hawaii, but would allow it to reach all of Alaska,” he said.

South Korea’s Moon said on Monday North Korea now faced its “last opportunity” to engage in talks with the outside world.

North Korea has conducted four ballistic missile tests since Moon took office in May, vowing to use dialogue as well as pressure to bring Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile programs under control.

This week, North Korea was a major topic in phone calls between Trump and the leaders of China and Japan, both of whom reaffirmed their commitment to a denuclearized Korean Peninsula.

Trump has recently suggested he was running out of patience with China’s efforts to pressure North Korea.

(For an interactive package on North Korea’s missile capabilities, click http://tmsnrt.rs/2t6WEPL)

(Additional reporting by Soyoung Kim in SEOUL, Kiyoshi Takenaka and Elaine Lies in TOKYO, Ben Blanchard in BEIJING and Ayesha Rascoe in WASHINGTON; Editing by Bill Tarrant, Robert Birsel)

U.S.: Military solution to North Korea would be ‘tragic on an unbelievable scale’

U.S. Defense Secretary James Mattis gestures during a press briefing on the campaign to defeat ISIS at the Pentagon in Washington, U.S., May 19, 2017. REUTERS/Yuri Gripas

By Phil Stewart and David Brunnstrom

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said on Friday that any military solution to the North Korea crisis would be “tragic on an unbelievable scale” and Washington was working internationally to find a diplomatic solution.

North Korea has defied all calls to rein in its nuclear and missile programs, even from China, its lone major ally, calling them legitimate self-defense.

It has been working to develop a nuclear-tipped missile capable of striking the U.S. mainland, and experts say its test on Sunday of a new missile was another important step toward that aim.

“We are going to continue to work the issue,” Mattis told a Pentagon news conference.

“If this goes to a military solution, it’s going to be tragic on an unbelievable scale. So our effort is to work with the U.N., work with China, work with Japan, work with South Korea to try to find a way out of this situation.”

The remarks were one of the clearest indicators yet that President Donald Trump’s administration will seek to exhaust alternatives before turning to military action to force Pyongyang’s hand.

The United States, which has 28,500 troops in South Korea to guard against the North Korean threat, has called on China to do more to rein in its neighbor.

Mattis appeared to defend China’s most recent efforts, even as he acknowledged Pyongyang’s march forward.

“They (North Korea) clearly aren’t listening but there appears to be some impact by the Chinese working here. It’s not obviously perfect when they launch a missile,” Mattis said, when asked about Sunday’s launch.

RE-ENTRY CAPABILITY?

South Korea has said the North’s missile program was progressing faster than expected, with Sunday’s test considered successful in flight.

North Korea said the launch tested the capability to carry a “large-size heavy nuclear warhead,” and its ambassador in Beijing has said that Pyongyang would continue such test launches “any time, any place.”

Mattis acknowledged that Pyongyang had likely learned a great deal from the latest test of what U.S. officials say was a KN-17 missile, which was believed to have survived re-entry to some degree.

“They went to a very high apogee and when it came down obviously from that altitude they probably learned a lot from it. But I’m not willing to characterize it beyond that right now,” Mattis said.

David Wright, co-director and senior scientist at the Global Security Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists, the big question was whether North Korea could build a re-entry vehicle for a long-range missile that wouldn’t burn up during re-entry and could keep a warhead from becoming too hot in the process.

“This test in principle gave them a lot of information about this, assuming they had sensors that could send information back during reentry so they could monitor the heat, or they could recover the reentry vehicle and examine it,” he said.

(Additional reporting by Matt Spetalnick; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and Cynthia Osterman)

North Korea missile detected by THAAD, program progressing faster than expected: South

The long-range strategic ballistic rocket Hwasong-12 (Mars-12). KCNA via REUTERS

By Christine Kim and Tom Miles

SEOUL/GENEVA (Reuters) – North Korea’s missile program is progressing faster than expected, South Korea’s defense minister said on Tuesday, after the UN Security Council demanded the North halt all nuclear and ballistic missile tests and condemned Sunday’s test-launch.

South Korean Defence Minister Han Min-koo told parliament the test-launch had been detected by the controversial U.S. THAAD anti-missile system, whose deployment in the South has infuriated China.

The reclusive North, which has defied all calls to rein in its weapons programs, even from its lone major ally, China, said the missile test was a legitimate defense against U.S. hostility.

