North Korea said on Monday it had simulated “tactical nuclear” strikes over the past two weeks, personally overseen by leader Kim Jong Un, in response to the “military threat” it said posed by the United States and its allies in the region.
• Read also: Five things to know about ‘tactical nuclear’ strikes
• Read also: Eight ballistic missiles in two weeks
The Pyongyang regime has carried out seven ballistic missile launches since September 25, one of which flew over Japan for the first time since 2017. And the international community expects North Korea to carry out a test soon nuclear, which would also be a first in five years.
The North Korean leader made the acquisition of tactical nuclear weapons his number one priority in January 2021 and promised, in late April, to develop the country’s nuclear forces “at the highest possible speed”.
Pyongyang revised its nuclear doctrine last month, outlining a broad spectrum of scenarios in which the country could use its atomic weapons, saying the country’s nuclear power status is “irreversible” and ending the possibility of talks on its arsenal.
Faced with this growing threat, the United States, South Korea and Japan have stepped up their military cooperation, conducting extensive naval and air exercises around the Korean peninsula in recent weeks.
But these joint maneuvers are perceived by Pyongyang as the dress rehearsal for an invasion of its territory.
“Simulation of a real war”
In response, “Korean People’s Army (KPA) units responsible for the use of tactical nuclear weapons held military exercises from September 25 to October 9 to test and evaluate the deterrence and nuclear attack on the country,” the official KCNA news agency said on Monday.
These ballistic missile firing tests were “the simulation of a real war”, according to KCNA. They included a “simulation of loading tactical nuclear warheads” onto a missile which was then launched from a silo under an artificial lake in the northwest of the country on September 25.
Kim Jong Un “directed the military drills on site,” according to KCNA. Photos released by state media show him wearing a white shirt, giving instructions to soldiers.
The leader, also pictured watching missiles soaring into the sky, dismissed the idea of resuming talks, saying North Korea “didn’t feel the need”, KCNA reported.
Other tests carried out in the following days consisted, among other things, in simulating the “neutralization of airports” in South Korea, the “strike of the main command centers” and “the main enemy ports”, according to KCNA.
As for the projectile that flew over Japan on October 4, it was a “new type of intermediate-range surface-to-surface ballistic missile”, the agency said.
Official photos show Kim Jong Un tracking flight data from the missile. This shot was intended to “send a stronger and clearer warning to enemies”, according to KCNA.
Spiral
“They’re looking for a tactical nuclear weapon, that’s for sure,” said US security analyst Ankit Panda.
Pyongyang’s claim that its fire is a “response” to U.S.-South Korean drills is part of a “familiar spiraling dynamic” on the Korean peninsula, he added.
“I fear this is the start of a dangerous dynamic on the Korean Peninsula, where we have a bitter rivalry between two states and each has a strong incentive to shoot first in the event of a serious crisis,” he said.
“Nor do we have any real means of negotiated restraint or direct lines to manage crises,” he told AFP.
North Korea also claimed to have carried out “a large-scale combined air attack simulation” involving “more than 150 aircraft”, which was also supervised by Kim Jong Un.
On Thursday, Seoul said it took off 30 of its fighter jets after detecting 12 North Korean aircraft flying in formation and conducting firing exercises near the inter-Korean border.
KCNA’s statements about its recent tests – which are unusual, with state media no longer routinely commenting on launches – seem to indicate that Pyongyang is worried about recent joint exercises led by the United States, analysts said.
“This may be a harbinger of an upcoming nuclear test for the type of tactical warhead that would arm the units Kim visited,” said Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul.
Many experts and officials in Seoul and Washington also believe that North Korea has completed preparations for a new nuclear test, which would be the seventh in its history.
“We need to take more seriously the fact that the possibility of nuclear war on the Korean peninsula has increased,” Lim Eul-chul, a professor at Kyungnam University, told AFP.