The North Koreans used the excuse of regularly scheduled US intelligence flights as their excuse for firing an ICBM when the real reason they fired it is because they are likely upset about President Yoon attending the NATO summit:
North Korea fired an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) into the East Sea on Wednesday, the South Korean military said, after the recalcitrant regime warned of military action over U.S. spy aircraft operations earlier this week.
The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said it detected the launch from an area in or around Pyongyang at about 10 a.m., and the missile, fired at a lofted angle, flew around 1,000 kilometers before splashing into the water.
The North’s first ICBM launch in about three months came amid tensions heightened by Pyongyang’s tough rhetoric against the United States, a move seen as aimed at firming up internal unity and building a rationale for provocations.
Yonhap
You can read more at the link.
This should not be surprising that the North Koreans are making bold threats they likely won’t or can’t carry out:
Anchor: The sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un issued another warning just several hours after claiming that a U.S. military reconnaissance plane repeatedly violated the North’s airspace. South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, on its part, urged Pyongyang to put a stop to such false claims that heighten military tensions.
Our Bae Joo-yon has more.Report: Kim Yo-jong, the powerful sister of the North’s leader, warned on Tuesday that U.S. forces will face a “very critical flight” if they continue with what she termed an “illegal intrusion.”
She issued the warning in a statement carried by the North’s official Korean Central News Agency(KCNA) as she said that she will act “upon authorization” if a U.S. spy plane again violates the North’s exclusive economic zone(EEZ).
The warning came just nine hours after Kim accused a U.S. reconnaissance aircraft of intruding into the zone over waters east of Tongchon of Kangwon Province and waters southeast of Uljin County in North Gyeongsang Province between 5:15 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. Monday.
In a separate statement issued under the name of the defense ministry spokesperson, the reclusive state repeated Kim’s claims and warned that it can shoot down U.S. planes.
KBS World
You can read more at the link.
I wonder what made up airspace boundaries Kim Yo-jong is claiming this aircraft violated?:
Kim Yo-jong, the powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, on Monday claimed US reconnaissance aircraft intruded in the country’s airspace.
Kim issued a statement alleging that a US spy aircraft intruded in the North’s eastern airspace twice at around 5 a.m. and 8:50 a.m., respectively, on the same day.
In a statement carried by the Korean Central News Agency, she said the US is “engaging in a serious military provocation by conducting aerial surveillance.”
Kim Yo-jong added that the North will not respond directly to the US reconnaissance activities outside of the country’s exclusive economic zone, but warned that it will take “decisive action” if the US military again crosses its maritime military demarcation line.
Meanwhile, South Korea’s military rejected the North’s claim of its airspace being violated as “not true” and described flights by US aerial surveillance assets around the peninsula as part of regular surveillance activities.
Korea Herald
You can read more at the link.
The ROK has concluded that the North Koreans were trying to conduct a legitimate space launch with their rocket that crashed in the ocean back in May:
The salvaged wreckage of a North Korean space rocket is displayed on the deck of the ROKS Gwangyang at the Navy’s Second Fleet in Pyeongtaek, 60 kilometers south of Seoul, on June 16, 2023. (Pool photo) (Yonhap)
South Korea has retrieved a North Korean spy satellite wreckage and concluded it has “no military utility,” Seoul’s military said Wednesday, ending a 36-day operation to salvage the sunken debris of a failed North Korean space rocket launch in late May.
The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said that the military raised multiple key parts of the rocket and the satellite through the operation that began May 31 and ended earlier in the day.
South Korean and U.S. experts have conducted a detailed analysis of the wreckage and found that the salvaged satellite debris has no military utility, the JCS said.
Yonhap
You can read more at the link.
This was a pretty typical statement from the North Koreans on the 73rd anniversary of the Korean War:
North Korea fires a Hwasong-17 intercontinental ballistic missile from the Sunan area in Pyongyang, in this file photo released by the Korean Central News Agency on Nov. 19, 2022, a day after the launch.
North Korea’s foreign ministry on Monday accused Seoul and Washington of pushing tensions to “the brink of a nuclear war” akin to the 1950-53 Korean War, saying it will continue to bolster its self-defensive capabilities.
In a research report released by the foreign ministry’s Institute for American Studies, North Korea likened the current military tensions in the region to the night before the outbreak of the Korean War as it slammed the United States and South Korea for their “delusional anti-communist military confrontation” and “rhetorical threats.”
“Such bellicose moves of the U.S. have pushed the military tensions on the Korean peninsula and in Northeast Asia already plunged into an extremely unstable situation closer to the brink of a nuclear war,” the ministry said in the English-language report released by the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).
Yonhap
You can read more at the link.