The North has been working on a missile, mounted with a nuclear warhead, capable of striking the U.S. mainland.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration has called for an immediate halt to Pyongyang’s provocations and has warned that the “era of strategic patience” with North Korea is over. U.S. Disarmament Ambassador Robert Wood said on Tuesday China’s leverage was key and it could do more.

Han said Sunday’s test-launch was “successful in flight”.

“It is considered an IRBM (intermediate range ballistic missile) of enhanced caliber compared to Musudan missiles that have continually failed,” he said, referring to a class of missile designed to travel up to 3,000 to 4,000 km (1,860 to 2,485 miles).

Asked if North Korea’s missile program was developing faster than the South had expected, he said: “Yes.”

Han said the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) anti-missile unit deployed by the U.S. military in the South detected the North Korean missile, marking the first time the controversial system has been put to use since its deployment last month.

China has strongly opposed THAAD, whose radar it fears could be used to spy into its territory, despite assurances from Washington that THAAD is purely defensive. South Korean companies, from automakers to retailers and cosmetics firms, have been hit in China by a nationalist backlash over Seoul’s decision to deploy the system.

The North’s KCNA news agency said Sunday’s launch tested its capability to carry a “large-size heavy nuclear warhead”. Its ambassador to China said in Beijing on Monday it would continue such test launches “any time, any place”.

The test-launch was a legitimate act of self-defense and U.S. criticism was a “wanton violation of the sovereignty and dignity of the DPRK”, a North Korean diplomat told the U.N. Conference on Disarmament in Geneva on Tuesday.

DPRK are the initials of North Korea’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

“The DPRK will bolster its self-defense capabilities as long as the United States continues its hostile policies towards the DPRK and imposes nuclear threats and makes blackmail,” diplomat Ju Yong Choi said.

The missile flew 787 km (489 miles) on a trajectory reaching an altitude of 2,111.5 km (1,312 miles), KCNA said.

Pyongyang has regularly threatened to destroy the United States, which it accuses of pushing the Korean peninsula to the brink of nuclear war by conducting recent military drills with South Korea and Japan.

Trump and new South Korean President Moon Jae-in will meet in Washington next month, with North Korea expected to be high on the agenda, the South’s presidential Blue House said.

Moon met Matt Pottinger, overseeing Asian affairs at the U.S. National Security Council, on Tuesday and said he hoped to continue to have “sufficient, close discussions” between Seoul and Washington, the Blue House press secretary told a briefing.

“FURTHER SANCTIONS POSSIBLE”

In a unanimous statement, the 15-member UN Security Council on Monday said it was of vital importance that North Korea show “sincere commitment to denuclearization through concrete action and stressed the importance of working to reduce tensions”.

“To that end, the Security Council demanded the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea conduct no further nuclear and ballistic missile tests,” the council said, adding that it was ready to impose further sanctions on the country.

The North’s foreign ministry rejected the statement, saying it infringed on its right to self-defense, particularly as the missile was test-launched at a sharp angle to ensure safety of neighboring countries.

The UN statement also condemned an April 28 ballistic missile launch by Pyongyang.

Following that launch, Washington began talks with China on possible new U.N. sanctions. Traditionally, the United States and China have negotiated new measures before involving remaining council members.

The United States sees China as key, U.S. Disarmament Ambassador Wood told reporters on a conference call.

“I’m not going to talk about various policy options that we may or may not consider, but I will say this: we are certainly engaged right now in looking at a number of measures – political, economic, security – to deal with these provocative acts by the DPRK, and dangerous acts in many cases,” he said.

“So we are going to be raising the level of engagement with China on this issue. China really is the key in dealing with the North Korea issue. Ninety percent of the DPRK’s trade is with China, so clearly there is a lot more leverage that China has, and we would like China to use.”

The Security Council first imposed sanctions on North Korea in 2006 and has stiffened them in response to its five nuclear tests and two long-range rocket launches. Pyongyang is threatening a sixth nuclear test.

Trump warned in an interview with Reuters this month that a “major, major conflict” with North Korea was possible. In a show of force, the United States sent an aircraft carrier strike group, led by the Carl Vinson, to waters off the Korean peninsula to conduct drills with South Korea and Japan.

Admiral Harry Harris, the top U.S. commander in the Asia-Pacific, said continued missile launches by North Korea showed the importance of the alliance between Japan and the United States and called the North’s actions unacceptable.

Harris met Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who also said China could apply more pressure to rein in North Korea.

“Now is the time to put pressure on North Korea,” Abe said. “Japan and the United States must coordinate and put pressure.”

