Category: North Korea

The North Koreans could use drones and gliders for terror attacks, but why would they at this time?:

This file photo, provided by the National Intelligence Service, South Korea’s spy agency, on Jan. 8, 2024, shows an F-7 rocket-propelled grenade launcher manufactured in North Korea suspected to have been used by the Hamas militant group. Korean characters are engraved inside of the fuse (in blue circle) of the grenade launcher.

South Korea’s spy agency said Tuesday it cannot rule out the possibility of North Korea staging attacks involving drones and motorized paragliders amid suspicions over Pyongyang’s ties with the Hamas militant group.

The National Intelligence Service (NIS) issued the warning in its annual report on global terrorism, as the North has been ramping up weapons tests and verbal threats amid allegations of its illicit arms transfers.

In January, the NIS confirmed suspicions that North Korean-made weapons are being used by the Hamas militant group in its war against Israel despite Pyongyang’s repeated denial of such transactions.

Yonhap

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Another day and another North Korean provocation:

North Korea fired several rounds of short-range ballistic missiles toward the East Sea on Monday, the South Korean military said, three days after it launched cruise missiles into the Yellow Sea.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said it detected what appeared to be several short-range ballistic missiles launched from the Pyongyang region at 3:01 p.m. 

“The North Korean missiles flew about 300 kilometers and splashed into the sea,” the JCS said in a text message to reporters. It did not provide further details, citing an ongoing analysis.

Yonhap

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You can tell the Kim regime is trying to amp up the scary factor when they start calling things “super-large”:

North Korea conducted a “super-large warhead” power test for a strategic cruise missile and test-fired a new anti-aircraft missile this week, state media reported Saturday, further ratcheting up tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

The Missile Administration carried out the test of the warhead designed for the “Hwasal-1 Ra-3” strategic cruise missile, and test-launched its new anti-aircraft missile, the “Pyoljji-1-2,” in the Yellow Sea on Friday, KCNA said, noting that a “certain goal” was achieved through the test launch.

It is the first time that Pyongyang has named a missile “Pyoljji,” which means “meteor” in Korean.

Yonhap

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The missile may have failed, but the test is only a failure if the engineers did not learn anything from it. As we have seen in the past, the North Koreans learn from their mistakes and have successfully built a number of capable missile systems:

Defense Minister Shin Won-sik said Sunday that North Korea’s hypersonic missile launched earlier this month was “unsuccessful in its last glide flight” but predicted that the North’s hypersonic missile with an intermediate range could be “successful one day.” 

Shin made the assessment during an interview with public broadcaster KBS after the North claimed it successfully test-fired the Hwasongpho-16B, a new intermediate-range ballistic missile tipped with a hypersonic warhead.

Yonhap

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