The U.S. Seventh Fleet carrier, the Ronald Reagan, left Yokosuka in Japan on Tuesday on its regular spring patrol and will be out for around three to four months, a Seventh Fleet spokesman said.

Besides worries about North Korea’s missile and nuclear weapons programs, cyber security researchers have found technical evidence they said could link the North with the global WannaCry “ransomware” cyber attack that has infected more than 300,000 computers in 150 countries since Friday.

(For a graphic on North Korea missile launch, click http://tmsnrt.rs/2pNI8t6)

(For an interactive on nuclear North Korea, click http://tmsnrt.rs/2n0gd92)

(Additional reporting by Jack Kim and Ju-min Park in SEOUL, Michelle Nichols at the UNITED NATIONS and Kiyoshi Takenaka and Minami Funakoshi in TOKYO; Writing by Nick Macfie)

Is North Korea putting a nuclear-tipped bargaining chip on the table?

North Korean Leader Kim Jong Un. KCNA/via REUTERS

By James Pearson and Ju-min Park

SEOUL (Reuters) – As the leaders of China and the United States sit down for a summit on Thursday, North Korea has made sure it also has something on the negotiating table: A nuclear-tipped bargaining chip.

North Korea launched a projectile on Wednesday, which U.S. officials said appeared to be a liquid-fueled, extended-range Scud missile that only traveled a fraction of its range before spinning out of control and crashing into the sea.

The launch was North Korea’s latest in a long series of missile and nuclear tests that have accelerated in their variation and intensity over the last two years.

And now, experts agree, North Korea is closing in on the ability to hit the United States with a missile, a goal that for decades has been the subject of Pyongyang’s vivid propaganda posters.

“They’ve been able to put a nuke on a missile for a while now,” said Jeffrey Lewis of the California-based Middlebury Institute of International Studies.

“The stated purpose of the last test was to validate the nuclear weapon design that would arm all of North Korea’s missiles,” Lewis said of North Korea’s September 2016 nuclear test – its fifth and largest to date.

Since then, North Korea has further ramped up its tests and rhetoric, emphasizing a consistent message: To create a nuclear device small enough to mount on an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), and fire it at the United States.

“If we push the button, the bombs will be fired and reduce the U.S. to ashes,” an editorial in the ruling Workers’ Party newspaper the Rodong Sinmun said on Wednesday.

North Korea now has the strength to “wipe out” the United States “in a moment” with an H-bomb, the editorial said.

“This is again our warning”.

BARGAINING CHIP

From last year, North Korea took the rare step of publicizing images of its missile equipment tests, convincing analysts that Pyongyang’s banned program was further along toward successfully testing an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) than first thought.

“The first few tests might fail, but that’s not good news because they’ll learn,” said Lewis. “How long it takes to make it work is anyone’s guess. Maybe a couple of years, maybe the first time”.

North Korea has been pursuing its nuclear and missile programs at an unprecedented pace since last year, with an aim to expand its deterrence against Washington and diversify its line-up of nuclear-equipped missiles, another expert said. (See FACTBOX)

“They have been doing so many test launches last year and this year to develop systems to transport nuclear warheads,” said Kim Dong-yub, a professor at Kyungnam University’s Institute of Far Eastern Studies in Seoul.

“The whole thing is about expanding their deterrence and continuing to keep upgrading their missiles to deliver nuclear warheads,” said Kim.

It was not clear if Wednesday’s launch was deliberately timed to coincide with Thursday’s summit between China’s President Xi Jinping and U.S. President Donald Trump in Florida, where North Korea is expected to be a prime topic of discussions.

Some experts think North Korea has tried to make sure the two world leaders are aware Pyongyang has a bargaining chip in any forthcoming moves to clam down on its weapons programs.

Cheong Seong-chang, a senior research fellow at Sejong Institute outside Seoul, said that could come in the form of another nuclear or ICBM test after the summit. Perhaps first with a low-level show of force – enough not to upset China – followed by a period of intensified weapons testing.

“Then, next month when a new (South Korean) government gets under way, North Korea is expected to try to turn the situation around into a phase of appeasement and, use its moratorium of nuclear and ballistic missile tests to find middle ground with South Korea and the United States,” Cheong said.

This year, North Korea officials, including young leader Kim Jong Un, have repeatedly indicated an ICBM test, or something similar, could be coming, possibly as soon as April 15, the 105th birthday of North Korea’s founding president and celebrated annually as “the Day of the Sun”.

(Editing by Bill Tarrant)

North Korea test-fires missile into sea ahead of Trump-Xi summit

FILE PHOTO: A North Korean flag flies on a mast at the Permanent Mission of North Korea in Geneva October 2, 2014. REUTERS/Denis Balibouse/File Photo

By Ju-min Park and Jack Kim

SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korea test-fired a ballistic missile into the sea off its east coast on Wednesday, South Korea’s military said, ahead of a summit between U.S. and Chinese leaders who are set to discuss Pyongyang’s increasingly defiant arms program.

The missile flew about 60 km (40 miles) from its launch site at Sinpo, a port city on North Korea’s east coast, the South Korean Office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement. Sinpo is home to a North Korean submarine base.

The launch comes just a day before the start of a summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping, where talks about adding pressure on the North to drop its arms development will take center stage.

“The launch took place possibly in consideration of the U.S. -China summit, while at the same time it was to check its missile capability,” a South Korean official told Reuters about the military’s initial assessment of the launch.

The missile was fired at a high angle and reached an altitude of 189 km (117 miles), the official said.

Any launch of objects using ballistic missile technology is a violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions. The North has defied the ban, saying it infringes on its sovereign rights to self-defense and the pursuit of space exploration.

The launch drew swift condemnation from Japan, with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe saying further provocative action was possible.

Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga described the launch as “extremely problematic” and said Tokyo had lodged a strong protest.

South Korea’s foreign ministry also condemned the launch as a blunt challenge to a series of U.N. Security Council resolutions targeting North Korea’s nuclear and missile program. Seoul called a National Security Council meeting and vowed to respond strongly in case of further provocations.

In a terse statement, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said: “The United States has spoken enough about North Korea. We have no further comment.”

Trump wants China to do more to exert its economic influence over unpredictable Pyongyang to restrain its nuclear and missile programs.

China has denied it has any outsized influence on Pyongyang and Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying ruled out the chance of a link between the launch and the summit, saying, “I can’t see any certain connection between these two things.”

Ahead of the U.S.-China summit in Florida, Trump had threatened to use crucial trade ties with China to pressure Beijing into more action on North Korea.

A senior U.S. White House official said Trump wanted to work with China and described the discussions over North Korea as a test for the U.S.-Chinese relationship.

ICBM THREAT

North Korea could choose to continue with missile-related activities through next week, when the isolated and impoverished country celebrates the 105th anniversary of the birth of the state’s founder, Kim Il Sung.

It has used the anniversary in previous years to test-fire the intermediate-range Musudan ballistic missile and to launch long-range rockets to try to put satellites into orbit.

An expert on the North’s political strategy warned against reading too much political significance into the timing of the tests ahead of the U.S-China summit.

“They may have taken the summit into account to pick a day but, to me, it is more likely to catch up with its own missile development roadmap for their technical needs,” said Kim Dong-yub, a military expert at Kyungnam University’s Institute of Far Eastern Studies in Seoul.

North Korea failed in an attempt to launch a ballistic missile from its east coast two weeks ago. Earlier in March, it fired four missiles towards Japan, some of which came as close as 300 km (190 miles) to the Japanese coast.

It has also conducted two nuclear weapons tests since January 2016, all in defiance of U.N. sanctions.

The U.S. and South Korean militaries said initial assessments indicated the latest launch was of a KN-15 medium-range ballistic missile, which would be the same kind North Korea test-launched in February.

Pyongyang tested a new type of medium- to long-range ballistic missile in February, which it later said was an upgraded, extended-range version of its submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM).

North Korea has carried out several SLBM tests near Sinpo.

“While it is entirely possible it was the land-based KN-15, it very well could have been a test of their SLBM system that was conducted on land,” said Dave Schmerler, an expert at the California-based James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies.

The North is believed to be developing an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) that could hit the United States and its leader, Kim Jong Un, has vowed to test-launch one at any time.

Experts and officials in the South and the United States believe Pyongyang is still some time away from mastering all the technology needed for an operational ICBM system, such as re-entry into the atmosphere and subsequent missile guidance.

– For a graphic on ‘North Korea’s missile launch’ click : https://tinyurl.com/mb6ennc

– For a graphic on ‘Nuclear North Korea’ click : https://tinyurl.com/mpxs45r

(Additional reporting by James Pearson in Seoul, Kaori Kaneko in Tokyo and Idrees Ali in Washington; Editing by Lincoln Feast and Clarence Fernandez)